An outdoor charity dinner that was to be a Terry Fox Foundation fundraiser will now direct its proceeds to the Michael Cuccione Foundation.
The Diva en Blanc on Aug. 22 — an outdoor picnic-style dinner at which guests will be wearing all white, at a location that will only be revealed on the day of the event — had been selling tickets for about a month. Proceeds from the sale of tickets, which are $130 each, were to go to the Terry Fox Foundation.
But the divas — Port Moody Coun. Diana Dilworth, event planner Polly Krier and NDP MLA Selina Robinson — learned last week that they'd have to make a change.
They decided over the weekend to direct their fundraising to the Michael Cuccione Foundation instead, noting it was in keeping with their original intention to support a local organization that funds cancer research in the name of a young person "whose life was taken far too soon from cancer," Robinson said.
In the past three years the divas have hosted Oscar night parties that have raised $50,000 for nine local charities.
Donna White, provincial director of the Terry Fox Foundation's BC/Yukon branch, said there was some confusion around the divas' offer this year.
"The Foundation functions under a set of policies that have remained true to Terry's wishes since 1980," she wrote in an email. "One of these policies is that any event that bears Terry's name must be accessible to all, have no entry fee, and that donations must be entirely voluntary.
"We have more than 9,000 events that take place across the country, they must all abide by this guiding principle."
• Visit www.divaenblanc.com for more information.
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