Celebrity Waiter Night sets charity record 8/24/2009 11:00 PM Submitted article Every year on the Monday evening after Mother's Day, families, friends and businesses from across Aiken County extend their Mother's Day celebrations by bringing their time, talents and generosity to help their community's most vulnerable children and their families.
This year's Celebrity Waiter Night, the 14th annual fundraiser for Children's Place Inc., raised more than $62,000, and the Celebrity Waiters from the Shaw AREVA MOX Services team beat their record-setting total from last year, bringing in more than $26,000 at Casa Bella.
Dave Stinson, president and project manager for Shaw AREVA MOX Services, explained their success.
"Our focus was on helping Children's Place meet the needs of the children and families they serve, and that drove us to exceed even our own expectations," he said. "The hard work of our employee waiters, the generosity of our guests and the helpfulness and wonderful food of Casa Bella put us way over the top."
Floyd Bartoe, cost manager for Shaw AREVA MOX Services and Celebrity Waiter Night coordinator, added, "Our employees and subcontractors really put the 'fun' in fundraising, from a golf tournament, raffles and a silent auction to an in-house band and strolling Elvis. We had so much fun last year, and it's such a worthy cause; we had to try to do better this year."
Celebrity Waiter Night is the largest fundraiser of the year for Children's Place, a United Way agency that provides daycare for at-risk children from throughout Aiken County.
Besides meals and a caring environment, the agency also provides speech, occupational, behavioral and play therapy tailored to each child's needs and parental and caregiver training and advice.
Celebrity Waiter Night donations are used to support those therapeutic activities.
The Children's Place staff cares for approximately 100 children each day and each year serves approximately 35,000 meals, makes approximately 1,500 home visits and provides more than 1,200 hours of therapy.
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