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The Nugget Newspaper
Sisters, Oregon
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The contents of the on-line edition of The Nugget represent a selection among the stories that appear in the weekly print edition.

SOAR to raise funds for recreation center
By Jim Cornelius

U.S. Bank has donated $10,000 to the SOAR project. Bank Relationship Manager Dan Jacobson (left) and Market President David Imig (right) joined Sandy Brink (second from right) in making the award to SOAR's Tom Coffield and Maureen Bidasolo. Photo by Jim Cornelius

The Sisters Organization for Activities and Recreation is at about the half-way point in its effort to raise $950,000 to build a recreation center in Sisters.

The complex will include ballfields and a gym/teen center/martial arts studio on 15 acres dedicated to the organization by the Sisters School District.

"We really hope to start on the project this next summer," said SOAR director Tom Coffield.

SOAR has raised about $490,000 through grants so far. The organization has spent about $26,000 to clear the site near the future high school and to run utility services to the site.

Many of the grants received require local matching. According to Coffield, some of that match can come in the form of in-kind work from contractors' services to volunteer labor.

However, he said, "part of this really needs to be some cash."

Coffield said the SOAR board will soon develop a fund-raising campaign to raise the rest of the money needed to ensure a timely start.

Coffield acknowledged that the organization has to avoid burning out volunteers with an exhausting series of small fund-raisers. And SOAR does not want to exploit a generous community past its capacity to give.

"This community gets hit pretty hard for fund-raisers," Coffield said.

Coffield emphasized that he and the SOAR board are open to fund-raising ideas -- preferably ideas with the potential to raise significant amounts in a single effort.

Plans call for a 2,501-square-foot Taekwondo studio; a 1,093-square-foot dance/aerobics room; consolidated office space for SOAR staff; a climbing wall and a teen center.

A SOAR gym will help the organization stage its basketball tournaments, which now bring hundreds of youth players to Sisters. The organization currently rents gym space all over the county.

According to Coffield, it will cost approximately $25,000 to $30,000 to operate and maintain the facilities. He believes money saved from renting space for Taekwondo ($1,300 per month) and renting gym space for tournaments (about $8,000) will offset operations costs.

Coffield is confident that expanded activities or a fund-raising event will take care of the rest.

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