~Fundsraising~

Letter on Fundsraising

28th July 2004

Dear Friend,

I am writing to you regarding Srila Gurudeva’s Murwillumbah Preaching Centre.
As you may know, we are in the process of buying a block of land in Murwillumbah where Srila Gurudeva wants us to build a three-story building that will contain a preaching centre, a school and a medical dispensary.
Due to the generosity of devotees and well-wishers, so far we have paid-off over $40,000 towards the total cost of the land - which is $90,000.
Srila Gurudeva is pushing us to get on with it. However, before we can start building we need to finish paying-off the land. This will give us the security needed to qualify for a bank loan for the building. (At this stage we have no assets in the Society’s name.)
Srila Gurudeva is threatening not to come to Murwillumbah this year unless we can stage the festival on his land. This seems almost impossible at this stage. However, we do have a plan to make this happen. At a recent meeting, the Murwillumbah devotees decided we should give it a go.

THE PLAN
If we can pay off the land by Radhastami, we can get a prefabricated, re-locatable building constructed and installed on-site 6 weeks after getting the go-ahead from the bank and the Tweed Shire Council. This building would be the size of a small Hall and would enable us to have our own Temple for as long as it takes to raise the funds and build the planned 3-storey building envisaged by Srila Gurudeva.
The time frame is;
1. All donations received on or before Radhastami: - 22nd September.
2. 4 to 6 weeks to arrange bank finance for the building (about $80,000) and get Council building approvals. (During this time work can begin on the building.) - 3rd November.
3. Delivery of building on site – mid to late November. (Details of the building are included.)
4. Fitting out of building with kitchen and toilets etc – mid to late December.
5. Landscaping – gardens, car parking etc – January.
6. Host Srila Gurudeva’s Annual “Festival of Devotion”!

The temporary building is re-locatable, which means that once work begins on the main Temple it can be sold and removed from the site.

THE FIRST STEP
This plan can only work if we achieve the first step, which is to pay off the land.
To do this we need $50,000 by Radhastami. It sounds a lot of money, but actually if we all give as much as we can, we can easily do it. For example, we only need 25 devotees to give $2,000 each.
We will then have a block of land owned outright by the Sri Giriraja Govardhana Gaudiya Math Murwillumbah, which at present market prices is valued at around $150,000.
We would then be able to get a bank loan for $80,000 to buy the temporary Temple, with repayments at present interest rates of $135 / week. These could be easily met by the local devotees.

A GIFT TO SRI RADHA
So I am humbly asking you to give a gift to Sri Radha this Radhastami that will be beneficial to everyone.
Please think about how much you would like to give and let me know as soon as possible so that I can keep everyone informed as to how we are going towards our goal.
Every donation will help immensely.

Yours in the service of Srila Gurudeva,

Raghunatha dasa