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Volunteers feel 'relief and excitement' after saving local camp

'We are looking forward to a whole new and different chapter for the camp now,' says club president of successful effort to save former Girl Guide camp

After a five-year battle to save a former Girl Guide camp from closing, The Camp Tewateno Optimist Club volunteers are breathing a huge sigh of relief knowing it will live to see another day. 

The group had set up multiple fundraisers over the years to try to raise the $300,000 needed to purchase the 100-acre camp, but as their Oct. 30 deadline loomed, had begun to lose hope that the camp would be saved. Much to their surprise, a local group stepped up at the last minute to save the camp.

“Communities Connecting For Children decided to help us, and they put up the $300,000 for the camp. We were able to close the deal, but it didn’t close until Nov. 5 because they came on at the last minute and there was a lot of back and forth with lawyers,” said club president Joyce Goodenough.

“I have known those women for a long time as they were members of the original camp committee. I knew they had the best interest of the camp at heart and so did we," she said.

Communities Connecting For Children, a registered charity that brings outdoor education, cultural awareness and health and wellness to children and families, plans to keep Camp Tewateno as a campground, said Goodenough, adding the two groups will work together as partners to keep the property and the camp going.

Denise Calvert, president of the charity, said when they were approached by the Optimist Club about the camp, they jumped at the opportunity.

“We never thought in our wildest dreams that we’d be able to purchase the camp, but we were able to and we are very thankful to the Tewateno Optimist Club, and we are going to continue to partner with them,” she said. “The local Girl Guides will continue to use the property … and we will also have it available for the wider community - all kids, not just girls.”

The objective of the charity, Calvert said, is to educate children and youth to protect and preserve the environment.  

“The camp is a cultural heritage site … the sites are created after certain aspects of our own history in Canada. When we used it for Girl Guides, it was wonderful for them to be able to camp on one site, and then come back another year and camp on a different site and get a different heritage experience,” she said. “We hope to carry that tradition on.”

Calvert said over the next few months, the organization will be working on a name change for the camp.

“Tewateno means sisterhood in Wendat language, and we want to create, with the Indigenous people in the community, a name that encompasses community connecting," she said.

Goodenough and her husband have spent the last several years travelling to the Midhurst-based camp from Innisfil on a weekly basis to keep the camp and the property from going into disrepair, and said it will be good for them to be able to step back a bit and take a break. 

“We have had four years of fighting for the camp, dealing with lawyers and going to court and everything else. We are getting tired and this does give us a chance to step away if we want to,” she said.

“We are part of the Optimist Club and the other members are wanting to do things with the camp as well. I think it will work out well,” she said. “The Communities Connecting for Children have a lot of young people involved and you need young people for the energy and the young blood to keep things going.”

The camp won’t reopen until the spring, she noted, adding there are a number of steps that need to happen before it can reopen and campers can return - but it will all be worth it.

“It’s been a hard battle,” she said. “We are looking forward to a whole new and different chapter for the camp now. It’s a relief for both Gary and I - and for the other members of the Optimist Club because right up until the end, we didn’t think we were going to be able to save the property at all.”