Katie Ryan
Special to The Lake Report

Red Roof Retreat is bringing back its annual Pasta with a Purpose dinner after three years of pandemic-related cancellations. 

Steffanie Bjorgan, executive director and founder of Red Roof Retreat, said she’s excited that the popular dinner is back.

“It’s so rejuvenating,” she said.

“We’ve gotten through the last few years and we can start up (again) these events that are so important to sustaining our program,” said Bjorgan, adding that the community is always quick to snap up tickets.

In past years, “It was hilarious because we didn’t think to pre-sell tickets and we were overflowing in the building that we hosted it in,” she said.

This year’s dinner will be at John Michael’s Banquet and Event Centre in Niagara Falls on April 30.

Tickets can be bought through the Red Roof Retreat website at redroofretreat.com.

Adult tickets are $35. Children ages of five to 12 are $15 each and those under five dine for free.

Ken Hendriks has been supporting Red Roof Retreat since 2000 and the pasta dinner fundraiser was his idea.

It first started 21 years ago and was initially was just a celebration of friends, family and people who had special needs family members who relied on Red Roof Retreat.

“We’ve gone from raising $1,500 that first year (2002) to about $90,000 the last year we did our event, which was in 2019,” said Hendriks. 

Bjorgan said Red Roof hopes to raise more than $90,000 this year.

“The more we raise, the less it costs families,” she said, adding the money goes to general operations and is then put into supporting the agency’s programs.

Hendriks said the dinner is a time where everyone can get together and celebrate while  learning about Red Roof’s future plans.

Anyone wanting to donate items for the evening’s auction can email  claire@redroofretreat.com for more information.

Other donation opportunities are posted on Red Roof’s website under the Get Involved tab.