Volunteers with the Winkler and District Christmas Cheerboard were hard at work last week bringing joy to hundreds of local families.
Cheerboard volunteers spent Tuesday and Wednesday at the Meridian Exhibition Centre wrapping up children’s presents to go out with the grocery gift cards delivered to 397 households in and around Winkler.
Cheerboard president, Crystal Rempel notes that number is down a bit from 2022.
“We actually did 424 last year, but we did change our application system this year,” she said, explaining they moved applications online and tweaked some of the guidelines to ensure the hampers are getting to the right people.
Rempel said they looked at the Manitoba Housing criteria and also worked with Central Station to ensure the application process was as fair as possible and accessible to those families who need help putting food on the table through the holidays. They also work closely with the school liaison workers and other service providers to ensure qualifying families are aware of the program.
“We still want to make it easy enough that people that need it can get it,” she said, noting they’ll be assessing how the changes went this year and if further adjustments are needed.
There’s a lot of diversity in the families the Cheer Board helps each year, Rempel shared. It ranges from single-person households to large families, longtime Winkler residents as well as many newcomers to the community and to Canada.
Every hamper included a Co-op gift card for recipients to use on groceries. Every child under 12 received a wrapped toy purchased at cost from Janzen’s Hobbyland or Canadian Tire, while older kids received gift cards to Canadian Tire or Superstore.
Moving the grocery part of the hampers to gift cards instead of an actual hamper filled with food gives recipients more control over what they’re getting, Rempel noted.
“With how diverse our community has become, this allows them to get things they will use,” she said. “They can buy according to what their family uses and will eat … it empowers them to be able to make those choices.”
On the fundraising front, the Cheerboard had raised $86,453 of its $130,000 goal as of last week.
Rempel is confident donations over the next few weeks will bring them closer to that goal.
“It’s always a little nervous in the end of November, because that’s when we decide how much we’re giving out,” she said. “But people are just kind of gearing up for Christmas right now.
“Over the past years, the money still keeps coming in to the end of December and into January. So we can’t just bank on what we see now … we haven’t met our goal yet, but we anticipate that we will.”
If you’d like to help them do that, head to winklercheerboard.com to make a donation.
“We’re so appreciative of everyone who stands behind us for the greater good,” Rempel said. “This is for our neighbours and it’s for our family members and it’s for our friends.
“We all want to just be there for each other and support each other through challenging times.”
