BackStoppers of Jefferson County will hold its Biennial Membership Drive Banquet from 6-10 p.m. Saturday (March 9) at the Festus-Crystal City Elks, 4 Elks Drive, in Crystal City.
Tickets for the event cost $40 per person, $75 for a couple or $280 for a table for eight.
As of March 4, 500 tickets had been sold and fewer than 50 tickets were still available, said Donna Litton, treasurer for BackStoppers of Jefferson County.
The event will include a cocktail hour from 6-7 p.m. followed by a dinner. An open bar will be included.
In addition, the banquet will feature messages from the families of two officers with local ties who were seriously wounded in the line of duty and helped by Backstoppers – Ryan O’Connor, a retired Arnold Police officer who was shot in the head in December 2017 by a burglary suspect, and former De Soto Police Officer Mike Flamion, who was shot in July 2016 during a traffic stop in Ballwin, where he worked at the time, and was paralyzed from the deck down.
O’Connor’s wife, Barbara, will be featured in a video interview recounting when her husband was shot. The interview was scheduled to be recorded Wednesday at Jefferson College, Litton said.
“She tells a remarkable story about that day,” Litton said. “She really gives a play-by-play of the day. I really want to get her story out there.”
Flamion and his wife, Sarah, are scheduled to speak at the banquet.
Flamion, who spent the first seven years of his nine-year career with the De Soto Police Department, was a Ballwin Police officer when he was shot. His family moved into a smart home built by the Gary Sinise Foundation in November 2017.
The foundation reportedly is building a smart home in Fenton for the O’Connors.
The banquet also will feature live music, and those who sign up or renew their BackStoppers memberships will have their form entered in a drawing for a flat-screen television that was donated by the De Soto Walmart, Litton said. She also said Walmart manager Scott Sherrill helped secure a grant from the company to help cover the cost of the banquet.
Proceeds from the evening, along with other money raised throughout the year, will benefit BackStoppers of St. Louis, she said.
“I believe we are helping 64 families (in the St. Louis area) through BackStoppers,” Litton said. “They take care of families. They make sure the children are taken care of, that the mortgage and car is paid for, and they pay for college for children.
“BackStoppers is totally dependent on donations and memberships. Memberships can be individual, family, business or corporation. There are all kinds of levels of memberships, and memberships can be paid in full, through payroll deduction or other installments.”
Tickets for the banquet may be purchased at the door or reserved by calling Litton at 636-208-8176 or Doug Reuther Sr. at Reuther Ford at 636-464-9000.