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A fundraiser to benefit the Springwood Avenue Park on the city’s West Side drew over 150 people to Porta Pizza on Sunday night and raised $10,000 in the process.

Sponsored by the Monmouth Conservation Foundation, the fundraiser is part of an effort by the group to get more involved in providing recreational opportunities in urban areas.

“Look at this crowd. It’s outstanding,” said William Kastning, the group’s executive director, in his remarks to the gathering.

The park, a key aspect of Springwood Avenue revitalization, is currently under development with a playground installed in one corner of the site. But there’s still two other phases to be completed, which include a civic plaza, raised stage area and a lawn for pick-up soccer games and other recreational activity.

Despite the county providing an $800,000 grant for the park, there is about a $175,000 gap in funding to fully complete the $1.7 million project. The Conservation Foundation is working to help fill that gap.

The foundation has been awarded a $30,000 matching challenge grant by the Mary Owen Borden Foundation. If the Conservation Foundation can raise $30,000 if will receive the $30,000 Borden grant and thus contribute $60,000 toward the park’s $175,000 funding gap.

Aside from the $10,000 raised at the Porta fundraiser, the group has active leads for other sources of funds, according to Lisa McKean, the marketing director for the Conservation Foundation. First Constitution Bank also provided support for the Porta fundraiser, she said.

Speakers at the fundraiser said that the Springwood Park would be the first public park in memory in this west side section of Asbury Park, and that the site has sat vacant for over 40 years.

Attendees at the fundraiser were from all over the county, and represented many new faces from those who typically appear at Conservation Foundation fundraising events, McKean said. Attendess paid $55 to attend the Porta fundraiser.

The Monmouth Conservation Foundation, founded in 1977, has until now mainly focused on preserving open space in non-urban areas of Monmouth County, particularly those that were once farmland.

In her remarks to the crowd, McKean said that two of the group’s key founders — the late Judith Stanley and the late Michael Huber — would be pleased with the foundation’s newly expanded mission to work on recreational opportunities in the county’s urban areas.

“I know they would be behind this one hundred percent,” McKean said, noting that Stanley was born in Asbury Park.

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