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OUR HOMETOWN: Passion for community growth

Williams Lake Daybreak Rotary Club member Andrew Sandberg enjoys volunteering
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Andrew Sandberg enjoys being a volunteer with the Williams Daybreak Rotary Club. (Monica Lamb-Yorski photo - Williams Lake Tribune)

Born and raised in Williams Lake Andrew Sandberg plans to stay for the rest of his life and is committed to making the city a better place.

He and his wife Melissa, also born and raised in Williams Lake, are expecting their second child in June, a younger sibling for their two-year-old daughter Hayden.

“I have a passion for helping our community grow and want things for our children to do,” he said.

Andrew has been a member of Williams Lake Daybreak Rotary Club for five years and after spearheading a successful mural project last year has now embarked on his biggest idea - developing a bouldering park in Boitanio Park.

The park would feature small rock formations or artificial rock for people of all ages to climb without needing to use ropes or harnesses.

He has not seen a bouldering park in person, but said originally he and Marilyn Martin from Rotary were looking at possibly putting together a new playground.

“In our efforts to find a Canadian supplier, we stumbled upon this company who does bouldering and urban outdoor obstacle courses. We saw the boulders and immediately chose it because it can facilitate not just kids but everybody.”

Once they put their minds to idea they sought approval from the club, were successful, and progressed to get approval from the city, and received it.

“The city asked us to choose between Boitanio Park and Kiwanis Park and we picked Boitanio.”

A specific spot has not been identified in the park yet, although Andrew is working with the city’s director of municipal services Rob Warnock to identify where it should go somewhere between the washrooms and the back of the bus loop.

The park would include a base-camp and summit climbing boulders covering an area of about 62 feet by 25 feet with one of the structures being 12 feet tall and the other one eight feet tall.

To complete the park, Rotary will need to raise $200,000.

He does not get to choose how it looks, where the handles are or the size, that is done by the manufacturer.

“We got $5,000 from Fortis, we’ve got confirmation from the West Fraser Truckers Association that they will be donating. I don’t know what’s on that cheque yet but it is supposed to be ready some time this week.”

About two weeks ago he also mailed out donor information to more than 9,000 mailboxes and businesses about the project.

For as little as $250 a family would see their name as a sponsor on the park’s sign and $1,000 for a business, with tiers going up from there.

Since the mail out a few families have donated.

Sandberg said they are waiting to hear whether or not they are getting a grant through the Kal Tire’s Kal’s Replay Fund that helps cover the cost of projects that turn scrap tires into new rubber products for playground surfaces, flooring, roofing, landscape tiles, paving, garden mulch and children’s play structures.

The application deadline was Feb. 28, 2022 and Rotary applied for upwards of $25,000.

“I hope we will have more coming as the word gets out. We are trying to get this as locally-funded or sponsored as possible so the community can stand together and say, ‘we did this.’”

Rotary has done some fundraising in the past and will be doing some more toward the bouldering park.

The club’s book sale, which the club has been doing for 30 years, will take place May 14 and 15 in the container on the property owned by Home Hardware along Mackenzie Avenue.

He noted the club meets every Tuesday at 7 a.m. at CJ’s Southwestern Grill.

Andrew and Melissa both work at Sandtronic Business Systems, which his father Ingolf Sandberg has owned for the last 37 years. Andrew is the account manager and Melissa does accounts receivable.

READ MORE: Williams Lake Daybreak Rotary Club proposes boulder park for the city

READ MORE: Daybreak Rotary commissions mural for Williams Lake building



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Monica Lamb-Yorski

About the Author: Monica Lamb-Yorski

A B.C. gal, I was born in Alert Bay, raised in Nelson, graduated from the University of Winnipeg, and wrote my first-ever article for the Prince Rupert Daily News.
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