Funds for Games

Press, 7 September 1989, Page 12

Funds for Games

Sir,—"Off-the-street” comments from Christchurch people on the suggestion that there could be some nationwide financial contribution to assist funding for the 1990 Commonwealth Games were featured on television recently. My thoughts returned to many cold winter nights which we, members of the Auckland sporting fraternity, spent raising funds for the 1974 Christchurch Games. My “beat” was “K. Road” and we raised about $150,000 — worth now about $750,000. It was given to Christchurch as a gesture of good will, which in turn became an international gesture of good will. So the Christchurch reaction which television chose to depict — an aversion to any contribution being made — rankled somewhat. Christchurch basked in the success of those Games, as did the rest of us who supported the nationwide effort. We all have an opportunity to do it again, on a personal basis, either through the supporters’ club or some other means. Maybe 16 years is a little long for some Christchurch folk to remembei the help they received from “outside.”—Yours, etc., CLIFF WILLIAMS, sometime technical director of N.Z. Swimming. September 5,1989.