Salvation Army Kettle Campaign expected to miss campaign goal

It’s been a challenging year for many people, and the same can be said for the Salvation Army’s Kettle Campaign.

The campaign is hovering around the halfway mark of its $350,000 fundraising target in the final days leading up to Christmas.

Judy Regamey is the director of family services with the Salvation Army. She said it’s still heartwarming to see people wanting to give so much when it may not be the easiest thing to do.

“It’s always great with Saskatoon, we always seem to be able to count on the support of the community,” Regamey said.

One of the biggest donors in the city has been The Murray and Audrey Neufeld Charitable Foundation. They are matching a total of $18,000 that was collected last Friday.

“The Neufeld family are great supporters of The Salvation Army. That’s very kind of them and that’s going to bring our total up a little bit more,” Regamey.

There are roughly 200 volunteers helping out this year during the pandemic at 13 different locations around the city. Regamey said they normally see several more in a typical year but understands they are still in a unique situation.

“People are still a bit hesitant to volunteer. Over the years, we’ve had lots of seniors that have loved to do this. There’s lots of them that are still not quite there (and) that is totally understandable and we get that,” she said.

“We’ve also had lots of families that would stand at the kettles and those numbers have dropped as well. People are still a bit unsure, we’re still in the middle of this pandemic. We think we’re on the other side, and we’re not,” Regamey said.

With the lack of senior volunteers and larger families taking up the majority of roles, it was time for a change of pace.

Regamey said seeing an uptick in younger volunteers was a refreshing sight.

“We’ve approached the high schools because there’s some community hours that teenagers have to put in. We’ve had lots of teenagers that have said they’d be happy to stand there.”

The Kettle Campaign goes until Christmas Eve and Regamey would love to see a late surge to close out the year.

“Really asking people to stop and say hello to that volunteer and throw in some money. That would be great,” she added.