United Way Lloydminster and District President Alex Wilson says their latest fundraiser “blew out all records this year despite COVID.” The organization held their annual “Breakfast Day with United Way” on October 7th with proceeds going towards their operating costs.
“October is usually United Way’s campaign month, this is where we really push ourselves and all the funds we do raise over the next couple of weeks will help continue with our operations throughout the year. We do continue to fundraise throughout the year, but this is by far the biggest source of income.”
About 1,300 breakfast sandwiches were made and $8,000 raised through the fundraiser. Several local businesses such as Safeway, Canadian Brewhouse and Lloydminster & District Co-op donated supplies, eggs, bread and other food to help cut costs for United Way.
“It’s been really great to see the tremendous outpouring of support from all the local businesses. Obviously, it’s been a tough year with COVID, but despite those hurdles we’re still able to run this whole breakfast day operation more or less without cost.”
Treasurer Amanda Williams says they are now focusing on their 3rd annual 50/50 draw in the coming days. She says more details will be released soon and residents will be able to pick up tickets by contacting any of the board members. The draw is expected to run until December 16th.
United Way is once again taking in submissions for the second round of Emergency Community Support Fund. The grant supports non-profits helping seniors, Indigenous communities, food banks, mental health, shelters and healthcare initiatives in the area.
“We did just get approved for somewhere around $46,000 within Lloydminster. We’ll be going through applications for non-profits and other support organizations within the community and we’ll be happy to divy that out.”
Wilson says they’ve distributed over $330,000 to local organizations through the federal grant as well as provincial grants and donations from Husky Energy, Synergy Credit Union, ATB Financial, Wawanesa Insurance, Canadian Tire and other businesses.
Vice-president Larry Boswell adds there was an overwhelming amount of applications in the last round. The deadline to apply for funding is October 30th.