Cornhole just part of the reason people supported Jean B. Purvis event Saturday
SUMMIT TWP — Patty Starnes worked for Jean B. Purvis for 18 years, so when an event came along that would let her support the legacy of the late Butler community activist, Starnes didn’t hesitate to call her friends to go with her.
One of her friends happened to have her own set of bean bags tailored for use in cornhole, so that was another plus in inviting them to the Jean B. Purvis Food Truck Fundraiser and Cornhole Tournament on Saturday, June 6.
The tournament and event was almost secondary for Starnes and her friends, Kim Tedder and Patty Marcucci, who all wanted to support the event to raise money for the Jean B. Purvis Community Health Center. All three of them commented that the Purvis center was deserving of support, in part because of her influence on it.
“She was the sweetest, kindest most giving person,” Starnes said Saturday. “I’m here for Jean.”
The Jean B. Purvis Community Health Center provides free outpatient primary medical care, preventive medical services, referrals for specialized services and referrals to other agencies to people in need. It open to the public in 2008, and in 2018, the center was renamed the Jean B. Purvis Community Health Center, in honor its founder.
Marissa Stenzel, patient navigator at the health center, said the organization is always raising money to maintain funding for its services. She said the food truck event began in 2025, as another way to gather money and support for the clinic, and the cornhole tournament was added to the event this year to help grow attendance.
Stenzel said the event may continue to take place every summer, since it makes a nice midpoint to the health center’s main annual fundraiser.
“Signature Sensations is the main fundraiser for us, but I'm definitely hoping that if we continue to do the food trucks we can also bring in more money,” Stenzel said.
Five teams signed up for the cornhole tournament, and food trucks parked around the health center’s parking lot from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. There were also some children’s games under tents in the parking lot, staffed by employees of the health center.
The cornhole tournament was more casual than competitive. The people who signed up mainly also did it for Purvis and to support the health center, like Lisa Hunt, who works for a partner of the center and attended the event with her husband and two friends.
“I just said, ‘Let’s go play and have fun and be terrible at cornhole,” said Hunt, who works at USX Federal Credit Union. She teamed up with Tiffany Wells Saturday to form the team “Scatter Sisters.”
Matt Wells, who formed the team “The Rockers” with Hunt’s husband, Bobby Hunt, also said he enjoys going to events that are fundraisers.
“We always support community events, Chamber (of Commerce) events,” he said.
Even Starnes’ friends, who visited from South Carolina, wanted to support Purvis, having met her before she died in May 2020. Marcucci commented that the health center was a good legacy.
“This was a good thing she started,” Marcucci said.
