The Souris Cooperative Daycare were this year's recipient for Pembina Co-op's Fuel Good Day campaign.
The Souris Cooperative Daycare provides essential childcare services for families in the Souris-Glenwood community, and they're working hard to raise funds for their expansion project.
Three years ago, plans for a new build began to take shape, but when the local school board received government approval for its own expansion project, the daycare put their plans on hold. Unfortunately, they were recently informed that this proposal has been cancelled, leaving them once again looking at how to take on the project themselves, shares the Pembina Co-op's Fuel Good page.
The Souris daycare is now at capacity and have a growing waitlist of families eager to join. The demand for childcare has never been greater, and the daycare knows an expansion is needed to meet the needs of new and existing families.
“Every contribution brings us closer to making the expansion happen,” says Stacie Murphy, fundraising Board member. “We’ve felt a major need to expand with our community’s childcare demand. Expanding our space will mean more children can access safe, nurturing, and educational care close to home.”
The daycare is in the early stages of exploring what is possible, from choosing a feasible size, to identifying a location, to working through all the steps it will take to make this project a success for our community’s youngest learners, notes the brief write up on the Pembina Co-op website.
Through Pembina Co-op's Fuel Good Day, they were able to raise $1393 for the daycare centre.
"This was a great opportunity for them," shares gas bar Manager, Olivia Whitmore. "The weather was great. The pumps were pumping. Wasps were making their presence known. The BBQ was going and yeah, it was a great day for the Souris daycare!"
Whitmore says they saw strong community support, not just at the gas pumps, where 10 cents of every litre of fuel sold went towards the fundraiser, but also at the c-store with the purchase of coffee and Big Cool Slush that added an extra $1 for each sale.
In addition, the Coke rep donated all the canned drinks and the Old Dutch rep donated the potato chips. All the Souris daycare volunteers and staff had to do was purchase the hot dog, hamburgers and buns.
Pembina Co-op staff were happy to help their local daycare raise these much-needed funds. "There are some parents that have been on their waiting list for two years. So, they're just looking at trying to raise some funds and whatever they can do to try and add on to their building and make it a little bit bigger so they can try and help some of their local parents," explains Whitmore.
Pembina Co-op purchased the Souris White Owl Gas Bar in December of 2019, and since then they've seen a healthy interest in Fuel Good Day.
"2020 was our first year and it was something that was brand new to the community," says Whitmore. "A lot of them didn't really know what Fuel Good Day was. So just over the years it's gotten a lot more out there and the word has been spread. This has been so far our most successful one since we've started it in Souris."
"I think this one was really good this year because parents were spreading the word and board members of the daycare and workers of the daycare, like the word was spread everywhere," she adds. "There were students coming from school at lunch hour because there was a memo put out in the school saying, 'Hey! Barbecue for the daycare!" Souris is very community oriented!"
"I just appreciate everyone's support," adds Whitmore. "No matter what the group is that is receiving the funds from that day or who is putting the BBQ on, the community is always there to support whoever it's for. So, kudos to Souris!"