Five Things To Know About the Roundtable's Community Affairs Dinner

The Community Roundtable is looking back and forward with this year’s Community Affairs Dinner, an annual event at which both the Alice B. Tompkins Community Service Award and the Non-Profit of the Year award are presented.

Also at this year’s dinner, the first recipient of the will be named. The award is given in memory of the Roundtable’s former president and long-time community supporter, who with her husband, Frank, received the award in 2000.

The deadline to apply for the scholarship has been extended to Feb. 15.  This year's scholarship is for $500. For information, call the Roundtable at 813-661-4350.

Here's five things to know about the Community Affairs Dinner:

1. The theme – “Celebrating Community Pride: Past and Future.” Roundtable organizers “wanted the Brandon community to remember where we came from,” said Janine B. Nickerson, the group's vice president. “It also will be the theme for the Greater Brandon Fourth of July Parade,” which the Roundtable also is in charge of.
2. Representing “then” is speaker Nat Storms, who in 1959 raised enough money to win the race for the first honorary mayor of Brandon. His wife, Alice, was instrumental in creating the Roundtable Charities of Greater Brandon Inc., an umbrella group for area charities and non-profit organizations.
3. Representing the “future” is speaker Col. Lenny J. Richoux, base commander of  MacDill Air Force Base. “We selected him because of the close relationship between military families living in Brandon and the base,” Nickeson said. “About 80 percent of MacDill’s officers live in the Greater Brandon area, which has been called, ‘MacDill East.’ ”
4. The venue is the , which shares space with the Brandon Regional Library in the Sandy Rodriguez Center. The Presidents Roundtable in the 1970’s played a key role in establishing Center Place “and so it is fitting that we hold our dinner there,” Nickerson said. The Roundtable meets at Center Place the second Wednesday of the month at 6:30 p.m.
5. Tickets cost $40 per person and include meal, dessert, ice tea and coffee. Donations for the Maureen Krzanowski Scholarship Fund will be accepted for soft drinks and alcoholic drinks.  On the menu: chicken Marsala, salad, vegetables and smashed potatoes.
6. Reservations are required; the deadline is Feb. 15 at noon. Call: 661-4350. Email: Email: roundtable2008@aol.com