Category Archives: Fund Raising

Fund Raising Posts

Summer 2023 Raffle!

The 2023 Raffle is Over!

We held the drawing at the conclusion of our Annual Meeting yesterday afternoon, September 2nd. The winner of the grill was Cheryl Willis, the Winner of the L.L. Bean gift card was Linda Gallion, the winner of the Reny’s gift card was Geraldine Hull (wife of Paul Barton), and the winner of the Sheepscot General gift certificate was Lee Sledjeski (a friend of our new President, Gareth Bowen). There was an additional 5th prize made and graciously donated by Linda Clark, wife of Alan Clark, a lovely sun catcher and a pendant made with real flowers (picture at left). This unexpected lovely final runner up prize was won by Steve Cowles daughter-in-law, Jess Puth.

We’ll be collecting the grill from Louis Doe Garden Center this coming week and delivering it to it’s new home.

All told we raised $2335 for our Dam Repair Fund bringing the fund balance to an impressive $26,310. We would like to thank EVERYONE who bought tickets this year for helping support our dam repair efforts.


The Second Annual Clary Lake Association Raffle is underway! Once again, Mark & Tara Doe of Louis Doe Garden Center in Newcastle have  graciously donated our First Prize, a Masterbuilt Digital Charcoal Grill + Smoker (pictured at left) with a retail price of $599. To increase your chances of winning something, we have three runner up prizes too! Our 1st runner up prize is a $250 Gift Certificate from LL Bean in Freeport. Our 2nd runner up prize is a $100 Renys Gift Certificate, and our 3rd runner up prize is a $50 gift certificate from Sheepscot General. Tickets cost $5 each or 5 tickets for $20. 

The drawing for the raffle will be held at the Clary Lake Association’s Annual Meeting on Saturday September 2nd at the Clary Lake dam on Route 218 in Whitefield. The meeting starts at 2PM and usually goes for about an hour and a half. We’ll hold the drawing at the conclusion of the Membership Meeting. There is no limit to the number of tickets you can buy so if you want to increase your chances of winning, buy a lot! 

Why Are We Raising Money?

We are raising money for our Clary Lake Dam Maintenance and Repair fund. The dam is in reasonable shape now but it leaks, and leaks only get worse, not better. Someday in the not too distant future we’re going to have to make some costly repairs to the dam and gate mechanism. This is your chance to help fund that effort and maybe win something as well. Sadly, money that you spend on raffle tickets is not tax deductible, even if given to a nonprofit organization such as the Clary Lake Association. Sorry! If you WOULD like to make a tax deductible contribution, please visit our Donate to the Association page!

Here’s what our tickets look like. You keep the big part. We keep the small part:


YOU DO NOT NEED TO BE PRESENT TO WIN!
 Make sure that you write your contact info (at least your first name and phone number) on the back of the ticket stub so we can reach out to you to let you know you won. Gift certificates can be mailed. Particulars for claiming the 1st prize will be furnished at a later date.

How To Get Tickets

There are lots of ways you can get raffle tickets:

  1. Make out a check made out to Clary Lake Association and mail it to PO Box 127, Whitefield ME 04353 and we’ll mail you your tickets! How easy is that?
  2. We’ll be sending out our Summer 2023 Newsletter soon with an included Dues envelope. Just include your ticket money with your dues and we’ll mail your your tickets! 2 birds with one stamp!
  3. If you know a Board member, go see them, they’ll have tickets to sell.
  4. We’d like to make it easy to buy tickets! You can simply email your name, mailing address, and phone number to ticketsales@clarylake.org and someone will call to make arrangements to meet up with you to get you some tickets!
  5. Tickets will be available at the Annual Meeting on Saturday September 2nd from about 1PM until the drawing.
  6. You can buy tickets at the Clary Lake Association’ Ice Cream Social (Saturday July 15th)
  7. Starting in June, we plan to have a table set up to sell tickets at the Whitefield Recycling Center (and possibly other places to be announced); stop by and grab some tickets!
  8. You can use the button below to buy tickets and pay for them with a credit card or with your Paypal account. Make sure we have your full name, mailing address and email address and we’ll put your tickets in the mail to you and put your ticket stubs in the bucket with all the rest. How easy is that!

We’re continuing to work on easy ways to see you tickets. Stay tuned for future announcements!

CLA Summer 2022 Raffle Ahead!

Mark & Tara Doe are CLA members and own a house and property on Hornpout Lane. They’re also owners of Louis Doe Home Center in Newcastle. I was talking with them a few weeks ago about how we’re going to have to start raising money for dam repairs before long, and out of the blue they graciously offered to donate a Weber Spirit E-310 gas grill (pictured at left) to us to raffle off this summer to start raising some money. We’ve been scrambling to get all our ducks in a row and get everything ready, and we’re about to launch the first ever Clary Lake Association Summer Raffle! We’re still in the process of lining up some runner up prizes and hope to be able to start selling tickets as early as next week. We expect this will become an annual event. Continue reading

29 November 2018: Fundraising Update

We’re within 10% of reaching our second fundraising goal and I’d like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who has helped us get this far. While we’re a little shy of the additional $15,000 we wanted to raise, we’re still in pretty good financial shape going forward. While donations have slowed down, they haven’t stopped coming in and I trust we’ll reach our goal before long. In round numbers, since we started fundraising last spring we’ve raised over $130,000 in donations. Impressive for a small lake association.

We generally don’t single out individual donors for recognition, but from time to time we do and I’d like to acknowledge a recent generous donation to our Dam Purchase & Repair Fund from the Whitefield Lions Club. It was both unexpected and greatly appreciated. I hate to say it but I wasn’t really familiar with the Lions Club and what they do so I read up about it. It’s an international, non-political service organization established in 1916 with currently over 1.7 million members world-wide. The Whitefield Lions Club has been serving the towns of Whitefield, Jefferson, Windsor and Somerville, Maine since 1953 and is part of Lions Clubs International Maine District 41. Thank you Whitefield Lions!

 

12 October 2018: Fundraising Update

One week ago today the Board mailed out yet another fundraising letter to our Membership, other Clary Lake shore owners, and friends of Clary Lake in the surrounding community. I had hoped to post a fundraising update before sending that letter, explaining where we stand financially, what we’ve spent money on so far, and why we need to raise more money, but the past couple of weeks since receiving the favorable bankruptcy court ruling have been unbelievably busy and I just haven’t found the time to sit down and address the matter. Until now. A few people have reached out to me recently with questions about the need for additional fundraising, so here I go, better late than never.  A lot has been on hold this summer, pending receipt of the Clary Lake dam and we’re now trying to make up for lost time. First and foremost is getting the dam repaired as soon as possible. I’ll update everyone about that effort in a separate post. Continue reading

02 June 2018: Donations Continue

Please join me in thanking the Chickawaukee Ice Boat Club for their $500 donation to our campaign to raise money to buy and repair the Clary Lake dam! My friend Bill Bunting stopped by the other day to say the club would be donating to our fund, and this morning the check arrived. It is very gratifying to see this level of community support for our efforts to restore Clary Lake.

I enjoy ice boating, the picture at left is of me sailing on Clary 2 winters ago in a Lockley Skimmer. I’d like to get my hands on a nice little DN Class boat sometime. And a helmet.

And yes, we’re still accepting donations 🙂

15 May 2018: “Buy the Dam” Fundraising Campaign Officially Ends

Today (May 15, 2018) marks the official end of our Spring 2018 “Buy the Dam” fundraiser and we would like to publicly acknowledge and thank our (anonymous) matching donors and by name, those other individuals, members and non-members alike, who have helped make our campaign such an outstanding success. We have reached our fundraising goal of $125,000 and we are extremely gratified by the outpouring of support for our efforts to buy the dam and protect and preserve Clary Lake. Donations arrived not just from people in our local communities of Whitefield and Jefferson, but also from people from elsewhere around Maine, and around the Country. Donations are expected to continue to arrive over the coming weeks, and the funds will be put to good use. There will be more work to do, and ongoing recurring expenses that need to be covered so if you haven’t yet donated, it is not too late! Continue reading

26 April 2018: Fundraising Continues, New Matching Donor Found

We’ve been busy! Our original matching donor cut off at $45,000. We have actually managed to secure another matching donor (who also wishes to remain anonymous) who will match up to an additional $10,000 worth of donations! Seeing as how we’re currently at almost $107,000, an additional $10,000 in donations along with these new matching funds will push us over the top of our phase 2 fundraising goal of $125,000. This means we should be able to make permanent repairs to the Clary Lake dam this summer, rather than having to wait a year. Our fundraising success has been incredibly gratifying and shows just how much people want this water level crisis to end. If you haven’t donated to our fundraising campaign yet, please consider doing so at your earliest opportunity. Checks may be sent to:

Clary Lake Association
PO Box 127
Whitefield ME 04353

Alternatively you can visit our Donate to the Association page and donate via Paypal.

We’re making progress towards purchasing the Clary Lake dam from the Bankruptcy Court, but it’s slow going just now. We’ll provide more updates as information becomes available. Your patience is appreciated.

21 April 2018: CLA Fundraising Campaign Extended

We reached our initial Phase 1 fundraising goal of $90,000 much sooner than expected and while the Board hadn’t discussed trying to raise additional funds for permanent repairs so soon, it only makes sense that we maintain our forward fundraising momentum and move right into Phase 2 fundraising without delay! We needed the initial funds to purchase the dam in a relative hurry, however Phase 2 fundraising can proceed at a somewhat more leisurely pace. The money is to pay for engineering services and for permanent dam repairs which we won’t need to spend for a while. We have only begun working on getting prices and we won’t have a firm budget for the work yet. However, some preliminary estimates we’ve received indicate we’ll need at least $30,000 for this second and final phase of effort, possibly more, hence a new fundraising goal of $125,000. We may need to revise that figure upward but for now it seems like both a realistic goal and an achievable one. I haven’t felt the need to reset our donation thermometer and have instead just added $35,000 to the original $90,000 goal giving a new goal of $125,000. The money all goes into the same pot, so to speak. Any money left over after permanent repairs are completed will be use to fund ongoing dam maintenance and repairs. Owning the Clary Lake dam is a big commitment and we’re taking it seriously. Continue reading

19 April 2018: We Have Reached Our Phase 1 Fundraising Goal!

In only two short weeks of fundraising we have met our phase 1 goal of $90,000!!!! Many, many thanks to everyone who contributed,  and special thanks to our patron who has matched donations dollar for dollar. I’m truly grateful for the outpouring of support, financial and otherwise, shown by our members, other lake shore owners, and friends of Clary Lake in the surrounding community.

However, our fundraising efforts haven’t ended with this early victory, in fact we’ve really just begun so please, if you have intended to make a donation but just haven’t gotten a round to it yet, please do so at your earliest opportunity! We plan to make temporary repairs to the dam as soon as we own it, but some unanticipated expenses and the need to make permanent dam repairs not too far down the road means we’re going to need more money before long. The more money we can raise now, the sooner we can move on to that next phase.

Our rapid fundraising success has actually caught us a little flat-footed as we still have a lot to do as we move forward with purchasing the Clary Lake dam. The Board is working diligently on multiple fronts. Stay tuned for developments!

11 April 2018 Lincoln County News: Clary Lake Group Raising Funds to Purchase Dam

There is an article in this week’s Lincoln County News by staff writer Greg Foster about our plan to purchase the Clary Lake dam. It is for the most part factually accurate which is particularly impressive given the both complexity of this story and Mr. Foster’s being relatively new to it. The part about the CLA making an offer on the little red building sitting on the dam was really just me daydreaming out loud, something one probably shouldn’t do when being interviewed for a newspaper story! For the record, the Association currently has no plans to make an offer on the red building:

Clary Lake Group Raising Funds to Purchase Dam

Can’t beat the publicity: I was at the check out at Sheepscot General this evening when someone came up to me and gave me a $10 bill saying it was to help purchase the Clary Lake dam 🙂

I’ve archived a PDF copy of the article should you have trouble getting it off the Lincoln County News site:

07 April 2018 Centralmaine.com: Fundraising starts to buy Clary Lake dam in Whitefield

There is an article in this morning’s Centralmaine.com newspapers (Kennebec Journal, Morning Sentinel) by Staff writer Jessica Lowell. There are a couple of minor inaccuracies but all in all it’s a good article, and GREAT publicity. It’s also nice to see they finally got some new pictures to go with their Clary Lake articles:

https://www.centralmaine.com/2018/04/06/fundraising-starts-to-buy-whitefield-dam/

I thought I was smiling 🙂

Here’s an archived copy in case at some point in the future you can’t get to the on line version:

05 April 2018: And We’re Off!

More than 30 people showed up for the April 4th Special Membership Meeting to vote on purchasing the Clary Lake dam. The vote passed with overwhelming support. We also had over 100 proxy ballots on hand. Photograph by George Fergusson 04 April 2018

At a Special Clary Lake Association Membership Meeting held last night (picture at left) the Membership overwhelmingly voted to approve the purchase of the Clary Lake dam from the dam owner’s bankruptcy estate for $80,000 and has further authorized the Board to raise and spend the money necessary to make it happen. To that end, we have begun fund raising in earnest. Our current goal is to raise at least $90,000 by May 15th and hopefully much sooner. That figure includes funds for settlement costs and temporary dam repairs so we can start managing the water level to comply with the DEP Water Level Order. If for some reason the sale does not receive Bankruptcy Court approval, all donated funds will be returned, but the chances of that happening are slim. Let’s think positive and get to work! Continue reading

18 April 2017: Spring Musings and a Look Ahead

firetruck on clary

Isn’t it time to get a dry fire hydrant installed at the inlet of the lake on Route 126?

[dropcap]I[/dropcap] try to keep this news forum factual and informative and not all that speculative. From time to time however I am compelled to offer up some commentary on what has been happening, where we are and where it looks like we are headed. This is one of those times. My goal is to bring some perspective and commonality into our lives where they intersect with Clary Lake and the travails that have assaulted it for so long. Spring is a good time for this kind of musing: it’s a time to wake up, gear up, get in shape, and get ready for another season. I feel this is going to be an important year, that a lot is going to happen. We may not see a resolution of our water level crisis this year but then again we might, the problem being that I really have no idea what a “resolution” might look like. Certainly we’ll see some real progress towards a resolution. Not only am I prepared to be surprised, I expect to be. If one thing has been proven time and time again it is that we have no idea what lies around the next corner. Continue reading

Spring Supper to Benefit Fergusson Family After Fire

Happy Spring, everyone!

For those of you who don’t already know, the ancestral Fergusson family home on Clary Lake caught fire last week. Luckily, nobody was hurt in the blaze, however, a large part of the home was destroyed in the fire and George’s son Colin Fergusson and his partner Sara Roy lost pretty much everything in the fire.

The Fergusson family has been living on Clary Lake for 95 years. George Fergusson is the current Secretary of the Association and plays an integral role in the Association’s management and ongoing success. His father Stuart Fergusson was one of the CLA’s founding members of the Clary Lake Association back in 1961. Colin and Sara are already making plans to rebuild and hope to be moved back into part of the house by next winter.

The Clary Lake Association Momentum Committee will be co-sponsoring a Spring Supper with (and at) the Sheepscot General Store on Townhouse Road to benefit the Fergusson Family on May 6th from 5-7PM. Admission to the supper is two-fold: $5 and a dish of some sort to share (either a side dish, a salad, a dessert, or a beverage), but don’t let the lack of a dish stop you from coming by.

Please feel free to pass this email along or advertise as you see fit.  The more, the merrier! If you have questions contact the Momentum Committee at momentum@clarylake.org. All proceeds will go to the Fergusson Family home rebuilding fund.

All the best,

Erin Grimshaw, CLA Momentum Committee Chair

07 September 2016: Making Progress Toward Our Membership Goal

We are very close to reaching this year’s Membership goal of 100 members. Currently at 89, many of this year’s members are new members to the Association: they have either never been members before, or they have not been members for a long time. In either case, this is a great trend that I hope to see continue! However, there are a number of people who were members last year or the year before who have NOT renewed their membership yet. We need all the support we can get, now more than ever, so if you are one of those people who has intended to renew your membership but just hasn’t found the time yet, please do so soon! It is important! If everyone who was a member last year would renew again, we would not only meet our membership goal, but exceed it.

I’d also like to bring your attention to our new online Current Membership List. For years, the Clary Lake Association did not disclose their membership list for no particular reason other than the organization was relatively small, the group fairly close knit, and everyone knew everyone else anyways. When I first became President of the Association back in 2o07, we were averaging 35 to 40 members a year. Since then, interest in and support of the Clary Lake Association has grown considerably and our membership numbers have reflected that increased interest. Last year we had 81 members and as I mentioned at the start of this posting, this year’s goal is 100 members.

Two years ago we started to publish a Membership List in the Summer Newsletter, and it was well received. People commented favorably about it and they universally appreciated being publicly recognized for being a member. In fact, I believe making our list public has actually helped increase our membership- it certainly hasn’t hurt it! So after discussing it with the Board, we decided publishing our Current Membership List on the website was a good idea. You’ll find it at the top of the list under the Membership  Main menu heading.

16 November 2014: Clary Lake Association eligible for donations through AmazonSmile

The Clary Lake Association is happy to announce that they are now eligible to receive donations at no cost to you in the form of a small percentage of your purchases on AmazonSmile. For those of you who have never heard of AmazonSmile (I hadn’t until a few days ago), it’s simply another way to shop at Amazon.com with the difference that anything you buy on Amazon.com you can buy on AmazonSmile and Amazon will donate 0.5% of the purchase price to the charity of your choice! We of course would hope that you select the Clary Lake Association as your preferred charity, but you are free to select any charity you wish. All you need is an Amazon.com account.

You’ll notice a new AmazonSmile banner over on the sidebar, just to the right (under What’s New”) just like the image at the top of this post. When you click on that banner image you’ll be directed to smile.amazon.com pre-configured with the Clary Lake Association’s ID so you can just start shopping. You can also share that link with your friends and colleagues so they too can contribute to the Association:

http://smile.amazon.com/ch/01-0495730

Now, 0.5% doesn’t amount to a lot of money on any given sale (only 50 cents on a $100 purchase), and our user base at present is rather small but if you use it, and you ask your family and friends to use it, over time, it can add up to real money. I have the distinction of being the first person to use AmazonSmile to contribute to the Clary Lake Association; earlier today I ordered a linquini attachment for my Marcato Atlas pasta machine, something I’ve been wanting for a long time. It cost $39.95 and the sale resulted in a $0.19 donation to the Association 🙂

Remember, it costs you nothing to contribute to the Clary Lake Association through AmazonSmile.

For more information about AmazonSmile check out their About AmazonSmile page.

10 September 2013: Clary Lake Association receives Exempt Charitable Organization status

donate-onlineThe Clary Lake Association has finally received Exempt Charitable Organization status under the State’s Charitable Solicitations Act. We applied for exempt status back in July. I thought it prudent at the time to curtail our solicitations activities while our application was pending review.  In accordance with our new-found status I have added back the donate button on the “Donate to the Association” page as well as put a donate button back on selected pages. My wife Margaret, who is the chair person of the Fundraising Committee, will be most pleased.

Let the fund raising begin!

12 May 2013: Clary Lake Dam Fund Update and Information

eyesI’ve received a few questions from people about how, when, and under what circumstances the Clary Lake Dam Fund monies will be spent. I’ll try and clear that up in this posting. First, I’m happy to report that Bill Donovan from over on the west shore of Clary Lake donated $100 to the Dam Fund bringing the balance of the fund to $1402 which is almost 1/3 of the way to our $5000 goal. Have no fear, when we are close to achieving our $5000 goal we will simply raise it; the $5000 goal was just an initial target. Bill’s donation was a good-faith gesture; he and a few other people that have donated money have said they will donate more money when the time comes to actually spend it. Yeah.

The plan is that the dam fund should be used to repair the dam as soon as possible regardless of who happens to own the dam at the time. Our thinking goes that whomever owns it is going to need financial and technical assistance. We’re prepared to offer that assistance. Assuming the Association does NOT own the dam then there are some conditions that must be met to receive our money; the Association will not simply give the money to the dam owner to spend as they see fit. We will discuss the scope of the work and the nature of the repairs as well as the projected costs and if we approve, then we will authorize the work and we will pay the bills. These conditions should not constitute a serious problem for the dam owner; when it comes to repairs we’re open to suggestions and ideas but we must assure that money donated to the Association for repairing the dam is well spent toward that end.

We also anticipate and are willing to help with other unavoidable expenses associated with repairing the dam such as the costs of designing and building a coffer dam between the narrow gauge rail road abutments, State permitting requirements, etc. We have set up a discussion list to talk about these issues and kick around ideas. If anyone is interested in participating in the list, get in touch with me.

As for when all this might happen… I’m sorry to say probably not for a while. Mr. Kelley (perhaps understandably) has not acknowledged our offer to purchase the dam but sadly, he  hasn’t responded to our request for permission to get an engineering assessment done on the dam either though it’s been almost 2 weeks since the letters were sent. This is truly “cut off your nose to spite your face” behavior on Mr. Kelley’s part because he would benefit greatly from a current engineering assessment. Given how far relations between Kelley and the Association have deteriorated, it is extremely unlikely that he will entertain letting the Association get involved in dam repair planning and execution anytime soon. Perhaps as the reality of a DEP enforced water level order approaches, Mr. Kelley will become more willing to negotiate. In the mean time, we plan, we collect money, and we wait.

Perhaps people will remember this article in the Lincoln County News last August:

How soon we forget eh?

Dam Fund Progress: [progressbar url=”https://clarylake.org/data/dam.txt” rounded=”0″ width=”400px” color=”green”]

09 May 2013: Clary Lake Dam Repair Fund Update

smiley-face_0With all the doomy and gloomy petition stuff I’ve been posting of late, it is a real pleasure (that’s me smiling at left) to be able to provide this update on the Clary Lake Association fund raising initiative. Don and Lucy Norman of Jefferson stopped by the other day to talk to me about making a donation to the Clary Lake Dam Repair fund. They hoped that by putting some “seed money” in the fund that it would encourage others to contribute. This afternoon, Lucy called to tell me that she had just dropped a check off with our Treasurer, Linda Gallion.

The check was for $1000.

I’m pretty much blown away by the Norman’s donation and wish to publicly thank them for their generosity. I’ve known this was coming for a few days and have been thinking in the back of my mind how I would acknowledge what they’ve done. Finally, I just decided to write this post.

I would also like to take this opportunity to thank Beverly D’Urbano for her generous donation of $50 to the fund and for being the first person (besides me) to try out our new online PayPal donation processing system! The dam repair fund, which a few days ago stood at $152 is now sitting pretty at $1202.

Make that $1302, Mary Shaw just donated $100 to the Dam fund!

Make that $1402, Bill Donovan just donated $100 to the Dam fund!

Dam Fund Progress: [progressbar url=”https://clarylake.org/data/dam.txt” rounded=”0″ width=”400px” color=”green”]

And….. we’re off! Remember: No amount is too big, or too small. Give Generously, and Give Often 🙂