Mayor Angie Nelson Deuitch has yet to be in office for a hundred days, but she is already helping Michigan City achieve important milestones. On a festive Friday evening, hundreds of people attended the Mayor’s Charitable Gala where $113,000 was raised to help the city’s youth.
“I think that it is important that we raise funds for the community, and this was the best event to start with focusing on our youth,” Deuitch said. “If we keep them busy and occupied, they thrive. My ultimate goal is to support smaller programs, neighborhoods and different organizations that normally don't get funded.”
Although not the first time Michigan City has a Mayor’s Charitable Gala, this is the first time the city has had it since the COVID-19 pandemic. The importance of focusing on youth is to demonstrate outlets and avenues that will encourage them to stay in the city.
“When they go off to college or to the military, we want them to make Michigan City their home as they become adults,” Deuitch said. “You have to show them that they have a place in the community.”
The former Girl Scout troop leader and former coach knows plenty from her own experiences growing up in Michigan City how important that is. It is why this event and supporting the youth is especially meaningful to her.
“I was born and raised here,” Deuitch said. “I had wonderful educators that supported me as a young person. I want them to know as mayor that I'm here to support them in their endeavors in whatever they would like to do.”
In her first hundred days as Mayor, Nelson Deuitch has brought together the community so well. It is something the Chief of Police Marty Corley and the police department get to see first hand.
“It's great that the mayor has brought the city together,” Corley said. “Mayor Angie has got us back on track, and what I like about Mayor Angie is that she's about bringing people together no matter what our differences are. We need to get together to improve our city because what's good for our city trickles down to our families.”
Bringing community together and strengthening community relationships are two things that are very important to the Michigan City Police Department. They help make the city safer which is the ultimate goal of the department.
“We want the city to grow, and we're here to make sure that they can grow and thrive,” Corley said. “We want everybody to know that we are because we are committed to building strong relationships with the community to make our operations move smoother.”
The event would not have been possible without members of the community including those who chose to sponsor it such as Horizon Bank, who was the presenting sponsor. Different organizations and members of the community filled 74 tables at the Stardust Event Center. In attendance also included local and state leaders such as La Porte Mayor Thomas Dermody.
“We want to support our local communities, and what's good for Michigan City is good for La Porte and good for LaPorte County,” Dermoddy said. “We want Mayor Angie to know and we support her and her team and working together it's going to be hard to be stopped.”
For both La Porte and Michigan City, the youth are their futures. It is the goal of the whole county to make high quality of life available right here at home.
At the end of the event, the whole entire room stood and cheered as the first organizations received the donations. It was a celebratory finale for an event that looks to be the start of the work Deuitch and Michigan City hope to accomplish with the city’s youth.
For more information about the City of Michigan City and its departments, please visit https://www.emichigancity.com/.