Tickets are now on sale for the 15th Annual Rotary Duck Race.
The rubber ducks will race down the Alouette River on Sunday, Aug. 9, and hundreds of people will gather along the riverfront in Maple Ridge Park for the event. There will be games, music and a family festival atmosphere, before the popular race sees up to 11,000 ducks floating to the finish line.
The grand prize for the first-place duck owner will be $15,000.
This is an event that local, non-profit youth and senior groups get involved in, and they are permitted to keep $8 from every $10 duck race entry they sell.
“The Rotary Club doesn’t make a lot of money out of it, but the youth and seniors groups we work with do,” said Alex Pope, president of the Rotary Club of Meadow Ridge.
Last year, the First Haney Scouts sold $12,900 work of ducks, and the First Pitt Meadows Scouts $12,600. They were able to keep 80 per cent of that. There were 29 youth and seniors groups that benefited.
The race will raise up to $110,000. Last year it was billed “a race to $100,000,” but the event is growing.
“We added 1,000 ducks, because we pretty much sold out last year,” explained Pope.
With the 20 per cent of the funds that Rotary gets, they cover that grand prize.
Prizes:
Grand Prize: $15,000 cash
Second: $1,200 cash and a $1,200 shopping spree at Marks
Third: 10 Rounds of golf and five carts at Meadow Gardens Golf Course ($1,365 value)
Fourth: $1,000 cash courtesy Centra Lawyers
Fifth: Samsung 65” smart TV ($1,000 value) from Haney Appliance & Sound.
Tickets are on sale every Saturday at the Haney Farmers Market in Memorial Peace Park (11925 Haney Pl.), from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. Look for the Rotary awning. They are also available intermittently at the ValleyFair Mall.
The event on Aug. 9 will start at 11 a.m., and the race will be at 1 p.m.