Raising money for motorcycle awareness

By John Reblin

January 20, 2018 was the 7^th Annual Randy and Janine Memorial Ice Fish-o-ree held on Wallace Lake in West Bend. Hosted by Eddie’s Lakehouse it was once again a great event with much fun had by all who attended.

The day started out at five am on the lake with the sun coming out about an hour later and staying out with temperatures in the mid-40’s while standing on 16 inches of ice.

Breakfast was created by Sandy Schmidt from Sandy’s Barton Café and it didn’t end with breakfast. Sandy was busy all week baking homemade rolls for the lunch menu along with chili.  Later in the morning with the help of Ernie Goratowski donating the burgers and cooking those along with the tasty brats it made for a delicious hot lunch for those working up an appetite fishing. Sandy donated all her time and all the money made from serving this wonderful food.

Eddie’s bartenders, Kim Tuttle committee chair for the event and Angela Trisko committee member did their job making sure that coffee, soda along with adult beverages were available all day. They were moving fast all day, with a large smile on their faces making all feel welcome.

Committee member Tim Sutter helped setting up the event and with raffle ticket sales. Ralph Schneider, also on the committee was the brains behind the fishing part of the contest, measuring and keeping things going on the cold ice.

The lake looked like a small community with the warm weather, the number of people fishing – this was one of the largest of these events I have seen. And the raffle ticket crew visited all the “huddles” selling raffle tickets, seeing how the fish were biting and just visiting. We were joined by Roman, the son of one of the contestants, and he is an awesome seller of raffle tickets! He decided he wanted to spend the rest of the day with us and sold the majority of the meat raffle tickets. Great Job Roman, we will need you again next year! Thanks to Ernie for letting us use his side by side to maneuver on the ice. It made our jobs much easier.

At 5:30pm the crowds came in for the drawings. The place was wall to wall people anticipating the raffle ticket pay out. A last-minute selling of raffle tickets and the drawing was held after the fish winners were announced. At the end of the day the group raised $4,374.00 for the ABATE of Wisconsin Highway Safety committee to be used in raising awareness that motorcycles are on the road and to look twice. Over the 7 years this event has raised nearly 20,000 dollars that have been donated to ABATE of Wisconsin for our Motorcycle Awareness Projects. Thank You!

If you are ever in the West Bend area stop in Sandy’s Barton Café or Eddie’s Lake House and support these businesses that work hard raising money so we can ride safely on the roads.