Senior Connection of Chilton County has been busy lately, and not just preparing for the holidays.

On Thursday, the group presented a $300 check to Marilyn Colson with Chilton County Department of Human Resources for foster families.

Senior Connection Coordinator Vanessa McKinney said the group makes a donation annually to DHR to benefit foster families.

“I appreciate your support every year for foster children,” Colson told members gathered at the Clanton Recreation Center on Thursday. “This will only go to foster children, nothing else.”

Senior Connection also held its monthly birthday party Thursday, complete with a potluck dinner, for members with November birthdays.

Rep. Kurt Wallace was guest speaker and talked about the vote coming up for Chilton County residents in June regarding a 1-cent sales tax increase to pay for the construction of a new hospital in the county.

Lately, Senior Connection has been raising money to renovate and purchase equipment for the group’s future meeting place, a space in the Fred’s shopping center purchased by the city of Clanton.

The group meets and holds its activities at the Clanton Recreation Center on Lay Dam Road.

“We’re constantly fundraising,” McKinney said. “It won’t all come at one time; it will come in stages. The first thing we’ve got to do is get the floor and ceiling fixed.”

McKinney said the new space is 12,000 square feet and will have room for features such as a stage, exercise area with equipment, bathrooms, director’s office, library/computer room, classroom and health screening room, nurse’s office, walking track, sitting area with a TV, game room, craft room, kitchen and storage area.

In the last two weeks, McKinney said the group has received $1,400 from people in the community.

The Pink Ladies, an auxiliary group that worked at Chilton Medical Center before it closed in 2012, donated a reception desk they had purchased last year.

“People are so generous,” McKinney said. “The future looks bright so far, and we just appreciate the community helping us.”

McKinney said the group would continue to seek grant funding for the project.

Monetary donations may be mailed to: Senior Connection of Chilton County, P.O. Box 2611, Clanton, AL 35046.

The Clanton Evening Lions Club recently recognized McKinney as its 2013 “Pillar of the Community.”

McKinney has been Senior Connection’s coordinator for many years and has led the group through significant changes, such as when the hospital stopped funding the group in March 2011 and the group relocated to the recreation center two months later.

“I would not be even considered if it weren’t for Senior Connection,” McKinney said. “It’s in their honor, and God made everything possible. He deserves all the glory for it for sure.”