History of Botany Randwick
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From the speech given by our Club President, Christine Baralamis, at the Inaugural Dinner.   
 
The formation of our new Rotary Club of Botany Randwick has resulted from the amalgamation of the Rotary Clubs of Botany Bay and Randwick.
 
The two clubs have a long history with Randwick formed in 1948 and Botany Bay in 1961.  Both Clubs have strongly supported their local and international communities since their formation.
 
The merging of the clubs has been met with enthusiasm by members and Rotary District 9675, and has re-vitalised the club.  It has involved hard work, not only by myself, but Greg Lill and our extremely capable Treasurer, Richard Woodburn, who are very well-respected and experienced Rotarians. 
 
I was asked to be president of the former Botany Club 2 ½ years ago.  During this time I’ve been learning “on-the-job” and I am very honoured to have been appointed as the Inaugural President of Botany Randwick.  
 
Some of what I’ve learnt, as a Rotarian, is that Rotary is an International, important, worthwhile organisation that has an amazing structure that contributes to communities and to people on many levels.
 
This contribution has required significant funds and both clubs have been very fortunate in the way funds have been and are being, raised to date.
 
No, we don’t sausage sizzle at Bunnings!
 
Botany Bay has been part of the tri-clubs collection of coin donations at Sydney Airport along with the Marrickville and Rockdale Rotary Clubs.  Botany Bay’s relationship with the Airport started in the 1960’s with coin collections 2003 thanks to Max Moore-Wilton, Executive Chairman and Chief Executive of Sydney Airport at the time.
 
For 27 years, Randwick together with Maroubra club, ran the Kingsford Sunday Markets. This enabled them to have a strong base to provide ongoing support to its traditional and future projects.   
 
What projects have the clubs supported? :-
 
The Randwick club has been giving strong support annually to Rotary Service Projects such as:
  • ROMAC – a program that assists children with facial deformities from predominantly South Pacific Island Nations.
  • Australian Rotary Health, and in particular to Indigenous Health Scholarships
Other projects supported include:-
  • Constructing water wells and providing water filtration to villages in - Timor Leste.
  • Blue Dragon Foundation based in Saigon –supporting and educating homeless and trafficked children.
  • Closer to home -  The Deli Family Support Center, the Sydney Children’s Hospital School, the Prince of Wales Hospital Foundation with long-term provision of Emergency medical equipment and Ronald McDonald House.
The former Botany Bay club has also supported overseas and local projects such as:-
  • Assisting women to sell their handcrafts by opening a retail shop and the production of village water wells in Uganda. 
  • Locally we supported The Windgap Foundation – assisting adults with learning disabilities, The Men’s Shed in Botany, the Little Heroes Swim Academy and Gardener’s Road Public School with a Special Needs Sensory Room".
More recently, the new club has donated to:-
  • Australian Rotary Health Indigenous Health Scholarship
  • Rotary Youth Leadership Award,
  • The Rotary Foundation's Polio Plus Fund,
  • GreenTL – A Humanitarian Project of food distribution to isolated villages, in Timor Leste as a result of lack of resources due to COVID.