There is still another $20,000 needed to be raised in order to get the Riverside Community Kitchen open and running, but the recent grant from Valley First takes it one step closer.
The Valley First Community Endowment grant of $5000 was presented to Judy Short of Princeton Rotary who heads up the project. “This grant will go towards the air intake system,” said Short as she gave Darren Bitzer and Dean Wonneberg of Valley First a tour of the kitchen in progress.
“We are pleased to present this grant,” said Wonneberg, “being responsible and looking out for our community is what we are about.” “I can see many other great projects developing from this,” he added.
The cost to hook up the air intake system for the kitchen is $48,000 and, “thanks to Valley First, we’ve almost enough to get it done,” said Short.
Dinner Theatre evenings, weddings, receptions, — a place for community events and more are what inspired the Riverside Community Kitchen project.
The kitchen project was started by Rotary three years ago. In that three years $60,000 has been raised with grant funding from: Princeton Weyerhaeuser, the Town of Princeton, district designated grants from Rotary International, Community Foundation of the South Okanagan Similkameen, The Similkameen Spotlight and partnering community businesses, personal donations and by Princeton Rotary fundraisers such as Wine Fest and the Rotary Golf Tournament, and now, the Valley First Endowment grant. “The community of Tulameen has been a huge help and deserves tremendous thanks,” said Short. They donated approximately $3400 worth of bottles towards the project “A special thank you to Mike Sanderson for the organizing and for transporting the bottles,” she added.
Short says that Rotary is grateful for all the support for this project, “we’ve got about another $20,000 to go to finish,” she said, “and we’re going to do it.”