Marny Mills of Sault Ste. Marie will have to find another way to keep her 10-year-old son entertained over the course of the next week after reading the news that Camp McDougall — a popular summer camp for youth located just west of Thessalon — had announced the cancellation of its summer program Thursday due to staffing shortages.
It would’ve marked the third year her son Jackson attended the venerable summer hotspot for children and teenagers, which has been operated by the United Church of Canada since 1960. Mills says Jackson, who was set to attend the camp this Sunday, was “heartbroken” over the last-minute cancellation.
“I knew that they were struggling to find staff,” Mills told SooToday during a telephone interview Friday. “It’s just too bad the kids had to suffer because of it.”
Although Camp McDougall started the season with sufficient staff, it has been closed because it lacked a head cook and certified lifeguards, according to an announcement published to the camp's social media account.
"It is with heavy hearts that the board of directors announces the closing of the camp effective July 9," the statement reads. "All campers who have pre-registered for the 2023 season are being notified by email and a full refund will be forthcoming. And all present staff have been given favourable recommendations in their search for new employment."
Mills was aware that organizers had been struggling to secure lifeguards and a cook; she says the minister at her church recently took to social media in a last-ditch effort to secure workers — even if they could just work at the camp for a week at a time.
“I don’t get it. This post-COVID world that we’re living in now, I don’t understand why there are so many jobs and nobody to work in them,” she lamented.
It’s safe to say that Camp McDougall is a rite of passage of sorts for families in Sault Ste. Marie and the Algoma District. Mills, much like her son, has a number of fond memories attached to the popular summer destination.
“I loved it — it was great. I went with a friend of mine from church, and we spent a week in the cabins. We got to know each other quite well,” Mills recalled of her own time there. “I remember the songs at the dinner tables, and the campfire at night. It was a ton of fun.”
Sheridan Worth was employed by Camp McDougall as a director in the summer of 2017, coming in to oversee its program coordinators during a time when enrolment was “very high.”
She says that while there was no shortage of job applicants, the camp had a hard time filling lifeguard and cook positions due to the extensive certification that comes along with those summer gigs.
“I remember everyone was very eager to work, and it’s just really sad to see that now they’re struggling to hire in those really key positions — because you can’t have a summer camp without a lifeguard. There’s just no way around it, same with a cook,” she told SooToday Friday. “Those are two very essential — and hard — positions to fill, unfortunately.”
Now employed as a digital media specialist for the marketing team at Village Media — the parent company of SooToday — Worth was nonetheless “heartbroken” for the kids who can’t attend camp this year.
“My heart just broke, because camp is such an essential thing for children to have. When you go to an overnight camp, kids just feel their first feeling of independence,” she said. “Summer camp is something that, I think, every kid should experience because it’s so important for them to feel happy, independent, secure — and it’s just an amazing thing for them to have access to.
“Just to hear that is not going to be an option for a lot of children this summer is really heartbreaking, even for the parents because a lot of parents really rely on summer camps to provide their children with not only child care, but an enjoyable environment.”
Worth says it's "really sad to see how things are unfolding" at the camp she once worked at.
“It’s something so ingrained in our community that we don’t even realize," she said. "It’s been such a big part of a lot of people’s upbringing as well, and it’s something everybody looks forward to in the summer."
Mills says every single week was booked solid at Camp McDougall last summer; this year, all the weeks for Jackson’s age group were filled up as well.
But for now, Jackson and all the friends he’s made at the camp over the years will have no other choice but to forgo that one idyllic week of camaraderie and fun along the shores of Lake Huron next week.
“In the future he wants to be a camp counsellor, because he loves it so much out there and he forms such a bond with counsellors,” said Mills. “He just loves it out there.”
Camp McDougall initially agreed to an interview, but had no one available to speak with SooToday prior to the publication of this article.