Auction set for Saturday at city hall ballroom

By Tucker Henderson

Reporter

The annual New York Mills Lions Auction is set for Saturday, April 6 at the New York Mills City Hall ballroom with a social hour at 6 p.m. and the live auction at 7 p.m.

The auction will feature a light lunch during the social hour, a gun raffle, and the live auction will be conducted by Perala Bros. Auctioneers. About 75-100 items will be auctioned off to support the NY Mills Lions Club. According to auction chair, Latham Hetland, this is the largest general fund fundraiser of the year for the NY Mills Lions. All of the funds are poured back into the community through service projects and donations to local organizations and a lot of support to the school.

“We do a lot of stuff with the school, community organizations, also stuff with our neighboring Lions clubs,” he said. “Last year we did a giant food packing day for food shelves.”

The NY Mills Lions Club has been hosting the annual event since 1991, according to Hetland. He said that the average age of an event is five to seven years and he’s happy to see the Lions buck the trend on this one.

“This has been going for 33 years, which is kind of crazy,” said Hetland, “It’s almost identical every year, which is incredible, but I think that’s just a testament to the support of the community.”

This will be Hetland’s seventh year as chair for the annual auction and he always looks forward to seeing the outcome of everybody’s combined efforts to make the event a success.

“There’s a lot of people,” he said. “Between the people who bring items to those who help, we get between 75-100 items on average each year. It’s a lot of homemade projects, unique items, and experiences donated by Lions members and community members.

“We even have one person that makes cookies and they sell for like $100 per platter,” Hetland continued. “It’s fun to see people get together, support a good cause and then get funds back into the community to help support projects and organizations. It’s also really fun seeing what items people bring and how unique they get and how much time and effort they put into what they’re doing.”

While the NY Mills Lions are currently working on putting together a list of projects for 2024, they are open to all requests and are always looking for service opportunities.

“Come to the Lions board meeting, or talk to any Lions members,” said Hetland about getting on the agenda. “We’re always interested in helping service projects, we built a lot of the shelters in town, we do a lot of stuff with the school.”

The NY Mills Lions general meetings is the second Wednesday of the month and their board meetings are always held two days prior to the general meetings. The best time to ask about a service project or organizational request is at the board meeting.

During the auction the NY Mills Lions will be serving beer, a light meal will be served, and a plethora of auction items can be bid on. This event is open to the public and everyone is invited to attend.