Mayor Marty Bootsma is not only leaving Salmon Arm’s political scene, he’s leaving Salmon Arm – albeit temporarily.
Bootsma, who is not running in this municipal election, plans to head to Thailand as part of a project spearheaded by the Chase Rotary Club. He said he’ll be helping to build bathrooms at a school where children from surrounding hill tribes attend. The little village where he’ll be working is outside of Chiang Mai in northern Thailand. He plans to be overseas about two months.
“It’s not all generosity on my part. It is 75 or 80 degrees, right? I still have my selfish side,” he laughed. “You don’t see me doing this in Inuvik.”
Although Bootsma grew up working in a bakery, he took a carpentry apprenticeship in his younger years. He said it’s been a while since he’s done any construction work.
“It would be nice to get a supervisory role,” he laughs.
Bootsma hopes to travel as well, making side trips to Cambodia and Ho Chi Minh City.
Asked what inspired him to do this, he remarked, “I did want to be somewhere warm and I didn’t want to be bored. It looked like a nice fit.”
Bootsma is a member of Salmon Arm’s Daybreak Rotary Club and will be joining Chase and Kamloops Rotarians in Thailand. He said two people from the Chase Rotary who headed up the project live in Thailand six months of the year.
He’ll be paying his own transportation costs but believes his accommodations will be covered.
