A FUNDRAISER from York, who aims to support mental health charities, has been nominated for a Community Pride award for his staggering work.

Michael Lacy, who lives in the Burnholme area of the city, has been nominated for Person of the Year in this year's awards.

In 2019, Michael set up Patch Amnesty to raise money for the mental health charity, MIND.

Having some left-over clothing patches from a project he was working on, he reached out to other friends with an interest in making 'Battle Jackets' to see if they would donate spare patches to him to sell at a music festival.

He said the response was "overwhelming", and Michael decided to keep going and push it more to see where it would go. He was building up to having a stall at Bloodstock 2020, a festival with capacity of 20,000, but this was put on hold due to the Covid pandemic.

However, moving sales online, he persevered and continued to raise funds.

Through Patch Amnesty, to date Michael has raised £17,000 for the MIND charity.

Scott Turnbull, who nominated Michal, said he is a true is a "true inspiration" to those around him.

He said: "Patch Amnesty is driven by Michael's first hand experience of ill mental health and his enthusiasm to succeed.

"He refuses to give up and while the world has thrown everything it can at him, it has made him even more focused to raise funds and help those that need it the most.

"His enthusiasm is infectious to anyone who has met him."

Not just focussed on mental health charities, Michael also organised the Marathons for Music campaign - which encouraged people to complete 26.2 miles in any way possible in July last year to raise money for the #SaveOurVenues campaign to support grass roots music venues in the UK.

In this year’s Community Pride awards, there will be prizes for Spirit of Youth, Person of the Year, Good Neighbour of the Year, Sporting Hero, Public Sector Hero, School of the Year, Charity Fundraiser, Health Service Hero, Teacher of the Year, Volunteer of the Year, Child of the Year, Best Community Project, Doctor of the Year, the Mental Health Award and Carer of the Year.

Nominations for the awards are now closed. All winners will be announced at a ceremony later in the year.