The Greely Lions Club co-sponsored the Halloween event and volunteered their time to help out with various odd jobs around the community centre. Standing left to right, Cecil Stanley, Lions President Paul Elford, Lee Nickerson and Michael Boomer. Sitting down from the left, Colleen Gesner, Osgoode Ward Councillor George Darouze and Steve Williams.      Glover photos

Kory Glover
Villager Staff
GREELY – There was something spooky going on at the Greely Community Centre Sat., Oct. 27.

Children were screaming in terror, claiming they witnessed zombies, severed heads and ghoulish children jumping out at them. Thankfully, it was all in good Halloween fun put together by Osgoode Ward councillor, George Darouze and his partnership with the City of Ottawa.

“Councillor George Darouze approached us to help him run the Halloween event and the haunted house. The recreational staff are very excited to be part of the event and they were the brain child behind the decorations, the haunted house itself and the theme,” said Tara Charron, program co-ordinator for the City of Ottawa. “There are about 30 staff members here right now volunteering their time as actors in the haunted house and working the activity stations.

Charron admitted that it’s always nerve-wracking wondering whether or not people will show up to the event, not to mention a crowd of people. However, she was relieved that a decent sized crowd of parents and children showed up for good pre-horror fun before the main day.

“We’re always really nervous in case nobody shows up but it turns out everyone has heard about the event. The event is packed and we’re expecting about 400 children and we’re kind of on par with what we expected.”

Darouze wanted to do something to celebrate the spooky season with the community, so he wanted to partner with the City of Ottawa to think of ideas on how bring out the Halloween spirit in Greely.

“They used to have Halloween every year and two years ago, because we work in the same branch in Metcalfe, we started talking about Halloween and I wanted to do something for the community,” he said. “We started brainstorming and talking about ideas about what we can bring to the table and what they have in talent and volunteers, we could make a big event for the whole community.”

The children screamed with pure terrifying delight throughout the afternoon, proving to Darouze that the event was a success with the combined turnout and the amount of volunteers.

“I’m very pleased with the success of our haunted house,” he said. “I’m very thankful to all the volunteers that helped out today. This is a great team and everything we’ve accomplished today is thanks to them.”