Strong Voices

Sandra Dunning, a former IHC Pukekohe Op Shop volunteer, dropped off some Christmas biscuits to volunteers in the shop a week before Christmas. On Boxing Day she died in a house fire.

Her son, Scott Dunning, set up a Givealittle page as “a last good deed” in her memory for the benefit of three charities that were important to her – IHC, Women’s Refuge and Sands NZ, a charity supporting parents who have lost a baby.

Sandra was a keen volunteer some years ago at the former Pukekohe IHC Op Shop in Seddon Lane. Scott believes she worked there for about 10 years and finished up in 2016 or 2017.

“Mum gravitated to anyone who needed a hand. For the intellectual disability community in Pukekohe, Mum would have seen the extra barriers and seen the struggle and was keen to help. Mum loved them dearly,” Scott says.

“She also loved the Pukekohe IHC Op Shop for the caring and giving community that’s formed around it. The other volunteers and the regular customers quickly became Mum’s friends, which were her family of choice.

“She was a whirlwind of visits and calls, bringing with her home-made jam and baking; prepared meals to pop in the freezer; or anything else she knew you needed. To anyone in need, she would always offer help, even if she had only met them minutes before. She gave all of this freely, despite for most of her life having little money of her own.

“With her booming, infectious laugh and complete lack of a filter, Sandra was the glue that held the people around her together,” Scott says.

Long-time Op Shop volunteer Elaine Brown recalls working with Sandra at the previous shop. “She just loved strawberries. She would have strawberry pictures on her cupboards. She had a full apron with a panel of strawberries.”

Op Shop manager Kathleen Felix says she only knew Sandra as a customer.

“She would come into the shop every week.” Kathleen says that in the week before Christmas she brought in cookies for two of the volunteers and some jam for anyone who wanted it.

Caption: Former IHC volunteer Sandra Dunning, who died in a Boxing Day house fire.

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