Over the last year, I've had the opportunity to be involved in an amazing project - the creation of a community-based recreation association. It's the brain-child of a dear friend whose dedication and belief in making fitness and movement available to everyone is unmatched.
It started out with a visit to a local facility that was closed by the province and then purchased by a local construction family. Their objective is to convert it into a community within a community and they're doing just that. It's called The Gallipeau Centre and with over 800,000 square feet of buildings on more than 350 acres, it's a sight to behold. A beautiful location just outside of town with mature trees and lots of greenspace. Included on the site was a pool, gymnasium and numerous classrooms all in one area of the facility (starts to sound like a cool rec facility no?) The catch? The facility had been closed for a few years and the pool out of commission.
Over the last year, we participated in the Aviva Community Fund in which we won $99,000.00 to refurbish the pool, got access to some grant funding and have enjoyed the generosity of members of the community who have donated their time, money and expertise. The result is a virtually brand new pool that will be opening in 3 weeks offering swimming lessons, public swimming, aquafit and the like.
The last year has involved significant time and effort from many of us; it has meant missed family dinners, time away from home at meetings or weekend events and festivals to tell people our story, countless hours working on a website, logo competitions, managing a facebook page and conducting interview. There are days I've been exhausted and didn't even want to think about it.
Yesterday I had the pleasure of spending the day signing kids up for swimming lessons, adults for aquafit memberships and families for swim memberships. It was one of the best days I've had all year. It reminds me how important this is for the residents of our community and the surrounding communities who don't have access to this kind of facility today. But they will. In 3 weeks. And that makes me exceedingly happy.
This has occupied countless hours of my time outside of my day job and teaching. Now multiply that by about 10 - volunteers who run a regular Tuesday night BBQ to fundraise, board members scraping, patching and readying change rooms for paint, doing all the media interviews, working with contractors and the list goes on. All of it done by volunteers.
If you want to learn more about us, check us out - we're called The Hub and our members affectionately known as Hubsters.
From this Hubster to everyone who has supported and continues to support us - thank you. Without volunteers, this never would have happened.
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