Silver lining for RKY camp

Jeff Green | Jun 03, 2020

It was almost a relief for the staff of RKY camp when the Province of Ontario announced last week that all sleepover camps scheduled for this summer, will be closed in 2020.

“Even the thought of trying to keep 160 campers separate and distanced was hard for us to get our heads around,” said Darcy Munn, director of the year-round facility on Eagle Lake, which normally sees over 750 campers during week-long summer camp sessions in July and August. 

Munn said that the majority of the RKY families have agreed to transfer their deposits to 2021, helping with cash flow, and campers who were registered for this year will be welcome back next year. 

It’s not as if the site will be completely quiet this summer, as construction on a new, 8,000 square foot dining hall continues apace.

The dining hall, a $2 million project, was supposed to be completed before camp started this summer, but it was delayed by the COVID-19 lockdown, and if camp were being held this summer, it would also have had to co-exist with the finishing touches being done on the new building.

“It’s been a challenge to manage everything, now at least we can plan for the future,” said Munn.

The soon to be former dining hall, a 3,600 square foot building that was built in the 1970’s, will be converted over time into a new outdoor centre, although the timing of that renovation project is still being worked out.

“While the old dining hall is a solid building, we had outgrown it, and the kitchen facilities were not up to modern standards and were due to be replaced. With the building being available to re-purpose however, we will be in a better position in the future if we need to bring in distancing measures in another season,” said Darcy Munn.

Even though RKY will be closed until at least the fall, it is a year-round facility, and depending on what happens, there may be school groups arriving in the fall or winter.

The dining hall construction project is now slated to be finished in July. While over $1 million had been raised for the project before it started, a number of fundraising events scheduled for 2020 have had to be cancelled, and the camp is facing the possibility of holding a mortgage for the building, which they had been hoping to avoid.

“We are in a strong enough position, even with this summer, to carry a mortgage, but we will be going to some of our larger institutional supporters to see if we can still raise the money needed to avoid that,” said Munn. “The new dining hall will be an asset for the camp for many years. We are also pleased that we were able to contract an excellent local building company, RK Porter out of Perth, to do the construction. They have been great to work with, even under the difficult 2020 conditions.

The increased capacity of RKY camp, will also make Central Frontenac a more attractive destination for a variety of groups, as the camp is used for retreats and other large events in the fall, winter and spring seasons.