When Pat Kunnecke wants to relax, he gets together with his poker group.
It occurred to him, when he joined the Board of Directors for the Boys and Girls Club of Benton County more than 20 years ago, that the organization could use a fundraiser. Not just any old party or golf tournament, but an informal event that more people could enjoy.
Texas Hold’em Tournament
What: A poker competition, food and drinks with proceeds benefiting the Boys and Girls Club of Benton County
When: 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Jan. 24
Where: Avondale in Bentonville
Registration: $90 in advance, $100 at the door
Information: (479) 273-7187 or bgcbentoncounty.org
"We just try to appeal to as broad a part of the public as possible," Kunnecke says. "It's turned out to be very successful."
Most years, the event sees about 100 participants spend an afternoon in friendly competition, have a meal and a few beers while watching a basketball game.
"It's a great opportunity for people who love to play poker, like me," he says. "You have a chance to test your skills against a larger group, and if you play online, it's a chance to test yourself against real people. But the truth is, it's just a lot of fun."
There's only one winner, of course, but prizes are awarded to the top 10 or the final table. Many area poker groups enter and cheer their members on as some float to the top.
Kunnecke has seen members of his own group make the final table, and he says the hard-earned spot grants bragging rights for the remainder of the year.
Players vary in many ways, but the two things they have in common are a taste for the game and a desire to help local charity.
"There's more women playing than you might imagine," Kunnecke says. "But it's a good mixed group. It's always lively. There's something about poker players -- they're the outgoing type -- and you get settled in after the first hour or so while people are being eliminated along the way."
Kunnecke started volunteering with the Boys and Girls Club when he moved to Arkansas to take a job at Arvest Bank and searched for a way to contribute to the community. He appreciated the organization's mission to help buoy children's confidence while teaching them important ways to take care of themselves and others.
"Our programs help kids build their self-esteem," he says. "It helps focus them on getting a good education and making the right kinds of decisions when it comes to peers, alcohol, drugs and sex and teaches them some leadership skills."
Kunnecke's first contribution was to help with the campaign for erecting a new building, and the more he learned about the nonprofit, the more invested he became.
Since then, "I've gone from having had no contact with the Boys and Girls Club before I came here to thinking they're one of the more important nonprofits in the region," he says.
Hardly an event passes or a committee forms that hasn't had the benefit of his time and energy.
An eight-year member of the Arkansas Alliance of Boys and Girls Clubs, Kunnecke helps lobby for the government funding and grants that provide critical monies for operation and growth. Last year the alliance raised $2 million for its clubs statewide.
"We've been highly successful in giving government grants that have helped clubs much poorer than ours with crucial funding," he says. "Our budget is around $2 million a year, which we have to raise every year, and that's hard. But the truth is that if we had more money, we'd be serving more kids.
"If we could just hire more staff and build bigger buildings, we'd be serving more kids."
Now that the Benton County club is more than 20 years old, Kunnecke and others see some of the results of the organization -- grown men and women who are living and working and making contributions for others in the community.
"We have adults in the community that were raised in the Boys and Girls Club, and that's the benefit to the community, that we're turning them into productive citizens instead of, hopefully not juvenile delinquents, but that's the risk when you're leaving your child alone at home."
Knowing that the club can have an impact on the trajectory of someone's life is what keeps him lobbying for more.
"When you do what we do serving kids, you find those who most need it and you can either turn away from them or do whatever it takes to help them," Kunnecke says. "We have a huge impact on their lives and their families. There's a need there, and we're uniquely designed to fulfill it when it comes to building up kids on a daily basis."
April Robertson can be reached by email at [email protected].
NAN Profiles on 01/18/2015