Cruise nights help Veterans Memorial funding, more still needed

Thanks to two Tea Cruise nights held at the end of May, the Tea Veterans Memorial received a boost in its fundraising efforts.

Todd Boots, who sits on the Veterans Memorial Committee, said thanks to the people of Tea and businesses like the Sky Lounge, who matched the first $500 raised and paid for a paver for one lucky winner, they have been able to reach $9,000 in fundraising for the memorial.

“All things considered, about $9,000 is pretty good with what we’ve had to work with this spring and summer,” Boots said.

The pandemic has not helped efforts to raise funds through the donation boxes they set out at businesses around town in March. With business continuing to open up and more people getting out and about, Boots hopes that will help keep donations coming in.

“Once we get some more of those out, I think that’ll help,” he said.

Boots has some more fundraising ideas that he needs to run by the committee. He hopes they can have enough raised by the fall to be able to put in the footings and get cement poured yet this year.

He said the footings getting done this year will depend on how much money they can raise and how much Mother Nature cooperates.

The minimum fundraising goal for the project is $60,000. However, they will continue to fund-raise beyond that number in order to replace flags and keep up on any maintenance needed in the future.

Those interested in ordering a paver to honor a veteran will need to fill out a form. Those can be found at the American Legion in town.

Boots is excited about the fundraising that has been done so far and hopes they can keep it up.

“What the Cruise did is great and what the Historical Society did is great, that really moved the needle. That’s where our two biggest ones are at now besides regular donations from people,” he said. “It’s a little bit of a work in progress.”