Baseball for Dad postpones scavenger hunt due to COVID-19

By Mike Riley

Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

Baseball for Dad's Knocking Stigma out of the Park Community Scavenger Hunt had to be postponed recently due to the current provincial lockdown from COVID-19. According to Baseball for Dad's Louri Snider, this was done at the direction of Hastings Prince Edward Public Health. Snider hopes to reschedule the event for sometime later this summer or in the fall.

Baseball for Dad is a non-profit charity set up in honour of Mark Snider who tragically lost his battle with mental illness, taking his own life in 2019. It was set up in Mark's honour by his mom Louri, to take the stigma away from mental illness. Since their inception, they've come up with a plethora of initiatives like placing baseball gloves around the world (as baseball was Mark's favourite sport), the Buddy Bench program, their Kindness Moose program and their Moosing Around party rental business.

The Knocking Stigma out of the Park Scavenger Hunt arose from Baseball for Dad's green ribbon initiative, to support mental health awareness week from May 3 to May 9. Snider says they have reached out to Carlow Mayo, Hastings Highlands and the Town of Bancroft regarding the initiative, as well as local businesses to hang green ribbons with laminated paper baseballs attached to them for the scavenger hunt.

While the registration for the originally scheduled hunt ended on May 1, the event had to be postponed due to the current provincial lockdown to stem the tide of COVID-19, at the direction of HPEPH. The lockdown is expected to last until at least May 20.

Snider says they are still hanging green ribbons around Bancroft, Maynooth, Fort Stewart and McArthurs' Mills. She says it's going well.

“There are currently 225 ribbon pins that have been handed out for people to wear on their shirts. This weekend we have 10 people who will hang 250 ribbons. And quite a few businesses are hanging ribbons, putting up green lights or going green in some way,” she says.

Off the top of her head, Snider mentions some of those businesses participating; the Bancroft Pregnancy Care Centre, the North Hastings Community Integration Association, Mack Attack Outdoors, Vance Motors, North Hastings Children's Services, the North Hastings Public Library and the Wattle and Daub cafe.

“We want to do all we can to create awareness, so we decided to promote ‘go green' for mental health. We did throw around the idea of the end of summer or tie it in with Suicide Prevention Week in September or Mental Illness Awareness Week in October,” she says. “We will just wait and see how things go.”