Planners are very busy, so it is time to make your reservations for the Fifth Annual Valentine’s Dance sponsored by the Bangor Board of REALTORS to benefit the Bangor Area Chapter of Habitat for Humanity.

This year’s dance will be held from 8 a.m. to midnight, Saturday, Feb. 10, at the Bangor Civic Center.

This increasingly popular midwinter fund-raiser features the music of Brian Catell and the Jump City Jazz.

Catell, on piano will perform with Norman Vincent on the horn, Rick Haseltine on bass and Mike Borja on drums.

Once again, Bangor REALTOR member Bunny Barclay is chairing the event that planners hope will bring in more money than ever before.

Working with Barclay is REALTOR board member Jan Currier, who said the sponsoring organization decided to keep the tickets at $15 per person, “the same as for the last five years, because we want to make it affordable. The whole purpose, after all, is to raise funds for Habitat for Humanity.”

The plus to this particular fund-raiser is that, as has been the case in the past, the Maine Association of REALTORS Affordable Housing Fund, and Wells Fargo Mortgage, will match funds raised from this event to benefit the local HH chapter.

With support “from businesspeople in the community, we’re looking for a great event at a peak time; a time that people want to be out and about,” Currier said of the February fund-raiser. “There is plenty of room on the dance floor, and we want the public to know that everyone is welcome to attend.”

Currier said the dance/fund-raiser is becoming quite a community event, with increasing numbers attending each year.

The Bangor Board of REALTORS, with those matching funds, has donated more than $40,000 to the local Habitat chapter, helping support the completion of a new home for a new family every year for the past three years.

And even more exciting activities are in the works with the possibility that the next Habitat home will be in Brewer. Tickets should be purchased in advance, and may be purchased individually or by a table of 10 for $150.

Tickets also may be obtained at the Grasshopper Shop in downtown Bangor, by contacting Chuck McKay at the Back Door Dance Studio, 843-5638, or by contacting any member of the Bangor Board of REALTORS.

Ticket information may also be obtained by calling the Bangor Civic Center at 990-4444.

The Bangor Community Chorus is looking for a few good women: Singers, that is.

Any woman who would be interested in joining the Bangor Community Chorus is invited to attend its first rehearsal of the semester at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday, Jan. 16, at the Brewer Methodist Church on South Main Street.

If you have questions about this organization, you can call Carolyn McKinnon at 945-6752.

We congratulate the many members of the Maine Bankers Association who have been named the organization’s Year 2000 America’s Promise Volunteers.

The America’s Promise campaign, chaired by retired General and Secretary of State designate Colin Powell, is a national commitment to help the young people in our country by providing them five fundamental resources that will help them in their daily lives now and later as adults.

Those five resources include an ongoing relationship with a caring adult; safe places and structured nonschool hour activities; a healthy start; a marketable skill through education; and an opportunity to give back through community.

The Year 2000 America’s Promise Volunteers recognized by the MBA from our area are Lori Peakall-Cote of Bar Harbor Banking and Trust Co. in Lubec; Heidi Benner of Camden National Bank; Al Butler, First Citizen’s Bank in Houlton; Lornie Smith, First National Bank of Bar Harbor; and Bonnie Lash, First National Bank of Damariscotta in Rockport.

Also honored for their outstanding volunteerism were Tammy Griffin, Katahdin Trust Co. in Houlton; Charles Kennedy, Vice President of KeyBank, N.A.; Missy Stevens, MBNA New England in Camden; Brent Folster, Merrill Merchants Bank of Bangor; Foster Mathews, Union Trust Co. of Cherryfield; and Nancy Richard, UnitedKingfield Bank.

And while we’re recognizing these bankers for their community efforts, we most certainly want to, albeit belatedly, congratulate Maine Bankers Association’s Year 2000 Volunteer Banker of the Year, Roberta Keep of Ellsworth.

Chosen by a distinguished panel of judges that includes state legislators and community program directors, the 2000 honoree is a senior customer representative for the Ellsworth Branch of the First National Bank of Bar Harbor.

The top MBA volunteer for 2000 first began serving her community 30 years ago as a teen-ager, when she helped raise money to build a community center for the city of Ellsworth.

The organizations Keep has served over the years range from the Ellsworth Assembly #9 Order of the Rainbow for Girls to the American Diabetes Association’s Tour de Cure to Friends of the Union River.

We extend our sincere congratulations to Keep for becoming the 11th recipient of the MBA Volunteer Banker of the Year award.

Joni Averill, Bangor Daily News, P.O. Box 1329, Bangor 04402;

990-8288.