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Here
is the answer...
Not
for the weak at heart!
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But,
until then... lets look back on our time in Spirit and be happy to have
once been a part of something that touched so may lives.
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Spirit
folded for several reasons:
- Membership
dropped, falling below 40 members.
- With
a drop in membership, there was a corresponding drop in revenues.
- We lost
the free practice facility at Columbia Middle School when the
community center was constructed. As a result, we searched for
another facility and could find nothing for free. The City had
nothing. We ended up renting space at the Kings Academy (old
Sunnyvale High). This was an additional financial burden that
had to be borne by the group.
- The
band struggled to continue, built around a group of returning
veterans and their families. However, without "new blood", there
were no new boosters to carry on.
- The
recruiting was getting more difficult, in light of the financials.
Even with the string of SBI wins, we could not draw the new
members. It was difficult to compete with the local high schools,
which have pretty good marching band programs.
- The
last straw occurred when King's Academy asked us to leave. They
were renting out space in evenings to DMV for classes and felt
that the noise was not compatible...
- On top
of that, Spirit had an old loan that needed to be paid off.
Without the facilities support that the band enjoyed in the
"early years", it got to the point where it could not be sustained.
The costs of facilities, insurance, band director/staff, tour,
etc. caused the cost per person to be prohibitive.
- The
Board decided to liquidate assets to pay off the debt and fold
up.
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