This year marks the 31st Year that the Current Schaap Sanitation Team has participated in the Relay for Life Murray County. Our team is one of the continuous original members for the Murray County event. Originally, we were the CRD team with all members employees of the CRD. As time progressed our team membership changed and we transitioned to Schapp Sanitation with the support or Eric Joens from Schaaps. Originally, we were a team of 18 and currently our team size is usually in the 6-member category. We raise the majority of our funds by private contributions. We do a community band supper in the park on Thursdays before the community band concert the week before the 4th of July. We serve Monogram Hot dogs, chips and bars. Originally our meal in the park consisted of Maddy Forsbergs famous Chili and Homemade strawberry short cake. With the decrease in team size and health concerns we have gone to the grilled Hot Dogs and we appreciate the support we get from Monograms for donating the dogs to our team as well as our customers.
Our team has been deeply affected by cancer. Original Team members included Maddy Forsberg, Gary and Helen Brinks who are all sadly no longer with us. Our team currently still relays in honor of our past members. Gary and Helen were very much the driving force behind the CRD/Schaap team. We relay today still to honor their desires to find a cure for cancer.
Some of the fun memories we talk about each year is relaying all night. That 3 to 5 am time was tough. But we have great memories of freezing to death or else the humidity was so bad we were soaking wet with dew. A fun team event we had was we sponsored a pickle eating contest one year with the big dill pickles. I still am not sure I will ever look at a dill pickle the same. We have also served grilled Buffalo at our campsite. We also have played plinko at our campsite with prizes we accumulated from various organizations.
Our team has been instrumental in the creation of the Hope Garden which was recently added to the event. Our team designs all the Hope Garden bags each year.
We have never been able to get the 1st place award but have had the 2nd and 3rd place team awards many times thru the years. If you or your family would like to join our team, we are more than happy to have you join us on Schaap Sanitation. The only requirement to be a team member is that you need to raise $100 and then you get the HOPE Relay Team Shirt. If you would like to join our team and make a difference you can contact Kathy Schreiber at 507.227.3471 or Linda Tobias at 507.227.7195 for more information. This year’s Relay will be August 8th and the Relay hours will begin at 5 and end around 10 PM. There will be a silent auction again as well as a short program and we will have games for all to be involved in.
