The Parade of Lights is coming up Thursday and is still looking for people to get involved. It’s estimated the event sees between 7,000 and 10,000 people come to watch and donate to the cause of the year.
This year the parade is raising money for the pediatric centre at the Lloydminster Hospital. After a $20,000 dollar donation by Boundary Ford, the Parade of Lights has already met their goal of buying two biliblankets to help treat babies with jaundice. The rest of the funding will be used to buy more equipment for the new ward.
Lloydminster Parade of Lights President Ryan LeBlanc says they have filled all 120 volunteer positions, but there’s still time for anyone wanting to join in the actual parade.
“We are still accepting parade entries up until the day of. They’ll just get placed into a ‘B’ location for the section. So people still can enter their floats and we’re still looking for for more. We’re at about 55 floats this year, and we’re definitely hoping for some more.”
In addition to the donations for the Lloydminster Hospital, LeBlanc says they will be helping other charities at the Lloydminster Exhibition Grounds.
“We’ll have two trucks set up there. One’s going to be collecting food donations for the Salvation Army and the other will be collecting toys for the Lloydminster Sexual Assault Centre.”
People wanting to get involved or find more information on the Parade of Lights can visit their Facebook page.