Osoyoos realtor Linda Davreux and her daughter Alaina, 17, have once again organized a Christmas fundraising venture for the South Okanagan SPCA in Penticton. A donation box set up in the Royal LePage office on Main Street in downtown Osoyoos and is accepting items like cat and dog food, blankets, toys and office supplies. Photo by Keith Lacey.

 

 

When you love animals as much as Linda Davreux and her family do, getting involved in helping raise funds and donations for the nearest chapter of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SPCA) is a labour of love.
For the seventh consecutive year, Davreux, an Osoyoos-based real estate agent, has organized a fundraising drive for the South Okanagan SPCA, which has its main headquarters in Penticton.
A donation box was set up in the Royal LePage (Desert Oasis Realty) office on Main Street in downtown Osoyoos 10 days ago where local residents are being asked to drop off items that are in big demand by the SPCA, including dog and cat toys, blankets, food, office supplies and cleaning products.
“We have the donation box set up and people can bring in anything they think could be used by the SPCA staff to help run their operation,” said Davreux. “The SPCA is pretty much run entirely by volunteers and they don’t have a lot of funding available, yet they do a tremendous job with the few resources they have.
“Being able to help them out every Christmas for the past seven years has been an honour.”
The Christmas donation drive to assist the area SPCA was Davreux’s idea as she has been a lifelong animal lover, but she has been ably assisted by her daughters Jennifer and Alaina.
Jennifer, 20, recently moved to Vancouver, where she works as a commercial animator. She helped her mother for several years during the annual donation drive.
Her other daughter, Alaina, 17, has been heavily involved the past couple of years and will be assisting her mother during the 2012 drive in not only collecting donations, but making several trips to Penticton to drop off the donations to the South Okanagan SPCA office over the next several weeks.
“I’ve loved animals all my life and I’m definitely proud to try and help my mom with this event,” said the modest teenager. “I’ve had cats and dogs and guinea pigs and I’m helping take care of a horse right now, so I would definitely say I love animals.”
Davreux said the South Okanagan SPCA is a wonderful organization that has staff who go beyond the call of duty to assist animals, find them loving homes and assist the authorities in prosecuting those who abuse animals.
“It’s a great organization and this is a good cause that I’m proud to be a part of,” she said. “I was looking for a worthy community cause to get involved with and because my girls love animals so much, we thought about setting up this donation box in my office and we’ve been able to raise a lot of stuff for the SPCA over the past six years.”
The generosity of the residents of Osoyoos is the key to the donation drive’s success, she said.
“This is a very caring community and the residents here have gone out of their way to give what they can,” she said. “Things have been slower the past couple of years because I don’t think a lot of people in town know about what we’re trying to do, but we’re really trying to get the message out this year and hopefully we’ll have a very successful drive and really be able to help out the SPCA.
“There are a lot of animal lovers in this town and they’re very generous. We thank everyone for their assistance.”