Money made by the annual Bantam Jeep Heritage Festival is being awarded to area nonprofit groups for the third year. Friends of the Bantam Jeep Association has selected 22 groups to get $27,200.Butler Eagle File PhotoA view from atop of the Cycle Warehouse of the Annual Jeep Invasion on Main St in Butler on Friday June 8, 2018.

The Friends of the Bantam Jeep Association will once again distribute financial gifts of $500 to $2,200 to local nonprofit organizations.

The association, which is the owner of the Bantam Jeep Heritage Festival, is distributing the gifts for the third consecutive year.

FBJA has chosen 22 groups to receive a total of $27,200 in funds.

“Part of our organization's mission is to support charitable contributions to other local nonprofit organizations in the community,” said Todd Wagner, FBJA president. “Since 2016, we have given $77,200 in gifts to a wide variety of nonprofit groups.”

Wagner said the group makes the donations on behalf of the hundreds of volunteers who work to ensure a successful festival every year.

The 2018 event was held on the weekend of June 8 at Cooper's Lake Campgrounds in Worth Township and opened with the Jeep Invasion in Butler. According to organizers, 24,639 people attended.

The organizations, who were chosen from a pool of 60 applicants, include Associated Artists of Butler County; American Legion Riders; the Veterans In Need Fund; the Jean B. Purvis Community Health Clinic; Historic Harmony; Moraine Preservation Fund; VA Butler Healthcare's homeless veteran program; and the Evans City and Zelienople libraries.

The FBJA also donated $1,700 to K9s for Warriors, which provides service dogs to veterans. Those funds came from the festival's Bantam Proving Grounds Jeep pull, which was introduced at the 2018 event.

In addition, $20,000 was donated by the FBJA to the many organizations that helped execute the 2018 festival.

Those organizations include Moraine, McConnells Mill and Jennings Commission; Civil Air Patrol; Rodfathers of Butler; and the Slippery Rock Volunteer Fire Departments in both Butler and neighboring Lawrence County.