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Photograph by George Sakkestad

There was an invasion of pink flamingos in Saratoga last week, and they congregated on the front lawn of Jill Hunter's home. The flamingo invasion is part of a fundraising effort by Saratoga's Relay For Life. It takes a donation to get rid of the plastic birds, and another donation can get them placed on someone else's lawn. The question is who will get flocked next?

Flock of flamingos fills front lawn for fundraiser

Relay For Life benefits from Hunter's surprise

By Jason Sweeney

A flock of pink flamingos has invaded Saratoga. The flamingos gather on front lawns in the early morning hours, and the only way to get rid of them is to make a donation to the Relay For Life team from Saratoga High School.

Jill Hunter got flocked by 18 plastic pink flamingos the morning of May 9. Chris Van Hoy, the chairwoman of Saratoga Relay For Life, stood in front of Hunter's house with a group of fellow Village Gardeners early that morning. The group knew Hunter would leave the house at about 8:30 a.m. for a weekly gardening session tending to the flowers along Big Basin Way.

When Hunter stepped outside and saw the pink flamingos planted on her lawn, the Village Gardeners let out a shout. "You've been flocked!"

"This is the first flocking of the season," Van Hoy said.

Van Hoy hopes the tacky flamingos on front lawns will get flockees to kick in a little cash for Relay For Life. A cash donation gets the flamingos removed. Another donation, and the flockee can specify the next person for a flock treatment. And a $20 insurance payment will keep the flamingos from congregating on your own lawn.

"The biggest thing we want to get across to people is that Relay For Life is a family event," Van Hoy said. "It's a lot of fun and it's for a good cause."

Saratoga hosted its first Relay For Life last summer at Redwood Middle School, raising more than $44,000. This year, Saratoga's Relay For Life begins at 10 a.m. on June 24 on the Redwood Middle School track. Music, food and informational demonstrations occur throughout event. The highlight comes at sunset when hundreds of paper lanterns, called luminaria, are lit to honor victims of cancer. Each luminaria is purchased for $10, which goes to the American Cancer Society. Relay teams walk through the night in the candlelight, not stopping until 10 the next morning.

Relay For Life began in May of 1985 when Gordy Klatt, a Tacoma, Wash., physician, spent 24 hours circling the track at Baker Stadium at the University of Puget Sound for more than 83 miles in an effort to raise money for his local American Cancer Society office. Klatt's effort was a success and has since evolved into a phenomenon that involves millions of people nationwide, raising millions of dollars for cancer prevention, early detection, treatment and patient support.

According to the American Cancer Society, one in three Americans will be diagnosed with cancer. The American Cancer Society invests about $130 million a year in the fight against cancer, making it the largest nonprofit, nongovernmental cancer research funding organization in the United States.

Fourteen registered teams raised money and then walked the track for the Saratoga Relay For Life last year. The top fundraising team was The Spirit of Life, which consisted of 16 people from Coldwell Banker and the Cornerstone Title Company. The team raised more than $17,000 by hosting a breakfast, an auction, a raffle and a pizza luncheon.

Members of the Saratoga High School team are hoping the pink flamingos flocking on people's lawns will add a little more money.

Magda Jisrawi, the community development manager for Relay For Life, coordinates volunteers throughout the Silicon Valley and the Central Coast region and was present for Hunter's flocking. "Relay is an event by the community, for the community," she said.

"Relay For Life is a wonderful event," Hunter said. "I'm thrilled to be the first person flocked."

She and fellow members of the Village Gardeners stood next to the flamingos on her lawn and plotted who to flock next.

For information on how to flock someone or on Saratoga Relay For Life, call Chris Van Hoy at 408.313.1768.