Photo courtesy of Bob Schneider

By Scott Roblin

HALO Donations

Business community jumping on board with HALO Challenge

Jun 3, 2020 | 5:30 PM

MEDICINE HAT, AB – Donations and fundraising initiatives from Medicine Hat’s business community in support of HALO Air Ambulance are picking up steam this week.

Industries across the region are banding together in creating items and products for customers that will be helping to fund the medevac non-profit which reported facing significant financial issues.

Medicine Hat’s merchandise community has begun the practice of challenging each other with the goal of getting as many businesses on board as possible.

Boylan Imaging kicked things off by designing a ‘Save HALO’ sticker and selling them through a minimum $3 donation to HALO.

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They then challenged other local business owners to following their lead, which was picked up by Logos Embroidery and Tiki Press Screen Printing who developed and partnered on a HALO t-shirt.

“We heard that they were in need of funding,” said Logos manager Denise Simmonds. “We all feel that it’s a very important thing for people to have access to. Tiki Press we’ve joined up with them before for ‘Pink Shirt Day’ and did a great job with it. So, we thought let’s try this again and see how that goes with these shirts.”

From every sale of the t-shirt, $20 will be donated back to HALO.

Wednesday was the first day that Logos was able to sell the shirts in store, while Tiki Press has been able to handle online orders with an estimated 175 shirts sold between the two outlets.

Simmonds said it’s a movement that speaks volumes about the local business community and their willingness to support local groups in need.

“It’s really good and it’s important to keep business local,” she said. “You need to help out each other, especially in times of need like this. And, you really do see people stepping forward to help out.”

Southland Volkswagen has also confirmed that proceeds from all vehicle sales from Thursday to Saturday will be donated to HALO.

With the flood of support they’ve received over the last few weeks, CEO Paul Carolan said they’re confident they’ll be able to keep HALO-1 on line until the province’s Helicopter Emergency Medical Services review is completed this fall.

Though the fate of HALO beyond that timeline is uncertain, Carolan said he’s grateful to have gotten to this point.

“We’re respectful of everything that these people have done in making these things possible and making sure that we’re grateful and saying thank you about that,” said Carolan. “The other is just to keep the pressure on both the fundraising side, we always need to make sure that we’re doing everything we can to raise every penny we need, but also the pressure on the government.”

The City of Medicine Hat is expected to lend their support to HALO with an announcement on Thursday morning, while other weekend fundraisers hosted by the local business community are expected to be revealed as well.