Inverness County Cares Gives Thanks

Inverness County Cares (ICC) is a registered charity, established in 2012 and based in Inverness County, NS, Canada. ICC was created by a group of local people who wanted to bring a better life to those in desperate need, with a focus on children in developing countries. Our first project was working with a school for street children, in Nairobi, Kenya for six years. The next project was the development of a water collection system for Ngeza village in Uganda. The current project is the Kawambwa project in Zambia, two schools which cater to albino, blind and visually impaired children as well as those with other physical and intellectual disabilities.

ICC members meet monthly and we work toward providing funds for our projects. Covid 19 restrictions have impacted our usual methods of fundraising but we are still encouraged by the generosity of our supporters. Our most successful project involves collection of refundable beverage containers. Two box trailers are available for people to drop off these items. One location is in Mabou at the Freshmart parking lot and the other is located at the corner in Port Hood at 209 Main Street (Ted and Hermina Van Zutphen’s lane). We thank the many generous people who drop off their containers and also extend our gratitude to Ted Van Zutphen, Stanley Beaton and Raymond DeBont for managing the containers and taking them to the depot to be counted.  We thank Wayne and Karen Beaton and Ted and Hermina Van Zutphen for providing the space to park the collection vehicles. Each Christmas season ICC donates the December proceeds from our two collection sites to the local food bank to serve those in need in our local area.

This past summer, ICC members, John and Theresa MacInnis, and Bill Murphy planted a large field with assorted varieties of potatoes. Good weather, fertile soil, lots of hoeing and irrigation equipment from Marlanda Strawberry Fields (Joanie and Angus MacDonell) resulted in a beautiful bumper crop of diverse species of potatoes.  In October ICC members gathered to harvest the bountiful crop and in one weekend they were sold at a substantial profit, all of which went to benefit the vulnerable students at the two Zambian schools.

Each Christmas season ICC sends out an appeal letter to ask assistance for our project. This Christmas season our supporters responded very generously and we thank them so much. Our local business community and faith-based organizations have also provided tremendous support, which we greatly appreciate.

ICC works in partnership with Chalice.ca. This is a very beneficial relationship as Chalice provides ICC with accounting services, CRA income tax receipts and very importantly supplies auditing and onsite supervision of our projects. We consider ourselves very fortunate to have access to the guidance and support provided by Chalice personnel at their Halifax head office and their field staff in East Africa.

We also want to give very sincere thanks to our own membership of ICC, who meet at least once a month and spend much more additional time and effort on outreach and support of initiatives to bring a better life to the students. We are always available share the Kawambwa story with our community (following safety protocols or by Zoom) and provide first-hand accounts of life at the Kawambwa Schools.

 Inverness County Cares always welcomes new members. 

 Individuals who wish to donate, can use the donate button on our website https://invernesscountycares.com

E-transfer address:  [email protected]  Please include mailing address for CRA tax receipts and thank you, when using E-transfer.  

or send a cheque to Inverness County Cares Box 99, Judique, NS, Canada, B0E1P0. Taxation receipts provided for USA and Canada.