CHESTERMERE – It was just this year the government decided to stop producing the ever so popular penny from the Canadian currency and it will no longer be circulated in Canada as of Feb. 4, 2013. The holiday and winter buying season is important to Canadian retailers so the Feds have decided to hold off until the New Year with the demise of the copper coin.
Now, as we have said all along, there are some pretty creative people who live right here in Chestermere so these creative people saw a need and saw an opportunity to fill that need. The creative people are leaders and kids at the Chestermere Recreation Centre Before and After School who have named their project “Mere Pennies” as in ChesterMERE. The 52 youngsters registered in the BAS program started collecting pennies in early November from pretty much anywhere they could and decided to donate the proceeds to the Christmas With Dignity campaign. The kids broke into 9 teams and challenged each other to collect more than the next group. Each team got creative and chose a name for them. How’s this for creativity – The Cool Fundraisers, Awesome Pennies, Coin Bros, Jackpot, Xmas Penny Kiss, The Millionaires, Mr. Penny and finally the LAJBKS (which is just the first initials of each of the team members). Greta Houston, Head Program Leader, said “It was wonderful to see how the kids got so excited about this fundraiser; the kids even brought in their own piggy banks and donated the money inside them”.
The contest and fundraiser ended on December 12 with a total of $500 going to the Christmas With Dignity Campaign. The winning team was the LAJBKS and the prize for winning was that the kids were allowed to wrap up and decorate the after school leaders like Christmas presents and a Christmas tree.
Many thanks to the Out Of School Leaders who helped out so much; they are Megan Mailman, Emily Hartman, Haley Mosher and Matthew Wright.
