Chairman’s Report 2/21/2008

Dear Member Clubs’ Presidents and Directors:

It is my pleasure as Chairman to report the status of your Lions Blind & Charity Fund, Inc. (Fund) for the fiscal year ending January 31, 2008.

I am pleased to report that almost every Member Club continues be responsive to requests to assemble appeal packets and open donations (see Club Activity Summary sheet). Continued thanks to the Club Directors who have been so cooperative in responding to Lion Jim Martin’s requests for Lion volunteers to accomplish these tasks.

Our second (of five) $35,000 payment honoring our $175,000 pledge to the Upstate New York Transplant Services (UNYTS) Transformations Capital Campaign was presented to CEO Lion Mark Simon on November 29^th. The occasion was UNYTS Annual Board Installation / Recognition event held at the Westwood Country Club.

At our 2007 Annual Meeting, the Directors voted to distribute 4% of the Fund’s assets to the Member Clubs. Later this evening we will discuss this year’s distribution amount for Member Clubs. We continue to act responsibly to preserve and, if possible, grow our assets for future generations of Lions and continued support of the Eye Banking portion of UNYTS.

Each year since becoming Fund Chairman, I have reported that we achieved progress during the past year. This past year we were represented at UNYTS “Bear Open” fundraiser and had an opportunity to talk with a number of other community leaders about our organization. Another innovation, suggested by Secretary Lion Len Thornton, resulted in the development of a variety of suggested giving levels based upon each donor’s previous year donation. From initial investigation this appears to have worked very well.

Another notable happening was the receipt of a $120 pledge by one of our Lions. While the gift is super and outstanding in its own right, the notable part is that this Lion set up a payment schedule of $10 each month throughout the year! Wouldn’t it be great if every Lion were to make a donation to the Lions Blind & Charity Fund a part of a year-round giving program? Making a gift through payroll deduction to the United Way, and designating the Lions Blind & Charity Fund as the recipient can easily accomplish this.

The Executive Committee continues to meet regularly throughout the year to review plans for our annual appeal and the day-to-day management of the Fund. Your officers also participated in several sessions to assemble appeal packets, record donations and prepare donor acknowledgement letters. Each elected officer contributed many hours of service to the Fund in addition to formal meeting attendance.

Some notable accomplishments since last year’s Annual Meeting are:

· Presented $35,000 donation to UNYTS as second payment on our $175,000 pledge.

· Mailed 250 appeal packets using first-class postage to previous “high donors”.

· Mailed 111 follow up letters to unresponsive previous “high donors”.

· Set Fall appeal mailing of approximately 50,000 packets for November 2008.

· Mailed personalized appeal letters to over 2,339 donors from past appeal campaigns and all Lions of our Member Clubs.

· Mailed over 46,500 prospect appeals with personalized salutations and captioned photos.

· Mailed personalized “Thank You” letters to all donors of $20.00 or more.

· Responded to hundreds of calls to the Lions Blind & Charity Fund telephone.

· Maintained a database backup stored in Lion Koch’s office.

· “Seeded” 200 Lion non-donor letters with $1.00 bill, requesting return of the dollar and at least another dollar in return. This was funded by a restricted gift from each Fund Officer.

During this past year we received notice of the following bequest:

· Theodore J. Syzdek Residuary Beneficiary (Estate Value Currently Unknown)

United Way donations received for the year ending 1/31/2008 were:

· State Employees Federated Appeal (SEFA - code # 571040) $ 288.81

· United Way of Buffalo & Erie County $ 62.89

Total $ 335.40

I am pleased to report that our “seeding” Lion non-donors the past two years, has resulted in an increase in Lion member donations. I continue to urge Lions who are retired, or who work for companies that don’t have a United Way campaign, to respond to our annual appeal as a show of support for the work that we do.

I am proud to have served as your Chairman this past year, and thankful to the Lions of the Member Clubs who responded to requests to help open returns, prepare appeal packets and thank you letters.

In closing this report I would like to especially note the work of the current Officers of the Fund: Lion Richard Koch, Treasurer; Lion James Martin, Vice-Chairman; and Lion Len Thornton, Secretary. Each has many times this past year taken on tasks that were over and above their normal duties. We owe them a loud Lion’s roar and a debt of gratitude for their efforts.

Yours in Lionism,

Lion Tom

Lion PDG Thomas H. Reinagel

Chairman, Lions Blind & Charity Fund, Inc.