In addition to our regular monthly meetings (4th Monday of the month) and our board meetings, we undertake projects in three major categories: service, fundraising, and social activities. We provide service to fulfill our mission as a service organization. We fundraise so that we can support other worthy charities in our area (see Who We Support.) We socialize to build cohesiveness in our club and to meet new members of the community. All social activities are paid for by the members alone, no funds raised from the community are used.
Service
We partner with the Red Cross to put on our Blood Drives. Held at Christ Community Church of Ashton, we typically collect 25-40 pints of blood every other month. Many of our members take pride in the gallons of blood they have donated over the years and also their ability to participate in the Double Red platelet collection program.
Our club sponsors over 20 collection boxes for our Eyeglass Collection project. Glasses that are collected by all Lions in our district go to a central processing location where they are cleaned, sorted according to prescription, and prepared for shipment to areas where they are needed.
In addition to collecting eyeglasses, we also provide support for individuals in our community who need eyeglass prescriptions and eyeglasses but can’t afford them.
The Hospital Equipment program provides wheelchairs, hospital beds, walkers, potty chairs, crutches, and other such items to people in our community who are need of them at absolutely no cost. We also accept donations of these items. We normally are delivering or picking up items multiple times per week.
Lions from our club volunteer to help direct the participants at the bike race during Olney Days. This 45-K bicycle race winds its way around Olney and the surrounding communities and they need helpers to make sure the racers can find the route and safely interacting with traffic on the roads.
To support the youth of our community and foster a spirit of volunteerism we sponsor Leo Clubs at Farquhar Middle School and Sherwood High School. Leos are students with a passion for volunteer working and bettering their school and our surrounding community.
We sponsor the Lions Peace Poster Contest at Farquhar Middle School and Sandy Spring Friends School. In the context of their art classes, local students design and create a piece of artwork in one of a variety of mediums: including charcoal, crayon, pencil and paint, to express the theme for that year. This is a worldwide contest with winners at the local, district, multiple district, and international level.
As a district 22-C project, lions, including some from our club, march every year in the National Memorial Day Parade in Washington, D.C.
Every year, our club does Pre-school hearing and vision screenings.
Several lions participate, along with the Sherwood Leos, in the Olney Days Parade every year in May.
Sandy Spring Lions have participated in the Montgomery County Adopt-a-Spot program. We have adopted Sherwood High School campus. Along with the Sherwood Leos, we ensure the campus is trash-free.
Fundraisers
Our first fundraiser of the year is serving Ice Cream at the Montgomery County Fair. The Lions Ice Cream Parlor is along the main strip at the fairgrounds close to the animal barns. Each day of the fair, a different Lions Club runs the parlor. Sandy Spring traditionally has served ice cream on Wednesdays during fair week.
In December we set up our Christmas Tree lot. We normally unload the trees the weekend after Thanksgiving and run the lot every weekend until Christmas. The lot is located on the hospital grounds owned by Medstar Montgomery Medical Center, near the corner of Rte. 108 and Prince Philip Drive in Olney. We also have a team of Lions working on wreaths to sell at the lot.
In both the spring and the fall we spend a week doing White Cane Vision Days. Local grocery store chains Giant and Safeway allow us to spend the week soliciting for funds near their entrances. Our mantra on these days is “Help the Lions Help the Blind” and this is an all-hands project.
Our final fundraiser of the year is our Golf Outing, an 18 hole tournament that takes place at Willow Springs Golf Course in West Friendship, Maryland.
We also are happy to accept donations. Many of our donations come in from recipients of our Medical Equipment program. Members of the community also sometimes leave bequests or donate in memory of friends who have recently passed away.
We also do direct fundraisers and donation drives for Olney Help, the Family Justice Center and St. Jude’s Children’s Hospital.
Social
The members always love to get together with spouses and friends at the annual picnic and potluck. This event has all the things you love in a summer picnic: grilling, horseshoes, picnic tables, and great food brought in by the Lions themselves.
The club also organizes an annual Winter Theatre Event. In the past we have attended performances at either the Olney Theatre (where light refreshments and wine were served) or Toby’s Dinner Theatre in Columbia.
We have our annual Charter Night, which is held in May and celebrates the anniversary of the founding of our club. The new officers for the year are installed at this event. The outgoing Club President gets a chance to thank the members and give out awards for the work done in that year and the incoming Club President gets to set the agenda for the coming year.
Many members also attend other Lions District and Multiple District events, such as 22-C Night, where the District honors the District Governor, the Multiple District 22 Convention, where all the Lions of Maryland, DC, and Delaware get together to perform district business, and other Lions region, zone, and district events where business meetings can be mixed with social exchanges.
Sandy Spring Lions Club 