SMAC Leads Community/Music Center Effort
By Don Fink, Resident Moneta, 24121

   The Smith Mountain Arts Council has grown tremendously in the last several years, it continues to expand programs in its long standing areas of interest, gathering several new activities under the SMAC "umbrella" and greatly extending its educational outreach to bring arts and cultural events into Lake area schools.
   Larger and more ambitious events have been undertaken, attracting bigger audiences than the Arts Council has ever reached before.  These have been financially successful enough to cover all event costs and also build modest reserve funds.  The end result is SMAC has been able to underwrite even more ambitious educational outreach programs, launch a new initiative to support publication of a locally written novel and allocate $5,000 to a capital expenditure fund -- supplemented by another donation of $1,000 -- for the proposed Community Center/Arts & Music Center .
   SMAC no longer is a small, locally oriented arts and music group primarily concerned with staging small events for its members, it has become a significant organization serving a growing cultural need throughout the Smith Mountain Lake Community and beyond.  Recent events have drawn attendees from Roanoke, Salem, Vinton, Lynchburg, the Charlottesville area, Martinsville, Rocky Mount and Boones Mill, as well as throughout the Lake area.  Programs have been sponsored in nearly all of the elementary, middle and high schools in Bedford and Franklin counties, and this year two local high school graduates planning to pursue music and arts majors at the college and university level were awarded $1,000 scholarships.
   There is a "cost" associated with this continued success, and that cost can be counted in two currencies, "support" and "involvement."  The Arts Council will need to turn to the Lake community in the near future for big commitments in both of these categories. If the Arts Council is to successfully lead the community in making the proposed Community Center/Arts & Music Center a reality, it will need help in raising  a significant amount of money and soliciting commitments of time and talents to get the facility designed, built and operating.  The task will be daunting but not overwhelming.  There is a tremendous "talent pool" around the Smith Mountain Lake area and a comfortable level of affluence.  If the community chooses to tap these resources, which are readily at hand, a powerful force can be marshaled that can make a significant and positive contribution to our community.
   We stand at a "critical crossroad," and I invite all of you to consider how you might play a role in continuing the expansion of the Arts Council's activities in this beautiful lake community.  If you are able to make an extra contribution in either of the currencies listed above, please contact the Smith Mountain Arts Council by phone: 721-2904, fax: 721-1765 or e-mail: This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it .
   The next few years can be exciting ones filled with challenging opportunities to build a long lasting monument to the arts, adding in the process a new element to our community for the benefit of all.  I encourage all of you to "buy into the vision" and support this undertaking.