When you throw a few dollars into a Salvation Army bucket, you’re hope to someone in a hopeless situation.
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And if you don’t have any cash on you, that’s OK.
For the first time, people feeling generous but without any loose change will be able to “tap to donate” during the Tamworth Salvation Army’s Red Shield Appeal.
The Salvo’s tap and go is pre-set to $10 and will be floating around the city’s shopping centres this week, as the charity builds up to its big annual fund raiser this weekend.
Tamworth captains Dean and Rhonda Clutterbuck said they were “very keen” to use it.
“It will be the way of the future,” Mr Clutterbuck said.
“It will be interesting to see how the community embraces it.”
Mrs Clutterbuck said while the new technology made it “easier to give”, the organisation’s traditional red-and-white buckets weren’t going anywhere.
“It doesn’t matter how much it is, their donation plays a part in the bigger scheme, it doesn’t go unnoticed,” Mrs Clutterbuck said.
By making a donation, residents – or “hope givers” as Mr Clutterbuck likes to call them – are helping someone get out of a hopeless situation by providing them with “light at the end of the tunnel”.
“It’s not just the Salvation Army giving these people hope, through their donation they’re able to give people hope as well,” Mr Clutterbuck said.
“The money that comes from Red Shield gives locals who need help extra services to access, so things like drug and alcohol rehabilitation and our family tracing services.
“We’ve even seen things like sending kids away to a kids’ camp that was sponsored by Red Shield funding. They get to have a holiday that they may never have had before.”
Mrs Clutterbuck said the Tamworth Salvation Army offered much more than just financial assistance services.
“It’s not just meeting that emergency financial need, we have services for those other avenues in their life that they need help with – we want to help them get out of their hopeless situation,” she said.