ACF makes donation to St. Vincent de Paul

A couple of local non-profit organizations have received some financial aid from the Amherstburg Community Foundation (ACF).The Society of St. Vincent de Paul have received a cheque for $2,000 from the ACF.

Local branch president Sharron Bombardier said the donation stemmed from a roundtable discussion presented a few months ago by Councillor Patricia Simone and ended with the donation made earlier this month.

“We just raised the issue of cost to individual members about police clearances,” said Bombardier. “For us, as a society, we are required to have police checks (for members) every three years.”

With proceeds raised going towards the society and the support they give to individuals and families in need in the community, there is little left to aid members with the costs of police clearances. Bombardier says members have to the $25 cost pay out-of-pocket and that can be difficult as many local society members are seniors and on fixed incomes.

“Some of us had to be fingerprinted,” added Bombardier. “The costs were getting difficult for individual members to cover.”

Those additional fingerprinting costs can range from $50-$75, she added.

Costs of police clearances can vary depending on municipality, she noted, pointing out there are no costs in areas policed by the OPP but in areas policed by Windsor or LaSalle, there are costs for the members to get the clearances. They are required to get police clearances due to the fact volunteers deal regularly with vulnerable people. Bombardier said they turned to the Amherstburg Community Foundation to see if they could help and the ACF agreed. She said they are very grateful for the donation.

“We were happy to have it,” she said. “I was delighted.”

ACF president Richard Peddie said the board talked about the importance of the Society of St. Vincent de Paul and the impact it has on the community and agreed to pay the $2,000 out of miscellaneous funds the board had. Peddie said volunteers with the society put in roughly 5,700 hours annually and “it was an easy decision” to help them.

Peddie also noted he wrote a personal cheque to the Holiday Beach Migration Observatory(HBMO) for $1,200. He recalled going with his father to Holiday Beach with his father to watch bird banding and he is still interested in it, so he agreed to help the HBMO with a donation.

The ACF also is continuing to encourage the public to vote on the ten other initiatives that local non-profits are requesting funding for. The foundation has collected about $35,000 from community builders but overall requests totalled $73,000. People wishing to make donations to the foundation to increase the pot of cash that will be divided among the causes chosen are welcome to reach out to the foundation through their website at www.amherstburgfoundation.org.

Peddie indicated the ten non-profits add a lot to the community and how the public votes will help the board decide who to donate to and how much can be donated.

“All the causes have a lot of merit,” he said.

People can vote through the ACF’s website by clicking on the “Believe in Amherstburg Vote Today!” tab in the upper right corner of the screen. The public can vote daily for as many of the ten organizations as they choose. Organizations looking for funding include the Amherstburg Food and Fellowship Mission, Amherstburg Community Services, Amherstburg Fort Malden Horticultural Society, the Fighting Island Boxing Club, Wings Avian Rehab, Firehorse Leadership Organization, The House Youth Centre, Natural Pathways Learning Centre, the Park House Museum and the local chapter of Safe Families Canada.

“We’ll keep the voting going as long as people are interested,” said Peddie

ACF launches online voting for latest initiative

“Thought Leaders” series continues with how-to guide on building municipalities

The Amherstburg Community Foundation (ACF) presented its fourth night in its “Thought Leaders” series last week with the guest speaker giving tips to municipal leaders how they can grow their municipalities.

The ACF welcomed Jason Thorne to the Libro Centre, with Thorne being the general manager of planning and economic development for the City of Hamilton. Thorne’s talk was entitled “A How-To Guide to Community Building in Smaller and Mid-Sized Cit ies” and drew municipal leaders and the general pub lic not only from Amherstburg, but from surrounding municipalities as well. The majority of Amherstburg town council were among the large crowd at the event as were other area mayors including Kingsville Mayor Nelson Santos and Leamington Mayor Hilda MacDonald.

It was touted that previous “Thought Leaders” speakers spoke about what could be done, with Thorne giving tips on how to do it successfully. Thorne noted that he wasn’t off ering recommendations, but was telling people what worked in Hamilton. He highlighted media reports about Hamilton, which included The Globe & Mail and New York Times, adding “to see this kind of interest and excitement is just fantastic.”

That city’s success didn’t come in one fell swoop, he stated, but was “the culmative eff ect” of doing the little things properly. That includes municipal departments and the citizens working together.

“We don’t have the luxury to work in silos,” said Thorne. “We need to get everyone on the same page.”

One of the topics was “kinder, gentler” bylaw enforcement, noting Hamilton traded in its police-like uniforms for its bylaw officers and replaced them with golf shirts so that they were more relatable. Thorne said he and staff would also go to lunch at new businesses to understand what worked and what didn’t in the city’s systems and processes so that they could further help new businesses going forward. He added that “co-creators” need the room to do their jobs and sometimes the municipality has to “get out of the way” and let them do their thing, noting some events in Hamilton may not be doing everything by the book but bylaw officers are sent elsewhere those nights to let the event thrive.

“You have to give co-creators the space to co-create,” he said.

As it pertains to an art crawl in Hamilton, Thorne remarked the city “did nothing. We let it happen.” Other ideas that Thorne pointed out were “urban intervention,” where special event permits could be applied for to allow people to use public spaces to be creative. A legal gra΀ ti wall was also created in Hamilton to allow people to express their art. Thorne also pointed out ideas like allowing street encroachments for flowers, awnings and signage and to try and “decomplexify things a bit.”

Hamilton has also has concurrent reviews in its streamlined planning process for developments, reducing the amount of time developers have to wait to get started on their projects.

“All of this is about simplifying your processes,” he said.

Thorne noted Hamilton simplifi ed the zoning processes for retail and restaurants and also allowed more food trucks. The latter has led to more “bricks and mortar” restaurants as food trucks have become traditional restaurants instead. Parking regulations were relaxed as well.

“We were putting in unnecessary barriers preventing the businesses from being successful,” said Thorne.

Arts and culture are “infrastructure,” Thorne continued, and cited examples Hamilton has used as “creative industry zoning,” highlighting the city’s music scene including helping churches double as concert halls, allowing buskers and music on patios and creating “musician loading zones” so performers could park their vehicles to load and unload equipment as they needed.

“It showed we are listening and are trying to do something,” said Thorne.

As it pertained to music on patios, Thorne drew applause when he noted Hamilton has asked those whoare concerned over noise volume be the ones to bear the expense of noise testing. Thorne also said Hamilton has tried to “reanimate public spaces” by allowing on-street patios and having groups naturalize or beautify boulevards. He pointed out Hamilton’s vacant building registry to prevent buildings from falling into disrepair, heritage and brownfi eld remediation grants and having design competitions to generate ideas on how to redevelop areas.

“Every city of every size builds something,” said Thorne. “There are opportunities to lead by example.” Thorne acknowledged that every municipality has a budget but believed a lot of what he did in Hamilton didn’t cost a lot of money and made an impact. “Nothing I’ve presented is at all radical,” he said. “Nothing I’ve presented is particularly expensive. Nothing I’ve presented is particularly innovative.”

Thorne urged people to be open to risks and be willing to accept failure as “that is the nature of city build-

ing.”

Councillor Patricia Simone thanked Thorne, stating he brought ideas which will allow local leaders to generate ideas of their own and spark conversation about moving Amherstburg forward into the future.

Readathon to help Citizens for Carnegie

Despite the fact the Citizens for Carnegie reached their fundraising goal through the Amherstburg Community Foundation (ACF), the committee members are working with the Essex County Library to hold another fundraiser.

The Citizens for Carnegie and the Essex County Library are co-sponsoring the Amherstburg Community Readathon Fundraiser to bring in additional dollars for the Amherstburg library refresh. Though it was announced at the March 5 ACF event that Citizens for Carnegie had reached their $40,000 fundraising goal, committee member Shannon Bailey told the group any additional funds would still be put towards the library refresh.

Included in the refresh is updated technology such as new computers, new seating areas, artwork and new books for the 106-year-old building.

Lori Wightman, administrative director with the ACF, said the readathon opened March 1 and runs through April 1. They also worked with Naples Pizza last Monday as the local pizzeria donated ten per cent of its sales from the day to the library refresh initiative.

“Participants can collect pledges and then those who place the highest in the three diff erent age categories will win prizes,” said Wightman.

Prizes are baskets of items from local businesses, she noted.

Age groups are children 6-11 years of age, youth 12-18 years of age and adults 19-and-over.

Pledge forms are available at the Amherstburg library.

ACF announces new round of funding

The Amherstburg Community Foundation (ACF) has announced a new round of projects and successful completion of two others. The ACF held the fourth in its “Thought Leaders” series last Thursday night and used the occasion to announce how its next round of fundraising projects will be decided upon as well as to celebrate the completion of two of its projects that were announced during the fi rst wave of funding..

Richard Peddie, president of the ACF, said the revamped foundation relaunched in its current form eight months ago and has completed three of its fi rst four fundraising targets. One of those – the upgrades to Beaudoin Park in River Canard – was already completed thanks to additional funding from the Amherstburg Accessibility Committee and the Rotary Club of Amherstburg but two more were announced last week.

The Amherstburg Freedom Museum’s “Freedom Achievers” program, which features a high profi le speaker series and a mentorship program – was completed as all $39,000 was raised while the Carnegie Library Refresh achieved its $40,000 fundraising target. The latter includes upgrades to technology, seating,murals and other upgrades.

“We’re looking at a great start to 2020,” said Peddie.

Amherstburg Freedom Museum president Monty Logan said the museum was happy their target hasbeen reached.

“We’re very excited our goal has been accomplished,” he said.

Logan touted the high profi le speaker series has al ready seen Detroit Pistons head coach Dwane Casey come to Amherstburg with the next speaker scheduled to be author Hadiya Roderique., author of “Black on Bay Street,” will discuss “Freedom in the 21st Century” March 28 from 11 a.m.-1:30 p.m. at the museum.

Shannon Bailey, who helped lead the Citizens for Carnegie, said they will continue to put any further donated funds towards the refresh. There is an ongoing readathon underway to raise money for Amherstburg’s Carnegie Library, with pledge forms available at the library, and Naples Pizza also donated ten per cent of its sales from March 2 to the initiative. Bailey added Essex County Library CEO Robin Greenall and board chair Nelson Santos were also very supportive of the refresh prokect.

“Much appreciation to everyone here because you helped us cross the fi nish line,” Bailey told the large crowd at the Libro Centre during last Thursday night’s meeting.

The latest round of fundraising will focus on non-profi t groups in Amherstburg. Entitled the “Believe in Amherstburg” initiative, the ACF will fund up to $7,500 per organization to those who apply and get accepted. Applications were distributed last Thursday night and are also available through the foundation’s website at www.amherstburgfoundation.org.

Administrative director Lori Wightman stated the idea to help fund community organizations stems from her attendance at Amherstburg budget deliberations late last year. She recalled community groups coming before town council looking for money and brought her idea to the ACF board of directors, noting the community groups and museums are working to make the town a better place for all ages.

“It all comes back around to belief,” said Wightman. “The foundation wants to make Amherstburg even better. (The community groups and not-for-profi ts) are the people we should be working with.” Wightman said if applications fi t within the ACF’s values of healthy, inspiring and inclusive, they will be eligible for online voting, which will last from April 1 to May 29. Donations will be awarded through online, community voting as well as voting by the ACF board. Winners will be announced at the ACF event planned for June.

ACF vice president Chris Gibb stated community and service groups are the “icing on the cake” in Amherstburg and they are helping to fund this year’s initiative through “community builders” that each donated $1,000. A total of 27 individuals, couples and businesses have stepped up so far includ-

ing Deputy Mayor Leo Meloche; Jeff and Tammy Ostrow, Bob Luckino; Ryan Deslippe; John D’Alimonte, Kim Wheeler and Jayci Wigle; Eric and April Farron; Dominic Amicone; Fiona Coughlin; Mayor Aldo DiCarlo and his wife Laura; Sean and Karrie Maine; Meg and Loris Boschin; CAO John Miceli; Dave Cowlin, Ron Deneau; John and Melissa Tregaskiss; Mike and Tina Girard; Kirsten Kurzuk; Luigi DiPierdomenico and Beth Preston; Councillor Marc Renaud; Michael and Nancy Greenaway; Robert James and the Anderson Family; Dr. Sean Sinasac; the law fi rm of Hogarth, Hermiston, Severs and Peter and Laura Dobrich.

Gibb added that donations of any size are appreciated.

“This is a community that works together,” he said. “If you donate $50 or $5, it all works together.”

“One-hundred per cent of the money goes back into the community,” added Peddie.

Amherstburg Community Foundation recognizes local business for its donation.

The Amherstburg Community Foundation (ACF) has recognized another local business for its contribution.

The local law firm of Hogarth Hermiston Severs LLP was thanked for its donation to the foundation with ACF director Linden Crain officially presenting a plaque to Tom Hogarth, one of the partners in the firm.

“Linden was a co-op student here and he got involved with it,” said Hogarth. “He showed me literature on it and it was a fantastic idea. The people involved with (the ACF) are high quality. They have a legitimate concern for Amherstburg like I do.”

Hogarth believed the ACF can help “fill in the gaps” by funding projects that may not otherwise receive funding, at least not in the short term. “It makes Amherstburg a better place to live, which is what we want to encourage,” said Hogarth.

Hogarth called supporting the Amherstburg Community Foundation “an easy decision to make” and noted the law firm likes to support local initiatives, organizations and sports teams. “It’s not a hard thing to support them,” he said. “I like this because it involves a lot of projects. It covers a lot of groups. They are all worthwhile to me. I see value in all of these (initiatives).”

Crain said it is important for the ACF to reach out to a lot of different businesses and residents to try and gather financial support for their initiatives, one of which has hit its funding target. “We definitely can’t do it alone,” said Crain. Crain noted donors will receive tax receipts and that members of the foundation’s board of directors will be seeking additional contributors in the future.

“We’re continuing in the new year and we’re definitely going to be reaching out to new businesses.” Hogarth added he encourages other businesses to get involved and noted “we’ll continue to support it.”

“It’s a general way to help the community,” he said. “Fundraisers of this nature is great for the town. It makes Amherstburg a better place to live.”

The Amherstburg Community Foundation will present its fourth installment of its “Thought Leaders” series March 5 at the Libro Centre. The guest speaker that night will be Jason Thorne, general manager of planning and economic development for the city of Hamilton. That event will run from 6:30-8:30 p.m. The three remaining initiatives in the first wave of projects include the Amherstburg Library Refresh, the single-track cycling trail at Holiday Beach Conservation Area and the speaker series and mentorship program at the Amherstburg Freedom Museum. The Beaudoin Park refresh and update in River Canard has seen its fundraising goal met, with the help of additional partners such as the Amherstburg Accessibility Advisory Committee.

For more information about the Amherstburg Community Foundation or to donate, visit www. amherstburgfoundation.org.

Author and media commentator stops in Amherstburg to promote combatting climate change, climate deniers

Thank you from Stella Maris Students

Dear Amherstburg Community Foundation, 

  We would like to thank you for the complimentary tickets to your

climate change presentation. We thoroughly enjoyed it and it raised our

awareness of the Climate Crisis. We now know the dangers of climate

change and what we can do to stop it. We also thank you for the shout-outs

during your presentation, regarding our delegation for tiny houses. It was

very kind of you to recognize us during your presentation. Thank you again

for the invitation and tickets to the presentation.

Sincerely,

The Raybots (Stella Maris School)

Beaudoin Park - Goal Reached!

Team work between the Amherstburg Community Foundation, Town of Amherstburg, the Accessibility Committee, the Rotary Club and businesses/organizations/residents brought us over the finish line for the Beaudoin Park Initiative.

Congratulations and much thanks to all the community builders who took part in this wonderful accomplishment!

Be a Library Person - Letter to the Editor- River Town Times, November 6, 2019

BE A LIBRARY PERSON

Building upon the River Town Times article in the October 30th issue.  

Today libraries are critically important for a healthy community. They educate, inspire and entertain people of all ages. 

But they can only accomplish that if they receive regular investment. In Amherstburg we have a 1913 Carneige jewel - - there are only 66 of them in all of Canada. Unfortunately our library has been neglected and ignored for years. While five Essex county libraries have been revitalized, and Leamington has just opened a beautiful new one; our library has received almost no support. Why is that? 

Thankfully today long time library supporter Shannon Bailey leads a “Citizens for Carneige” action group, backed by the Amherstburg Community Foundation. Together we are championing a library refresh (more titles, more computers, more seating, colourful wall graphics). As I write this Op Ed we are encouraged that people have already donated $29,000 or 72% of the funding target. By going on line right now at amherstburgfoundation.org you can move that number closer to its end goal. But don’t your think our library ambition should be  much larger, much bolder than a refresh? Each dollar your donate says that you care about your library and that you want a revitalized and expanded library. The town owns the land to the south and west of the library so a modern expansion that compliments its historic facade is very possible.  

However like any great cause it needs champions. Amherstburg is lucky that it has Shannon, but I wonder where are the Essex County library board directors that care about Amherstburg and who will go to bat for a library that helps make our town more liveable for all?

Be a Library Person and support this important cause with your dollars and your voice.  

Richard Peddie 

President, Amherstburg Community Foundation 

Amherstburg Community Foundation recognizes local businesses that donated

A pair of local businesses were recognized by the Amherstburg Community Foundation (ACF) for  contributing  to the foundation’s causes.

 Rivertowne  Family Dental  and Mariner’s Rescue bed and breakfast were awarded certificates by ACF board members. ACF director Linden Crain Made  the presentation at Rivertowne Dental to Dr. Sean Sinasac, the latter stating it was Crain who reached out and made the initial contact.

 “I  think  this group  leading the foundation is solid,” said Sinasac. “I  like their initiatives. A group like this in our community deserves our support.”

 The  donation  from Rivertowne Dental will be over three years but  the exact amount was not disclosed.  Sinasac said that businesses regularly get approached for donations and, after due diligence, they decided the ACF was “a good group of  people that are going to do something   good.” He   added they are interested in seeing the community grow.

 Crain said he has been a patient at Rivertown Dental for approximately ten years and has developed  a relationship with Sinasac. He believed some of the initiatives, including the  single-track   cycling trail   at Holiday Beach Conservation Area and the Amherstburg  library refresh, were up Sinasac’s alley and approached him.

 “I  pretty  much reached  out to him and gave him a cold call. I explained the foundation’s four initiatives (which also includes a mentorship and speaker series at  the Amherstburg Freedom Museum and upgrades to Beaudoin Park in River Canard) and he took it from there.”

 Crain added  the ACF wants more youth to get involved and while  they may not have the funds at this stage of their lives, youth can still provide a powerful force and encourage people to get involved.

 “I think it’s important youth in schools  are aware of the foundation,” he said.

 Mariner’s Rescue owners Lauri, John and son Kaine  Brouyette said they purchased the home at 223 Dalhousie St., the former Jewellery by Design location, with the intent of converting it into a luxury vacation home.

 “Who  doesn’t  love Dalhousie St.?” asked Lauri.

 Now that the air B&B is running, they decided to give back. They went to the Gil Penelosa presentation and were inspired to make a donation.  That too was undisclosed.

 “We were sold about all the things that we could do to bring the community together,”  she said.

Kaine  still lives  in Amherstburg while John and Lauri plan to move back after John retires. They  contacted  ACF director Lori Wightman  about making a donation and  Wightman said she was happy to help.

 “The ACF is obviously looking to get buy-in from the community and residents,” said Wightman. “We want to work together  to make the community an even better place.”

 For  more information  on the Amherstburg Community foundation  or to donate, visit  www.amherstburgfoundation.org

Ron Giofu - River Town Times

October 16, 2019