CHEO launches lottery with Canada-themed Dream Home
Fundraiser has brought in more than $40 million to buy hospital equipment
CHEO’s 27th annual Dream of a Lifetime lottery launched Tuesday, with a luxury Dream Home centrepiece — designed and decorated as an ode to Canada’s sesquicentennial — and nearly $3 million in other prizes available.
The 5,392-square-foot home at 585 Chriscraft Way in Manotick opened to the media and stakeholders involved in designing, building and furnishing the house, which is the lottery’s grand prize.
First prize also comes with $100,000 in cash, a 2018 Toyota Tacoma 4x4 pickup truck, a $5,000 Farm Boy gift certificate, and moving, legal and cleaning services, for a total value of about $1.8 million.
This year’s model, the Red Maple, is warm and inviting with contemporary and classic Canadian features that include rustic stone, Douglas fir beams and wood floors milled from reclaimed Logs End Inc. logs pulled from the Ottawa River.
“There’s a lot of barn board and post and beam but it is still contemporary,” said Dan Champagne, vice-president of development and corporate relations at the CHEO Foundation.
“The Canadian theme runs throughout the house right down to the accessories — the books that are on the shelves are Canadian stories and/or Canadian artists.”
There are four bedrooms in the home, including one designed as a den/office. High-end amenities include a gourmet kitchen, soaring ceilings in the great room, an outdoor fireplace, a two-storey kids’ bedroom, and a fully-loaded basement recreation room with a gym.
A total of 70,500 tickets are available, with one-in-14 odds of winning one of the 5,100 prizes that have a total value of $2,894,311.87. Prizes include vacations, power boats and cars, as well tickets to the Grey Cup and the Ottawa Redblacks’ last 2017 regular-season game for those who purchase before Sept. 22. Also, 50/50 tickets will be sold. Last year’s winner took home $539,657.
Since the lottery’s inception in 1991, it has generated more than $40 million for the CHEO Foundation. Last year, it raised $3.3 million, which funds state-of-the-art equipment, research and support services for the hospital.
Kevin Keohane, president and CEO of the CHEO Foundation, said the lottery grows every year because the community has a vested interest in the hospital’s success.
“I know it’s a lottery and a lottery is supposedly about winning, but I think if you talk to enough people
who buy our tickets, what they say is, ‘I’d love to win something but I’m doing this really to support CHEO and winning is a bonus.’ ”
Young Wyatt Scott, who suffers from a rare disease that affects his ability to open his mouth or swallow, is an example of why so many people get behind the lottery. His mother, who spoke at the launch on Tuesday, doubts her son would be alive if not for the care he received at CHEO.
“He has a rare condition called brain stem dysgenesis and there are only 15 cases right now in the world,” Amy Miville said.
“That’s the best thing about CHEO. They make you feel like you are going to get out of this, that there’s a light at the end of the tunnel.”