After more than 40 years of living in Campbelltown I’ve seen a few things change.
Most, I have to say, have been good.
From the facelift of Blaxland Road, which used to be an eyesore of old junkyards and panel beaters’ tin sheds, and our housing commission estates, Campbelltown has become an enviable place to live.
We have a wonderful sports stadium and a large art gallery and large tracts of natural bushland are a stone’s throw from Queen Street.
Even our charitable organisations have got better and better.
Leading the way is the 40 Hour Fight Against Cancer, which has raised more than $4 million in the past 13 years.
And thanks to the legacy of its founder, the late Fred Borg, every cent is spent here in Macarthur looking after local cancer patients and their families.
It is such a big effort every year, 40 Hour Fight even has a formal launch to both galvanise the troops and to spread the message.
But no matter how big it gets, 40 Hour Fight goes to a lot of trouble to look after the people who support it every year.
A couple of days after its 2018 launch, I called chairman Warren Morrison for another matter, and I asked him what he was doing.
Delivering the sponsors’ thank you plaques, he replied.
Some sponsors can’t get to the formal launch where they are presented with their plaques, so the chairman, who is one of the busiest people in Macarthur, jumps in the car and drives around to personally present them.
No wonder last year 40 Hour Fight raised $317,000.
When you consider that they’re not alone out there in the ‘’charity market’’ it’s an impressive result.
But that’s Campbelltown and Macarthur these days: a confident, generous community that counts its blessings we live in such a wonderful part of the world.
