Peter Wagner and his daughter Petra Kitteringham. (Supplied)

By Sheldon Spackman

Giving Back To The Community

Local woman launches online fundraiser for Red Deer Hospice Society

Dec 15, 2020 | 5:31 PM

An online fundraiser for the Red Deer Hospice Society is garnering significant traction in only its first week.

Organizer Petra Kitteringham says the New Year’s Eve Non-Event has already pulled in over 25 per cent of its $5,000 fundraising goal since launching last Wednesday.

She says the initiative was inspired by her late father Peter Wagner, who was admitted to the Red Deer Hospice in January and stayed there until his passing on April 14 at the age of 83.

“His birthday was December 6 and my birthday is December 7, so the holidays have been a little difficult,” says Kitteringham. “I’ve wanted to do something for the hospice, so I’ve been saving my money and figured I would try to do kind of a fun spoof on doing a gala without having anybody attend.”

Kitteringham describes the Red Deer Hospice as a wonderful organization that meant a lot to her father.

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“He believed in living in a community where you made it a better place than how you found it. We used to go camping and we used to walk around camp sites and clean up any garbage and stuff laying around,” she recalls fondly.

“He was involved with teaching figure skating, curling, he was a member of the curling club, wood working club. He worked for the City of Red Deer in the Electric, Light and Power department. He was just everything to me and the people who met him.”

Kitteringham says it was Red Deer Hospice Society itself that referred her to CanadaHelps.org to help get her personal fundraising initiative off the ground.

She says the idea is to have supporters celebrate New Year’s Eve at home and order Margarita Cocktail Kits from local businesses Roadpop and Tacos and Tequila Blanco Cantina to help ring in the New Year.

“There will be no boring speeches to listen to, they don’t have to worry about convincing anybody to go to a party with them or do small talk or worry about masks or social gathering right now because of COVID,” says Kitteringham.

“You can enjoy your cocktail hour whenever you want to start it. I’ve teamed-up with local sponsors Roadpop and Blanco Cantina. They’re making Margarita kits that they’re going to be selling to anybody who wants to purchase one, and all of the profits would go to my fundraiser.”

Kitteringham says any money raised through the online initiative will be in addition to her own savings of $3,000 for Red Deer Hospice Society.

“My fundraiser is for residential care. They don’t charge anybody to utilize the hospice. They do everything from donations and small government funding, so I’m hoping to help with that.”