Four Offaly finalists in Lottery Good Causes Awards 2024
Four groups across Offaly are celebrating this week after being named as the county finalists in the National Lottery Good Causes Awards for 2024.
The four are: Scripts, Ireland's Playwriting Festival; Edenderry Women's Shed; Moneygall Community Cafe and Clonbullogue GAA. They were nominated in the arts, community, health and wellbeing and sports categories respectively.
The total prize fund available on the night of the Good Causes Awards ceremony is €100,000, with seven category winners each receiving €10,000 and the overall Good Cause of the Year taking home an additional €25,000.
A special category, ‘Hero of the Year’, will also be announced on the awards night in recognition of outstanding work, where the recipient will receive a prize of €5,000. In addition, each of the national finalists will receive a cheque for €1,000.
The National Lottery said the vision of Edenderry Women's Shed is to “empower women in the local community” while they said the Script's Playwriting Festival “creates unique opportunities for playwrights, aspiring and established, to have their work developed and produced.” The third of the four Offaly finalists, Moneygall Communtiy Cafe, emerged to address “a vital void in their community, spurred by the aftermath of COVID-19.” according to the nominating committee.
The awards aim to honour, showcase and celebrate the inspiring work being carried out nationwide by thousands of projects, clubs and individuals who have received support from Good Causes funding.
The four county finalists from Offaly will now compete for a place in the National Finals judging phase next month, after which the national finalists will be announced.
The National Lottery CEO Designate, Cian Murphy, extended his congratulations to the 147 Good Cause beneficiaries named as county finalists in the 2024 Good Causes Awards, and said the awards programme “gives recognition and vital visibility to each Offaly winner” and shines a light on the “tremendous work being done behind-the-scenes daily across the country.”
In 2022, on average €4.9 million per week was raised by National Lottery players to support on average 4,500 community groups and voluntary groups around Ireland.
Nearly 30 cent in every €1 spent on all National Lottery games goes back to Good Causes in the areas of sport, youth, health, welfare, education, arts, heritage, and the Irish Language. In total, more than €6 billion has been raised for Good Causes since the National Lottery was established 36 years ago. In 2022 alone, €259.5 million was raised for local Good Causes in communities across Ireland