Hamilton Burlington CWA Volunteer Appreciation Event

 We (Lisette & I) were invited to this event at Williams Cafe at 42 Discovery Drive in Hamilton on the 21st of October as HB-CWA was winding down their activities for the year by co-founder of the group, Nancy Gray.

As I had a challenging surgery that morning, we got there around 2pm for a 1pm start and were just in time to meet a few of the pilots and site co-ordinators before grabbing a bite and coffee to settle down to hear from the organizers.

The afternoon was ably compered by veteran cyclist, spin instructor, internet guru and Elvis impersonator, Adam Kulchyski who kept everyone on track and tried to limit their talk time.  There were so many stories to go around as we heard from each of the five site co-ordinators.  This was a concept that I was grappling with as to how to grow the use of the trishaw(s?) while keeping the administration manageable.  Using a site co-ordinator for each of the facilities seemed like the best way to develop the program while staying sane.  The site co-ordinator is responsible for recruiting and managing pilots for the appropriate number of rides scheduled out of one site which rotated weekly between 5 of their regular sites.  Their communications are done mainly by email, sometimes with tense moments from nail biting waiting for pilot slots to fill.

Also, their advisory committee consisting of 8-10 dedicated volunteers including Tammy, the head of New Hope for Bikes, the umbrella organization under which HB-CWA operates and Nancy, one of the co-founders of the CWA affiliate.  

Tammy spoke on how they found the website of H-CWA before they incorporated Burlington into their operations and thought that it would be a perfect match for their program serving a segment of the population that was left out of their regular reach.  Nancy and Jill jumped at the opportunity to run the program without the headaches of also running a non-profit charity to support it.  Made me wonder if a financial person like Nancy was loathe to run a non-profit charity, was I biting off more than I could chew?  The works of JoAnn Bell came back to reassure me, "If I can do it, you can too!"

Nancy updated us on the number of rides, total kilometers ridden and number of passengers who got to experience 'wind in their hair' for the season which was impressive.  Also, their trial of a VanRaam wheelchair trishaw for implementation when it is difficult or impossible to move a rider from a wheelchair to the trishaw.  It was an expensive option but one that Brockville had invested into and was loving the benefit of being able to give rides to the wheelchair bound passengers.  Something to aspire towards as our program grows.

Nancy also passed on the sad news that her co-founder, Jill Axisa, who had been battling a return of her cancer, succumbed to it at the end of September and that in her memory the next purchase probably of the VanRaam wheelchair trishaw would be named.

I also had an opportunity to speak to the team from CWA-Markham and their leader, Alfred Sung, who worked on their Project Spotlight award and video from BrokerTeam.  He was enthusiastic about the program and had HB-CWA bring trishaws out to Markham to showcase them to the company and seniors living there.  We were impressed by dedication to the project and they had already registered an affiliation with CWA Canada for the Markham region.

We left reluctantly past 4pm knowing that we would be facing rush hour traffic to be able to make it back to Mississauga for 5pm appointments.  We were not disappointed by the chock-a-block traffic (and we were driving AGAINST the rush) which made me appreciate my ability to cycle into work.