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Sonoma County, a dynamic county combining agriculture and industry, City and country, creating unique and varied challenges for its citizens join us as we present some of the information and services provided by the county of Sonoma to help us as we move into the 21st century. Welcome

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to Sonoma County in the 90s with your host, Dana Rico. Hello, I'm Dana D'Errico and welcome to Sonoma County in the nineties. Today we're going to be talking about the great event that's coming up the human race. And with me, I have two delightful ladies who

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put in many, many hours of work time to make this a success and many other events in the county of success. And that is Michelle Carnesecca, who is the director of fundraising and pam Simpson special events coordinator. Nice to have both of you here. Today. We're

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here to talk about the human race, who wants to talk about what the human race is. I'll start and the human race is Sonoma County's single largest collaborative fundraiser. It is um, actually a nationwide event. Um, there are 20 human races, I think. Within California alone,

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it is a three k, 10-K walk run. Um, and that is in May May 8th and building up to that is a whole season of fundraising and education and pr and fun, Um, where by non profit agencies, uh, get all their soldiers out into the community

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to raise funds on behalf of their particular nonprofit. Over 430 participated last year. Um, over 8000 participants were raising money, uh, collecting it from 50,000 people in the community. So, um, Sonoma County should be very proud is the largest human race in the nation. Last year

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we raised about $700,000. I say we, I mean, anybody in Sonoma County that was involved again, over 8000 people were raising money, $700,000 in total on behalf of the many nonprofits in Sonoma County. So these, this funding goes to all of the different nonprofits in Sonoma

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County, anybody, any nonprofit who signs up to participate now, there are over 600 nonprofits. That's the number that fluctuates, but about 600 active nonprofits and of those, over two thirds participate year in and year out and any non profit is is um, welcome to get involved.

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And so the monies go to those according to the hard work that they do, who, um, who are the types of people that participate in the human race beyond the volunteers beyond the volunteers. Um, anyone in the community can be involved. We have Children. Um, a

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lot of senior citizens as as well as families, entire families. Um, they come with kids in strollers and their dog, their pet dog walking beside them. So it's for the community. You'll see wheelchairs, you'll see roller skaters, you'll see pets. It's truly community. So how is

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it set up and how do you go about becoming involved? Well, the first thing that you would want to do is pick a nonprofit to raise your funds for and then ask all your friends and family to sign your pledge sheets. Um, some people really like

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to really get into collecting money for their non profit. And if they're lucky and connected with a business that perhaps matches their funds, it really makes it a big incentive to go out and collect funds. Um, and then they fill out the, the human race run

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form if they wish to run and pay a $15 fee to run. Um, but the walk is free and the walk is a three K or 10-K. And then these people just show up on human race morning and large numbers and off we go where they

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just elaborating on who gets involved. What we found is great is Sonoma County is full of people who are involved. That's partly why we live here. And so every person we've come across, we speak to schools and rotaries and chamber of commerce, all sorts of different

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groups. Every everybody in the audience has some connection to one or more non profits, whether it's a school or soccer team or a church or, or they've been blessed by the help of Home Hospice or um, they've raised a dog for canine companions. The list goes

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on to give blood to the blood bank. There are so many nonprofits here and, and they're supported by literally every citizen in Sonoma County is affected or benefits or volunteering in some way. So it's not a matter of who can participate? Anybody can participate? It's a

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matter of um, finding a slice of time and tapping into their heart to figure out why participate. Um, there are, there are a myriad of reasons and what we're trying to do is to appeal to the community at large to point out it's fun. It benefits

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everybody. It's educational. It's kind of the glue that keeps us together. It's not too much work and it really helps you sleep at night. It's just a great, it's a great way to, it's a great and easy way to get involved, make a difference to meet

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people and have a good time. And it's, it sounds so cliche, but it is truly a community where everybody that gets involved benefits. We're kind of just hosting and hopefully educating and enabling this to happen. Well, I have a couple of questions here. Where does one

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get their pledge sheet? They can get it by calling the volunteer center or stopping by, um, or they could call their favorite nonprofit. Um, they, we also have them usually displayed in health clubs and who is, um, what is the phone number at the volunteer center?

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That would be 573-3399. Okay, so 5733399 if you want to get a pledge sheet or you want to volunteer helping, put the event together. Now I want some more details about this. Where are people supposed to show up? I mean where is it going from? What

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point to what point in the walk or run? And what can you expect along the way are the refreshments? You bring your own water? How does that work? Come come race? I'll start, I'll leave some things out come race day, which is May 8th Slater Middle

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School on Sonoma Avenue is the start at eight a.m. We have registration table starting to open at 6 30 and so parking will be provided along the avenue or yeah, lupa, depending on whom you ask and there'll be shuttles available to come to the school locations.

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Um, the starting line is right in front of the school, the rest of the race continues and it goes up through Howard Park and to Spring Lake Park and along the way we have water stations, so there'll be refreshments along the way. Um, runners do often

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carry their water, but um, it's not really that necessary because we do have it supplied all through the park and then the park through the park down no Anger Avenue Sonoma and back to the school and it ends at the school and that distance is um,

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we have a short three K and then the longer one is a 10-K. So the 10-K goes up through the park, I presume, and then the three K will cut short and come back down, around on the loop and then at the finish line, we're working

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hard this year to really have an exciting finish line with pep squads and marching bands and so forth to urge stragglers through and again build that sense of enthusiasm and spirit. Um, we have what we call a marketplace, which is on the black top and back

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of Slater school. Um, oranges and fruit are available. We have a pancake breakfast for $3. A person. We have booths there, um, like a fair setting booths for both businesses and agencies that participate. There will be informational materials from the non profits, talking about the organization

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and other fundraising campaigns. There are fun free giveaways from the businesses, balloons, hats, visors, whatever. So that's quite different this year. Then we're building it up this same format I think in years past, but again, we're trying to capitalize on this sense of fun. It is,

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it is fun to get involved and it's fun to be there. It's a great way to spend your money By noon. We're kicking everybody out. We want to clean up and go count the money. So it will end by noon. So the difference is you're just

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expanding, it sounds like the pancake breakfast. That's different, isn't it? For how many years has the human race been been going? This will be the 18th, 18 years. And do you have any statistics on what it started out as well? It started out as I guess

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all fundraisers do humbly. It was the first year and about $1800. So if you anticipate, um, or I guess, you know, the stock market would be so excited to have such a great rise, but $1800. It grew gradually. Um, I think they're the only time that

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there was a letter was that the economy had Had a bit of a tougher time in the mid, early 90s and, and it has continued to grow though, ever since. We've certainly surpassed every other year this past year. What are your, what is your anticipated turnout

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this year? Do you have any projections financially? We have a goal for next year actually of a million dollar day in the year? 2000. Um, so doing the math, we would like to reach about $800 or $850,000 this year. And that's our fundraising goal. And um,

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with regard to turn out our aim this year is to reach out to the business community. Again, we're trying to find the people in Sonoma County who have not yet been involved and and give them away to participate and we're really a way to find them.

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So we're going out into the businesses and say it's great for team building. It's great For NPR It's um, again, it's a lot of fun. Every employee can raise funds on behalf of whichever nonprofit they prefer. So there's not any, uh, you don't have to do

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any kind of group fundraising and um, hopefully we can reach out to people who have not yet been involved and get them involved. So we anticipate at least 8000. Um, I think capacity that school probably is short of 10,000, so we'll, um, we'll be selling tickets

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next year maybe, I don't know. Do you have the school Children, Do you campaign at the schools also to have all the schools? Who else, what other area do you go to to recruit for this big event? This is a wonderful thing for this community. Some

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of the schools, the schools and churches as well and a lot of their programs and sometimes they'll be raising money for themselves or they may pick a non profit as well. Um, and some share 5050 with a non profit and maybe a youth program. Uh, so

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school involvement has, and sports also have really picked up in the last few years. Great way for the kids to raise money. So with your anticipating 850,000, I guess if you divided $15 into $850,000, that would end up being your number that you anticipate as a

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turn out, it seems like there's gonna be a problem with park parking, I guess getting there is not always probably that's probably the hardest part of the whole event I would think is getting there. Actually, we've had great, again, volunteer shuttle service, um, from several agencies

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who helped us out with providing vans and really around the clock shuttle service. People have wised up to how they get their um, the neighborhood's been very helpful in terms of just being patient that morning, as their, as their streets are littered with cars and walkers.

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So this is the Montgomery village area, nearby east of there, just east of there. Um, so we've, the Taiko drummers are a great, a great way to get the race started. We're moving them to the front of the race this year. So that'll be quite a

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wake up call for the drummers that you may have heard them. They have this huge drug, you know, I don't know enough about them there, Perhaps Polynesian drums? They're huge and they, you'll see them at the thursday night market and that the Rose parade and their

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team of, of rhythmic drummers on these big barrel drums and they just real motivating. It's a great wake up call and they'll be there race day as they have been at the finish line. Actually, we're now going to ask them if they would be participating in

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the front of the race to really get people's heart pounding and get going before the run starts. Now, are there any prizes for this race or is it just strictly a donation? And everybody goes like the first person who comes, is there any kind of an

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award or how does it work? We do. We give ribbons for all classes of ages, men and women divisions and we need to break right here. Stay tuned. We'll be right back after this brief message. Welcome an exchange student into your family, learn about another culture

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in a fun and exciting way with youth. For understanding international exchange. I'm finding myself wanting to learn more and more about the countries and it's really interesting. Go Global Call 1 800 Teenage For This Free Booklet. Learn how you can welcome a youth for understanding exchange

00:15:16.990 - 00:15:32.970

student into your community. Welcome back to Sonoma County in the nineties. I'm here with Michelle Kunasek and with pam Simpson and we're talking about the human race, which is coming up on May 8th of this year and it is one of the largest fundraisers for all

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of our organizations in Sonoma County. So let's rejoin them and let's go back to pam who was talking about the prizes. If you are indeed fast and quick, there are prizes. Now, are those by category? Or like the three mile person that comes through first gets

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a prize, The 10 mile individual and the human race may get a prize. Why don't you explain for more? Okay, well, they're actually divided the three K and 10-K race and the three K runners of course come in pretty fast after the race starts within 5

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to 10 minutes and then the 10-K runners are approximately an hour. And um each category is divided into age groups and so everybody has a chance to win a ribbon in your age group, kids to senior citizens as well that we have. So it's a couple

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of divisions there. So everybody has a chance, everybody has a chance. And then we do best overall in the men's and women's in both the 10-K and three K. So that's pretty exciting in May. That's a beautiful time of year. You can get out, you can

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see the flowers in the park, enjoy the wildlife, the birds, ducks on the lake. It seems like it would be, That's a perfect timing May 8th. The awards are handed out there at the, at the marketplace that we talked about earlier on race day, we'll have

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the band playing, interrupt their broadcast for the awards to be handed out and there's media coverage, there's media cover, you're welcome to come. Um, and then we also have some fun contests and those will be judged that day. We're really trying to encourage again the sense

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of fun and um, like the beta breakers in san Francisco, we're having fun costume contest this year. So, um, we'll have centipede contest, not just for the fastest, but also for the wackiest. So we have um, so, so the racers are supposed to come in costume.

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We encourage that, they're not supposed, but we're encouraging that. And that's another way if you're not going to be the fastest, then maybe you can be the wackiest. So we have, um, contests playing on two things. One is the use of the number nine. Here we

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are in 1999. So you can't deny that the popular number this year. So the best use of the nine and a group of 99 people. We have fun, um, contests that are all better explained through the materials through the volunteer center, but we have nine contests.

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And um, so they should be a lot of fun. And there will be money prizes for those actually, which will then be awarded back to the agency that is represented by this group. Those will not be awarded until our award ceremony, which is not until june.

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And so, um, at the awards ceremony will be handing out these prize monies. And that should be a lot of fun. We're actually inviting judges real, you know, official behind the bench judges to be our judges of this contest. So they'll be there right at the

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close to the finish line. And as, as people do have a costume or some centipede group that they want to be considered. They'll need to be sure and register before the race. There'll be a registration table for these categories. They register ahead of time. They'll be

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judged at the end of the race. And it should be, that should be a lot of fun. We're looking forward to anything that's decent. No, no nudity, but anything else is accepted. That will be fun, yes, it sounds like it's going to be quite an event

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then when you have this event is their security and police and that type of thing. Why don't you talk a little bit about that? People will feel comfortable sending their Children off with these huge crowds. They want to participate. We'll lose anybody. Not just the good

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news, but yes, we do have city policemen are posted all over the streets. And then in the parks we have our own volunteer monitors, which is a reason that we need a lot of volunteers. So you're still looking for volunteers for this event to post station.

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We love even new people to come on board. We have some people that really get attached to their volunteer jobs and they want to come back year after year. But we're always looking for new people. How many volunteers does it take to cover an event like

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this Approximately? We use over 200 200 on race day. Getting ready for that. There are a slew of other volunteers who are involved, not just on behalf of every agency, but in helping us assemble all the materials and work in our committee alone puts in many,

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many hours. So it is truly a volunteer event. What about just volunteering in general? Why don't you give our viewers a little bit of background what you do And Michelle what you do because I seem to see you at every event and everything that comes along.

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It seems like there's Michelle Conason. Uh well, if I can, I wanted to just do a little ad for one other element, which we haven't given you a heads up about the human race. It's the incentive fund as it's been known in the past this year,

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called the Mutual fund. Our theme is take stock, invest in the human race, You can tip our hats to pan for that. We really wanted to capitalize on two things. One is worth the end of the millennium. What do you do then? You know, we're struggling.

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Oh, everybody's talking about millennium, not the M word again, but you do you re evaluate you think, what are our priorities, what am I gonna, what is important to me as we move into this next big landmark here? This is a big change, right? So we

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thought, what do you take stock and also playing of course, on the stock market, it's a topical theme and we're trying to appeal to the business community. So it seemed perfect invest in what will far outlive the stock market, We hope the human race, so we

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think that that's very clever. We expect a lot of, a lot of good turnout for that. And again, in line with that theme, We have the mutual fund and the mutual fund is we think the tool that will move us into the million dollar day next

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year, it is a matching fund whereby every participating agency will receive essentially 10% back. In addition to all the money that they raise, their getting another 10% from the human race. Um, we've had several generous sponsors all noted throughout the press and on our posters who

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have contributed significantly to this fund, we have over $60,000 to give away to all pledged getters. So when an individual is going up to raise money, every single individual who goes out to raise money, they can say if you give me $100, I have 10%, I

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have another $10 to add to that. They can go to nine other businesses or nine other sponsors of sorts and get another 10% in essence, they'll then double their money. So we think this is a really powerful tool for leveraging, fundraising and teaching people to work

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hard. That is a true incentive, businesses are really involved in this and very supportive because it rewards hard work. It rewards well conceived missions. It is exactly The kind of tool that we think helps educate and makes it easier for people to go out and raise

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money. They're not raising it for them, they're raising it for those who can't help themselves and they're getting a lot of support from the, from the businesses already as they, as they, it propels them forward. So we're really excited about that and all monies that are

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turned into us by May 26. That's an important date. May 26 is the date to have all your money's turned in and collect an additional 10% from this mutual fund. Um can you tell me who were the individuals or companies that provided the different businesses to

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the mutual is a good test. Let's not forget any. Let us not. Okay, well it starts with, we have sponsors of the human race who help us sponsored the event and there are upwards of 20 of those noted on our posters for the incentive fund. Um

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We have state compensation insurance fund, their biggie. They also um you'll see their name on our chest tags because they helped underwrite the race as well as add a significant chunk of money into this fund, their number one. Um but that makes sense because it's state

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compensation and we call them state fund because we always invert the to insurance and compensation. There is um Albergo Basso Degross is another big sponsor. You also will see their name on the T shirt because they help them to write the t shirt. They have also

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helped contribute significantly to the, to the mutual fund. Um Kendall Jackson has been a big sponsor this year. So they have, yes, so they have contributed significantly. Um The press democrat is always a big sponsor. You'll see lots of their advertisements and they are in there

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this year. Um A V is a big sponsor. You'll see their name in there. Um, who am I leaving out? I think that's the whole kit and caboodle. The t shirts. Are they available for purchase or are they t shirts are given at the end of

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the race? Just for participating? So if you've walked or ran at the end of the race, you can get a T shirt. I see. So that's part of kind of covered in the exactly the entry fee. And it gives you said the walkers participate for free,

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but with proof of participation, a copy of their pledge sheet, they get the chest tag and they get a free t shirt. I wanted to mention also the Finley Foundation because they are the other contributor. They started the incentive fund now in its fourth here. Um,

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now we determined the mutual fund, but they really, um, they took stock in in the human race first and we're brave and generous participants in launching this very innovative fundraising tool. So, the Family Foundation started at all. So it's, it's become very successful. It sounds like

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it's a, it's a success. We're here four years later and other people now are coming forward. Exactly. And it has been um, reviewed a lot. The chronicle of philanthropy and other nonprofit ventures are considering this as a great fundraising tool. Again, it does exactly what, um,

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all nonprofits are trying to do, which is instill in their volunteers and in their givers and in their clients a sense of if you work hard, you will be rewarded. And so we think of that. Exactly. So it has, it has been a great tool. And

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without the business community, we simply couldn't do it. They're just the main tool in this whole thing. I would suspect that you have lots of donations of like water, the t shirts and all of that. Also, are there a lot of donations? What if there's businesses

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out there watching and they want to donate? What they again call that same number? 5733399. Yes. So that in case there's someone out there or to call and just get all the information on it and to know where to send your application. Do you just bring

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it that morning or can you mail it in if you want to run, you can mail your application in With a self addressed stamped envelope and we will mail your run tag back to you. But walkers can just register that morning. It's very simple. We try

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to make it as easy as we can for everybody because we're dealing with mass. It's never too late to get involved. Up until May eight. We have people who might get $25, but it's their first shot at getting involved. We do encourage everybody to go out

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and represent a nonprofit. Um, but just coming that day will hopefully spark a sense of enthusiasm and the community spirit that will propel you to get more involved and get your family involved in your friends involved the next year. So we're really encouraging people to come

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and have a good time on May 8th. And in the meantime we're here in mid March. You have almost a full two months, which is plenty of time to send out letters to your family in Nebraska to send up letters to your colleagues and associates on

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the east coast or throughout the community the country, the world. John O'brien does a remarkable job. He has been our number one fundraiser for a couple of years is john O'brien. He's an attorney in town. He raises money on behalf of the american cancer society and

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he is brilliant in his fundraising techniques. He sends out letters to everybody he knows and asks them to support him in his cause, the american cancer society with a very detailed explanation of what this money will be used for. And he has raised Upwards of $10,000

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a year. I mean he has raised an individual as an individual over $70,000 in the years that he's participated $70,000, that's a lot, that is a lot. And and he hasn't been knocking on doors. He has been very been dutiful in sending out these letters and

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it just shows what one person can do really quickly. We only have about a minute left. How about the volunteer in general, don't you need other people all year round? If you can quickly make a plea to our audience about volunteers, we, um, not just for

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the volunteer center, but throughout all Sonoma County. We help place volunteers if anybody wants to get involved on any level and they don't know where to begin. The volunteer center is the place to go to find out how your skills or how what you want to

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learn matches up with a nonprofit in the community where essentially an employment service for volunteers. Um, and there are plenty of at the volunteer center itself to get involved, but we don't keep them all for ourselves. And once again, that's 5733399 dot volunteer. Thank you ladies

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for being on. I know to be a success. And I may see you there. Thank you for joining me. I hope to see you next time I'm dana D'Errico. And this is Sonoma County in the nineties