Milford City Council approved a donation of $5,000 to the Buccaneer Educational Foundation. The foundation provides support to classrooms and students in Milford School District.
“The Buccaneer Educational Foundation, which is Milford School District’s only and first academic foundation to benefit directly the schools, classrooms, teachers, and students of the Milford School District,” Matt Bucher, President and Founder of the foundation, said. “We have gathered an extraordinary group of business leaders and educators over the last two years. We have raised $200,000 that we for the for the betterment of the kids and teachers, on items that are not in the school’s budget, and the school, quite frankly, can’t legally budget. But we can fill in the gaps, and we’ve done some extraordinary things, sending low-income children who’ve won competitions to national competitions, airfare, hotels.”
Bucher explained that funds had been used to donate a new truck through an endowment to the Milford FFA.
“Those are just a couple of large and small examples of making a difference in the Milford community. So, we do an annual fundraiser, and this year we will be taking over Arenas for four hours on Saturday, November 21, and you all have the flyer in your packet. I have been given authorization to offer the city of Milford the following special sponsorship at a special level,” Bucher said. “So, you’ll notice that there’s a sponsorship that gives you four tickets. There’s another sponsorship that gives you four tickets. Well, that really doesn’t speak to the kind of partnership that the district, the foundation, and the city ought to have. Given with all the things that are going on, including Lulu Ross, we have already for this event crested $30,000 raised just for this fundraiser, and we’re still going, and we’ve raised another $8,000 that are specifically for Lulu Ross.”
Bucher requested $5,000 from the city which would include an invitation to all members of council and their spouses as well as the mayor and his wife. Also included in the invitation would be the City Manager, Chief of Police and the City Clerk along with a guest to the event at Arena’s.
Councilman Jason James asked if council could earmark the donation for Lulu Ross and the costs that will be incurred after the fire that damaged the building significantly. Bucher explained that council could earmark the funds as they saw fit.
“Sure, we’ve gotten a request before that were what I call direct endowments or direct donations, directed donations. For instance, we had an individual that wanted to donate $12,000, but he wanted it to go to the Milford 12th Man Gridiron Club. Well, we made that happen because that’s what he wanted us to do with the money,” Bucher said. “So, there’s no issue with that at all, I would also like to say that unlike just about any charitable concern or organization that specializes in charity, the Buccaneer Educational Foundation, 100% of your donations will go to Milford students, classrooms, teachers. There is no overhead. A lot of other ones you hear about, they take five ten, fifteen percent. We are all volunteer. We all of our business leaders and educators that our board and our advisory council, we are volunteer. We volunteer our time, our expertise, and quite frankly, our treasure, to make sure that everything goes to where it’s intended for Milford School District.”
City Manager Chris Coleman asked where the funding would come from should council approve the request.
“There is funding available in the council expense line. I believe last year was the first year that attendance at an event like this was entertained, and there was an additional $5,000 available in the community events budget that was able to be used for that, the first table and the second table that was considered by council that night,” Lou Vitola, Finance Director said. “That was the 2026 budget, which had $30,000 in council expense and that $5,000 in community events. In the 27 budget, there’s no extra funding in community expense, but that $5,000 and another $5,000 was added to the council expense budget. So, as the council expense budget was $30,026, it is $40,000 in 27, and it’s heavy by that $10,000 of essentially discretionary funds.”
James made the motion to approve the request, and it was seconded by Councilwoman Katrina Wilson.
“I would also like to reiterate that this should be used toward Lulu Ross school,” James said.
Bucher stated that he would be sure the funds were used toward that purpose. Council approved the motion with a vote of seven to zero as Councilwoman Nina Pletcher was absent.
