A new, dedicated fundraising committee will be helping the Weyburn Theatre Community Service Co-operative. Announced by the president of the co-operative, Ryan Janke, the committee will be looking to help bring the community-driven project to completion. The announcement also comes on the heels of the announcement of a major donation by the Weyburn Young Fellows last week, and the pouring of the foundation Friday morning.
The new committee will have a focus on engaging local businesses to help the final fundraising gap the theatre project has, thanks to inflationary challenges. Janke also noted they come with expertise in fundraising, something he stated the members of the board don’t necessarily have.
“We have had the ability with just the few members of our board, and none of us really have a lot of fundraising experience directly,” the board president told Discover Weyburn. “So, we've got some experts who wanted to volunteer a little bit of their time, a little bit of their experience to move this around.”
Janke explained the committee will be coming up with some unique sponsorship opportunities, and plans to proactively approach the community.
“They’ve really helped us out a lot in tailoring the stuff to the sponsorship opportunities, to the kind of thing that appeals to a local business,” he said. “Make sure that everyone has an opportunity to be a part of this, to push it forward.”
Janke also said that while the committee will be proactively approaching businesses soon, anyone interested in sponsorship opportunities can also reach out to any of the board members.
The launch of the fundraising committee comes on the heels of a donation of $150,000 from the Weyburn Young Fellows. Combined with their previous donation of $100,000, it brings their total contribution to the project to $250,000.
There is also now the work done on the foundation, which was poured last Friday. This gives the project what Janke called a “permanent fixture” on 3rd Street in downtown Weyburn, and is giving the project some momentum as it enters the final stretch.
For those behind the Weyburn Theatre Community Service Co-operative, it is more than just dollars and cents. It is about providing an opportunity for the whole community of Weyburn, and the surrounding communities, to feel a part of helping to make the theatre a reality.
“I want the whole community to feel like they have some ownership, like they helped make this possible,” Janke shared. “Because really, without community support, we wouldn’t have gotten this far, and we would never get to the finish line.”