WHITEHALL — The White Lake Community Fund, a branch of the Community Foundation for Muskegon County, was pleased to distribute over $88,000 worth of grants in its spring round of awards Monday at the White Lake Community Library.
Four organizations received five-figure grants, with the largest amount - $15,000 - going to AgeWell Services of West Michigan. The organization is using the money to fund Meals on Wheels distribution in the White Lake area. AgeWell's Laura Beechnau said the extra money will limit, if not hopefully eliminate, needing to create a wait list for the many residents who request help from the service and will fund over 1,100 meals. The meals go to residents 60 years of age and older, primarily homebound, who have trouble cooking for themselves.
The Montague Museum received a grant of $13,315, which will be used to fund the preservation of some of its artifacts as well as purchasing security cameras. The museum is open Saturdays and Sundays from 1-5 p.m. from Memorial Day through Labor Day. Admission is free, and local people are invited to become museum members for only $6 per year. The all-volunteer staff has digitized Montague annuals and placed them on their website for viewing.
"It has things in there you've never seen before," said WLCF board member Beth Pickard; some of the exhibits include old military uniforms, the dress former Miss America Nancy Fleming wore when she won Miss Michigan en route to that honor, and old rotary phones and typewriters guests can use.
The Montague High School Band Boosters received a grant of $12,800, which will fund an exploratory program that will allow every sixth-grade student at NBC Middle School to try band for a month. Montague band director Emma Greenwood said she got the idea for the program from a colleague in White Cloud who used it. The program will introduce new middle school students to band, as well as choir and other activities, on four-week rotations to see if it sparks an interest in band from those who may otherwise not have had the chance to explore it. Students will be able to try multiple instruments to see which one they might gravitate to.
Greenwood added that the upcoming leadership conference, funded by a WLCF grant the Montague band boosters received last fall, is taking place June 10-11. Renowned speaker Dr. Matthew Arau, whose Upbeat Global aims to foster leadership in young people through music, will be visiting to speak to local students June 10 before spending a full day with Whitehall and Montague band students June 11.
The Playhouse at White Lake received a $12,500 grant to fund its summer theatre festival, which director Beth Beaman called its "keystone project of the year," with eight weeks of programming scheduled. The festival will include productions by Central Michigan University, a Bon Appetit cabaret in partnership with the Muskegon Museum of Art, and a Playhouse production of Joseph and the Technicolor Dreamcoat.
Beaman also noted that the Playhouse will be bringing back a program that provides tickets and transportation to shows for low-income seniors in the area and that 10 free tickets are provided to the library for each Playhouse production each year, with cardholders able to check out tickets up to two times per person.
The Arts Council of White Lake-Nuveen Center's $6,500 grant will help fund the restoration of the Sailboat Trees sculpture in Covell Park in Whitehall, right next to the Whitehall/Montague bridge. The sculpture is one of the first sculptures to be part of the Art Walk when it began in 2010, which now has about a dozen sculptures. ACWL-Nuveen member Kathy Rogers said the organization hopes to have the restoration work done in June.
Walk the Beat White Lake's $6,000 contribution from the WLCF enabled the organization to give some sort of award to all 33 students who applied for one through its scholarship program this year, something it hadn't been able to do in the past. Director Sara Kane-Smart said while Montague students have long been well-represented in applications, she was pleased to see an uptick in Whitehall applications as well in 2025. She relayed one story of a dad who told her his son, who received a guitar at the annual kickoff event in April, played it for two hours the evening it was presented to him.
Camp Miniwanca's $5,000 grant from the WLCF will allow 12 students each from Whitehall and Montague schools to be part of its fall activities at no cost. Part of the Michigan Middle School Leadership Initiative, the camp brings students together from around the state to participate in activities and create community action projects they then put into action where they live.
Another $5,000 went to the West Michigan Symphony for its Link Up program. Geared to grades 3-5, the Link Up program - a nationwide program which, according to president and CEO Andy Buelow, originated at Carnegie Hall - is a year-long music curriculum which brings students in to work directly with symphony musicians, learning notation and melodies. Students receive a recorder and are able to perform alongside the symphony at a special concert; this year's took place Wednesday at the Frauenthal Theater in Muskegon.
"The sound of 1,000 kids playing recorder with an orchestra has to be experienced," Buelow smiled.
This award, said Buelow, will allow children from White Lake elementary schools to participate in the program. A total of about 50 schools from West Michigan are involved in the program, and Buelow said he believes the West Michigan Symphony is the only orchestra that has put on the program each year of its existence, which dates back over 20 years.
A third $5,000 grant was presented to First Tee West Michigan, a junior golf organization. The grant will cover costs for local children who would otherwise not be able to be part of the organization's events. The programs last 4-6 weeks at a time, and while they teach golf, Erik Sanford - who played golf for Whitehall - said there's also a focus on building life skills.
Sanford also mentioned First Tee's Junior Mentor Initiative, which hires teenagers - those who have participated in First Tee and others recommended by adults - as de facto assistant coaches. This creates leadership opportunities for the teens and mentee opportunities for junior golfers.
The Ferry Memorial Reformed Church accepted a $4,000 grant for its Food and More program, which delivers food baskets the weekend before Thanksgiving each year to area families in need. Volunteer Kathy Oakes said during her time with the program, meals have been delivered from North Muskegon to Ferry, near Shelby.
"It's heartbreaking to see how many people are in need, but it's also heartwarming to be able to provide help," Oakes said.
The Sable Point Lighthouse Keepers Association received a $2,000 grant, which will help boost five youth programs this summer at the White River Light Station. Site manager Sarah Johnston said the grant money will fund purchases of hands-on props for kids to explore, and SPLKA hopes to expand the offering to its other four lighthouses in future years.
New this year, the youth events are geared to those from grades 1-4 and will focus on lighthouse and maritime history in hopes of sparking interest in the field. Each session will cover a different part of lighthouse life, from what life was like for kids who lived at lighthouses to mysteries and urban legends of the Great Lakes. As of now, the SPLKA website lists June 25, July 9 and Aug. 13 from 2-3:30 p.m. as sessions for the program.
White River and Fruitland townships were the smallest grant recipients, being given a total of $1,100 to fund their life ring programs. The money will be used primarily to fund life rings that are taken from their township locations. Fruitland Township supervisor Jeff Marcinkowski said the life rings are particularly important to him, as he has been a U.S. Coast Guard reservist for 20 years.
