A collaboration between Itasca County Family YMCA and ElderCircle has led to an event where older citizens of our community got together to learn about different resources available to them. The event also held the award announcement for the 2023 Itasca County Outstanding Senior Volunteer.
Two separate events came together to form this Celebrating Older Adults event.
One was Senior Day at the Itasca County Fair, which was once run by the Moose Club and always held in conjunction with the fair in August. When the Moose Club decided they couldn’t do it any longer, ElderCircle took it on. Senior Day was offered at the Itasca County Fairgrounds and Renee Bymark, the former Executive Director for Elder Circle who now works in a consulting role, said that in 2020 they had to start thinking about what to do because they were serving close to 450 people. Bymark said, “We knew we had to change because the fair wasn’t a feasible place for older adults.
During Covid it was held at the Pavilion as a drive through event,” and the following year it continued to grow when they held it at the Jerry and Shirley Miner Family Pavilion at the IRA Civic Center and served over 500 individuals lunch with 32 vendors at the space with a live band.
In the summer, while this event happened, the Itasca County Family YMCA held their own senior picnic/luncheon on their campus in July for the past fifteen years. When ElderCircle couldn’t find a location for it, the two organizations decided it made perfect sense to combine the events and hold the Senior Luncheon and Expo.
2023 was the first time the events merged and this year they enjoyed their second annual expo where they celebrated an outstanding senior volunteer.
The event occurs thanks to the sponsors for the event and the vendors that come out to talk and interact with the participants to inform the participants about available resources in the community.
Bymark wanted to mention that the collaboration between the YMCA and ElderCircle has been thriving since Christy Kane and Betsy McBride, who both brainstormed and envisioned a larger senior center that would be able to benefit more community members.
Rachelle Miller, the YMCA Development Director, said that the “opportunity to join forces for the picnic was pretty natural. We started that last year and look to continue doing that in the future.”
The State of Minnesota used to recognize an outstanding volunteer at the state fair and Bymark mentioned that they oftentimes would have a nominee go down from our area. When the state stopped that recognition process, they wanted to continue recognizing senior volunteers who work to help make our community a better place.
At this year’s event, Kay Klingman was announced as the Winner of Outstanding Volunteer of the Year. Nick Eltgroth and Dale Kentoph were recognized as nominees.
Miller said that she heard multiple times throughout the event that the people who come love it. “I heard folks saying how valuable and needed it is to connect older adults to the resources that are available to them,” she said.
While the Grand Rapids area is a resourceful community with plenty of resources, Bymark mentioned that a lot of residents find out about the resources too late, when they need it, instead of thinking of the resources as a proactive measure that can prolong independent living, healthy living, and more.
The group wanted to thank the sponsors this year for their part in providing for the event:
$1000 Sponsor- UCare$500 Sponsor- The Pillars of Grand Rapids$500 Sponsor- Grand Itasca Clinic & Hospital$500 Sponsor- BlueCross BlueShield
An extra nod was given to Miller and Nicolle Scheper, Executive Administrative Assistant for ElderCircle, for their part in planning the event and making sure that everything ran smoothly.
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