The Friends of the Avalon Volunteer Fire Department will draw the winners of its 16th annual 50/50 raffle on Tuesday, Sept. 2, at The Princeton Bar and Grill on Dune Drive.

Only 300 tickets will be sold, and eight winners will be named. Six lucky participants will win $500. One entrant will receive $2,000, and the top prize of $10,000 will be awarded to the first-place winner. Tickets cost $100 per person, and all proceeds go toward the Avalon Volunteer Fire Department.

“We go through almost our entire year using those donations to do a lot of things,” said Kevin Scarpa, secretary of the Friends of the Avalon Volunteer Fire Department charity. “The Borough is a very generous, well-funded, and well-run operation that gives us X-amount of money. But we break a lot of things. You’d be shocked how many things we can break in a drill night or at a fire. We use the donation money to supplement that and keep the emergency equipment available.”

The money raised is also imperative for recruiting volunteer firefighters in Avalon.

If you see someone with an Avalon Fire T-shirt on, we used a donation to dress that member,” said Scarpa, who is also the captain of the AVFD. “It is an absolutely critical piece because we are still 100% volunteer. We have to keep the members motivated and recruit new members because everyone just gets older, and it’s a young man’s job to do firefighting.”

The Friends of the Avalon Fire Department has also used some of their funds to help build and maintain the Avalon September 11th Memorial Plaza that was dedicated on Sept. 11, 2012.

For raffle tickets, call 609-967-4111 and leave a voicemail or email avalonfireraffle@gmail.com with a message.