The organizers of the Hell of High Water fundraiser for victims of flooding and fire in British Columbia are “on cloud nine” this morning after yesterday’s fundraiser.
Speaking on the NL Morning News, co-organizer Kenny Hess said all of the small donations made during the 12-hour online telethon added up.
“We took a very small approach to it. $5 can make a difference if hundreds of thousands of people donate it and luckily last night we raised over $1-million,” he said.
“For four people with an idea and a small community got together and became a large community and I believe by the end of this we’ll raise close to $2-million dollars. We broke the $1-million mark during the show last night and I hope it just continues to go from there.”
Hess said the artists, despite having their own hardships, were eager to get on board for the fundraiser.
“Nobody has been more impacted by COVID over the past two years than musicians. We all lost 100 percent of our income over for two years It’s hard to imagine but we really did,” he said. “I’m humbled by how the entertainment community came together”
“There were no live performances whatsoever and yet, when asked to give they turned around and not one of them kicked back, they all said yup, we’re in.”
Hess, who performed on the show himself, says the money raised went beyond his wildest dreams.
“I did not think for one minute we would raise over a million dollars. I honestly thought if we can get $50,000 or $100,000 how wonderful would that be? And I would have been proud of that but I’m almost in tears at the thought that we could give a million dollars to people who really, truly need it.”
Hess says he was amazed at the generosity of some of the donors.
“Some of the bigger donations really helped. We had people like Farmcrest Foods, who the first day when I started on my journey in raising money, I phoned them and right away they cut me a cheque for ten grand. They’re from Salmon Arm, they’re not affected but they’re good farm people and they decided they wanted to do that and there was lots of people like that,” he said.
“If you gave $5 or $50,000 I still thank you exactly the same way because you gave what you could.”
You can still donate by going to the Hell or High Water website.
