By Adam Smith

The North Jefferson News



The Gardendale Rotary Club would like to invite residents and businesses to spend presidential election night with them.

The club is making arrangements for its second annual gala, to be held Tuesday, Nov. 4, from 6 to 9 p.m. at The Club in Birmingham.

Tickets for the event are $250 per couple. The club has 250 tickets to sell. Businesses can also purchase a table for up to eight employees for $1,000.

Rotary Club of Gardendale President Mark Argo said the election night date shouldn’t interfere with the event attendance. “We determined that no one would be voting at that time, so hopefully folks can have a relaxing evening,” he said.

Last year’s gala raised about $37,000 for the future Gardendale Miracle League field. This year’s gala will also support the Miracle League, but a level of financial commitment has not been determined.

The proceeds would have been less, if not for the generosity of some of the night’s $20,000 grand prize winners. Near the end of last year’s gala, there were only four tickets remaining to be drawn for the grand prize. All four ticketholders elected to split the prize four ways.

“The North Jefferson Business League bought a ticket and they were one of the four winners,” said Rotary Club past president and gala organizer Aaron Box. “They gave back their share, which worked out fabulously.”

The club will again have a $20,000 cash prize to be drawn at the end of the night, on top of several door prizes worth $250 or more.

Ticketholders are entered into a drawing for the prizes, which are given out throughout the evening. The ticket also comes with dinner for two and a choice of chicken or steak.

Proceeds from the event will go toward a number of Rotary Club causes, including its yearly scholarship program, which provides college aid to area high school seniors.

A more ambitious project the club is taking part in involves the future of water availability and cleanliness around the world.

Argo said two Rotarians, Richard Bradley and Chuck Cater, have been helping to spearhead the Water and Sanitation Health Rotary Action Group [WASHRAG] project at a local and district level for Rotary.

“It looks like our first project is going to be two water wells that will provide water filtration systems for Mosquito Indian families in one village in Nicaragua,” Argo said. “Hopefully, this will provide a template to start showing people in other places. Organizations have been doing projects like this for years, but Rotary is putting parameters on it.”

Anyone interested in purchasing a ticket to the Gardendale Rotary Club gala can contact Box at 631-6562 or they can be purchased from any Rotary Club member.

“We’d love for everyone to get involved in the gala,” Box said. “There’s just tremendous activities that the Rotary Club gets involved with, and the proceeds go to support those projects.”