Otago Community Hospice Appeals to Community to Break Even

CEO Ginny Green says Hospice Awareness Week (15 – 22 May) usually promotes Otago’s specialist palliative service, but this year is focused on seeking financial support from the community.

“Our commitment to our community stands strong and I want to reassure everyone that this call to aid is not about the Hospice thinking about reducing services, but our need for your support has never been stronger. 

“We are, as always, being extremely cautious with expenditure. However, we are facing a perfect storm of pressure points: our shops had a three week closure and subsequent reduced trading hours, our ability to fundraise through events has been curtailed since the arrival of omicron, and we are experiencing skyrocketing costs, particularly around pay parity issues.

“Our service is a valued and cherished one, which is there free of charge for our population when they need it; people all over our region can access our services to support them through their illness and death,” says Ms Green. “But our service costs close to $7 million a year and of that we need to raise an incredible $2.7million to cover the shortfall between those costs and our government funding. 

We rely hugely on multiple streams of community support to help bridge the gap, but the restrictions on our ability to fundraise sees us facing a potential shortfall this year. It may be up to $200,000. “We are certainly feeling the pressure at the moment, which could be relieved somewhat by our awesome community assisting us get to the end of this financial year with our books balanced.” 

Hospice Awareness Week 15 - 22 May 2022