The Ponce Business Association will hold a raffle drawing at its Feb. 27 lunch meeting as the first of three fundraisers this year to help finance much-needed repairs to counter exterior deterioration of the city’s historic Merrick House, 907 Coral Way.

The association chose Merrick House as beneficiary of its new fundraising initiative because of its community importance as the childhood home of city founder George Merrick and as an example of early 1900s Miami architecture, said PBA President Richard Martin.

And only 400 tickets at $10 each are now being sold for a chance to win one of the following donated prizes: a spa certificate at Mayfair Hotel and Spa, a $150 certificate to Fleming’s Steakhouse, a one-year family membership at Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden, and a gold-plated silver minted coin from Vizcaya Collectibles.

Tickets can be purchased at the group’s lunch meetings, which are held at noon on the first and third Mondays of the month at JohnMartin’s Irish Pub & Restaurant, 253 Miracle Mile.

“Some of the city-owned assets have deteriorated and there’s not enough money in the budget to maintain them…I thought this was a really good cause,” said Mr. Martin. “And we look forward to doing more forms of charity to help in the repairing of city-owned assets.”

Board member Richard Namon had observed the deteriorating condition of the treasured city asset such as the leaky roof with a patchwork of spot repairs and a rotting garage door. And as the Merrick House board can only fundraise for interior improvements and the city handles all exterior ones, he didn’t want to donate to the city for the repairs without assurance it would go toward the house.

So he worked with city officials to establish last summer the Roxcy O’Neal Bolton Merrick House Trust Fund, named in honor of Ms. Bolton’s pioneering activism in historic preservation. All fund contributions will go toward exterior Merrick House renovations -- starting with the roof.

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