April 3, 2020
Event Postponement Letter to GIVETOLIVE Family
Thank you for your kind messages and best wishes since our last note. It really underlines the deep connections we have with our GIVETOLIVE family!
We promised we’d be back in touch with you about the future of our remaining 2020 events. For the safety and health of all of our event participants and volunteers due to the ongoing concerns around COVID-19, we have made the difficult decision to postpone the 2020 BIG RIDE and 2020 BIG SWIM to 2021. Exact dates and details of the 2021 events will follow later this year.
The decision to postpone was a difficult one. In the end, we looked to the directive and guidance of the government and Public Health Agency of Canada around COVID-19. Considering their clear directives to continue to self-isolate, socially distance, and keep social gatherings small, along with the subsequent state of emergencies that have been declared in every Canadian province, we have accepted the real likelihood that those restrictions will remain in place. The decision to cancel also avoids adding undue stress on our event participants and volunteers arising from training, planning, and fundraising in the face of this uncertainty.
Why not just postpone until later in 2020? With the timeline of the pandemic unknown, simply postponing until later this year was not an option. COVID-19 concerns are proving to be dynamic and ever changing, and we cannot predict when the Public Health Agency of Canada will deem it safe to hold a large scale public event. We fully respect decisions that are being made by the health authorities to keep our communities safe, and we want to be part of the solution. Depending on when we’re given the green light we may entertain the idea of much smaller scaled down versions, but no promises yet.
We have long-standing relationships with our event charities and have been in touch with them to share the news. While disappointed, they assured us this was the right, and really only, decision we could make. We’ve assured them we’ll all be back and stronger than ever in 2021!
We’ve put together a FAQs document that will answer questions around registration fees and fundraising.
What now?
We know the power of community is strong with our GIVETOLIVE family and we wanted to give you a way to stay connected, especially in these unprecedented times. We’ve created an online virtual challenge – The BIG Boost Challenge – which incorporates the three pillars of GIVETOLIVE – fitness, giving, and achievement of the extraordinary. We really encourage you to join us in this 45-day virtual challenge. It’s simple, fun, and will help keep us connected, engaged, and motivated during these unsettling times. To learn more, click here. We will also keep all 2020 event forums open for you to chat and ask questions in.
If you have any other questions feel free to reach out:
BIG RIDE: bigridedirector@givetolive.ca
BIG SWIM: bigswimdirector@givetolive.ca
Or operations@givetolive.ca for any general GIVETOLIVE questions.
With love and thanks,
Your GIVETOLIVE family