After the COVID pandemic forced Blue Sky Opportunities (BSO) in Altona to essentially cancel its day programs, the organization received some welcome news recently.

“This coming Monday, October 26th, we will be fully open,” declared General Manager Richard Neufeld. “We’re looking forward to welcoming everybody back!”

After shuttering day programs for over a year, Neufeld said the news was received “very ecstatically by a lot of people we support, and parents and caregivers of those people that we support as well", noting it’s been very difficult for people to not be involved in work and the work place.

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Since the COVID-induced scale-back, BSO’s day programs have been restricted to ‘critical need’ based on criteria set up by the province. Once fully open, the organization will once again offer a variety of program options.

“We have some that are very work-based, some of that are more recreational based," said Neufeld. "We do have the wood shop. We build and sell mainly pallets and, of course, [there’s] recycling, the day program here at the main building. We have one area, the Opportunities program, where we support people that have mobility issues. We do contract work, we do a lot of shredding, we do assembly work, we also made crokinole boards. [There are] a lot of different things going on.”

Neufeld added, the wood shop had a record year in 2020. Crokinole board sales were four times higher than normal, and pallet sales also hit a record high. With high cost and low availability of wood, Neufeld said they were forced to be “ingenious" to maintain a supply of wood to meet demand. "We were fortunate to be able to do that," he noted.

Like many business sectors across Manitoba, BSO is short of staff, a situation which could likely affect the day program schedule, added Neufeld. BSO is hoping to hire additional staff to fill that need.