By Andrew de Souza

Legion out of luck with leaks

Nov 5, 2012 | 5:01 AM

Declining membership and a deteriorating building are putting the Prince Albert Royal Canadian Legion in a tight spot.

The roof of the Legion Hall has a persistent leak. Every time it rain, it’s up to volunteers with buckets and mops to clean up the mess, and each time the bill to fix the issue crawls up.

“Every time it rains, it leaks from our roof right down into our auditorium,” said Legion president Grant Bennett. “It’s something we’ve been trying to work on for years, but we’ve never been able to get the financial support we’ve needed.”

Bennett said the size of the bill is enormous at more than $90,000—and that’s just to fix the issues with the roof, not the internal damage that’s likely been caused.

Bennett said they qualify for some federal grants, but only for a 50 per cent share, leaving the goal still far out of reach.

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“We’ve been trying now for the last for five years to try and up support,” he said. “This year we got a crew together that has a little more brain power and we’re thinking and sitting just short of the $7,000 mark,” he said.

Bennett said sometimes other projects needed to be funded first and deplete stockpiled cash.

Other funds like the Remembrance Day poppy fund have a strict purpose that can’t be used elsewhere.

“The money that we get from the poppy fund has to go to veterans, their families, buying equipment for nursing homes, hospitals, things like that,” he said.

Going out to the business community has yielded only limited success as. After mailing out around 350 letters only a few responded, and no major corporations could donate anything.

Fewer members, fewer dollars

Bennett said another reason why it’s difficult to raise money is because there are simply fewer members to draw funds for.

When Bennett joined the legion, there were more than 1,000 members. Now it’s around 600. And Bennett said that while every member and any help they give is appreciated, there simply isn’t as much zeal for the legion and its needs as their used to be.

“In the old days, our veterans, they always pitched in and we did things as a group,” he said. “It’s just not that way any more with our newer members.”

But that being said, Bennett said they’ll keep moving forward, raising what they can and appreciating anything that comes in.

Anyone interested in donated can contact the legion.

adesouza@panow.com

On Twitter: @DrewdeSouza