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For
2008, Midwest Furfest is pleased to welcome Rainbow
Animal Assisted Therapy as our charity!
Rainbow AAT was founded in 1987 to assist the therapeutic
needs of special needs children. Since their humble beginnings
with just seven dog owners, Rainbow now service the city
of Chicago and the surrounding 6-county metropolitan area,
operating over 75 programs and reaching more than 1000 children
per month.
Among their many programs, Rainbow AAT uses trained and
certified therapy dogs to help hospital patients with occupational/physical
therapy, bedside and waiting room visitations, and in-patient
and out-patient psychiatric therapy. The dogs also go to
schools to help with special and remedial education, and
to residential centers to help with recreational and group
therapy. Rainbow also offers "Read to the Dogs",
giving a child a nonjudgmental environment and a willing
and attentive listener, as well as classes designed to help
children overcome their fear of dogs and to teach dog safety.
Another important program that Rainbow AAT offers is crisis
response. After the terrible tragedy at Northern Illinois
University earlier this year, several of Rainbow’s
members took their dogs to the campus – not to perform,
not to talk, just to be there for the students.
Rainbow Assisted Animal Therapy will have a table as well
as several of their therapy dogs at Midwest FurFest. They
will be showing off all the fine work they do, and will
be happy to answer any questions you might have. They will
also be presenting several panels to talk about various
aspects of their organization. And of course, they will
be gladly accepting donations - at their table, as well
as items for Saturday's Charity Auction!
Donation and collection of items for auction.
We gratefully accept any donation of original work from
artists — they are to be commended for devoting their
labor to our causes. We also are happy to auction off other
types of items as long as they are legal.
Donated promises of custom services with the end result
of a material item (i.e. fursuit or plush creations, leatherwork,
art commissions) are also accepted and welcome, provided
that a detailed description of the product or service is
clearly spelled out for bidders before the auction. However,
other volunteer services are not permitted; this will not
be a pet auction.
All items and offerings MUST be G-PG13 in nature. R-rated
offerings require special permission; if you have any doubts
about whether an object is appropriate, any staff member
should be able to help in locating the Director, who gets
the final say.
The auction of pre-owned, legal merchandise (i.e. art purchased
at a previous convention) is allowed since the pre- owned
merchandise is the property of the person putting it up
for auction.
Items up for bid will be displayed in a clearly marked section
at the MFF Art Show until the time of the auction.
The auction bidding process:
- Bids
on items and custom creations/services will start at
a suggested price offered by the provider or auctioneer
at a price significant enough to stimulate bidding and
will increase by a minimum of $1 per bid.
- Only
request to inspect the piece if you are seriously intending
to bid on it since this will impact the bidding process.
-
Bidders must raise hands HIGH and call out bid LOUDLY.
-
Only one round of final calls will be performed (i.e.
going once, going twice...). Decide quickly so the Auction
may go smoothly.
- Please
be reasonably silent if not bidding, and respect others'
requests for quiet. This includes silencing cell
phones while attending!
-
The auction staff will record the winning bidder’s
badge number. That number is our verification that you
submitted the bid for the item.
- If
the bidder is not available afterwards to pay for the
auctioned item, or does not have the appropriate funds
at the time, the item will be re-auctioned.
Once the auction begins, items may be allowed to be introduced
midway at the discretion of the Auction Director, but
the donor takes full responsibility for any uninformed
details of the item's condition or background. The Auction
Director and MFF Chairman may also remove items from auction
as warranted.
Caveat Emptor: buyer beware. We make no guarantees of
any item's flaws after purchase.
Collection and Distribution of Money
Upon submitting a winning bid, the buyer will immediately
proceed to the front to settle on the item. They may pay
cash, submit a credit card or write a personal check.
A charity representative will take the payment (using
their credit card equipment). No money will be handled
in the name of MFF. The bidder may request a receipt.
The bidder will then receive the item.
ITEMS MUST BE PAID FOR BEFORE THE CLOSE OF THE AUCTION
–– NO LATE PAYMENTS WITHOUT PRIOR CONSENT.
Bidders may request a short extension
of time to retrieve payment, at the Charity Director's
discretion. Otherwise, items left unbid or subject to
late payment will be returned to the donor.
How to donate items
Items for donation should be brought down to the Art Auction.
There will be a designated section for Charity Auction
donations on display. Fill out a 3x5 card (available in
the room) with pertinent information such as the donor,
artist, medium, preferred starting bid, and any other
important information a bidder should know so that the
item may be properly auctioned. This is mainly to benefit
the auctioneer.
If you are donating an item (artwork, sculpture, animation
cel, etc), it must be G-PG13 rated (R only with permission
from the Charity Director). Items donated also must be
unique. They cannot be available anywhere else at the
convention. They can be as small as an autographed print
not available or by an artist not in attendance, to a
full library of fanzines or 2 pounds of truffles, as one
convention auctioned two years ago. Set your creativity
free.
If you are donating a service, you must be 18 years or
older and have a legal, definable, service to offer (leatherwork,
plush design, costume production, etc). If the service
requires it, we will need to see a certificate stating
that you have trained for such. All services will be reviewed
before being accepted
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