Cape Verdean Veterans Hall shows it's getting back on its feet with week-long events

By PEGGY AULISIO

NEW BEDFORD — In celebrating Cape Verdean Recognition Week, which began Saturday, the Cape Verdean-American Veterans Association is also marking the progress made since last June when the state Department of Revenue seized the Veterans Hall for nonpayment of taxes.

Since the state closed the club on June 20, 2008, a new group has taken over and was able to re-open the building at 561 Purchase St. in December

Cape Verdean Recognition Week will provide a chance for the new group to show how far they have come. Having already started off Saturday with a clam boil, the week’s events include music, art shows and book signings.

"It’s a big fundraiser," said Dawn Blake-Souza of the fundraising committee.

"Thousands of Cape Verdeans come to New Bedford from all over the country," she said. "Traditionally, they’ve come home during that week because it’s a celebration of our culture."

The Veterans Hall was nearly closed for good after being locked up by the state Department of Revenue last June. Blake-Souza said she became involved in saving the Veterans Hall because of her memories of going to activities there while growing up.

"It was not simply a veterans center," she said. She said they had Ladies Auxiliary programs, father and daughter balls, cotillions, senior citizen dinners and dances, and many educational and youth programs, including an annual children’s Christmas party.

"It was a real community center and it stayed like that for many years," Blake-Souza said, "and that’s why people like me got involved with it."

When state tax officials moved to close the hall, they said they had attempted for several years to collect unpaid meals taxes and employee withholding taxes totaling $128,554 dating back to 2002. With interest and penalties, the amount totaled $253,293 by June 2008.

"The building was set to go on auction," Blake-Souza said, even though only $5,000 was remaining on the mortgage.

That’s when some members of the local Cape Verdean community stepped in.

Among those spearheading the effort was Viola Pina, a former city councilor, who chairs the fundraising committee.

Blake-Souza’s husband, Dr. Joseph "Jack" Souza, a retired Air Force captain and artist, became involved in the oversight committee.

Blake-Souza said the state Department of Revenue required an upfront payment of $40,000 before they could get the keys back.

Although she called it "a mountain to climb," she said they were able to get an anonymous loan from two lenders of $50,000, of which $40,000 went to the state and the rest to start paying off other debts.

Albino Dias, a public accountant from Dartmouth, volunteered to help. After compiling old receipts, the estimate he is coming up with is turning out to be much less than what the state revenue department projected, Blake-Souza said. She said the remaining debt is expected to be about $80,000 when everything is accounted for.

Blake-Souza said the Veterans Hall is now profitable, except for the Department of Revenue payments. She said the oversight group was able to get the Hall back on its feet because it tackled the debt as if it were planning a military strategy.

"They felt such an obligation to the Cape Verdean community," she said.

"They’ve set up a system so that it won’t ever go back to the mismanagement of the past."

Blake-Souza asked to put one misconception to rest. She said the group organizing the parade next weekend is no longer linked to the Cape Verdean-American Veterans Association.

"We do recognition week. The parade is separate," she said, but she added that veterans from the association still march in the parade.

Blake-Souza said people who wish to donate money to the Veterans Hall should give it directly to the Cape Verdean-American Veterans Association, not to organizers of the parade.