Your Club: Mike Regennitter, Executive Director
It’s more than a car club
The generosity of our members and volunteers never ceases to amaze me. Mercedes-Benz Club of America is a club of auto enthusiasts who have a greater purpose. We strive to serve a community of passionate Mercedes-Benz fanatics whose passion is cars, and our sectional and national leadership do a great job meeting members’ expectations.
However, sometimes it reaches far beyond the car club community. I attended a Niagara Section event this past weekend and learned about a program that they participated in that raised money to support Mercy Flight. Mercy Flight is a non-profit provider of emergency and non-emergency air and ground medical transport service for all Western New York, Northwestern Pennsylvania, Canada, and beyond.
Headed by Beverly Basinski, Niagara Section treasurer, and other section volunteers, section members raised $1,000 to support Mercy Flight. This effort will help pay for a day's worth of fuel and help save lives when minutes matter. Someone will be a recipient of Mercy Flight’s services and certainly be thankful for Niagara Section’s contribution to saving their life.
The Niagara Section’s isn't the only uplifting story to be found within the club. Several other MBCA sections are doing the same in making positive contributions that reach far beyond the club. The Gateway Section supports charities like the Shriners Hospitals for Children – St. Louis, The Arc and other charities that the section board approves each year. Their average annual giving reaches $2,000 and influences numerous charities that are making a positive impact.
MBCA takes pride to not only acknowledge our volunteer and section efforts with the Section-of-the-Year and Officer-of-the-Year awards, but also with a Public Service (PSA) Award.
The MBCA National Awards Committee acknowledged and awarded first-place honors to the Triangle Section with this year's PSA Awards. Committee Chair Rick Siefert said, "The Awards Committee worked diligently in reviewing all submissions. It definitely was not easy to acknowledge just one section. It's overwhelming and rewarding to see all the contributions that sections make to support causes in their communities."
In earning this year’s award, the Triangle Section hosted three charitable events throughout the year and raised over $5,000 in monetary contributions, supplies and gifts to several local charities. Siefert added, "The Triangle Section, and all section submissions, exemplify an amazing generosity of MBCA members and sections with supporting causes that help so many people."
If your section has a story about supporting charities, I would like to hear about it. Please consider sharing your story with me.
A “thank you” to the Awards Committee for working tirelessly in selecting this year’s PSA recipient and to all the sections and members who help support causes that make a difference in their communities. This speaks highly to the character and caring of our members that can make us all proud.