Page 54 - A_View_Of_Their_Own_the_Story_of_Westmount

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Peter Trent,
Caroline Thibodeau
and David Culver
launch the drive.
projects would be financed in the future; and it was
to be a community venture building for tomorrow.
"In the past, elected representatives decided on
their own how to spend a bunch of money," he
says. "In this case, Westmount told the citizens
about the problems (the library faced) and what the
results would be on their tax bills and then asked
them, do you want it or not. Given our dismal
experience in Canada in living within our means, I
think the Westmount Public Library (project) was a
pathfinder and others will follow." He predicts that
public money spent on schools and hospitals will be
handled the same way in the future.
"There was another aspect, too. We were in a
period of low tide, politically and economically.
Here's the little City of Westmount facing up to its
responsibilities to do for future generations what the
previous generations did for us. And doing it
without seeking help from outside the community.
That's also a sign of things to come."
These aspects also piqued the interests of
others from corporate, financial or fundraising
backgrounds who became involved: John Bridgman,
Gail Johnson, James Wright, Victor Drury and Peter
Duffield. The efforts of Mr. Duffield began back in
1991 before the election of the Trent council when,
as a councillor, Mr. Duffield laid some of the
groundwork for obtaining major gifts.
With Marjorie Bronfman as honourary chair-
man, the campaign committee included: David L.
Johnston and David M. Lank for major gifts; and
Joan Winser and J. Brian Aune, special gifts. The
community phase was chaired by Julia Reitman,
Cynthia Cundill and Paule Gautier. Robert Vezina,
Jay Gould and David Rolph headed public aware-
ness and Victor Drury served as special advisor.
"This was a grassroots campaign," says Belinda
Pyle, of Navion, the professional fundraising firm
hired to assist Mr. Culver. "It's what made it so
different from other campaigns that are broken
down into corporate donations. These were all
private gifts from people who have a history in
Westmount."
Starting off with a gift of $250,000 from an
anonymous donor, the lead gifts division of the
campaign, headed by Mr. Culver himself, generated
$819,000 by September 1995. This represented 17
donations from requests for $100,000 or more.
In the same time period, $196,900 was col-
lected from 34 major gifts (requests from $10,000-
$100,000) and $199,600 from 91 special gifts
(requests of $1,000 or more).
Another $50,021 was raised from the commu-
nity awareness phase of the campaign from 261
groups or individuals, involving numerous partici-
pants. Council members, campaign workers, library
trustees and city staff contributed $80,676 in the
name of the Library Family.
Rooms, windows and gardens have been
dedicated to individuals who made special contribu-
tion to the effort while plaques on chairs recognize
21 community organizations and 77 streets which
participated at the grassroots level.
A special interest was shown in the historical
windows, according to Mr. Culver. Each of the 65
special windows was "sold" with donors' names to
be marked by a plaque beneath.
The Burpee family, whose members extend to
the Winns, Hingstons, Dingles, Lowes, Reeves and
LoVecchios, collected $2,975 in honour of Lawrence
J. Burpee (1873-1946), whose name graced one of
the windows as a Canadian author, geographer and
historian. "Some of you have asked who he is,"
wrote organizer Thomas Burpee, so he sent them all
a picture and biography of the writer.
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