A new community-based website – mysundre.ca – has been launched for local organizations and citizens to more easily access and manage information about local resources and services as well as events taking place in the town and surrounding area.
The creation of mysundre.ca, a joint partnership of four local non-profit organizations - Greenwood Neighbourhood Place (GNP), Sundre Petroleum Operators Group (SPOG), Sundre and District Chamber of Commerce, and the Town of Sundre, was based on an idea that was 10 years in the making. It was officially unveiled on Nov. 7.
“Greenwood Neighbourhood Place has been working on bringing community resources together for I don't even know how many years. I remember when I was working as a program coordinator this was one of my dreams, starting way back over eight years ago,” said Marita Stermann, executive director for GNP.
The idea behind mysundre.ca, say website creators, is to have one central location to manage and view all current and future events, as well as making planning easier for the people and organizations of Sundre, but also for anyone visiting Sundre and the surrounding area. As well, it is hoped mysundre.ca will help with streamlining scheduling, thereby increasing attendance and removing guesswork for anyone interested in hosting an event.
Tracey McCrimmon, executive director of SPOG, said the first meeting to create mysundre.ca was held last February after SPOG found out it planned an event the same night as GNP's Suicide Awareness forum. She said SPOG officials felt its event would be taking attendance away from such an important community forum.
Officials from the partnering agencies brainstormed on how to eliminate overlapping mandates, scheduling conflicts, time wasted on locating venues, and tracking down information and contacts on events. These early discussions led to the concept of creating a colourful, simple to understand and easy to navigate online community calendar, designed by Sundre's Sandra Nielsen.
“I think they (citizens) are going to think it is fantastic. It goes on in other towns and other communities where it gives everybody a better idea of all that is available,” said McCrimmon. “I think it gives the community an idea of all the events that are going on within Sundre and the surrounding areas and that it profiles all of the activities from different interests that they can either choose to participate or become aware of.”
Organizations can now simply submit information online for their events. They are sent to Greenwood Neighbourhood Place, where Tirene Mitzel, the agency's communications liaison, is charged with collecting information, approving it and then placing it on the mysundre.ca site.
“We are definitely feeding into it with a lot of our information and our events,” said Gord Moore, manager of the Sundre and District Chamber of Commerce. “We pass on a lot of the information that we get of people who are advertising who are not on the web. We will use it quite a bit.”
The website is free to the community. All costs to get it up and running have been covered by the partnership.
GNP will be running the site, while all four partners are contributing to any additional expenses. There is no charge to list events on mysundre.ca. However, listings must be submitted by a non-profit organization and approved by GNP.
