(file photo/CJME News Staff)

By CJME News Staff

Friends of the Riders lottery ends after long run

May 16, 2019 | 4:35 PM

A fixture in Saskatchewan for the past 33 years is shutting down.

Tom Shepherd, the founder and president of the Friends of the Riders Touchdown Lottery, announced Thursday that the lottery is being discontinued.

“At 76 years old, I have come to realize that the time has come for me to wind this venture down,” Shepherd said in a media release issued by the Saskatchewan Roughriders.

“I have spent the last 33 years volunteering and giving my all to the lottery but it is no longer practical for me to go forward.”

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Since its inception, the lottery has raised almost $22.6 million for the Roughriders. It has distributed more than $32 million in prizes to ticket-buyers.

Shepherd was a Roughriders director for 25 years and served as the club’s president from 1987 to ’89. He was inducted into the team’s Plaza of Honour in 1995 and was enshrined in the Canadian Football Hall of Fame in 2008.

“Tom’s contributions to the Saskatchewan Roughriders cannot be understated,” team president-CEO Craig Reynolds said in the release. “He’s poured countless hours of his life into making sure the club was the best it could be.”