By Jordan Baker
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Volunteers, campers, board members and others celebrated the rebirth of the Estevan Bible Camp on Friday evening.
Roughly 60 people, including regional and national bible camp directors, spent the evening in the newly constructed hall in Woodlawn Regional Park that will be the new home of the camp following the destruction of the former campy by floodwaters in 2011.
Travis Franke led the evening, and as a board member for four years, and chairman for the last two, he hasn't known much more than dealing with the aftermath of 2011. For most of this time, he has been helping deal with the turmoil the camp experienced along with the rest of the region when flooding in the spring 2011 wreaked havoc on the camp and many areas within the Woodlawn Regional Park.
"After the flood of 2011, Rotary Hall was damaged and Woodlawn (Park Authority) decided they wanted to rebuild it a little bit differently, and it wouldn't quite fit our needs," he said. "But they also thought they would take the opportunity to provide us with something that worked a little bit better for us, so they moved us over to where the scouts used to be."
The scouts will continue to use that area of the park as well, with the bible camp erecting a new building along with cabins right along the river.
"They've given us a good amount from their PDAP money to build a brand new building for us that we designed, which was great because we got to have a much larger kitchen facility," said Franke. "A proper bathroom and shower facility that works to our needs a lot better. That's what we've been working on."
The ceremony on Friday involved some speeches about what changes have happened in the camp as well as what the camp has meant for many Estevan youth since it began in the 1930s. The building wasn't quite finished yet, but attendees got a good glimpse of what it will look like in a short few weeks when the work is complete.
The bathrooms and kitchen will be ready for camps this summer. Franke also said the cabins are complete and moved into the proper places, while work has begun on constructing two new ones for staff and incoming speakers. They also plan on building a cabin for their directors in the future.
The kitchen and bathroom facilities were the main focus of the rebuild, said Franke.
"Particularly the kitchen, we wanted to go from pretty much a basic house kitchen to an industrial kitchen, so we'll have a nice-sized kitchen that is laid out and designed to meet an industrial need."
The camp has between 30 and 40 campers, along with a staff anywhere from five to 10. The kitchen could feed up to 80 or 100 people reasonably if the time called for a larger event in the bible camp building.
"It allows us to expand our camp, which is another big feature now that we're not at Rotary Hall. Rotary Hall is use d a lot for weddings, but this new facility, because it's more for us, we can expand our camp and go longer into the summer without interfering with weddings. We can grow the camp to those numbers," he said referring to the feeding of up to 100 people when the need arises.
The showers, he added, are an improvement over what was used in the past. They will also be a fully handicapable camp in the years to come as they are planning to install a washroom to include wheelchair access.
"The hall itself will be a little bit smaller than Rotary but the facilities inside will be bigger, which is great. Being a little more secluded from Woodlawn's campground is nice. We can launch our canoes right from our grounds now and be a little bit more permanently situated," said Franke.
"I think it's amazing how far we've come in the last three years. To be such a small camp, we're one of the smallest across Canada, and to go through something so devastating, to be up and running to be in a brand new facility and looking at expanding in the next year or two is phenomenal," said Franke, noting they continued to hold camps each summer following 2011.
The first camp, the squirt camp, begins July 8.
