September 28, 2020
Planning was our greatest challenge this year, but creativity, flexibility and innovation were our strengths!
Covid restrictions dictated what type of events we could host for our community. Our well loved, and well attended, traditional beach opening and closing events were cancelled. Our beach closing was cancelled a week before our planned event due to the changes announced for outdoor gatherings by our premier last week.
The silver lining in all of this is that we were able to engage a new partner in our community, Consortium Jules Léger, a school and resource centre for francophone students with special needs. We were also very pleased to make some personal connections with families with young children in our community to encourage participation in the events that did go forward. Our board members spoke personally with parents and children playing in the street. As a result we have new “Friends of Westboro Beach”. I am also pleased to report that we were able to continue to support one of our long standing partners, Carlington Community Health Centre, in one of our events.
All events were publicized on our social media sites ( web page, FaceBook, Instagram and Twitter). We included Park People hash tags and graphics as instructed.
We had three successful events this summer:
- Westboro Beach Scavenger Hunt – August 2020
- 4 volunteers from the WBCA created the scavenger hunt clues. The objective was to have people get to know their neighbourhood. It included clues along the river and green space, the beach, the Selby Plain and the flora, fauna and wildlife in our neighbourhood. It was great to see families exploring the neighbourhood with their list of clues!
- 33 people participated – 21 adults, 9 children, 3 teens
- We also had interest from people outside of the neighbourhood.
- Two of the teens got the highest number of points!
- All participants received a gift card from 4 different local businesses
Van Lang Neighbourhood Chalk Art Contest – August 24 to September 4, 2020
- Staff from Carlington Community Health Centre, volunteers from WBCA, Ottawa Housing Corporation and the Westboro Tenants Association worked together to plan and implement this project.
- The contest ran from August 24 to September 4
- Children in the targeted neighbourhood drew pictures or positive messages with chalk
- All the children participating received sidewalk chalk packages (100 chalk kits were distributed) and shared photos of their art and had their name entered for gift cards to Dairy Queen
- 12 children submitted photos and they all received a gift card
- 4 volunteers worked on this event
Chalk Art Event – September 17 and 19, 2020
- 50 Jules Léger students participated in the chalk art event on Thursday, September 17
- The WBCA provided the students with supplies
- 2 teachers and 2 WBCA volunteers were involved
- On Saturday, September 19, another chalk art event was held on the pathway between Selby Street and Beachgroove Street
- We had 25 people participating in two separate shifts (to allow for physical distancing on the path)
- 7 volunteers were involved in planning and hosting this event
Westboro Beach Community Association 