Organizers are looking to the community to help ensure one of Canmore’s longest-running events does not end in this, its 25th year.
Three Sisters Scottish Festival Society (TSSFS) launched a fundraising campaign this week to raise $50,000 by March 1 to ensure funds are available for this year’s event and to rebuild its reserve account, which has run dry.
The games have lost money each year since 2011, forcing the society to dip into its reserve account with an average loss of $20,000 to $35,000 over the past three years, and without the $50,000, said society secretary John Parboosingh, the 2015 event would not go ahead as planned.
“We had a reserve of $60,000 to about $80,000,” Parboosingh said Monday (Jan. 5), “and it gradually dwindled since 2011 right down to virtually zero.”
Parboosingh attributed the dwindling reserve account to a number of reasons, including how the society is organized and operated, the recession and how the Alberta Lottery Fund allocates financial support.
“We have relied fairly heavily on casino funds, which used to be given yearly and then every three years. The next allotment is the fall of this year, October or November,” he said. “The second reason is the sponsors fell off in 2008 with the recession and I would say they have never returned to pre-2008 levels. But I would say we have not been as aggressive as in the past.”
Event expenses, meanwhile, have increased, while the number of attendees has dropped, a result, said Parboosingh, of a cap on the number of people allowed to attend the evening ceilidh due to fire regulations.
“We’ve had a slight reduction of revenues at the gate and also a bigger reduction in revenues for the ceilidh ... We could sell any number of advance tickets for the ceilidh, but we have to cut them off,” he said.
Attendance in 2014 dropped 10 per cent compared to 2011-2013.
“Our average ticket revenue for everything for the last three years has been $99,000 and last year it went down to $90,000,” he said. “That’s 10 per cent, that’s big. That also leads to a reduction of sales in food and beverage. That has come down by 20 per cent.”
The society sent emails to previous games supporters and attendees seeking help and Parboosingh said a few have come back asking what the society is doing to get on track.
It’s a valid question, he said, and over the summer, the society reviewed and changed its operations and management.
“We’ve introduced new monitoring processes, including tighter control of purchase orders,” he said, adding the society has tightened budgets and is undergoing two external audits as well.
“And we are quite honest in accepting that things have to change and we can’t accept that things are going right because otherwise we wouldn’t be in this position,” Parboosingh said. “(The games) need a renewal of operational processes and a renewal of acceptance that what worked in the past is not going to work now and for the first time we’ve had a functioning executive committee,” said Parboosingh.
The society also no longer employs staff and is now completely volunteer-run.
Along with adjusting how it operates, tightening its budgets and forming an executive committee to provide oversight, Parboosingh said the society is looking for additional senior leadership.
“We will fit their schedule and their expertise. What we need are your expertise and your feedback now to put this together,” he said.
The Canmore Highland Games are held each Labour Day weekend. This year’s event is scheduled for Sept. 5-6.
Donations sent to the society to support the Canmore Highlands Games will be returned if the society does not reach its $50,000 goal.
Go to www.canmorehighlandgames.ca for more information.
