31st annual Lions auction raises record $21,000

This year’s Lions Club auction netted a record $21,000 for Gainesville’s summer ball program and other local projects supported by the Gainesville Lions Club. The annual fund-raiser, now in its 31st year, was held Friday night at Gainesville High School. It included a chili supper and silent auction plus a live auction, both offering a wide variety of goods and services contributed by area merchants and individuals. The Lions Club always contributes a large portion of the event’s proceeds to the summer ball program, which is now managed by the Gainesville Schools. The rest is distributed among various other community projects, including various youth camps, sending local students to Boys and Girls State, providing glasses for needy students and adults, supporting the Interagency Council’s projects such as the Back to School Fair, funding holiday food baskets, and contributing to Project Graduations, the Share the Harvest charity venison project, Hootin an Hollarin and the Ozark County Toy Drive. The Lions Club also offers a Lions Club/H. T. Harlin Memorial Scholarship each year to a graduating Gainesville High School senior. Organizers expressed thanks to those who contributed auction items and to those who turned out to buy them.