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w w w . o a kv ill eb ea ve r.c o m O A KV IL LE B EA V ER W e dn es da y, N ov em be r 1 7, 2 01 0 8 By Dominik Kurek OAKVILLE BEAVER STAFF Its evident that philanthro- pists dont have to go at it alone. More than 50 people, who are involved in various commu- nity initiatives, gathered togeth- er Monday, Nov. 15 during the National Philanthropic Day. When they were asked to unite for a town-wide day of kindness, a great enthusiasm filled the room. This happened at a Random Acts of Philanthropy breakfast event at the YMCA of Oakville organized by the Oakville Community Foundation (OCF). When the CEO of the Community Foundation, Rusty Baillie, asked those present to 2007 only 31.7 per cent of Oakvilles tax filers claimed a charitable dona- tion, thats down 10 per cent from the year 2000. He added that with the recent recession, he doesnt doubt those number will have gone down even further. Wed like you to join us and turn- around this downward trend in chari- table giving by first raising the level of caring and engagement in our com- munity, he said. Baillie hopes to create one day a year for the next few years to be dedi- cated to doing acts of kindness town- wide. Hopefully a lot of people doing this would have fun and experience the simple joy of community building. That is the spark that we want to ignite, he said. He hopes participants in the one- day event would learn how good it feels to help others, which might lead them to volunteering on a regular basis. He said the participants might even provide more financial support to area organizations. When he asked if anyone was inter- ested in taking part in the event, the room went up in applause. Were going to need a lot of help, he said. The event will need an advisory group that can take the fledgling idea and build things such as logos, taglines, materials, campaign struc- ture, social media integration and more. Then there will need to be a steering committee that can do things such as detail planning and communi- ty engagement. Thirdly, he said there will need to be a team of volunteers to roll the ideas around the town and educate people and groups on what they can do. The fourth item, he said is the need for a facilitator, somebody that can help the advisory and steering groups get together and get started. He then asked people to sign up on the sheets provided on the tables, which a majority of people did. Just one of the many people to sign her name to the list was Barbara Burton, the CEO of the United Way of Oakville. I think one of the challenges for all of us in the not-for-profit arena is that there isnt enough awareness of number one, what the not-for-profit agencies do as well as the need for Oakville. I think its really important that we build awareness and theres no better way to get more people involved, she said. She was optimistic that the event would be a success and mentioned that Nov. 15, the national day of phi- lanthropy, was the perfect day to bring focus to such an event. To learn more about the work of the Oakville Community Foundation, visit www.theocf.org. Philanthropists unite to work together for day of kindness Rusty Baillie sign up and volunteer to help organize and run a town-wide day of kindness once a year, the sign-up sheets were passed around and the guests went to work to join in. Those present were members of various non- profit, charitable and service agencies, members of religious groups and of the private sector involved in community work. This is an opportunity to come together and decide how we might all, by working togeth- er, do a number of things to enhance the support for our fel- low citizens, to engage more peo- ple in this noble undertaking and to show others the joy and bene- fits that weve had in helping one another, Baillie said. Baillie told the guests that in