ABOVE: The Fairmont Opera House recently received a matching gift from the Michael and Elizabeth Garry family. Sentinel file photo.

FAIRMONT–A recent $100,000 pledge, offered as a matching gift from the Michael and Elizabeth Garry family to the Fairmont Opera House Capital Campaign, has rejuvenated fundraising efforts and boosted confidence in the project for the Fairmont Opera House (FOH) staff and board members.

Back in December 2023 the Opera House closed to the public after structural engineers found that needed repairs to the Opera House roof would be more invasive than originally expected. Since then, fundraising efforts have been taking place to raise the $4 million needed.

While an original deadline of end-of-year 2025 was set to raise the funds, the board of directors in December announced that it would be extending the deadline.

Of the decision, Board Member Zach Petersen said, “We took in enough fundraising, specific funds, that we could devote and use to keep ourselves alive for a few more months.”

He added that the board really thought it would run out of funds by December 2025 but that the situation changed, allowing them to push back the deadline.

The recent matching gift from the Garry family is a welcome boost to help with fundraising efforts.

Executive Director Blake Potthoff said that the Garry family had reached out a few months ago and that they had been in conversations ever since.

“It’s been a multi-month process to get to them committing the gift,” Potthoff explained. “It’s a pledge that they offered up as a matching gift for the community match. They’ll commit $100,000 and we’re leveraging that for $100,000 from the rest of the community.”

He said the family’s hope is that it will increase public and private investment in the project.

In a press release, the Garry family said, “The Fairmont Opera House has always been a special part of Fairmont. From the very beginning, our parents supported it–both financially and by attending performances–often inviting us along, and later their grandchildren, to share an appreciation of the arts. Their support reflected a deep belief in giving back to the community and a commitment to investing in future generations. We are honored to carry on their legacy by supporting the important work of the Fairmont Opera House and continuing a family tradition of giving back to the Fairmont community.”

The Opera House has been successful with some other matching gifts in the past. It completed a $25,000 match in memory of Dennis Turner and last year it had one for Stop the Hate, Save the Stage for Give to the Max Day and also one from the Lintelman family.

With that in mind, Potthoff said he feels confident and said that gifts like this show that people want the public to be involved.

“They want public and private investment in the project. They believe in it. It’s a six figure gift. These kinds of gifts really help move the project along,” Potthoff said.

Petersen added that while he’s generally superstitious, he’s much more confident now as a board member.

“These medium to heavy donations have gotten us all excited on the board. We are excited about it and more confident and that makes anyone more excited,” Petersen said.

Potthoff shared the feeling and said, “When we have gifts like this come in, it reignites that confidence that we’re on the right path. It gives us a renewed sense of optimism that we can then take to the community and that’s incredibly important. If we didn’t believe we could do it, and other people didn’t believe we could do it, then we wouldn’t do it.”

There is no deadline on the matching gift, but it is contingent on raising the rest of the funds needed to fix the building.

“Since this opened up, we’ve raised $16,000 in a week and that’s before doing large marketing,” Potthoff said.

To date, about $1.3 million has been raised for the project in whole.

While Potthoff, Petersen and the rest of the board are excited about the most recent gift, there are still other projects in the works.

Potthoff spends much of every day in his office, fittingly called Behind the Scenes, where he quite literally is working behind the scenes, researching and applying for grants, brainstorming fundraising ideas, looking for donors and answering questions about the project.

“We are going after any kind of money that we can,” Petersen said.

With that said, they appreciate any donation that comes in, whether it’s $25, $250 or $25,000.

For more information, or to donate, visit fairmontoperahouse.org.