Vinings Cumberland Scoreboard

Vinings Downhil 5K, a Run for the Kids

On August 19th, 2024, almost 1,500 runners gathered to compete in the 27th Annual Vinings Downhill 5K race. The Vinings Down Hill 5K course begins at the top of Mt. Wilkinson Parkway , winds around the Cumberland Mall area, and ends at the Lovett School (280-foot net drop).  All club members participate in this community wide event each at several meetings of planning and preparations.  40 members participated on race day itself.  In addition to club and community fellowship, the purpose of the race is to donate the proceeds to local charities.  This year, more than $85,000 was distributed to 17 charities.  

There is also a Kids 1K Fun Run and a fun Doggie Dash & Costume Contest! Our event includes a huge post race party at Vinings Jubilee with awards, music, great food and expo.

This is the 27th year the club has sponsored this race.  Countless club member group hours go into the planning of this event throughout the Rotary year.  On the day of the race virtually every club member is active in one or more roles to make the race the fund raising success that it is.  Eighty eight companies or individuals contributed to the race financially or in-kind to generate one of your best funded races ever!  Tremendous local community involvement, once again this year,

Our race committee starts in February planning and meets weekly in addition to their own individual hours of work. 40 club members were on hand the day of the race, some from 5:30 to 11 am. Five members met to review grant applications for four hours. The number of hours committed to this community fundraiser is difficult to measure, but the end result has a huge impact on our community, not only for the funds raised for charity but the fellowship and fun everyone has participating.

On February 4th, 2026, our race sponsors and 18 local children's charities were our guests for lunch where we handed out $83.5k in net race proceeds in support of local community charities that improve the lives of children in need. See viningsdownhill5k.com for more information and photos.

Twenty seven charities submittedrequests for grants. Local charities receiving grants from the race proceeds included:  

Atlanta Area Boy Scouts Council, Campbell High School Educational Foundation, Lekotek of GA, Kenrod, Cobb County Public Schools Education Foundation, Bankhead Boys, Youth Villages, Table on Delk,, Jason Cunningham Charitable Foundation, Food Security America, Free Bikes for Kidz, Girls On the Run, Tire Swing Collective Auditory Verbal Center, Marietta Schools Foundation Foundation, Good Samaritan Health Center, Calvary Children’s Home, Canine Companions, Waymaer Women's CenterCobb County Public Schools Educational Foundation

Rotafeliz - Cleft Lip and Palate Repair in Bolivia

International Service Travel Opportunity:

Club Members Traveled to Santa Cruz, Bolivia in January of 2025 and 2026. Planning in process for a January 2027 International Service Trip.

Rotafeliz

An annual campaign providing free surgeries for cleft lip and cleft palate to between 50 and 60 patients. This campaign has been carried out since 2013, and to date we have completed 10 campaigns, benefiting nearly 600 patients. This is made possible through a strategic alliance with Healing the Children Northeast, Rotary Club of Sriari in Santa Cruz Bolivia,  Rotary Club of Pituju in Santa Cruz, Rotary Club of Vinings Cumberland in Atlanta, GA. USA, SEDES in Santa Cruz, the Santa Cruz de la Sierra Medical Association, private companies, and volunteers from various institutions.

Agua Fresca - Fresh Water in Paraguay

International Service Travel Opportunity:

Club Members Traveled to Luque, Paraguay in June of 2018 and 2024. Planning in process for an August 2027 International Service Trip to inaugurate the 15 Agua Fresca (Cool Water) drinking fountains in Nueva Italia and Luque Paraguay.

History

This represents a multi year commitment by the Rotary club of Vinings Cumberland members to the health of Lugue Paraguay and their local Rotary club.  In 2025, it was further financed by a District Grant.

The project resulted as a need to p rovide fresh, cold water to students in the summer months of extreme Paraguayan heat without AC when the local club advised that student attendance is low due to not having cool drinking water. The initial project took place in 2018 followed by a trip to Paraguay by Vinings Cumberland Rotarians to see the fountains and meet Luque, Paraguay Club Rotarians.

A second school was identified in 2019, however due to the pandemic the project was paused. In 2022 Vinings Cumberland Rotary in partnership with Rotary in Paraguay did deliver a second project and the hope is to now scale this repeatable project to more schools in Paraguay. The Vinings Cumberland Rotary Club has been invited by our Rotarians in Paraguay to visit in Spring of 2023 by which time we hope to have reached additional schools with this cool, fresh water, AGUA FRESCA!

Rotary Luque in Paraguay and Rotary Vinings Cumberland have now expanded to additional schools in the region over a 1 year period (2025) via the Rotary Foundation Global Grant of $30,000 which consists of 13 schools and 4,752 students and teachers .

Facts and Timeline

RYE Student Support

In conjunction with several other Cobb County Rotary Clubs, our club supported a RYE student, Mariana Rodrigues Santos, from Brazil this year.  From meeting her at the airport to exposing her to Rotary and US culture at events such as baseball games and city tours, hearing from her about her native country and future life plans, we enjoyed her presence throughout the year.  We hosted her 16th birthday party at a local residence.  She is a bright and enthusiastic young lady!

Sack Pack - Children's Lunches

Vinings Cumberland Rotarians get together every Second Thursday of the month to assemble lunch sacks (chips, sandwiches, etc.) that are distributed the next day by The Table on Delk to children getting off the school buses in the immediate vicinity of Delk Road and Interstate 75. 

The Table on Delk is committed to serving individuals at risk of sex-trafficking. Part of that mission includes addressing critical needs of mostly women and their young families to decrease that risk, desperation, and food insecurity. 

The Sack Pack is held at the Vinings Fire Station No. 5's Community Room (near Old Vinings Inn) beginning at 7:00 p.m. VCR provides the materials; volunteers provide the manpower and cheer.  

Caption: The January 2026 Sack Pack Team, above! 80 sack lunches made with care by Michael Mims, Jim Johnson, Debby Bolt, Kent Osborn, Ann Johnson, Wallly Horlacher,Jennifer Humphrey and Ross Henderson. e

Caption:  The December 2025 Sack Pack Team in action, above! Over 80 Sack Lunches packed for The Table on Delk by Don Miers, Dorothy Sullivan, Michael Mims, Kent Osborn, Jennifer Humphrey and (not pictured, but taking the picture) Wally Horlacher!  

Caption: The November 2025 Sack Pack started the Club's year of support to The Table on Delk with sack lunches for their clients' children as they get off the school bus! The Team made 101 Sack Lunches. Rotarians Brant Campbell, Michael Perkins, Wally Horlacker, Kent Osborn, Debby Bolt and Jennifer Humphrey participated.

Free Bikes for Kids - FB4K

In conjunction with the Campbell High SchoolInteract Club, our club assisted in a Service Project to provide free bicycles for kids.  We helped clean bicycles which others at the warehouse had previously rebuilt.  Over 25 bikes were cleaned by Rotary, Interact and friends of Rotary on a Saturday morning in Atlanta.  Chains were adjusted, medals were tightened and wheels aligned.  

Six Rotarians were joined by five Interactors and three friends of Rotary for this Saturday morning activity.  

FreeBikes for Kidz has volunteers work on bikes throughout the year. They take any bike in any condition or even parts of bikes.Many cycle teams are actively making them just like new. Kids receive them at Christmas and another time at the beginning of summer.  They are then donated and sold to the local community kids for use in playing, learning and transportation.  

VCR Road Clean-Up January 2026

On Saturday, January 17, 2026, Vinings Cumberland Rotary joined forces with the Vinings Homeowners Association and Keep Cobb Beautiful to conduct a road clean-up in the Vinings Community, starting just above the Chattahoochee River.  Thirty volunteers, including 11 Rotarians, bundled up, gloved up, and bagged up to work on this community project.  Roughly fifty bags of trash and miscellaneous debris were picked up, beautifying the area and preventing trash from moving into the waterway. Hat tip to Rotarian Jim Johnson who loaded the bags into his pickup and delivered them to the appropriate disposal area.  

Duffel Shuffle: Holiday Heroes for Youth Villages at Inner Harbor

The Youth Villages Inner Harbour Campus is home to residential psychiatric treatment programs for children and youth with serious emotional and behavioral challenges. Eleven Vinings Cumberland Rotarians joined Youth Villages staff to stuff backpacks with hats, gloves, coloring books, and other gifts for the 144 kids in residence at Youth Villages Inner Harbour campus during the holidays. Rotarians also helped decorate the space the youth would be using later that week for a holiday party. Following the service activity Rotarians toured campus and participated in a West African therapeutic drumming activity.

HERO Kids Holiday gifts

According to the CDC, youth aged 13-24 accounted for 20% of all new HIV diagnoses in the United States in 2020, despite representing only 7% of the US population (HIV Surveillance Report 2020 (cdc.gov)). 

Hearts Everywhere Reaching Out for Children, Inc. (H.E.R.O.) has been committed to improving the quality of life for these children through enriching programs, unforgettable experiences, and connections with the community for the past fifteen years.

Holiday of HEROs is H.E.R.O. for Children's annual outreach to provide children impacted by HIV/AIDS with at least one gift they need and one gift they wantduring the holiday season. Through the outstanding generosity of some exemplary individual and group donors, H.E.R.O. was able to serve a record-breaking 435 children from Atlanta, Athens, Albany, Augusta, and Macon via this program!  This year our club joined 16 others in donating the gifts.

Each year, in conjunction with our club holiday party/gathering, we collect gifts for local children of need.  This year we collected and delivered   several bags of gifts to HERO children.  



Laws Of Life Essay Contest

Each year our club contributes funds and evaluates essays written by students. Winning essays are awarded a scholarship for college.   This projectprovides a club rallying point for our contribution to the leaders of tomorrow.

The Georgia Laws of Life Essay Contest asks students to select their own Law of Life, and to write about how it applies to their lives. In doing so, students reflect deeply and write from the heart about what they think matters most. The contest celebrates the students’ stories and their often profound reflections, and proudly presents significant cash awards to students and teachers.

Alzheimers Weekly Raffle

Founded in 1995 by Roger Ackerman, a Rotarian in Sumter, SC, The CART Fund (Coins for Alzheimer’s Research Trust) is a non-profit grassroots organization that provides “seed” money for cutting edge, high impact research grants to help find a treatment or cure for Alzheimer’s Disease.

Each week at our Rotary meeting, a collection of dollars is made for a raffle to split the pot.   fifty percent goes to CART, 25% goes to the lottery winner of that day, the remainder goes to a pot for a winner who draws an ace of spades on any day.  Since 2022 more than $12,000 has been sent to CART for their research programs.

Weekly Book Donation

Each week at our Rotary Club meeting, we have our speaker sign a book for donation to the Vinings Public Library.  This then becomes available for the community to read and enjoy fostering literacy and enjoyment.

Club Connect Evenings

The club is committed to getting Rotarians together for informal meeting outside the weekly lunch meeting.  These gatherings are held periodically at local restaurants.

 One this year was celebrating the season with fellow Rotarians at the District 6900 Christmas Cheer at 101 Steak here in Vinings

It was a wonderful opportunity to gather, connect, and enjoy good food and even better company as we wrapped up the year together. Grateful for the fellowship, the laughter, and the shared commitment to service that makes Rotary so special.

Curious about what our club is all about? We’d love to welcome you...reach out to learn more about the Rotary Club of Vinings Cumberland and how you can get involved.