Grant Recipients

The Grade 3’s at the Minnewasta School had a good idea that grew into something more for local fury friends.

The Grade 3’s held a bake sale and raised $257.65. They were going to donate the monies directly to the Pembina Valley Humane Society (PVHS) but decided to partner with the Morden Area Foundation to create an even larger grant to the PVHS for the much needed new cat and dog beds at the shelter.

Students Mia Brass and Austin Dyck made a presentation to the Morden Area Foundation (MAF) as to why they wanted to donate to the PVHS. The Grade 3’s had gone to a lot of great work learning about non-profits, choosing a local non-profit organization to donate to, making a plan on how to raise monies, and then completing the plan. The MAF Board was so impressed by their work, the Board chose to team up with the Grade 3’s by offering a matching grant for $257. Together the Grade 3’s and the MAF granted $514 to the PVHS.

Congratulations Pembina Valley Humane Society! Thank you for your continued hard work in taking care of Morden and area’s fury friends. And thank you Minnewasta School Grade 3 students for the opportunity to partner with you in the wonderful project.

Thanks to a couple of large donations from Enbridge and the Morden Area Foundation, Morden Fire and Rescue has been able to add a rescue boat to its fleet of emergency vehicles.

The boat is to be used on Lake Minnewasta but can also be accessed within the mutual aid district. “We hope we never use it for saving a life … we want to wear it out training” says Fire Chief Andy Thiessen. “We’ve had a number of instances over the years where we’ve been fortunate enough to obtain a boat that’s already on the water, but that’s not something that we can depend on.” He added “now this is something we can depend on that we can use for rescue purposes.”

The Morden Area Foundation teams up with the Morden Services for Seniors to purchase a much needed new stove. This project was a joint effort involving donations from local seniors plus $1,000 from the MAF. “This project was very exciting to see it come together with the help of so many” says Karen Dyck, Resource Coordinator for the Morden Services for Seniors. “This new stove replaces our old stove of 20 years. Hopefully this will last another 20 years”. This new stove will certainly help with the meal program available for all seniors. The congregate meal programs provide a full course, hot, nutritious meal served at noon Monday – Friday and available to all seniors for a nominal cost. Thank you once again to the generous community of Morden.

Morden can officially call itself a True Sport Community.

Morden Mayor Ken Wiebe and Morden Area Foundation Executive Director Lynda MacLean signed the pledge to adhere to the principals of a True Sport Community on Wednesday.

The Morden Area Foundation partnered with The True Sport Foundation to grant the City of Morden in the amount of $32,000 to be used toward sporting needs identified by the community. In a community focus group the projects selected for funding included: baseball diamond repairs or upgrades, mobile tennis and pickleball nets, as well as official and coaches clinics for a variety of sports.

“Partnering and working together with organizations is at the very core of the Morden Area Foundation. By leveraging MAF funds with True Sport funds, the MAF was able to grant with greater impact to the City of Morden. Now that’s exciting!,” shared MacLean. “The MAF looks forward to working on more projects like this to help build Morden and area into an even greater place to live and visit.”

Mayor Ken Wiebe says it’s part of the city’s mandate, to make Morden as healthy as possible. True Sport Foundation is a series of programs designed to give communities and organizations the means to take advantage of the benefits of sport. Their goal is to make sure everyone’s sporting experience is based on fairness, excellence, inclusion and fun.

Morden is the 3361st Canadian community to join the True Sport Community.

Camp Bridges is a special weekend camp held at the Pembina Valley Bible Camp. It provides a camping experience for children and teens between the ages of 7 – 17 who have experienced the recent death of someone significant in their lives. Camp Bridges offers an opportunity for children and teens to express and learn to live with their grief through engaging in memorial activities and typical camp activities like archery, campfires, horseback riding, and wall climbing.

The MAF is pleased to announce its best donation to date, a commitment of $50,000 towards the new Tabor Home and supportive housing units. The grant will be paid out over a two year period, making a substantial contribution towards Tabor Home’s $3.9 million fundraising goal.

This ground-breaking facility will be built on a ten acre parcel of land along PTH3 west of the Homestead private assisted living complex. Together the two facilities will form a unique complex for seniors, the first of its kind in Manitoba. The new 100 bed Tabor Home will allow our community to better provide for those individuals who require long term care, keeping them close to family and friends who can offer them much needed support.

To learn more about the new Tabor Home and their fundraising drive, visit their website at http://www.taborhome.ca/fundraising-donations/new-tabor-home.

The MAF granted $1,000 towards an $11,000 project to replace shingles on the Morden Community Child Care Centre. Established in 1981, the Centre provides family oriented day care services for children ages 3 months to 12 years, and serves 150 families per month within the community. The MAF strives to help people of all ages through its grants. We are pleased to support children and young families through this initiative.

Mothers, fathers, and children facing challenging times have long benefited from the library at the Pregnancy Care Centre. The Centre’s trained support workers have found that for some issues, clients prefer teaching through DVD’s which provide helpful information and speak about complex issues in simple terms. This grant will assist them in updating some of their video resources which address prenatal preparation and fetal development, pregnancy options, and fatherhood, all key areas for the Centre’s programming.

With this donation the Pregnancy Care Centre’s clients can receive the best possible support and information during this difficult and often stressful time in their lives. Helping young people make good decisions with their pregnancies and into parenthood is important to long term health, well-being, and stable family relationships.

The Canadian Fossil Discovery Centre is one of Morden’s most significant tourism resources, as well as a centre for scientific activity. The Foundation is pleased to partner with the United Way and the Morden Thrift Shop to help the Centre upgrade their classroom facilities. As Foundation board member Ron Westfall said, “When the Fossil Discovery Centre approached us to fund a share of the cost of needed improvements to their classroom, we were happy to oblige. We like to see that our funds can be a part of a cooperative effort.”

Within the museum is a dedicated classroom which is used throughout the year in partnership with schools, by the fossil day camp, and on a day to day basis by their young visitors. The funds were used to purchase tables and twenty-four stacking chairs. This worthwhile project will benefit the children and youth of our community and beyond for years to come.

The fluid boundaries of environmental issues compel us to work beyond our usual geographic boundaries. The visibly deteriorating quality of water in Lake Winnipeg, the world’s 10th largest freshwater lake, is a disturbing sign that the entire watershed is under stress. The MAF joined with other local foundations and the Community Foundations of Canada (CFC) in making a second $1,000 grant to the Consortium to further its scientific study of the Lake Winnipeg watershed.

The Lake Winnipeg watershed is the second largest watershed in Canada. Morden is located within its 1,000,000 km2 area, home to five million people, which extends through four provinces and four U.S. States. The combined contributions of the local foundations and the CFC enabled the Consortium to capitalize on a matching government grant.

Located just five miles west of Morden, the village of Thornhill is known for its friendly residents and country charm. When Theo Allen put in a request on behalf of the Thornhill Community Club for help with a new $20,000 community playground and park, the Foundation quickly jumped in with a $3,000 grant.

The funds were used to erect a fence, play structure, and provide picnic tables and benches. Thornhill now has a beautiful green space for community events and fellowship, as well as a place for residents to gather and visit.

In our fast paced world, we don’t always have time to sit down and read a book. Some of us struggle with reading, and others simply enjoy being read to. The MAF was pleased to assist the Morden Library in purchasing ten digital audio books. Plug in some headphones or link them to your stereo, and the book will be read to you.

The library has received over $15,000 in grants from the Foundation since 1995, and it has a dedicated fund within the foundation which anyone can donate to, providing future financial resources for the library as needs arise.

Launched in 1967 as part of Canada’s centennial celebrations, the Corn & Apple Festival brings tens of thousands of people to Morden the fourth weekend in August to enjoy Morden’s friendly hospitality, free corn and apple cider, as well as free entertainment, a midway, and countless other activities. The Corn & Apple Festival is a family event which caters to all age groups with a variety of wholesome entertainment in a relaxing atmosphere.

The influx of so many visitors every August brings opportunities and challenges, leading the MAF to grant $2,749 towards $4,749 in improvements for the portable public washrooms set up on Nelson Street. The improvements included replacing the paper towel dispensers with electric hand dryers and installing motion detector lights over the stairs in the entrances, providing a safer, more sanitary facility for guests and participants of the Festival.

From December 1st to mid-March, the outdoor rink on the grounds of the Morden Courthouse is used every day. The grant for rink enhancements was spearheaded by Fire Chief Andy Thiessen and Constable Brent Menzies. The improvements included repairs to the boards and ice-cleaning tractor, providing a bench for lacking up skates, and new net near the bench to prevent skaters from getting pucks in the head while they lace up their skates.

The rink is used by groups of all ages and fosters a strong sense of community. Even when the temperatures hit -30º with wind chill, you’ll find brave souls outside enjoying the facility. The Foundation board is proud to support projects like this, ones that make our citizens happier and healthier, and that continue to build a strong sense of community.

In 2008 the Foundation joined with local governments and other rural foundations in pledging $25,000 towards the purchase of a Magnetic Resonance Imager (MRI) for the Boundary Trails Health Centre.

This sophisticated $7,000,000 imager uses magnetic fields and radio frequencies to generate pictures of the inside of the human body. Only the second MRI to be located outside of Winnipeg, it provides thousands of rural Manitobans with more convenient access to quality diagnostic services.

A Rocha, an international non-profit conservation organization, spearheaded the development of the Pembina Valley Raptor Migration Project. The project monitored Manitoba’s premiere spring raptor migration right here in the Pembina Valley, and in doing so promoted awareness and conservation of the biodiversity and habitat right in our own backyard.

This $32,000 project provided environmental education to local students and awareness to the public through the monitoring of raptors (birds of prey). It also brought economic benefits to Morden as visitors and project participants patronized local businesses enroute to the Pembina Valley. Recent spring bird counts include 8,000 sightings of the spring migrating Red-tailed Hawks, making the Pembina Valley North America’s top site for viewing these birds, as well as more than 1,000 Bald Eagles and 95 Golden Eagles, a Manitoba record.

The Pembina Hills Arts Centre is dedicated to encouraging the growth and diversity of arts and culture for the 52,000 people who live in Morden and the surrounding area. More than 8,500 visitors come and visit the Centre every year, viewing the work of our talented local artists. The Foundation is pleased to provide $1,000 toward a new $4,800 art hanging system, one which makes the job of hanging and removing art exhibits much easier. The Arts Centre may be in a historical building, but their equipment is not!

The Child Development Centre provides low cost, high quality day care for parents completing their high school education at the Morden Adult Learning Centre. Many of these students are unable to find or afford day care for their children, making the Child Development Centre an important part of their academic journey.

Until recently the Centre’s programs were limited to the use of their indoor facility, but now the children are able to enjoy a safe outdoor play space. The design features a play structure, tractor tire, canoe, and lots of greenery, as well as an area with tables for children who want to rest or participate in outdoor art activities. The Foundation provided $1,500 towards the cost of the fence. The total project cost was $6,500.