Bushfire raffle a winner

By Kath Gannaway
AS winner of the Lions Club of Healesville Bushfire Appeal Raffle, Badger Creek mum Debra Jensen drove away from the RISE Concert in Healesville with a trailer full of brand new whitegoods.
And, was she excited to have all those beautiful new things – television, refrigerator, clothes drier, all sorts of appliances, tools, etc?
“I was thrilled, but it was the trailer which was the really exciting thing for me. Ours had had it and we were thinking we were going to have to buy another one,” she said.
Mrs Jensen’s name was read out before a huge crowd at the concert and within seconds her phone was ringing to tell her the good news.
“I thought my son and his mates were pulling a joke and it wasn’t until I got the call from the Lions Club that I really believed it,” she said.
Mrs Jensen had bought her fair share of tickets, but it was one bought by her mum Isla Larkin, a volunteer at the Lions Opportunity Shop, that struck it lucky for her.
Lion Jim Crow, who organised the raffle, said the tickets virtually sold themselves once people realised what the raffle was for.
Mr Crow said members worked hard, none the less, to sell the 8000 tickets in Yarra Glen, Healesville and along the Warburton Highway.
“We were out there six days a week for four or five weeks,” he said and estimated the raffle would have raised between $14,000 and $15,000 for the appeal.
He said he was particularly touched by the generosity of an elderly lady who had been evacuated from Warburton in the weeks following Black Saturday to the Lilydale Relief Centre.
She told Mr Crow she had been treated very well.
“She gave us $50, but didn’t want a raffle ticket and then said if we were here next pension day she would give us some more,” he said.
The Lions Club of Healesville has been giving out vouchers to people affected by the bushfires for food, fuel, tools and gardening equipment.
The money from the raffle will assist that project.