John and Leslie Wilson have been residents of the Fort McMurray community for a long time, 35 years to be exact, and the couple wanted to give something back so they donated $500,000 to the Northern Lights Health Foundation as part of the Gratitude Campaign. The donation will be used for developing new surgical suites at the facility that are sorely needed. The Gratitude Campaign was launched by the foundation in March of this year, and the campaign goal is to raise $16 million to fund a total of 8 health care projects. According to John the decision to make the donation was easy because the hospital was a really good fit. “Health care plays an important part in everyone’s life. It’s a good thing for the community as a whole, not just for the regional health centre. The community has been extremely good to my family and my business and we just thought it was appropriate to give back to the community that gave so much to us. All my employee’s over the years have benefited from the services. It’s pretty logical to give to health care because it has so many needs, not just in our community, but in every community.”

In the 35 years that John and Leslie Wilson have lived in Fort McMurray the couple have used the hospital many times, and that made the decision to make a donation to the Northern Lights Health Foundation easy. Through the years all of the children that John and Leslie have had have been born at Northern Lights Regional Health Centre, and Leslie was also employed by the hospital as a nurse for a period of time as well. John started and owned a paving, water, and sewage company called H.Wilson Industries until 5 years ago when he finally sold the company to Volker Stevin.