By Sebastian Kanally, Times Chronicle
A new Skate Library glides into Sun Bowl Arena on Sunday Feb. 12 for the first time offering free skates for use by anyone who may not have a pair but wishes to get onto the ice.
“Many of our special events we hold at the arena are free events, but a lot of times the cost of skates is something that holds families back from participating, so we are hoping to mitigate that with this library,” said Sara Dynneson, Program Supervisor of Community Services with the Town of Osoyoos.
Susan Cran, President of the Osoyoos Rotary Club, approached Dynneson last year and suggested they partner on a project and they settled on the Skate Library. The idea came from a similar honour-based Skate Library at the arena in Midway.
“I have personal ties to the Midway arena, that’s where my kids skate out of . . . they have that library and I thought that was just such a wonderful community thing that happens in that arena, and I wanted to bring that here and make skating just that much more accessible for everybody,” Dynneson explained.
Cran did the research and put the proposal together, and was able to receive a $1,000 grant from the Town of Osoyoos, $1,000 from the Osoyoos Credit Union with Rotary chipping in another $500 to make this project a reality.
The Rotary Club already supports the free public skating at Sun Bowl Arena from the money raised at the Coyotes Beer Garden. Cran said, “it sort of went hand in hand with us already supporting public skating, and the need here in Osoyoos is quite great with respect to there being a lot of families that can’t afford ice skates.”
“We needed to build a structure that was portable, able to roll, that we could keep the skates on so that at Sun Bowl Arena whoever takes care of that could wheel it in and out when there was public skating,” Cran said.
Andrew Barnes, Lead Hand at the Sun Bowl Arena is the individual whose task it was to make this idea a practical reality. “We are going to give it a shot this year, then make adjustments going forward,” he said.
The library will be a service for anyone to use who may not have skates, or may simply be passing through town and not have their skates with them. In addition to this, the intention is to have a place where people can donate skates.
“The hope is this is also a place where people can donate skates if they’ve got an old pair hanging around, kids who have grown out of their skates and are looking for a home for their old ones, they can just drop them off at the arena and we will take care of the rest,” Dynneson said.
Barnes noted that the arena is going to have a nice large apple bin where people can come and drop off their skates to donate. Staff at the rink will take them, fix them up, determine if they are in usable condition, and go from there.
The skate donations will go towards building up an inventory, thereafter some of the money will go towards filling the gaps in skate sizes that will be available. They are intending to have sizes from toddlers to adults, so there will be something for everyone.
The library will be an ongoing service that is founded on an honour system. The library will be rolled out when there is public skating and you will pick some up and put them back when you are done. Afterward, the arena crew will be responsible for making sure the skates get cleaned between each use.
Public skating is at least twice a week Saturdays and Sundays, but it depends on tournaments and Coyote’s playoff schedule. They also offer senior and tot skating three days a week.
The Osoyoos Skate Library grand opening is on Sunday Feb. 12 from 3:30-4:45 p.m. at Sun Bowl Arena.
