Miniature Mister Five Hills pays Ronald McDonald House utility bills
Special to Leader-Pres
Many families travel far from home and spend several weeks or months to get treatment for their seriously ill or injured children at Children’s Hospital at Scott & White in Temple. It can be a long time for children to be separated from their parents and parents separated from their child. For children facing a serious medical crisis, nothing seems scarier than not having mom and dad close by for love and support. Miniature Mister Five Hills Robbie Rackley decided to make a big difference in these small children’s lives.
Robbie chose the Ronald McDonald House as his platform of service during his year long reign. He began collecting pop tabs for the charity in March, 2018 when he was crowned. The Ronald McDonald House provides a place for families to call home so they can stay close by their hospitalized child at little to no cost. He enlisted the help of his royalty family as well as family, friends, local businesses and organizations which all collected tiny pieces of aluminum. One by one they added up until the now 4-year old amassed thousands and thousands of pop tabs weighing more than 160 pounds.
Robbie and his mom, Misty Rackley, made regular visits to businesses and clubs over the past year picking up pop tabs collected.
“The goal is to help sick kids,” Misty Rackley said. “I know if Robbie was sick, I would lose my mind. When your child is sick, you lose everything.”
As Robbie prepares to crown his successor in just a few days, he and the Five Hills royalty made a trip to Temple to donate the multiple containers filled with pop tabs. One by one, they dumped them into industrial-sized garbage cans where they will be held for recycling.
As the trash cans began to reach capacity, a few stray tabs fell on the floor and Robbie scurried to pick them up.
“Oh…,” he said in excitement as his eyes widened. “There’s a tab and there’s one. We have to get them all.”
The tabs will be sold to a metals company and the cash received in exchange will be used to pay the Ronald McDonald’s utility bills which cost approximately $6,000 year.
Ronald McDonald House Weekend Manager Gayle Bourland, who has worked for the charity for 10 years, said Robbie’s donation of the small tabs will make a big difference.
“These tabs are free money for the House,” Bourland said, adding that anyone can collect and donate the tabs. “It doesn’t have to be a huge amount. It all makes a difference.”