Over two dozen team captains, co-captains and board members assembled at the Greenville YMCA on Tuesday night to kick off Butler County’s Relay For Life (RFL), the American Cancer Society’s (ACS) premier fundraiser in the fight against cancer.

The goal for Butler County is $100,000 for the 2005 event.

This year’s RFL, which once again takes place at the Butler County Fairgrounds, is slated to begin Friday night, May 6, continuing into the wee hours of Saturday morning, May 7.

The theme for this year’s Relay, &uot;Birthday Celebration&uot;, was carried out in the Y library Tuesday night with a table featuring a cake with the RFL logo, colorful party hats and balloons.

Joan Reynolds, chairperson of the Butler County Chapter of the American Cancer Society, welcomed the volunteers and covered the information in the Team Captain’s packets with the group, including how to properly document cash and check donations to RFL.

&uot;Our ‘Bank Night’ last year went great, everything was so smooth – we want to do that again this year,&uot; Reynolds stressed.

In addition to the glow of satisfaction one gets from helping fight this disease, tangible rewards are also out there for ambitious team participants to win, the chairperson pointed out.

&uot;There are some wonderful incentive prizes available for those competitive spirits on your teams, those individuals who raise $175 or more,&uot; said Reynolds as she held up a chart displaying the prizes.

Reynolds introduced a new RLF board member, Rebecca Richardson, the new Teams Recruitment Chair for RFL. Contact numbers for Richardson were also announced: 382-1596 and 799-7247.

Also on hand to speak was Laurie Martin, who is in charge of entertainment for the May event. Martin shared the many ways the teams can earn ‘Relay Bucks’ which allow them to compete for &uot;that wonderful trophy on Relay night.&uot;

One way teams can earn a bevy of Relay Bucks, Martin said, is to put an entry into the &uot;Dude Looks Like a Lady&uot; Pageant.

You earn $5000 Relay Bucks just for participating…and more than one pageant entry is OK,&uot; the entertainment captain explained.

Team captains were encouraged to decorate their RFL tents with the &uot;Celebration&uot; theme for a chance to earn bucks and to make the event all the more colorful and fun.

Teams were also encouraged to put their best cooks’ efforts into the RFL Cooking Competition, to be judged by RFL’s emcee and resident gourmand, Ralph Stacy, and their best hoofers into the Swing Dance Contest.

This year, a volleyball competition is planned, Martin said, with each 6-person team earning $1,000 in Relay Bucks and the winning team earning $5000.

Additional activities planned include kids’ activities such as face and hair painting and the cardboard city; karaoke, ski walk, hula hoops for both children and adults and tug of war.

Ways for the teams to raise funds for RFL were also discussed, everything from car washes, bake sales and road blocks to paying a &uot;fine&uot; to get pink flamingoes or a toilet removed from your front lawn.

&uot;There are a lot of great ideas for fundraising out there, so get together and pool your ideas…I raised a lot of money with the flamingo idea in Fort Deposit a few years ago,&uot; said Martin.

Other announcements included the date of the Annual ACS Survivor’s Luncheon, scheduled for April 29 at the First Baptist Church Family Life Center.

The next Team Captain’s Meeting is slated for March 21 at 5:30 p.m. at the library of the Greenville YMCA.

In the meantime, anyone interested in forming a new team is urged to contact Rebecca Richardson at 382-1596 or 799-7247. &uot;We are always looking for new teams to join our effort – we would love to see more teams from other parts of the county outside of Greenville,&uot; said Reynolds.

For more information on the upcoming ACS Relay For Life, contact ACS Chairperson Joan Reynolds at 382- 2696 or call the American Cancer Society at 1-800-ACS-2345.