The Players Championship Center at Wolfson receives $2 million for endowment
PGA Tour Golfer Jim Furyk and his wife, Tabitha, who are building a home in San Marco, were on hand Nov. 21 along with The Players Championship Executive Director Matt Rapp and the Red Coats, to present a $2 million check to Wolfson Children’s Hospital to help further endow child health, wellness and injury prevention programming at The Players Center for Child Health within the children’s facility.
The presentation took place in The Players Championship Playroom at Wolfson Children’s Hospital where Furyk presented the check to Baptist Health President and Chief Executive Officer Hugh Greene and Wolfson Children’s Hospital President Michael Aubin.
The gift will be matched at 150 percent through $3 million in funds supplied by Baptist Health bringing the actual value of the contribution to $5 million, said Aubin.
“Funding is one of the things we always worry about because funding is always variable,” Aubin said after the presentation, adding he was relieved by the gift because it means that the Center and its child health, wellness and injury prevention programs will be able to remain in perpetuity. “This gift will provide the core funding to keep it alive and well forever,” he said. “When we started it, the goal was to get the program going and to get it endowed so it would be able to keep going. We hope others will step forward. Any contribution to the fund in the next year and a half will be matched at 150 percent.”
The gift is the second sizeable donation The Players Championship has made toward the Center that bears its name. Its original gift of $1 million was made in 2011 and helped establish the Center.
In addition to Aubin and the Furyks, also at the presentation were Megan Denk, director of The Players Championship Center, several Center staff members and two children who have benefited under the Center’s programs, Raia Adams, who suffers from asthma and Jacob Lopez, who incurred a traumatic brain injury and is now a champion for child passenger seat safety.
“The goal of The Players Center for Child Health is to keep kids out of the hospital. We do it through prevention, advocacy and access to care,” said Denk. “This gift to our endowment will allow us to improve the health, wellness of families in the community in perpetuity.”
In the past five years that The Players Center has been in existence, it has impacted the lives of more than 100,000 children and families through community and parent education, childhood injury prevention, wellness and an assess-to-care program. The new gift will enable The Players Center for Child Health to sustain current programs and expand them to more kids in the region.
By Marcia Hodgson
Resident Community News
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