Vicki L MorrisonDue to tremendous growth over the past six years the Boomer’s Legacy Foundation decided to become a charity under the umbrella of the Canadian Armed Forces Support Our Troops program. The process was lengthly, but worth the wait.
“We determined the best route for us would be to fall under SOT. In this way it will be much easier for bases across the country to support the work we are doing, a way to eliminate red tape,” said Maureen Eykelenboom, founder of Boomer’s Legacy.
Eykelenboom approached the CAF to discuss opportunities to better align the objectives of Boomer’s Legacy with Support Our Troops, while still retaining the generous and passionate spirit of her late son. It took over a year to agree on a collaboration agreement that works for both sides, but on October 1, 2014 the Boomer’s Legacy Foundation gave up its charitable status.
The mandate of Boomer’s Legacy will remain the same, helping soldiers to help others at home and abroad.
“Boomer’s Legacy is about how the soldier feels when they get to do their job, while at the same time putting a smile on the face of a child a world away by handing them simple things like soccer balls. I cannot wait to see how much farther they will go under the umbrella of Support Our Troops,” said Eykelenboom.
Support Our Troops made the process easy for the founder.
“The staff with SOT are fantastic to work with. In the past we had explored becoming an actual charity, with an executive director and a board of directors. But it didn’t feel right. This feels right,” said Eykelboom.
Eykelenboom plans to continue playing an active role with the organization, as founder and in a fundraising capacity. She also hopes to have more time to be a wife, mother and a grandmother. Her ultimate goal is to eventually participate in a fundraising bike ride as an actual rider.
In 2006, Boomer’s Legacy was established as a charitable foundation by Maureen Eykelenboom following the death of her son, Cpl Andrew ‘Boomer’ Eykelenboom, a medical technician serving in Afghanistan.
In the past funds donated to Boomer’s Legacy were managed as an External Trust Fund within the Canadian Armed Forces Central Fund and were expended by CAF members helping the people of Afghanistan affected by poverty and war, with an emphasis on healthcare and education programs and services for women and children. Until Support Our Troops took over Eykelenboom conducted the majority of the foundation business from her dining room table. Since 2007 Boomer’s Legacy has raised $1,042,000 in twenty-dollar increments.
Please visit www.boomerslegacy.com for more information or to make a donation.
