WNC Friends of the NRA Dinner

On Friday night, the Complementary Spouse and I attended the WNC Friends of the NRA event held in Asheville. This event has been held annually for the past 28 years and is a testament to the hard work of Tyrone Phillips and his committee.

This was our second year attending the event. The attendance was down a bit due to the rescheduling of the dinner from its traditional February time frame. This was done to make sure the monies raised did not go to the NRA Foundation but rather to the NRA Freedom Action Foundation. Still, there were well over 100 attendees.

Beside a very good steak dinner, the event featured games, raffles, and an auction. We played the table raffle and a couple of other games. We didn’t win anything this year but that was OK as we knew the money was going for many good causes. Last year, our table did win the table raffle and we each went home with Ruger RXM pistols.

The auction bidding was very spirited. One interesting feature was the ability to “bump” your winning bid by $100 for a chance to win a S&W 1854 .45-70 lever gun. Additionally, if you won the bid on a “key item”, you were in the running to win a safe with 3 additional firearms. What I found really sweet about the whole live auction was that the auctioneer allowed a nice young lady with Down’s Syndrome to announce “sold” every time. Without sounding maudlin, it was just heart warming to see.

Joe Puleo is the NRA Field Representative who helped run the event. Currently, he covers all of North Carolina and South Carolina. He and I had a nice conversation on how the Friends dinners are going. It seems like they are back on track to raise a good deal of the money that should be coming from the NRA Foundation but isn’t.

If you get a chance to attend one of these events in your area, please do. It helps support the 501c3 activities of the NRA at the national level such as training, education, women and youth events, hunter safety, and much more. Just as importantly, half the monies raised remain in the state. Attending this Western North Carolina event were youth from shooting and hunter safety groups in Henderson and Polk Counties which are supported by grant money raised at this event and other like events.

We, of course, will be attending again next year.

If you are in Western North Carolina next Friday, April 10th, I’d encourage to join us at the WNC Friends of the NRA Dinner. It will be held at the Crown Plaza Resort in Asheville in their Expo Center starting at 6pm. The Complementary Spouse and I attended last year and had a wonderful time. The food was good and the company was even better. We even won a raffle prize!

The event was originally scheduled for early February and the organizers postponed it until April 10th so that they could be sure the proceeds did not go to the NRA Foundation but rather the NRA Freedom Action Foundation. As a reminder, half of the profits remain in North Carolina for local and state activities related to training, youth education, and firearms safety.

If like last year, there will be a steak dinner, a cash bar, games, raffles, and auctions galore. Tyrone Phillips who has headed the event for many years puts on a good time!

Ticket prices start at $70 for an individual.

For more information and to buy your tickets, use this link.

You can find the Friends of the NRA event in your area through this link. As a reminder, the monies no longer go to the Old Guard dominated NRA Foundation but rather to the Freedom Action Foundation and the new NRA Patriots Fund. Half the monies raised remain within the state and the other half goes to support the 501c3 activities of the NRA such as competition, training, education, and firearms safety.

UPDATE: Tickets need to be purchased in advance. I learned today that there will be no tickets sold at the door.