Gold Medal Club

On this page, we will highlight those persons who have given gold medal service to the community, in volunteering their time or in donations to the Community Centre.

For your nominations, please fill in the following information: Your name; Your email address; the name of the person you are nominating; the email address and/or telephone number of the person you are nominating; a three-paragraph (maximum) explanation of why you are nominating this person, listing the person’s contributions to the community and send it to Gold Medal Club nominations.

Every year, the Riverview Community Centre Board of Directors names a Volunteer of the Year. For 2007, the winner is Dave Kressock and Guido Cerasani.

Volunteers of the Year

On April 18, Dave Kressock and Guido Cerasani were honoured as Riverview Community Centre’s Volunteers of the Year.

Guido and Dave were instrumental in obtaining a zamboni and zamboni garage for RVCC, and it was put to excellent use this past winter, and we trust, for many winters to come. Dave and Guido are co-convenors of the hockey program, a demanding job in itself, but they also both coached RVCC minor hockey teams this past year, and have been volunteering in various capacities, with RVCC and other charities, for the past many years. Riverview is extremely fortunate to have such wonderful volunteers!

In the photo, left to right: Jenny Gerbasi, City Councillor, Guido Cerasani, Dave Kressock, Tom McMahon

On April 14, the General Council of Winnipeg Community Centres held a banquet honouring the most recent Past Presidents of Community Centres. Current RVCC President Tom McMahon and his partner Kelly Klick, Treasurer Carla Chandler and her partner Jonathan Adair, and Lynda, Dan and Maureen Falloon were present to honour Jim Falloon as RVCC’s Past President. Thank you Jim for all your excellent work with the Community Centre over the years.

Previous winners:

2003 – Louise Evans
2002 – Trudy Mattey
2001 – Ted Bigelow and Alistair Gillespie
2000 – Lori Keith
1999 – Barb Ediger

Members

All persons who donate funds to the Riverview Community Centre will be listed in the Gold Medal Club for the year of the donation.

Samantha Atkinson

The Staff, Board, children and their families at Riverview Ashland Child Care Centre (past and present) would like to offer a tearful goodbye and our heartfelt gratitude to Dr. Samantha Atkinson. Dr. Atkinson (known fondly to all as “Samantha”) has been employed (part-time – conducting a research project) at the Centre for the past 17 years.

All of us who have been fortunate enough to work with Samantha have appreciated her many talents and expertise. Samantha has applied her professional skills in many situations to benefit children and their families in “crisis” situations. She has also offered her friendship and support to staff and families when needed.

Samantha’s thought-provoking techniques and engaging manner have provided many children with the support and direction necessary to confidently make good choices in their life journey.

Her caring, warmth and practical judgement have provided direction to all of us. Samantha will be missed for many reasons. She is a “Whiz” at games and puzzles and her appreciation for the Arts is a legacy to the children.

If you visited the Centre on any of Samantha’s work days you might find her engrossed in a Board game, surrounded by children of various ages, all of them participating, learning countless skills, and, most importantly, enjoying the process! You might also find her chatting with parents, sharing a humorous story about their child. or offering some sage parenting advice.

Samantha lives right here in Riverview and will continue to work in her private practice, but we hope to see her from time to time. We wish her well in her “Semi-retirement”. We’ll miss you Samantha, come over and “play” when you can.

The Board, Staff, Parents, and especially the Children of Riverview Ashland Child Care Centre.

Bev Suek

Bev has lived in Riverview for about 30 years. She spent a good deal of the first part of those years raising her family (5 boys and 2 girls) , working for the federal government and doing volunteer work with women’s organizations . She has been active in politics , particularly related to women’s issues, on all levels – municipal, provincial and federal. She and her husband, Joe, converted their home (after all those kids left!) into a local Bed and Breakfast – Twin Pillars. Today her son, Matthew, now lives in and operates the B&B with his family. She also was instrumental in establishing Kali-Shiva a group which provides home-care and support to those living with HIV/AIDS.

Bev still resides in the community with her sister and works both as a human resource consultant and as the CEO of the Women’s Enterprise Centre. In the past year she organized the Spring Clean-Up at the playground at the Communty Centre, and spent many hours alongside some family and friends cleaning, scraping and painting the Playground. She also recently donated a climbing rock to the Playground, and also helped save the Summer Day Camp program at the Community Club. Bev is a devoted grandparent, and is also building a reputation as a surrogate Grandma (aka “Bamma”) to many of her grandchildren’s friends!

Kathy Borgfjord

In 1999 Royal Bank of Canada Financial Group launched its “Employee Volunteer Grants Program” to recognize employees for the good work that they do in their personal time, by volunteering in their communities. Employees and pensioners earn grants up to $500.00 each for the charitable organization at which they volunteer.

Riverview Ashland Child Care Centre Inc. would like to thank Past President and parent, Kathy Borgfjord for her tireless efforts for our Centre over the past 9 years. Kathy was President of our Board of Directors for many years and now continues on our Board as Past President. Kathy has been awarded $500.00 on behalf of our Centre not only this year but past years as well. We appreciate all of Kathy’s countless hours she has put in to making our Centre the wonderful place it is!

Louise Evans

Volunteer of the Year 2004

Riverview CC

Louise has trained and out lasted 3 presidents at RVCC. She has kept track of everything that everyone said, and I mean everything, for 5 years. It’s not that she is a busy body, she is the Secretary and that is her job.

Being the Secretary is a demanding job; accurate minutes are a necessity for smooth operation of the center. Taking a night off is not an option and… you have to put up with the President!

As far as we know, Louise only missed one meeting. That would explain the look she developed. A look that you knew you forgot to say something. It was usually “All in favour?”. She takes her job seriously; is always prepared and well organized. She can find any motion, agreement or discussion that ever happened during her reign.

Louise has the fastest minutes in town. After one meeting, a few Board Members stayed late. When we got home, the minutes were waiting for us, via e-mail. It was usually the next morning when the minutes arrived. The longest it ever took was 2 days after the meeting.

Louise is a wonderful person. She is kind, thoughtful and has a great sense of humour. She is a great asset to the Community and if we ever find a replacement for her, she will be sorely missed.

Trudy Mattey

There probably aren’t many folks in Riverview who haven’t bumped into Trudy at some time over the past decade or so. Trudy and Ian moved into Riverview in 1986 but it wasn’t until Trudy decided to stay home to raise her children that her activism in the ‘hood started to increase.

It started with doing daycare out of the home and then increased with participation once Spencer and Lisa got into school. Soon she was an active member of Good Neighbour Group #5, eventually chairing the group. After that it was on to the RVCC board as Vice-President for two years, President for three years, Past President for two.

Trudy remains involved with RVCC as a regular Fund Drive canvasser and as the facility co-ordinator, which includes handling hall rentals and canteen staff scheduling. Her efforts to professionally organize and promote hall rentals have significantly increased revenue for the club over the past four years and facilitated new programs like Pilates, Yoga, Karate coming to the centre. To give you some idea of what this position entails, Trudy fields about 50 phone calls a week about the hall.

Through all of her dedication to the RVCC, Trudy has remained active in her family’s interests too. She has been an ardent hockey mom for Spencer, and a devoted Rhythmic Gymnastics mom for Lisa and more recently doing volunteer work for the Osborne Street Dance Club. She is still very involved in school activities, like fund raising for band trips.

Beyond all of the ‘work’, Trudy takes time for fun and for herself. She has become an avid quilter and is involved with several other quilters, many from the ‘hood, in running semi-annual bees at the centre. Trudy and Ian enjoy the company of many good friends around the neighbourhood. Their home is often the site small dinner parties or great big parties, including the annual Mattey Martini Madness bash. Trudy has been playing for the Riverview Rowdies (old farts) indoor soccer team for two years.

Why does she do all of these things? Because you have to give back for all that life gives you.

Quinn Menec

At the beginning of 2001, Quinn approached the board and expressed his interest in becoming involved. In March of that year, he was elected VP, a position he held for 2 years

During that time, Quinn chaired the Personnel Committee which was responsible for staffing the Community Centre and was involved with a number of staff turnover issues at the time.

He was the designated alternate and attended the monthly City Centre Community Centre Board (CCCCB) meetings. These meetings bring all the Community Centres in the district together. The time was used to gather information from the City, discuss and make informed decisions with regards to the operation of the Community Centre.

As VP, he was responsible for taking the place of the President whenever necessary. This included chairing the monthly board meetings and the day to day operation of the Community Centre. Along with the President, he was the name that the members of the community called upon for every conceivable reason. Complaints and concerns were the main topics. Entrance to the facility and alarm calls were also frequent requests.

Quinn also sat on the committee initiated by the City for the beautification of the Osborne/CN Railway underpass. He was the treasurer for the annual Spider Mazur 4 x 4 hockey tournament and the Jackrabbits hockey program for 2 years, taking registrations, paying invoices, and preparing statements. The Jackrabbits hockey program involved some coaching, organizing of windups, and shoveling/blowing snow many times early on Saturday mornings.

In March of 2003, Quinn was elected President of Riverview Community Centre (RVCC). He now had the responsibility of the operations of the Community Centre. He chaired the monthly board meetings and became the representative at the CCCCB meetings. He even filled in for the District President of the District 1 Board at the General Council of Winnipeg Community Centres (GCWCC) meetings

Quinn coached smurf soccer for 2 years and initiated the mini-volleyball program at the Community Centre, being convenor for 2 years. He was successful in establishing a Karate program as well at RVCC and now serves as convenor. The program currently runs 3 times a week.

As of March 2004, Quinn has joined the Past President’s Club. Although the day to day workload has been passed on, Quinn continues to play a major part in the operation of RVCC. He has assumed the responsibility of Grant Coordinator. This is a new position and one that will help ensure the continued operation of the Centre. Quinn has already initiated and begun to gather information for a grant application to renovate the washrooms. Once completed, he will present the application to the RVCC Board, GCWCC, and the City of Winnipeg. Once approved, he will facilitate the renovations in the Spring. The Grant Coordinator is also responsible for securing money for programs and equipment. Without this funding, several of our current programs would not be able to continue.

In addition to his work at RVCC, Quinn has recently been promoted at his “day job” within Manitoba Hydro to the position of Executive Assistant to the Vice-President of Transmission & Distribution. He also regularly works for the United Way, starting in 2001 as a loaned representative from Winnipeg Hydro, now calling upon corporate donors to support the Winnipeg Community. He is married to Michelle and they have four (4) young sons. Jackrabbits will continue to be a part of their lives for many, many years.

Quinn and his wife have helped run and organize the South Osborne Nursery School (SONS) through the years, particularly with the social fundraiser featuring Bob Leigh’s Band, from their initial appearance at the first SONS social and extending for three consecutive years. This event raised approximately $8,000 for the school and enabled a big turnaround with the fiscal operation of the school. Quinn will typically obtain the liquor permit for these socials as well as the Spring Carnival (for the past two years) which invariably means hauling & organizing the liquor during the evening, bartending, and spending some very late nights cleaning up after the events.

Quinn performs his work with no complaints and always takes on a couple of canvassing routes for the RVCC fund drive. He never says no to anyone at anytime if they need to get into the club for some reason (and Michelle can attest to some strange or odd times of the day & night).

Quinn always thinks that there is more that he can do for the Community Centre and realizes the importance that the Community Centre plays, particularly for the kids in the area. Without the Community Centre, we wouldn’t have a means to organize sports teams across the City, have a place to practice, or ensure that everyone is on the same level with respect to sport policies and liability concerns. This is why he has taken his responsibilities and interest in the Community Centre so seriously. Michelle & Trudy have tried to remember every thing that he’s been up to, but we may have overlooked a few things. We do feel that he is definitely deserving of the gold medal club designation.

RVCC past presidents

1972
Walter Vatnsdal
285 Bartlet Avenue R3L 0Z7
453-5260

1973
Mr. D. McFetridge
152 Baltimore Road R3L 1H3
452-3716

1974/1975
Mr. B. Zilkey
226 Wavell Avenue R3L 1V1
474-2547

1975/1976
Mr. B. Kavanagh
53 Ashland Avenue R3L 1K3
284-2617

1977
Bruno Sledzinski
224 Clare Avenue R3L 1R4
453-2744

1978
Donald Calder
111Morley Avenue
284-0349

1979/1980
Hans Kerr
80 Baltimore Road R3L 1G9
475-1452

1980 – 1982
Rick Papineau
145 Oakwood Avenue R3L 1E2
452-7820

1983
Fraser Dunford
333 Baltimore Road R3L 1J2
452-6972

1984 & 1985
Frank Allen
253 Churchill Drive R3L 1V5
284-6443

1986
Diane Tokarchuk
362 Churchill Drive R3L 1V9
284-1835

1987
Jack McLaughlin
284 Clare Avenue R3L 1S1
453-7389

1988 & 1989
Paul LaRouque
194 Balfour Avenue R3L 1N3
284-0368

1990 & 1991
Bryon Kent
299 Oakwood Avenue R3L 1E7
453-1452

1992/1993
Stan Pochailo
194 Morley Avenue R3L 0Y1
284-7052

1993/1994
Mark Sachkiw
453-6646

1994 – 1997
Pat Kolpitts
66 Ashland Avenue R3L 1K4
452-2321

1997 – 1999
Ken Land
118 Balfour Avenue R3L 1N1
478-0570

1999 – 2001
Lori Keith
126 Arnold Avenue R3L 0W2
452-0082

2001 – 2003
Trudy Mattey
310 Bartlet Avenue R3L 0Z8
475-5674

2003/2004
Quinn Menec
316 Baltimore Road R3L 1J3
478-1562

2004 – 2006
Jim Falloon
121 Baltimore Road R3L 1H2
284-4865