'O' Foundation leads effort for complex awning installation
Thursday, June 12, 2008
A local effort to shield patrons of the Lincoln County Multi-Purpose Facility from the elements is just now receiving its first donations.
Brookhaven's "O" Foundation is extending its feelers across the city, seeking anywhere from $5,000 to $15,000 in donations to fund the installation of a sprawling, metal awning to cover the front entrance of the facility.
Foundation president Rose "Polly" Powell said the awning is estimated to cover an area of 36 feet by 90 feet - enough to cover about half of the front of the building. Powell said the idea to seek a cover for the facility has been in the works since last summer, when people began to notice how the weather made people in nice clothes who were attending nice events make a mad dash through wind and rain to get inside the facility.
"There's a lot of people who use this facility," Powell said. "We counted up about 100,000 last year. We have weddings, birthdays and political rallies, and sometimes the weather is so harsh we have to rent a tent to put up outside. It's hot, hot, hot; and then it's cold, cold, cold."
In order to raise the money, the "O" Foundation is seeking sponsorships. Powell said donations to the project are divided into four categories - platinum, $500; gold, $250; silver, $100; and bronze, $50. Business and personal advertisements, in honor or in memory of, will be permanently placed on the awning in different sizes according to the level of donation.
"It's really good advertising for your business because of all the people that use the multi-purpose building," Powell said. "And the more you sponsor, the bigger the area you can have."
Powell said the first donations have recently trickled in, with the project budget currently at $250 from five bronze donations, including one all the way from a Brookhavenite residing in Italy.
Powell is looking for local businesses, banks and concerned citizens to add to the total. She noted the project to place the awning will grow in quality if the budget goal is exceeded.
"We're going to make it as nice as the money we can raise," Powell said.
And raising the money is all about the "we."
With the Lincoln County Multi-Purpose Commission locked into its budget and managing several upgrades across the property, no county funds will be put toward the purchase and installation of the awning. The effort will be 100 percent community supported, said facility manager Quinn Jordan.
"We're within a budget year, and it goes from budget year to budget year," Jordan said. "We strongly rely on community support in order to bring these needed improvements to the facility while we operate on a very tight budget."
Jordan said he and the commission encourage the project. He noted, though, that final commission approval would be needed, in order to "dovetail" the project into the facility's one-, three-, five- and 10-year plans already in place.
While commission chairman Pat McCullough said he and the commission were behind the project, an engineering plan must be seen and approved before the awning plans can go forward.
"We have to see some kind of design criteria," he said. "The commission is aware of the plan, but we have to see the engineering plans before final approval."
Pending final approval of the engineering specs, McCullough said the awning project would be a worthy addition to the facility.
"The idea of the construction itself is a good thing, and we don't have the money to make that type of addition ourselves," McCullough said. "If anyone wants to compliment the facility with a plan like this, we'd be foolish not to take advantage of it."
Powell is scheduled to meet with representatives from Reed's Metals, Inc. - the company that will manufacture and install the awning - at the multi-purpose facility Monday morning to examine and discuss the project and develop a cost estimate.
Reed's Metals owner Bernard Reed said his company will generate its own engineering plans. He hopes to have them ready to present to the commission within a week of Monday's meeting.
