If United Way Alberta Northwest doesn’t get some more donations in the next few days, there will be some organizations in the community losing out on some money this year. Executive Director Brenda Yamkowy says they are pacing about 27 per cent behind what they should be but this is not much different than last year. There were also less donations coming in as well.
“We dipped into a little bit of reserves last year and gave more money to our community partners. Thinking that this was going to rebound and that didn’t happen. It is going to mean our community partners will see a decrease in funding.”
In the 2014/2015 year, the organization pulled in around $89,000 from special events but this year those funds have gone down by more than half.
“We have recognized that in the last year we have seen an economic downturn. We identify that through our stats that where we are down and out is our workplace campaigns.”
In the previous year, the organization collected around $518,000 from those campaigns. This year they have only collected around $300,000 so far.
Yamkowy says they hope that Grande Prairie can pull through with some donations. What they make by March 31st will determine what their community partners get.