Privacy

Who controls this information

The Sudbury Santa Claus Parade Committee — an ad hoc committee of volunteers, supported by the City of Greater Sudbury and Downtown Sudbury BIA. It is not an incorporated organization and there is no legal entity behind it.

There is no company to write to and no registered office. Everything below is what the committee undertakes to do, and email is how you hold us to it.

What we collect, and why

We only collect information when you give it to us, and only what we need to do the thing you asked for.

• Float registration — organization details, a contact name, email and mobile number, your entry description, vehicle and walker counts, and your compliance attestations. The mobile number exists so the Parade Marshall can text you on the day.
• Volunteer signup — name, email, phone, age bracket, emergency contact, shift preference, vest size and any accommodations you ask for.
• Sponsor enquiries — organization, contact details, the level you are interested in, and your notes.
• Awards evening RSVPs — attendance, guest names for the door list, dietary requirements and accessibility requirements.
• Contact form — your name, email, subject and message.
• Analytics — anonymous page-level statistics, so we know whether the parade day page is holding up under load. No advertising trackers, no profiles, no data sold or shared.

Accommodation and accessibility information

If you tell us about an accommodation you need — as a volunteer, or in an awards RSVP — that information is used only to arrange it. It is visible to the volunteer coordinator and the committee members organizing the event, and to nobody else. It is never used in a decision about whether to accept you, and it is deleted with the rest of your record.

Information about young people

Volunteers aged 14 and 15 can marshal with a parent or guardian on the same shift, so the volunteer form may collect a minor’s details. When it does, we require the guardian’s confirmation on the same form, and we hold the record under the same retention rules as everyone else. We do not contact a volunteer under 16 without their guardian on the message.

Payments

Float registration payments are processed by Stripe. Card numbers are entered on Stripe’s own checkout and never touch the parade’s systems. We pass Stripe your entry’s name and your email address, so it can send your receipt. Stripe is a separate company that processes payments outside Canada, under its own privacy policy. We keep the amount, the date, whether it succeeded and Stripe’s reference for it — that is all we ever see.

Where your information is held

The site runs on Google Firebase. Our database, uploaded files and server functions are all configured to a Canadian region, so registration records, volunteer records and photographs are held in Canada. Email the site sends — notices to the committee, and the copy you receive after signing up or registering — goes through Amazon Simple Email Service, configured to its Canada (Central) region in Montréal.

One exception. Firebase Authentication — the service that holds account login records for committee members and dashboard users — runs only from data centres in the United States and cannot be moved to a Canadian region. So account records sit in the US, while every other record we hold is in Canada. (Payments are the one other place your information leaves Canada — see Stripe, above.) If you have registered a float, volunteered, or sent us a message but never had a login account, none of your information is in that US service.

How long we keep it

• Float entries and volunteer records — three parade years, because returning captains and returning marshals are how the parade actually gets staffed. After that, deleted.
• Payment records — seven years, which is what the tax rules require.
• Contact form messages — one year.
• Accommodation notes — deleted with the record they belong to, or sooner on request.
• Analytics — 14 months, anonymous throughout.

Photographs of you

The parade is a public event and it is filmed and photographed. If you appear in a frame we publish and would rather not, tell us and we will take it down — no explanation needed. Volunteers are asked separately whether they are happy to appear in photographs, and saying no does not affect your shift.

Cookies and analytics

We set no advertising or tracking cookies. The site stores one thing on your device without asking: a half-finished float registration or volunteer form, so you can close the tab and come back to it. That stays on your device and never reaches us until you submit.

Analytics can be turned off from the banner on your first visit, or at any time from the link in the footer. Turning it off does not change anything about how the site works for you.

Asking for your information, or its deletion

Ask us and we will tell you exactly what we hold about you, or delete it. Email info@sudburysantaclausparade.com or use the contact form. We aim to answer within 30 days, and usually much sooner — there are not many of us and the list is not long.

One limit worth knowing: if you have paid for a float entry, we cannot delete the payment record before the seven years are up. Everything else can go.