Winter Bulletin 2003 Vol. 19, No. 4

Introduction
Plenty Boardmembers Visit Belize
Solar-Powered Lights for San Jose School
Clean water for Chimachoy, Guatemala
Central American Food Security Initiative (CAFSI)
Making More Plenty
Dorothy Bates Memorial Endowment Fund

This fall during the week of Sept. 20-27th I met on the Farm with Plenty staff, Board members, advisors and our newly formed fundraising committee. Our task was to discuss how Plenty could better fulfill its mission by growing into the size of organization more in keeping with its commitments and experience.

We focused on how to bring more like-minded supporters and old friends into or back into the immediate Plenty family. We all understood that raising more money to expand and fully fund our programs is our primary charge. However, we all acknowledge that this goes hand-in-hand with broadening our appeal, clarifying our objectives, improving our accountability and reaching out to more of our natural constituents.

Our work netted several significant results, which have since been adopted by a consensus of the Plenty Board of Directors. These included the creation of a fundraising plan, a 5-year financial projection and a plan for infrastructure expansion to parallel projected growth.

We intend to help Plenty build a significant endowment and dramatically increase our annual operating over the next 5 years. We believe that however the size of the organization may change, Plenty’s core beliefs will continue to nourish its heart and drive its alternative development approach. Whether we have a little or a lot we know we are responsible for finding the right way to share the abundance. This is why I returned to Plenty. I saw the same few people carrying the torch for Plenty’s mission, asking for little and making due with less. I began to realize that if so few people could do this much, imagine what a few more shoulders to the wheel might accomplish.

Please contribute however you can this year. If you haven’t made a contribution in awhile consider this: If one thousand people who receive the Bulletin but don’t normally donate were to contribute $25 that would be enough money to maintain Plenty Belize for an entire year while, at the same time, freeing up $25,000 that could support other projects. As we grow in small steps or giant leaps the momentum of any one donation may trigger an exponential growth which you and I know is consistent with the size of Plenty’s great heart. Thanks for whatever you can do.

Tom Wartinger
Chair, Plenty Fundraising Committee