The 29th annual Bowl For Kids is set for March 19 – the most important fundraiser of the year for Big Brothers Big Sisters (BBBS) of Innisfail as the youth mentoring agency continues aggressively to raise financial support during a troubled economy.
The organization expanded into Olds and Sundre last year and Tim Howard, the agency's executive director, admits there is added pressure for the organization to raise more money in today's difficult financial times.
“Any time you increase the scope of your organization and have staff it obviously puts stress on the finances,” said Howard. “We've had to be more imaginative and expand our fundraising, and we've been doing that in Olds.
“But it is one of those things that takes time and unfortunately we are expanding at a time when the economy in Alberta is contracting. We have had to expand where we are looking for money,” he added. We are being a lot more aggressive in pursuing foundation funding, which is something we haven't done that much in the past.”
Last month BBBS held a fundraiser for its new office in Olds and raised just over $10,000. The organization has one employee for both offices in Olds and Sundre, and a total of 12 kids from both towns have signed up, along with the same number of mentors.
“It has been a bit of a slow start. It didn't surprise us too much. We ran into some issues getting started in the schools, but we are past that now,” said Howard. “Things are moving along. It is a matter of recruiting people to serve as mentors.”
In the meantime, the Innisfail office, which also administers its programming to Red Deer County, Penhold, Bowden and Spruce View, continues to show strong support for the agency, with 183 kids signed up last year, most of them for Innisfail and a big jump from the year before. Howard added the most recent statistics show there are 106 mentors to support the registered kids. As for the outlying communities, he said numbers have remained “fairly stable” over the past year. However, Howard added the organization has received additional funding from Red Deer County for girls' programs over the next 18 months and those numbers are expected to increase.
As for the Bowl For Kids fundraiser on March 19 at Innisfail Bowling Lanes, there are up to 43 teams that have already registered, a number that is significantly down from the 96 organizers originally hoped for. Howard said the fundraising target this year is about $40,000, slightly above the $39,000 raised last year and significantly less that the $96,000 it aimed for earlier.
He said his organization would be more than happy to register more teams right up until the day of the event, including families, businesses or from any community organization.
For more information on this month's annual Bowl For Kids fundraiser contact BBBS at 403-227-6766, or go to the agency's website at www.bigbrothersbigsisters.ca/innisfail.
Tim Howard
"We've had to be more imaginative and expand our fundraising. We are being a lot more aggressive in pursuing foundation funding, which is something we haven't done that much in the past."
