BC’s worst wildfire season may impact donations for Terry Fox Run

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PORT COQUITLAM (NEWS 1130) – Hundreds of thousands of people across the country will put on their running shoes today to continue the legacy of one of Canada’s heroes.

The Terry Fox Run is taking place in an effort to raise money and awareness of cancer, an illness that’s touched almost everyone in some way. However, there are concerns donations may take a hit thanks to other recent events in our province specifically.

At midnight this past Friday, the BC government lifted the province-wide state of emergency of a record-setting nine weeks due to devastating wildfires.

Donna White with the Terry Fox Foundation expects donations could be down a bit this year with people directing their cash toward help the victims of BC’s worst wildfire season and a result, not all runs in BC are going ahead today as planned.

“We’ve made the tough decision for two of our events, Alexis Creek and Williams Lake have cancelled their runs for this year, just because those communities had been evacuated at one point.”

The run will go through Stanley Park in Vancouver. “Last year they had about 1,100 people and they raised about $192,000, which is the most money that event has raised in the course of the 37 years that they’ve been hosting the Terry Fox Run.”

She adds one of the biggest events is in Port Coquitlam, where Fox is buried. “We do find a lot of people will come from other parts of the province and even the Lower Mainland, to them that is the run they want to participate in and to come out and be a part of running in the place Terry called home.”

According to the foundation, through the annual run, more than $750 million has been raised around the world for cancer research in Fox’s name.

Fox passed away at the age of 22 after a long battle with cancer.

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