Published: March 14, 2009 05:21 pm      

Steak & Stake Dinner to honor 3 founders

The Boys & Girls Clubs of Gordon, Murray & Whitfield Counties will be hosting their annual Steak & Stake Dinner on April 28 at the club’s new facility at 1013 Underwood Street in Dalton.

This year’s event will be a special time of celebration in which three of the club’s founders will be recognized and honored; Jim Hazel, Gordon Morehouse and Carl Rollins.

Doors will open at 6 p.m. for facility tours and the dinner will being at 7 p.m.

Jim Hazel has been an active board member of the local Boys & Girls Clubs since 2002. He is the administrator of the Murray Medical Center and has been with the Hamilton Health Care System for 35 years. Hazel was first introduced to Boys & Girls Clubs in 2000 by Carl Rollins and John Campbell as he and his wife were working to create a structured program for local teens. For his distinguished service with the clubs and other community agencies, Hazel was recognized with the Healthcare Georgia Foundation’s Community Service Award in 2003.

Hazel said his passion is keeping young people from engaging in negative behaviors.

Gordon Morehouse is a founding board member of the clubs and past chairman of the Dalton/Whitfield Clubs. He is the proprietor of Morehouse Group, a local business that just celebrated 40 years of service in Dalton.

Morehouse is a Rotarian and has served as chairman of the Dalton-Whitfield Chamber of Commerce. He received the chamber’s “Outstanding Professional of the Year” Award in 1994. Morehouse was introduced to the clubs by Carl Rollins while serving as president of Rotary. While he was president, Rotary generously provided seed money used to plant the very first club site.

Carl Rollins was one of the leading visionaries involved in establishing the local Boys & Girls Clubs. He was a founding board member and continues to be a strong supporter of the Whitfield County Clubs. Rollins is the former vice president of administration for Shaw Industries and oversaw all charitable contributions for the company. He was first introduced to the Boys & Girls Clubs of America in the 1990s when many clubs were soliciting carpet donations from Shaw. Rollins said that the concept of a local club moved him to visit the Boys & Girls Clubs in Cartersville. After his visit, Rollins met with the Boys & Girls Clubs of America to initiate the formation of a chartered club.

Honorees will be formally inducted as the inaugural class of the Circle of Champions for the Boys & Girls Clubs of Gordon, Murray & Whitfield Counties. These individuals are community investors, youth advocates, and club supporters. Their combined efforts which established the first local club in 2002 was a feat that has since sparked more than six other club sites that served more than 1,200 members in 2008.

As in years past, the proceeds from this year’s Steak & Stake Dinner will help support the growth and expansion of the clubs’ services. Since 2007, the organization has renovated a new Whitfield County facility, acquired a new Gordon County facility, opened a new unit in Murray County and launched the first campus-based extension in north Whitfield County. Club membership has more than doubled and daily attendance is growing.

Sponsorship tables for Steak & Stake are on sale and can be reserved by calling the club at 706-529-5032, or by logging on to www.bgcgmw.org . The organization is asking that those who are unable to attend this year but would still like to invest in the work of the local Boys & Girls Clubs, please consider making a donation of 75 percent of their past contribution.

The Boys and Girls Clubs of Gordon, Murray, and Whitfield Counties offer after school programming at five sites for school-aged children. Such programs include tutoring, character development, healthy living, leadership, drug awareness and creative arts.