LEXINGTON – The Lexington Community Foundation held their annual big giving day Thursday.
On Thursday, the Lexington Community Foundation held their 13th annual Give BIG Lexington giving day. This year’s theme was “Woven through Community,” to represent the connection and strength of threads woven together. Overall, 188 organizations participated in this year’s event, with 80 from the Lexington area. Gothenburg was the newest addition to this year’s lineup.
Throughout the day, donors were able to contribute to their favorite causes and check out the leader board of organizations. Some donations were gifted in honor of someone, in memory or dedicated to someone. Several donors were also recipients of Golden Tickets which added $100 to their donations. In celebration of 13 years of giving, the foundation also did a power hour where an organization was randomly selected and granted $1,300, and the Minutemen Fine Art Association was the lucky recipient.
One volunteer, Sarah Neben, shared that it made her proud to be apart Lexington as a longtime resident and to see the generosity from people.
“To me it is amazing, I think we have so many generous people that live here. People give what they can give, and it’s just great to see. It makes me proud to be a part of Lexington.”
This year also marked as LCF Executive Director Beth Roberts first year into her new role and taking the lead for the big day. Roberts went on to say the day really shows the impact people and donors have.
“It’s being able to see our community in action and give in such a grander way to what we can do and how we can really make a difference in Lexington. It’s not just saying we’re going to do things. You really get to see the number behind the impact of what people do every single day in Lexington that puts us on the map as being amazing.”
The final unofficial total came out to be $641,939 raised from 460 donors, according to the givebiglexington website.
Give Big Lexington began in 2011 as just an idea and was the first in the state to host a giving day. Since then, the annual giving day has raised nearly $6 million dollars, which has gone to a variety of organizations from health and education to service clubs and causes. Give BIG has been able to fund projects like the Lexington Racquet Complex, Lexington Veteran Pavilion, and the LHS Field Turf. In 2022, Give BIG had donors from 65 Nebraska communities and 17 states donate on the giving day.
