What we Do
What we Do
This busy club of 26 members, doing the work of 52 has been serving the Kapuskasing area since 1966.
This little club who can, is very well respected in this community; if there is something happening in town, you can rest assured that Rotary is there, supporting it.
The Rotary Club of Kapuskasing has always been and continues to be involved in numerous community events including the Kapuskasing Lumberjack Festival an event in which they have been platinum sponsors for many years.
The Rotary Club of Kapuskasing accepted the reins of the Kapuskasing Food Bank in June 2016, and immediately instilled professionalism, organization and enthusiasm in typical Rotary standard of excellence. All members of our progressive club became involved in the Food Bank operations in one way or another. The Food Bank is housed in the same building as our Rotary Hall, so it’s readily accessible by our members for involvement and participation.
The day to day workings of the Food Bank are run by dedicated Rotarians and are answerable to a Board of 6 Rotarians.
The operation was completely overhauled, upgraded and improved, with only the wellbeing of its clients being the priority. We initiated personal, individualized service, a point system for shopping, improved food selection, more variety, fruits, vegetables, milk, eggs and packaged meats when possible.
Paramount to our mission, we injected dignity and respect for our 250 clients, and at the same time, made them accountable and gave them responsibility for their actions and decisions.
The Food Bank gave the Rotary Club an avenue to become more involved in the social services in our community and diversify our abilities to reach out and create more contacts to touch more members of our community. For example, partnering up with the Centre de Santé, a non-profit health centre focused on community health, is a unique and dynamic initiative, the first in Ontario, and allows us to broaden our impact on the Anglophone and Francophone members of our Northern municipality.
Our club is very proud of our impact in the lives of our citizens and the Food Bank is another perfect example of Rotarians doing what we do best...making a difference in the world!
If operating the Food Bank is not enough to keep the members of the Kapuskasing club busy, the following is a list of some of the other projects that they have been involved in:
The Hospice Suite at the local hospital. Not only have they sponsored this unit with a $50,000 donation, a few of the club members were involved in the final design, selecting the furniture and decorating the suite to give it a homey, comfortable look.
In the 2018 - 2019 Rotary year, the club applied for and received a District Grant to supply therapeutic equipment for the Kapuskasing chapter of the Cochrane Temiskaming Children’s Treatment Centre. And in 2019 - 2020 they applied for a Grant for a Slow Cooker Workshop for low income people. Unfortunately due to the COVID 19 outbreak, the workshops had to be cancelled. They have since found a workaround for this project and has ben implemented during in February 2021.
To help with the local environment, the club, in partnership with a local group called GREEN TK (Growing Roots for Each and Every Northerner, Town of Kapuskasing) to build a park at a corner of the Ash and Cedar Street intersection. This project was also assisted by a District Grant. In the Fall of 2019, the Town of Kapuskasing dedicated this park as the “Rotary Park”.
The club is also involved in developing a series of hiking trails that will start in the local park and lead hikers down the river to a set of falls that have attracted would be hikers for many years. The planning stages are finalized and work is constantly going on to make these trails as attractive and useable as possible while maintaining the integrity of it being a "Hiking Trail". You can visit the Hiking Tail Facebook page by clicking here: Kapuskasing Rotary Club Hiking Trails.
And again, assisting the community’s health care system, the club recently made a $75,000 donation towards the fundraising efforts for a CT Scan to the local hospital.
An ongoing fundraiser to assist the Youth Services committee raise funds for the Youth Services programs such as the Long-Term and Short-Term Exchanges and RYLA, is our Rotary Radio Day. Not only does this event raise significant funds to assist our local youth, it is also a great venue for the club to create awareness by talking about the services we provide and what we do in our community.
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