NORTH WEBSTER – The North Webster Community Center will hold a Vegas Night fundraiser March 23. The night will feature a raffle, a buffet with Sleepy Owl catering, a DJ and dancing, and Vegas-style games like blackjack, poker and roulette. The event runs from 6 to 10 p.m. in the community center. Tickets are $25, and are available in advance from all NWCC board members as well as at North Webster Ace Hardware, American Legion, Sleepy Owl, the Indiana Farm Bureau Syracuse office and Sue’s Creations. Raffle prizes include $500 and two big-screen TVs. Jessica Hardy, NWCC events coordinator, said the purpose of such events is to help build community center programming. Their offerings are growing, she noted, with new classes such as youth comedy camps. Vegas Night replaces the spring Shrimp Stag, which was a men’s-only fundraiser held the past two years that never quite had the buzz they needed, noted fundraising chair Sherman Goldenberg. “We’re looking for it to be an annual rite of spring for the area to buy into in a big way,” he said. Goldenberg added that, though it’s not as big as the annual October auction, which brought in $110,000 in three hours last year, “it’s still more than a lightweight fundraiser.” Community Center President Jon Sroufe noted that most board members thought the event should be co-ed, unlike the Shrimp Stag. Shrimp will still be on the menu, though it won’t be all-you-can-eat any more. “There’s still shrimp. It’s kind of funny, we said we might not offer shrimp this year, but that didn’t go over too well,” he remarked.
