Hundreds attend 2017 Denim & Dining fundraiser for Hoover City Schools Foundation

Several hundred people showed up at Hoover Metropolitan Stadium tonight for the second annual Denim & Dining fundraiser for the Hoover City Schools Foundation.

Jim ‘N Nick’s Bar-B-Q provided the dinner, but it was up to the guests to bring the denim – and even a little dancing.

Attendees bid on more than 75 items donated for a silent auction, including seven-night stays in Antigua, St. Lucia, Panama and The Grenadines, a round of golf for four at the Greystone Golf & Country Club, 10 1-hour passes to the Airwalk Ultimate Trampoline Arena, a football autographed by Alabama coach Nick Saban, jewelry, gardening supplies and gift certificates to restaurants such as Front Porch, The Boot and Cajun Steamer.

Music in the banquet room was provided by Hoover High juniors Ashley Vourlotis and Jordan Beam and Simmons Middle School teacher Robert Abernathy and his band. Outside on the patio, guests heard from the Spain Park High School Rhapsody in Blue show choir and a Hoover High School jazz quartet that included Brock Burks and Rahul Shah on saxophones, Nick Caine on bass and Joel Sullivan on drums.

Hoover City Schools Foundation Executive Director Janet Turner said the turnout was awesome this year. The foundation sold more than 300 tickets for this year’s event, compared to about 175 last year, she said.

Tickets cost $50 through April 4 and $65 starting April 5.

Turner said she probably won’t know until next week how much money was raised with this year’s event, but last year’s inaugural Denim & Dining fundraiser netted about $16,000 for the foundation.

The foundation uses the money it raises to provide grants to Hoover teachers for innovative projects and to connect Hoover schools with the business community.

Bluff Park resident Greg Stocks said he and his wife, Elizabeth, didn’t make it to last year’s Denim & Dining but came this year to show their support for Hoover schools.

He and his wife both attended the former Berry High School, and they have had two children graduate from Hoover High and still have a junior at Hoover High and seventh-grader at Simmons Middle School, he said. They want to keep Hoover City Schools as one of the best school systems in the state, he said.

Andy and Ashley Shaw of the Ross Bridge community said they don’t have any children in Hoover schools yet, but they have two young children who will be in the system soon and they always try to support the Hoover City Schools Foundation.

“The whole reason we live in Hoover is for the schools,” Andy Shaw said.

Events like Denim & Dining help the schools do things they otherwise wouldn’t be able to do, he said.

Turner said the foundation received great support from many sponsors for this year’s Denim & Dining, including Alabama Power, Signature Homes, the city of Hoover, Jim ‘N Nick’s Bar-B-Q, Birmingham Budweiser, Avondale Brewing Co., Medical West hospital, Tameron Honda, Coca-Cola, Anthony’s Full-Service & Express Car Wash, Schaeffer Eye Center, Pivotal Finance, Hoover Family Dentistry, Hoover Service Club, Dan Fulton, D.R. Horton, Backus Orthodontics, USS Real Estate, Regions Bank, the James P. Raymond Jr. Charitable Foundation and the Chick-fil-A restaurants at Hoover Commons, Patton Creek and Greystone.