Workplace health & safety training mandatory July 1

Planning for the upcoming WDMH Auxiliary’s Bazaar was front and centre at the August 8, meeting of the group’s board of directors.

The popular event will be held at the Joel Steele Community Centre in Winchester the year on October 19. The official opening will take place at 11 a.m. 

An elevator is available for those who would find the stairs an obstacle.

Returning features are: the bake table, produce sale, silent auction, tea room, sale of cheese and honey and a 50/50 raffle. A door prize will also be awarded and the auxiliary’s award winning Christmas Plum Puddings will be available for $12 each.

New this year will be a fashion show and sale of Jockey Ladies’ wear, and other local vendors with handmade items at reasonable prices. Everyone is welcome to attend this auxiliary fund raiser. 

Hospital CEO Cholly Boland informed the board that a five year strategic plan for the hospital has been finalized. 

It focusses on three areas: continuing the positive things being done now, working closely with the community in palliative care and care for seniors and researching ways to better serve the rural population. 

In closing, Boland expressed his sincere appreciation for all that the hospital’s volunteers do for WDMH.

The Auxiliary provided state of the art Baxter IV pumps to the hospital last year at a cost of $297,000 and has agreed to purchase several more with the cost of the additional units being $55,00.

Volunteer coordinator Alan Archer told the board that volunteers offered 925 hours of service to WDMH in July bringing the total for 2013 to 6,592. 

He emphasized that new volunteers are always needed at the hospital and anyone interested in offering a few hours each month may contact him at the hospital.

President Nancy Farley-Holmes announced that three local, longtime hospital volunteers will receive Provincial Life Membership Awards this year. 

The well-deserving recipients are Grace McAuley, Ruth Shearing and Betty Wilson. These awards  are presented at the Hospital Auxiliaries Association of Ontario convention which will be held in Toronto in November.

All members of the auxiliary are invited to attend a membership meeting on Thursday, September 12, 1:30 p.m. in room C401 at the hospital. It will include an informative and relevant presentation in the area of health care.

[…]

IROQUOIS – The suicide rate in Stormont, Dundas and Glengarry and Prescott-Russell is twice the provincial average. That is the reason the local Canadian Mental Health Agency and people like Augusta Waddell, believe so strongly in the importance of mental health promotion in schools.

Waddell’s late son suffered from mental health issues and since his loss, Waddell has tirelessly worked toward improving mental health locally, by making the community more aware of the help and resources that are available. Also, she has been part of fundraising initiatives that have helped bring funds and awareness to programs that she believes are important to have locally. 

Joanne Ledoux-Moshonas, manager of mental health promotions with the local mental health agency, accepted a cheque November 1, from Augusta Waddell and Margaret Swerdfeger, who organized a Halloween dance and silent auction fundraiser. The well-supported event raised $6,166.

“The event was great,” said Waddell.  “The support was amazing.” 

Swerdfeger, said that the silent auction featured some wonderful items, generously donated by both individuals and business, not only locally but from across the region. 

“People were very supportive of the auction, but what was remarkable, was that people who came to the event and supported the auction, often just wrote a cheque to donate to the cause too,” said Swerdfeger. “People are just so generous.”

Ledoux-Moshonas was overwhelmed by the amount of money raised through this one time event. 

The CMHA’s Mental Health Promotion in Schools program is not at all supported through government funding, so all of the funds that make this program which costs about $175,000 to operate annually, comes through fundraising and donations.

Mental Health Promotion in Schools is a program that the CMHA strives to take to every school, especially intermediate and high schools. 

The five day program works on day one to dispel myths, teaches about the various disorders on day two and day three focuses on suicide prevention. 

“That is an important focus,” said Ledoux-Moshonas, adding that the suicide rate in this area is twice that of the provincial average. 

Day four educates students on stress management and the supports that are available to help and day five features a guest speaker who shares a personal experience with mental illness.

The CMHA works in the schools to try and alleviate some of the stigma surrounding mental health. Stigma continues to be a huge problem for people living with mental illness. 

This stigma can hinder those with mental illness and their families from reaching out for the help they need.

Waddell sees this stigma as a barrier for the family support group sessions that she has organized to take place once a month in Iroquois. While people will stop her on the street for a chat, she still has yet to have people come to the family support group sessions. 

“People want to talk, but they won’t come, because they are embarrassed. Often they are frustrated by the system, and if they would come out, we could share our experiences and help. Talking about it makes life easier,” said Waddell. 

She will continue to be at the Iroquois Civic Centre at 6 p.m., the third Tuesday of every month, for anyone who needs the family support group. Anyone interested or with questions can email Augusta directly at augusta.waddell@gmail.com

[…]

Change is in the air for many of the United Churches within the Seaway Valley Presbytery.

Presbytery Chair, Wendy Wright MacKenzie revealed that last year the Seaway Valley Presbytery received “a number of requests from the people in the pews for help in addressing over-all declining membership.”

“We realized that the people knew their community better than anyone else,” said Wright MacKenzie, “and so in January 2011, 85 people gathered to dream about what the church might look like in a changing world.”

“In March 2011, over 800 people gathered at North Dundas High School for a vote to divide the Presbytery up into districts in order to continue a process of visioning and change. There was an overwhelming YES vote.”  

“Since that time, the congregations have been doing self-reflections and analysis. By November 28th, all congregations within the Seaway Valley Presbytery voted on whether they wanted to be in conversation with other churches to discuss possibilities for the future,” she continued.  

“At this time, we have 13 churches already in conversation, visioning and dreaming of what it might look like when following a different model of being ‘church’.”  

Iroquois United Church Reverend Janet Evans revealed that the “Iroquois United Church has a team of four people who will be meeting with some local churches – Brinston, Hulbert Valley, Williamsburg – to see where we might go from here.”

 The United Church in Williamsburg was recently listed for sale. The congregation, like so many  others, has grown too small to manage the upkeep of such a large and outdated building. 

Retired Reverend Ralph Taylor recently joined the Williamsburg United Church to help the congregation through the upcoming changes.

Taylor said that he is there on a renewable six-month contract, but will stay “as long as it takes.”

As for the decision to sell the church in Williamsburg, Taylor admitted that it wasn’t an easy choice to make for the congregation. “Some are more excited than others and some are anxious,” he said.

“The congregation is getting older and the cost of maintaining (the church) means they’d just be focused on maintaining, not on missions,” said Taylor.

He admitted that the choice is ‘heart wrenching’. “But what other choice do we have at this point?”

Currently, Williamsburg’s United Church congregation is meeting at the J.W. MacIntosh Seniors Support Centre on Sundays.

The congregation will return to the church in March, if it hasn’t sold. When it does sell, the congregation will seek an alternative location in the area.

Taylor admitted that “eventually they’ll be joining another congregation, but it will take a little while.”

With this news, comes the question of what will happen to the many other United Churches within South Dundas. How will they fare in the months and years to come?

According to Evans, “people from Iroquois United Church are both excited and nervous about the changes that will inevitably come our way.”

“Iroquois United Church, for example, has been able to support a full-time minister which means that the present minister has time to care for all of the shut-ins who are associated with our congregation,” she explained.

“Perhaps more people will have needs when several churches work together under a new model. Lay people may have to undertake more of the church’s work.”

“No one really wants to lose their building but that may or may not happen under a new structure,” she said, adding, “new structures could mean, however, more people coming together to offer their gifts and talents in God’s service.”

Wright MacKenzie said, “we realize that everything in life changes.” 

“The way to experience our worship needs an extreme makeover,” she added, pointing out that “the world is changing and so we have to look at new ways of what it means to reach out to the community. The way we ‘do worship’ does not appeal to the younger generation so we need to also look at some other options.”

“This is still very much a work in progress so it is exciting to see what the congregations come up with as they talk together.”

“Change is always somewhat nerve wracking but God will be with us as we journey into the future,” reminded Evans.

The Presbytery, according to Wright MacKenzie, will continue to offer help and support in whatever way possible.

As for the years to come, she said, “time will tell what this looks like in the future. This is completely in the hands of the people in the pews.”

[…]