BCS Championship Game tickets available in drawing to aid tornado relief efforts

HUNTSVILLE, Alabama --?The state's on-going?tornado relief effort is being benefitted through the generosity of a former Alabama football player and a drawing for a pair of BCS National Championship Game tickets.

A former Tide player, who wants to remain anonymous, has donated his two tickets to the Jan. 9 Alabama-LSU rematch in New Orleans?to the Dade Organization Acting in Disaster (DOAD). Those tickets will be raffled off with all proceeds going to the relief program.

The raffle will be conducted on the web site of the Chattanooga Times Free Press www.timesfreepress.com/doadtickets. A donation of $20 makes a person eligible to win the tickets. The contest will begin Dec. 23 and run through Jan. 4. A winner will be selected at random on Jan. 5. The championship game will be played Jan. 9 in the Superdome in New Orleans.

DOAD represents relief efforts from the series of April tornadoes in Dade County, GA, but also in the northeastern Alabama counties of Jackson and DeKalb. Dade borders those counties and DOAD is extending assistance in the sparsely populated areas in the extreme northwest.

Two persons died and almost 300 homes were totally or partially destroyed from the tornadoes in Dade. Just across the state line, on Sand Mountain, 12 individuals lost their lives and dozens of other homes were demolished or damaged.

"Our primary focus just after the emergency need was to get the community up and going again," said Joseph Chambers, chairman of DOAD. "Once we got out of that, we were looking at helping individuals. We are helping to rebuild and we are continuing to help with repairs."

To date, DOAD is working on rebuilding five homes and continuing to repair others. It has purchased five trailers for families, and has done myriad types of repair work on single family homes and trailers, in addition to purchasing furniture and household goods.

"Right now, we still need $100,000-$150,000 to finish off this disaster," Mr. Chambers said.

Although the organization is based in Trenton, GA., the county seat of Dade County, much work is being done in Alabama.

"State lines and county lines become blurred in a disaster," said Howard Doyle, a case manager for DOAD. "They are our neighbors. We want to help them as well."

According to Mr. Chambers, foundations have been established for three homes on Sand Mountain. He believes the relief effort won't be completed until late in 2012.

For more information, contact DOAD at 706-657-3233 ext 364.

Source: http://www.al.com/sports/index.ssf/2011/12/bcs_championship_game_tickets.html

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