Northdale Vets Christmas Fair brings out the crowds!

A great afternoon was arranged by Northdale Vets in Victoria Road, Worthing when they held an open afternoon in aid of WADARS on 1st December. Santa was in his Grotto, Christmas Gifts and toys were on sale and there was even a Nativity scene complete with Calves, Goats and Turkeys running around. Our thanks go to the staff at Northdale Vets for running this fabulous event, which raised a grand total of £968.21 for WADARS!

What a great effort!

WADARS volunteers Julie Gardner-Stanbridge and her daughter Kayley came up with a plan to run a Christmas stand for WADARS at the Sainsburys, Lyons Farm store and created a wide range of wrapped Christmas gift packs and festive table centres which they sold last Saturday, 17th November 2012.

Helped by family and friends Julie and Kayley raised a brilliant £516.00 on the day which will go to help WADARS rehome pets over the Christmas period. WADARS would like to thank all the members of her team who did so well and raised so much, and the staff at Sainsbury who allowed them to have the stand in the store entrance.

Melinda Lends Support

We had a lot of interest in our Information Stand in Worthing Town Centre on Thursday 25th October, and made contact with a number of people interested in re-homing animals from us. Melinda Messenger joined us for the afternoon, and was filmed for a Channel 5 TV programme which is due to be broadcast in the Spring. Here she is with Worthing Dog Warden and WADARS Trustee, Russ Akehurst.

Sensational Street Collection!

Many thanks to everyone who contributed to making our Street Collection on Saturday 20th October such a great success! We had a stall in Montague Place, and volunteer collectors elsewhere in the town, and in the end the generous folk of Worthing put £1,077.20 into our various pots, considerably more than last year. As our photo shows, even our President, Tim Loughton MP, came along to assist.! Our grateful thanks to one and all!

Jubilee Jumpers

Elaine Sinclair (Alias “The Queen”) and Chris Niall (Alias “The Duke of Edinburgh”) together with two inflatable corgis jumped off the pier at the annual Birdman Rally in Worthing on the 19th August in aid of WADARS. Their efforts not only raised funds for the organisation but also won second prize in the fancy dress competition collecting £250 in prize money. Well done to Elaine and Chris who now seem to be established as our annual “Birdman Jumpers”.

Dragon Boats Delight Again

July 29th saw the Dragon Boats making a welcome return to Brooklands for the 2012 WADARS festival. 18 teams took part in the day's racing, which culminated in a desperately close four-boat final.

Here WADARS Fund-raising Manager, Tony Thorn, presents the trophy to the winning team, I.C.C.

The WADARS team didn't quite make the final, but won all of their races, sporting costumes that just couldn't be missed!

Praise from the President at A.G.M.

At the 2012 Annual General Meeting of WADARS held at the Ardington Hotel on 26th April WADARS President Tim Loughton MP praised the work done by the charity in hard economic times.

Tim thanked the past Chairman Chris Horton for all the hard work he had done over the past 5 years to really develop the charity into one which was now regarded as being at the forefront of animal welfare in the area. “The enthusiasm and hard work that Chris has shown has really made a huge difference to the charity and how it has been supported locally” said Tim. “The dedication shown by staff and volunteers is to be admired and this has been reflected in the huge numbers of rescues and rehoming’s done by the charity”.

Tim welcomed the new Chairman Christie McMahon and said that he felt sure that she would continue this work and that under her leadership the charity would go from strength to strength. “The plans to develop more fundraising activities such as the highly successful Dragon Boat Festival and the proposed legacy campaign would really help with future funding” said Tim.

Agreed at the meeting were the election of officers and committee and the passing of a resolution authorising the committee to change the status of the charity from an unincorporated to an incorporated structure with limited liability.

Marathon runners do us proud!

The three man team of Serdin Simm, Louise Secco and David Barden braved the 26 mile run around Brighton on Sunday and all finished within 40 minutes of each other. Their final chip times were:
Serdin Simm 3:39:07
Louise Secco 3:29:17
David Barden 4:04:48
They all said they enjoyed the run but found the last 6 miles hard.
This is a tremendous result which they should all be proud of. Wadars would like to thank them all for their efforts on our behalf. Well Done!
We already have charity places available for the 2013 Brighton Marathon so contact Tony on 0300 30 30 999 if you would like to book a place.