By Lisa Merolla, Staff Writer
PRINCETON — The June Fete, the Auxiliary of University Medical Center at Princeton’s traditional fundraiser, has been sidelined this year in favor of a new event called the UNfete.
The auxiliary had hosted the Fete every year since 1954, providing residents with a day of food and entertainment. This year, however, the auxiliary says it decided to take fundraising efforts in a different direction. The UNfete is a tongue-in-cheek nonevent meant to encourage donations without a festival.
In a press release, the UNfete is described as “an opportunity to stay home, spend time with family and/or friends, and simply send in a contribution.”
Pam Garbini, the chairwoman of the UNfete event, said a variety of reasons had led the auxiliary to put the Fete aside this year. Times have changed since the Fete began, she said, making it more difficult to secure volunteers and attract residents to the day’s events.
”People are a little more distracted and busier than they used to be,” Ms. Garbini said. “There’s graduations and reunions. We thought having an event that you didn’t have to do anything for might be a relief to people.”
She said the Fete required a great amount of planning and needed many volunteers to run smoothly. She described a feeling of “volunteer fatigue” among auxiliary members — because more women now juggle full-time jobs with volunteering, they struggled to devote enough time to the festival.
”In the olden days, we had a lot of stay-at-home women, a group of volunteers with time to throw into the Fete,” Ms. Garbini said.
She added that problems with the festival site also contributed to the decision to sideline the event. The Fete took place at Princeton Stadium, an area now near university construction projects. Ms. Garbini said the construction would not provide the “right ambiance.”
The auxiliary is considering transferring the Fete to a new site in Plainsboro, where the hospital is preparing to move, but it could not hold the Fete there this year.
”The old site was compromised, the new site was not ready,” Ms. Garbini said. “Moving to a new site would take three times as much planning.”
With the decision to not hold the Fete made last year, the auxiliary turned its attention to devising a new fundraiser. The UNfete involved volunteers sending out what Ms. Garbini called “non-invite invitations” — fancy letters that invited people to a nonevent. Instead of responding with an RSVP, people were asked to donate money.
”We’re hoping people will read it and laugh,” she said.
UNfete is also a play on words, what is left when the ‘J’ and the ‘E’ are removed from June Fete.
It is serving as a placeholder event for the June Fete, Ms. Garbini added. Because people were used to donating to the hospital during this time of year, the auxiliary wanted to provide them with the opportunity to do so.
The auxiliary hopes the new event will raise a similar amount of money as the Fete, Ms. Garbini said. It cost much less to organize the UNfete. However, the auxiliary acknowledged that some people might not be willing to donate without the festival.
”People want to get something for their money,” Ms. Garbini said. “Some people are reluctant to write a check for a good cause. They want a day of entertainment. There will be some falloff, but we are hoping to raise the same amount of money or maybe more.”
She said the decision to cancel to Fete was a very difficult one, and some members of the public have expressed regret about it. However, it is too soon to tell whether the Fete will return next year.
”We need to figure out the best use of volunteers and the best use of auxiliary resources to support the community,” Ms. Garbini said.
The auxiliary is now collecting donations, and in the first week and a half, the fundraiser generated 50 responses. The auxiliary is looking to receive the UNfete donations in June, but there is no deadline.
People can donate to the UNfete event at http://www.princetonhcs.org/. Follow the University Medical Center at Princeton tab on the left, then follow the auxiliary tab on the left to the jUNe Fete page.