Rock Solid Refuge eighth annual banquet and auction set for April 7
An important fundraiser in support of Rock Solid Refuge will be held in Swift Current early next month.
Rock Solid Refuge will be hosting their eighth Annual Banquet and Auction Fundraiser on April 7th at East Side Church of God. The evening features dinner, both a silent and live auction, along with a keynote speaker.
Dallas Block, Executive Director of Rock Solid Refuge, said the upcoming fundraiser is an important one, with proceeds utilized primarily for the operation of their program and supporting the work they do to help youth that are in crisis.
Rock Solid Refuge is a faithbased residential program for teen boys aged 13 to 18 who are dealing with life controlling issues. They staff a fully accredited independent school, and provide 24/7 support to address the rehabilitation and recovery needs of teens who are in crisis at the 12-bed facility.
“Its pretty exciting. We’ve had such a great response from Southwest Saskatchewan and the Swift Current area. People seem to get really excited about our banquet and love to come out,” Block said
The guest speaker for the banquet is Scott Taylor from Arkansas, who is currently the co-director of Renewal Ranch and previously served as the Executive Director of Crosswinds Caribbean Mountain Academy. Through his work he has a perspective on having a proper program to help teens with life-controlling issues.
And while there are numerous Us-based programs working with youth via a similar long-term, faith-based residential program model, Rock Solid Refuge remains unique in Canada.
“As far as we know, we’re the only one still that is of that model. So that’s is one of the things we’re going to highlight this year at the banquet is the need for programs like ours across the country,” Block explained.
As this year marks the 10th anniversary of the beginning of Rock Solid Refuge, Block is excited to announce that another banquet speaker will be the individual who was the inspiration for their program back in 2005. This man is married with two children, and he served as a staff member during their first two summers.
“It’s exciting to see the person who was the reason for starting, because there wasn’t a program accessible to him and his mom and his family when he was a teenager. He became the inspiration for why we’re doing what we’re doing.”
Now, 12 years after that start, and a decade after Rock Solid’s launch, he will share his story and help people understand why it is so important for intervention to happen when young people are still teenagers.
Rock Solid Refuge has provided supports for teens who were in trouble with the law or involved in gangs, and their parents were desperate for resources and finding a place their kids could be safe and could be helped.
Block admits the program is not suited for everybody.
“It’s a pretty big intervention to think of a 12-month program for a young person that might be as young as 13. That’s a pretty intense intervention. So not everybody needs that. But the reality is that for those young people and those families that are in those desperate situations that really need an opportunity for their young person to leave the environment that they’re in, to go into a place that’s safe, away from the accessibility of the substances that they’re struggling with and getting addicted to, or even the crowd that they’re with.”
Additional information is available by visiting www.rocksolidrefuge.com/ banquet, and advance tickets are available at the Swift Current Pharmasave or by calling the Rock Solid Refuge office at 306-297-3663.