Jonathan Jackson
The Baldwin County Relay for Life held a meeting for team captains Tuesday night at Northside Baptist Church. The captains gathered to get updates on preliminary events leading up to the April 30 event at South Creek. Teams will gather to show their support for finding a cure for cancer and raising funds to make a cancer free world a reality.
Organizer Jan Nutt greeted team captains and informed them of what the organization has coming up in the next few months before the event. She briefed the captains on an upcoming event Saturday at the Milledgeville Mall.
Mall Days will allow Relay for Life volunteers to sell small items to raise funds for cancer research. Nutt said that team captains had until Thursday afternoon to register with her office by Thursday afternoon in order to reserve space.
In addition to Saturday, future Mall Days will be held Feb. 13, March 20 and April 10. Already, funds have been raised for the 2010 Relay for Life.
“We have 50 teams,” Nutt told the crowd. “We already have $7,000 raised. It’s a start.”
Nutt explained that the American Cancer Society would tighten their own purse strings in a down economy but would make sure that money raised went to the appropriate area.
“We really want the money to go to the right place,” Nutt said. “To fundraising and research.”
This year’s event is utilizing the power of social networking to spread its messages of hope and to serve as an informational tool.
“We have a Facebook page and already, we have more than 150 fans,” Nutt said.
At press time, 278 Facebook users had become fans of the event.
The American Cancer Society’s Relay for Life raises funds for cancer research and prevention and uses teams of co-workers, fellow church members, families and friends who bind together to battle cancer. Teams raise funds throughout the year and donate to the American Cancer Society. The event will be held at South Creek in April, and teams will set up camp sites for the events that sometimes run well into the following morning. Events held during Relay also raise funds from participants who may take part in contests and other fundraising activities. All the while, representatives from the team take their turns walking a track to symbolize the march toward a cure for cancer.
Throughout the evening, survivors of cancer are recognized and luminarias line the track marking the fight with names of people with luminarias in their honor and some in their memory.
For more information about Baldwin County’s 2010 Relay for Life, visit the event Web site at http://main.acsevents.org/site/TR/RelayForLife/RFLFY10SA?pg=entry&fr;_id=24438 or visit the Facebook page at www.facebook.com/relaybaldwin.
