One of the final acts of the Ops Ladies Auxiliary has been to donate $20,000 to the Ross Memorial Hospital Foundation in Lindsay.
The volunteer group was formed with the construction of the Ops Community Centre and Arena in 1974 in the former Ops Township. Since then, members of the Ops Ladies Auxiliary have volunteered their time to assist with community events at the centre, including weddings, funeral receptions, fundraising dances, and agriculture meetings.
In 2022, City of Kawartha Lakes council voted to support the demolition of the Ops Community Centre and Arena, due to its age and extensive repairs needed to keep it operational, at a cost of $300,000. In June 2023, the city awarded a bid to demolish and remove the building. With the demolition of the Ops Community Centre and Arena now completed, the Ops Ladies Auxiliary is disbanding.
On Wednesday (August 23), longtime members of the Ops Ladies Auxiliary Marion Brumwell, Joan Magahay, Noreen Brasier and Anne Walker met at the Ross Memorial Hospital to present a $20,000 cheque to Ross Memorial Hospital Foundation CEO Erin Coons. The donation will be used to help fund the hospital’s new MRI and CT scanners.
“It’s incredibly kind of the Ladies Auxiliary to mark this bittersweet milestone with a gift that benefits their entire community,” says Coons in a media release. “For so many years, the Ops volunteers made their community better, through recreation and event support.”
“Today, their generosity will touch lives through gold standard diagnostic imaging, which is an integral part of patients’ timely diagnosis and treatment. Patients of all ages throughout Kawartha Lakes will benefit from this gift. All of the members of the Ladies Auxiliary should be proud of what they accomplished together, today and over the past five decades.”
