L-R Alison Albury, Gwen Marcus, Maria Wolfe, Barbara Zenker, Dora Bellomo, Kristi Floyd.
Photo by Wellington Garden Club.
The nonprofit Wellington Garden Club is holding a document shredding fundraiser Feb. 4 that will do more than protect information that could be used by identity thieves.
“One of our primary reasons for existence is that we give out five annual college scholarships,” Wellington Garden Club President Maria Wolfe says. “Those go to students either in graduate or postgraduate studies of horticulture, botany or environmental studies.”
The club has held several shredding events. In addition to contributing to scholarships, document shredding provides people space at home and the peace of mind in knowing that their personal and business information has been disposed of in a way that can prevent data breaches such as identity theft.
Document shredding and recycling also reduce the bulk of the paper that otherwise ends up in landfills, which emit the greenhouse gasses methane and carbon dioxide.
Founded in 1981, the Wellington Garden Club educates its members and the public on gardening, horticulture, floral design and landscape design and has dedicated itself to promoting conservation of natural resources, civic beautification and youth education.
“The people that come and pay to have their documents shredded get the direct benefit of that,” Wolfe says, “but then the club uses the proceeds in more far-reaching ways into our communities. We also provide scholarships at the high school level for students to go to the University of Florida to attend environmental camps.”
Proceeds from the event will support not only the Wellington Garden Club’s contributions toward those scholarships, but also its Junior Garden Care programs, community beautification projects, and Habitat for Humanity’s mission to provide homes for veterans and housing equity.
“We also have a community garden,” Wolfe says, “at the Boys & Girls Club off of Wellington Trace in Wellington. We take students out there every Tuesday afternoon. They're growing tomatoes, eggplants, squash and beans, and we teach the kids how to plant, weed and harvest. And those kids get to take home all of the vegetables.”
The Wellington Garden Club’s document shredding fundraiser runs from 10 a.m. to noon Feb. 4 in Wellington’s Village Hall, 12300 W. Forest Hill Blvd.
For a $5 donation, you can have a letter-size box or container shredded; a $10 donation brings shredding of a legal-size box or container. Volunteers will help with the unloading of documents, which will be shredded in front of attendees. Those letter and legal sizes are very much approximate.
“If someone brings their stuff in a big garbage bag, we’ll take it,” Wolfe says. “We can certainly estimate whether it’s a $5 or $10 bag. And I’ll be there during the event. We try to do a lot of cool things like this for the western communities."
Only cash and checks will be accepted as payment. For further information, call Wolfe at 561-386-4903, or visit wellingtongardenclub.org.
