When Michelle Grzebien needs to be reminded of her legacy, all she needs to do is take a drive around Chatham, from the WISH Centre to the Chatham-Kent Children’s Treatment Centre to the Chatham-Kent Health Alliance campus on Grand Ave.
All are reminders of her 27 years in local fundraising in which she’s raised more than $40 million for community projects.
Michelle has announced her retirement from executive director’s post at the Chatham-Kent Health Alliance Foundation, effective Nov. 1.
“A lot of people don’t like asking for money but if you truly believe in what you’re doing it’s not that hard,” she said.
A Chatham native, Michelle returned from Ottawa to lead one of the first foundation-based projects in Chatham, the Lester B. Pearson Centre, now part of the Chatham-Kent Children’s Treatment Centre.
“It was 1989 and I had to create a foundation and raise $500,000 which was a lot of money,” she said. “The only other group that was doing that type of fundraising was the United Way. It made it more difficult since at that time, children’s mental health was viewed as something that was an issue for parents, not the community.”
The effort took three years and she credited a strong board with helping her in her rookie campaign.
“John Bergeron, the owner of the McDonald’s Restaurant in Wallaceburg was my first board member,” she said. “Rex Crawford put me in touch with him and away we went. We had Randy Hope who was the MPP at the time.”
The next two years were spent getting the bricks and mortar portion of the WISH Centre ready.
“It was a different campaign but I had the support and help of the J.G. Taylor Community Foundation and the Sertoma Club when Jim Anderson was president,” she said. “Tim Cross was awesome to work with as was Ivan DeNure of Chatham Coach Lines.”
Michelle said her office was in the soon-to-be-torn down coach line bus barns.
“I had big raccoons above my office and Ivan would stop in and ask me if I was okay by myself,” she said. “I told him I was all right but I was terrified.
It was worth it, the centre turned out to be a wonderful asset by the community. It’s still used by so many people.”
Michelle was then executive director at the Canadian Lung Association for five years, during which she was also a key factor in bringing the Ontario Special Olympics Summer Games to Chatham.
“The core group of the Special Olympics became the committee that helped bring the Festival of Trees at the Lung Association,” she said. “What a great group to work with.”
She signed on with the Chatham-Kent Health Alliance to raise $20 million for a new hospital in 1999.
“The Your health, Your future campaign was massive for Chatham-Kent,” she said. “There were a lot of key people involved including Wes Thompson Sr. who opened every door in Blenheim for me. He became a wonderful mentor to me.”
After being named executive director of the foundation in 2005, Michelle had numerous campaigns including a $2.7 million drive to raise funds for physician recruitment.
Her favourite campaign was the one to raise money for the hospital’s MRI (Magnetic Resonance Imaging) equipment.
“It’s my favourite, hands-down,” she said. “Everyone in the community wanted it and I had plenty of help from Dr. John Button and Dr.
Mein Ye. We raised $3.5 million in two years.”
One of her most interesting activities resulted from a visit by the Chatham Homebuilders’ Association.
“Wayne Faas, Clare Curtis and Mike Vandersluis came to my office in January and said they wanted to build a house in 36 hours and beat the guys in Windsor who had done one in that time. They said they wanted to sell it, not raffle it and I stood back and let them get going. They built the house in Windsor in just 29 hours. There was such excitement in the community over it,” Michelle remembered.
One of her most emotional moments came when she was sitting in her office and saw workers taking the roof off a portion of the hospital.
“We always thought we’d get an MRI but we didn’t have the funding so one day I saw the roof come off and a crane lifted an MRI device off of a massive transport and dropped it into the room. I got really emotional, knowing that we’d really done it.”
She said Chatham-Kent has been amazing in its support of community projects.
“It is a wonderful place for donors and volunteers,” she said. “We’re very rarely turned down for volunteers and once we get them, they just stay on. It’s great.”
Michelle said donors such as Andy Faas; “my first million dollar donor”, Frank Uniac and George Morris underscore the strength of the community.
“From the Sisters of St. Joseph to the people who give whatever they can, the support locally has been exceptional. I feel proud of what’s been accomplished.”
She sad the timing of her retirement had a lot to do with leaving the foundation in the hands of incoming director Fannie Vavoulis.
“We have great staff members at the foundation and Fannie will lead them toward a great future.”
Michelle said she plans to rest for a while and then volunteer her time with various groups.
“I don’t want to do fundraising but I’ve got a lot to give,” she said. “Things couldn’t have worked out better.”
