By Aaron Cordy
ONE of the region’s greatest traditions is the Rotary Club of Mooroopna’s (RCM) annual New Year’s Eve festival. For over 40 years, the festival has given away a new car as part of the Community Car Raffle. This year’s lucky new owners of the Kia Stonic Sport are Kialla locals Clint and Rochelle Hamlyn.
Parents to two young daughters, Clint and Rochelle, were not at the festival when their name was drawn.
“Funny story, we were in bed, sound asleep when they tried ringing us live that night. Because obviously two young kids, we were early to bed. For some reason, I woke up around 10 to midnight, and my phone was blowing up,” said Clint.
“I rang Richard (Speedy of RCM). He said, ‘I’ll talk to you tomorrow, but yeah, you won a car. So then we celebrated and couldn’t really get back to sleep. But it was a good way to start the new year.”
This year, RCM raised a record $105,000 for community organisations across Victoria and NSW. $50,000 will remain with the club, which pledged $10,000 to the 9790 Rotary District’s Bush Fire Relief Fund. The money will go to helping families affected by the recent bushfires.
Each year, the Rotary Club of Mooroopna’s New Year’s Eve festival charity car raffle puts a lot of money into the community, with RCM member Richard Speedy and Les Young the driving force behind the raffle. None of which would be possible without the support of Thompson Motor Group.
