WESTERN BUREAU – The Rotary Club of Montego Bay East will be distributing 280 new wheelchairs, valued at over $3 million, to disabled people across western Jamaica.

The wheelchairs – which were sourced through the Wheelchair Foundation, a charitable organisation based in the United States, and Rotary International – were handed over at a function at Sam Sharpe Square.

Paul Clark of the Nashua Rotary Club in New Hampshire, presented the chairs to the Rotary Club of Montego Bay East during the ceremony that saw Montego Bay mayor, Noel Donaldson, and the St James Custos, Clarence Nelson, in attendance.

Meanwhile, president of the Rotary Club of Montego Bay East, Haresh Ramchandani, has said that the chairs would not be issued to any organisation but to needy individuals themselves. He said that whenever the club was made aware of someone needing a chair, its members would make contact with that individual, and provided that he or she is truly in need, would see to it that the chair was donated.