Operation Red Nose rolled out for the last time this holiday season over the weekend in Williams Lake.
Coordinator Deborah Pickering said New Years Eve started off slow but then the phone lines started ringing between 11 and 2 am.
“That’s pretty normal because the parties are just starting. So between 11 and 2 am we were super busy, we ended up providing 68 safe rides home and over the whole nine weeks we gave 297 safe rides home. It took 191 volunteers over the nine weeks to get all those people home safely so we’re pretty happy with our statistics this year.”
Pickering noted that overall each weekend was slightly higher in the number of rides compared to each weekend last year.
Since Operation Red Nose began offering safe rides home for drivers and their vehicles back on November 24th, Pickering says they have raised over $13,000 in donations with some still coming in that will be shared equally between the four non-profit Youth Groups that volunteered drivers for this campaign.
Now having completed her second full year as Coordinator, Pickering says she’s very pleased how well Operation Red Nose went and that it was a honor to meet and work with so many people from the community that came out and wanted to be a part of getting people home safely over the holiday season.
“I am totally pleased at how well this year went. For me it’s just an honour to meet and work with so many fantastic people from the community that come out and want to do this that are enthusiastic and proud to be a part of Operation Red Nose,” Pickering said.
Something going on in the Cariboo you think people should know about?
Send us a news tip by emailing [email protected].
