The Estevan community came out in a major way on the weekend as the Estevan Elks club held a golf fundraiser, looking to raise money for the St. Joseph's Hospital Foundation's MRI Project. The golf tournament, held on Saturday, July 19th at Hidden Valley Golf Resort, brought out plenty of golfers and also hosted an auction to help raise money.
Donald Hilstrom, the president of the Estevan Elks, says it was a huge success.
"We started organizing this tournament back in March and worked with the Hospital Foundation, and we wanted to do something towards the MRI, of course, and the community got behind it great. We had about 116 golfers, and we had a Dutch auction after the bison meal and the Dutch auction brought in $16,000 towards the MRI. So that went very well."
The tournament consisted of a four-man scramble, with the winners receiving a $1,200 prize for the win, along with $400 going to whoever got the closest first shot to the hole for a total cash prize of $7,000.
Even though the weekend was host to a couple of storms, Hilstrom says the golfers were able to weather the conditions and get some rounds in.
"The weather was good. It was a gusty wind, but we were down at Hidden Valley, and they did an excellent job on preparing the course, and everything went smoothly as far as from their end. I can't say too much more about it; the conditions were excellent."
Hilstrom says that making sure an MRI can be built in Estevan to serve the southeast community is a great cause to golf for.
"The MRI is so important for anybody in the southeast for kind of travel time, and you're going to have to drive to Regina or get into Alberta and all those things. A huge expense for families to do that. So we felt the MRI was probably the best place to put some donation money."
With such a hit tournament this year, the Elks are already planning out another charity tournament for next year for another area where community money is needed.
Hilstrom says he's hopeful that with the tournament's contributions and everyone else chipping in, Estevan can get a big help up with the MRI Project.
"Everybody is behind the MRI in Estevan and the surrounding area. We had golf there from Whitewood, it's a couple of hours away. So everybody's kind of bought into getting the MRI done."
The MRI Project has less than half a million dollars more needed to be fundraised of their $6.5 million, with construction already started on their new wing, which will host the MRI machine.