A Special Day

The Rock hands out treats for charities
By Roger Knox - Vernon Morning StarPublished: October 31, 2008

Four local organizations found a big lump in their Halloween treat bag on Friday.
And they couldn’t be happier about it.
The Vernon and District Community Land Trust, Vernon Food Bank, Upper Room Mission and B.C. Teen Challenge received cheques totalling $100,000 from the Vernon-based The Rock Developments Corporation at a special ceremony Friday morning.
The cheque presentations were held Halloween morning at The Rock on Heritage, a 60-unit townhouse project located at 4900 Heritage Drive off Bella Vista Road.
It was the developers way of giving something back to the community.
“We want to be a responsible organization and be a community building a community for the betterment of the community,” explained Michael Molnar, joined by project partners Cornell Mulder and David Claeys for the presentations.

The partners, in 2006, set out to fill a gap in Vernon’s affordable housing market, noting that there were few affordable projects for first-time and average income home buyers, and not very many multi-family dwellings.
When they started out The Rock, they set out a condition among the investors: all would agree that a portion of the proceeds from the sale of The Rock units would be donated to charitable organizations in Vernon that would benefit people in need in the community.
The Rock is also donating $100,000 towards a number of projects overseas.
“We were all excited a couple of weeks ago that, on the morning the Dow Jones dropped by 800 points, we’re having a meeting deciding what to do with $200,000,” said Molnar.
The Vernon and District Community Land Trust, an entity that works with people to provide hope and shelter, were the biggest beneficiaries, receiving a cheque for $50,000.
“There’s all kinds of death, destruction and despair out there, we’re bordering on a world recession, and we have a corporation like The Rock doing the right thing for the right reason, providing money for not only shelter, but for hope,” said Randy Kolibaba, director of the Vernon and District Community Land Trust.
“Without hope, there’s no community. There’s no nothing.”
Kolibaba said his organization is working on a couple of projects that he can’t release details on at this time, but said the $50,000 “will help the community immeasurably.”
The Salvation Army Food Bank and the Upper Room Mission each received $20,000. David MacBain from the Food Bank said the cheque was the largest corporate donation ever received in the nine years he’s been in Vernon with the Salvation Army.
Andrew Yeo, manager of the Upper Room Mission, was only too pleased to get a phone call from Molnar’s group.
“It’s not everyday someone calls and says we have $20,000 for you,” smiled Yeo.
B.C. Teen Challenge, a faith-based ministry that helps youth, young adults and adults out of addiction, received $10,000. Representative Aaron Tilley announced that the money would go towards helping establish a women’s centre in the Okanagan Valley.
A cheque for $25,000 was given to the international Christian-based Be-A-Hero organization, which will use the money to support a children’s welfare project in Uganda. Picking up the money for Be-A-Hero was Wesley Campbell, son of former Vernon councillor and provincial MLA Don Campbell, who is now a pastor at a Kelowna church.
Other international projects to receive money from The Rock include an orphanage in the Ukraine and one that buys water well drilling equipment for Africa.

Phil Callaway


Funny, entertaining, thought provoking, honest, relevant, challenging,.....oh and did we mention Very Funny?These are just a few of the words to describe humourist Phil Callaway's "performance" at the Upper Room Mission's 2008 Fundraising Event held on Thursday October 9th. Those in attendance were held captive by his humorous real life stories, and challenged to examine what our responsibility is to those in need around us.Thank-you Phil for the deep lessons you deposited into us through the use of humor and for your openness and transparency. Thank you Mark Wensley for the beautiful music. Those of you who attended the sold out event, we thank-you for your support and the encouragement each of you are to the Mission.
We appreciate you more than may know!

What It's All About


Received a nice email today:

we would like to thank to thank the upper room mission for the help and support that you gave us in our time of need. Youll be happy to know that Ian is six weeks from reciving his buisness administration deploma, and i am a very happy, proud mother and plan to attend collage in march of next year. Here are some pictures of our family, we hope you enjoy them. we will keep in touch. thanks again.

Love Ian Casey Vanessa and Rex
T*Y*C

Thank You Global Ed and Home Depot!

Some overdue thanks are owed to the Global Ed Class for coming in and serving an excellent lunch of spaghetti, salad, garlic toast and fruit salad. Not a person (me included) went away with a very full and satisfied stomach!

Also, a huge thank you to Howard and staff at Home Depot for our excellent new shelving unit - it's brightened the kitchen up tremendously - thank you!!!

Congratulations!

Congratulations to Rick and Ellen, married last Friday afternoon in Polsen Park, by our very own Mission Chaplain Dave Bootsma!

By all accounts, it was a beautiful ceremony and we pray an even more beautiful union for the both of you in the years to come!

You're Invited!

In Memoriam

I can't put into the words, the loss and sadness we all feel at the passing of our volunteer and friend, Bert Dueck. I can't describe him or pay homage to him more beautifully, nor eloquently than his family did at his memorial this past Sunday. In short, we miss you Bert, we love you Berta and we cherish the time we were able to spend together... your quiet, gentle, warm and kind spirit we will dearly missed here at the Mission.

We look forward to seeing you again in Eternity. Farewell dear brother.