SHAPLEIGH — Elias Thomas III has always tried to be a good neighbor – whether at home, in his long relationship with the Rotary Club, or in India, immunizing children and helping communities with water sources to ensure more crops.

A longtime Realtor, Thomas is among 10 Realtors from across the country who are finalists for the National Association of Realtors Good Neighbor Award.

The award honors Realtors who have made a positive impact on their communities through extraordinary volunteer service, a statement from the organization said.

On Oct. 2, five winners will be named from among the 10 finalists. Winners will receive a $10,000 grant and be featured in the November-December issue of Realtor Magazine. The winners will also receive travel expenses to the 2018 Realtors Conference & Expo in Boston, where they will accept an award in front of their peers. The remaining five finalists will receive honorable mentions and receive a $2,500 grant in recognition of their work.

The public is invited to vote for their favorites among the 10 finalists, with the top three vote-getters earning bonus grants of $2,500, $1,250 and $1,250, respectively, for a nonprofit of their choice. Last year’s Web Choice Favorite voting program, which is sponsored by realtor.com, generated more than 93,000 votes. People may cast their vote at realtor.com/goodneighbor before Sept. 28.

In Thomas’ case, his work with the Rotary Club put him in company with the nine other finalists for the award. If he is among the five finalists chosen as winners, Thomas said he already knows where his $10,000 award will go – to the Rotary Foundation, directed toward use for another dam in India. If he wins the “popular vote,” the $2,500 prize will go toward the same cause, he said.

Thomas has led more than 350 Rotarians on volunteer trips to India to immunize children against polio and build a system of dams to provide villagers with access to clean water, and raised more than $350,000 for the cause, according to the National Association of Realtors.

His first immunization trip to India was in January 2001, when he was governor of Rotary District 7780.

Efforts to help people in India broadened in 2004, he said.

“I realized there was so much more our Rotary Dream Teams could do to improve the lives of those less fortunate and from that year forward, I have been pleased to have inspired over 150 Rotarians from about 10 different countries to join me,” Thomas said. “In the past nine years, we have helped to construct nine water catchment dams in various arid regions of the Punjab and Rajasthan – all done by hand, and have helped to bring the possibility of gravity-fed irrigation to these regions and thereby to increase the number of crops from one to three annually.”

He is currently president of the York County Board of Realtors. He and his wife, Jane, have a daughter, Heather Thomas Matlosz, and a grandson, John Thomas Matlosz, who is following in his grandfather’s footsteps, taking part in the India initiatives in 2017 and 2018.

Nominees were judged on their personal contribution of time as well as financial and material contributions to benefit their cause.

Tammy Wells can be contacted at 282-1535, ext. 327, or at:

twells@journaltribune.com