Developing a Royal Flush

Currently on Display at Crop Risk Advisor

There’s no set rhyme or reason as to how community support and spirit can be displayed.  Sometimes it could be a simple donation jar on a store counter, or in this case, a brightly colored toilet parked on your front lawn!

People have turned unused toilets into a yard planter, but in this case, Debbie Harris, Dwayne Dechant and Lena Austin, are using five colored toilets to raise funds for 29 year old, Lamar resident, Danielle Dechant’s cancer treatments.  Harris said she wanted to be able to find a way to help her friend, “One night I searched out fundraising ideas on the internet and discovered this suggestion.”  She said, Dwayne, Danielle’s brother-in-law, decorated the donated toilets and set about putting them in front of yards and businesses, with the owner’s permission…sometimes.  They’re located around Lamar in green, yellow, orange, pink and blue coloring, all with flowers pre-installed.  She said some people have already asked if they can purchase the colorful commodes.

“We just asked at some places that were remodeling if we could have the toilets and people were more than happy to help when we explained how they’d be used,” Harris stated.  She said there’s a scheduled pick-up, usually on Thursdays and Sundays when the toilets are relocated to a new address.  Usually the current toilet-holder suggests where the next stop will be and sometimes it’s a surprise and sometimes the new recipient is given a ‘heads-up’, so to speak.

Donations are made through a phone call to Harris at 691-5157 and can range from $10 to have the toilet taken away, $15 to send it to a friend and a donation of $20 is an insurance investment to make sure you don’t get a return visit.  Harris said Dechant, the mother of a five and 1 ½ year old, is receiving radiation and chemotherapy treatment in Oklahoma for the next six weeks for Adenoid Cystic Carcinoma.  She said she’s not sure right now how long the fundraiser will last, but there is a surprise planned for the person who becomes the final toilet landlord.

By Russ Baldwin