Kelowna comes through for kettle campaign with almost $1M raised

A huge increase in demand for services from the Salvation Army of Kelowna/Lake Country in 2020 was met by a surge in donations this past Christmas.

Even though the demand for service increased by 61 per cent during the year, the Salvation Army kept its Christmas fundraising goal the same as 2019 at $700,000.

They received $929,000.

“We are overwhelmed with gratitude and humbled by the support from this community,” Captain Darryl Burry, lead pastor and executive director of the Kelowna/Lake Country Salvation Army, said in a news release. “This has been a hard year, where at numerous times the financial challenges were very heavy to bear.”

In December, the chapter helped 659 households, a 25% increase over 2019, and 1,150 children were given toys for Christmas.

The need for services doesn’t end with Christmas so anyone who wants to help out can go to their website here.


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Rob Munro

Rob Munro has a long history in journalism after starting an underground newspaper in Whitehorse called the Yukon Howl in 1980. He spent five years at the 100 Mile Free Press, starting in the darkroom, moving on to sports and news reporting before becoming the advertising manager. He came to Kelowna in 1989 as a reporter for the Kelowna Daily Courier, and spent the 1990s mostly covering city hall. For most of the past 20 years he worked full time for the union representing newspaper workers throughout B.C. He’s returned to his true love of being a reporter with a special focus on civic politics