Morden Youth for Christ Executive Director Ryan Smith is grateful for the community support allowing them to purchase a 15-passenger Ford transit van to take kids in one vehicle on outings this summer.
Smith said this purchase wouldn't be possible without community support.
"We were excited that the community came behind us and raised a whole bunch of money to provide it, and it's going to be a great tool to be able to take more kids on more trips, do more stuff, reach more kids. We're excited about that."
The support came from a few areas of Morden.
"We did have an anonymous donor from the community who helped out a whole bunch, we had community members who poured in quite a bit of funds. The United Way, the Morden Community Thrift Shop, they all joined in to help us. It's been great."
Smith shared some of the outings planned for the summer.
"We take kids on powerboats etc, and this is enabling us to take a lot more kids at the same time on those sorts of trips. Also going to beaches, like Grand Beach and stuff. For some of them, it's the farthest they've ever been in their life." adding, "It enables us to pick up kids potentially and connect with kids farther away and even potentially in communities that are outside of Morden to bring them in for programming."
Smith elaborated on the depth of the impact on kids in Morden and even the YFC in Pilot Mound.
"They are able to do things through Youth for Christ they're not able to do that many of us would take for granted. You're able to laugh, have fun, have a great time, especially if young people are in kind of a tough situation at home or have limited resources, we're able to provide basically free programming to vulnerable and at-risk youth in the community. We can all remember just how many memories are built on buses like that throughout the years."
He reiterated gratitude, on behalf of the board and staff at YFC.
"We're so grateful for the generosity of the community, and we just appreciate the willingness to come behind us in this project and just the ability to connect with more kids, connect with different kids that might not have an opportunity to come to our programming."