Another Success for the Blackburn Cancer Chase

Published in The BANAR, November 2016 by Bill Horne, 2016 Cancer Chase Event Chair

Thanks to near perfect weather, great community support, willing volunteers, a topnotch organizing committee,
and amazing sponsors, Cancer Chase 2016 has turned over $14,108 to the Ottawa Hospital Foundation for targeted immune system cancer research.

I am pleased to announce that we beat the previous year by $1,052, which had been the most successful year before that. Every dollar raised is being matched by other donors. And it all stays right here in the National Capital Region.

I cannot possibly thank everyone by name who contributed to our success, in addition to the 162 who actually participated. Permit me to collectively thank our organizing committee, many of whom have done this for years, and the “day of” volunteers, who likewise are veterans. We were also delighted to welcome several new members to our organizing committee: including Chantal Goyette, Martin Hache and family, Betty Parmeter, and Joanna Pietkiewicz. We were delighted to have the support of two Blackburn Hamlet athletes of notable distinction, Kevin Frost and Keira Christie-Galloway. Our Ottawa Hospital Foundation rep Sarah Landry was a big help with taking meticulous care of the money.

The Blackburn Community Association, of which we are a committee, was outstanding in financial support and logistics. Special thanks to BCA President Laura Dudas and Fun Fair Chair Brent Laurie for their help. Course volunteers were mostly from Rideau High School, arranged by teacher Melissa Campbell Schwartz and other staff; no easy feat getting all those kids to Blackburn Hamlet on a Sunday morning. Yay, Rideau High School.

We had an 8% increase in online Running Room registrations over last year, and those are so valuable, as they generate significant revenue. The Running Room also provided the start/finish apparatus and gift cards for the top two male and female finishers. Yay, Orleans and Bank Street Running Room stores.

Our awesome sponsors helped to make the silent auction and raffle a major source of our funds. Check out the list and show them your appreciation. Ottawa Paramedics, Ottawa Parks and Recreation, Councillor Jody Mitic, the NCC and the Gloucester Hornets Soccer Association all played a major role in our success. Once again, the Metro store’s Chris Shaeen let us approach Metro shoppers for donations, and the results were awesome. And the venerable former Councillor Rainer Bloess; what a guy!

I want to give a huge shout out to my daughter Stephenie, and her husband Andrew, who collectively managed the cancerchase.com website and the drone photography. Steph was updating the website on a near instant basis while on vacation in Norway!

It was so great to have the Sewell family travel back from Belleville to help out, as well as the Hamlet’s Kathy Greenlaw, who were the founders of the Blackburn Hamlet Run for the Cure, which predated the Cancer Chase, some 15 years ago. Yay, Pioneers!

Huge apologies if I have missed someone I should have recognized by name; you are all so treasured in this.

Finally, here’s the important pitch: we need to replace our longstanding Sponsorship Chair par excellence, Eileen Lindsay, who in a word, organizes all the Silent Auction and raffle prize donors. No small feat.

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