Bus money
Race for Kids helps Whitney Pier Youth Club buy new vehicle.
Challenges, a race and prizes may sound like the stuff that childhood dreams are made of but on Saturday, it was the adults’ chance to have a little fun while raising money for a good cause.
Eight teams of four took part in the second annual Race for Kids fundraiser sponsored by Sydney Credit Union, which was held at the Whitney Pier Youth Club on Saturday. Each team was given 10 clues to find 10 checkpoints. After going to each checkpoint, the teams received tokens with letters on them and they then had to unscramble the letters, guess the word and then get to the finish line first. While there were food, drinks and prizes for the participants, the real goal of the day was to raise money for the youth club.
Youth club executive director Chester Borden said last year’s event raised more than $10,000 and he was hopeful this year would do the same.
“We need a bus,” said Borden. “We’ve outgrown the 15-passenger van so hopefully some of this funding will be going towards our programs but also towards the capital expenditure of a bus.”
Race organizers Rayanne Rogers and Pam Petrie expected that this year’s event would raise more than last year’s since $10,292.60 had already been raised by Friday night. Final total will probably be known this week.
“At the moment we are in desperate need of a new vehicle to transport more youth,” said Rogers. “The bus will really help us to expand into more communities. All the funds we raise today are going towards our portion of saving up for this new bus.”
This year’s event featured two more teams than last year and Petrie said she hoped this year’s race route would encourage more people to participate in the future.
“Hopefully by having the checkpoints all spread out, they’re going to see more of it and that’s going to bring more people, more questions, more people to participate next year,” she said.
“With imagination you can do almost anything.”