AUBURN - It was a perfect night for a dance under the stars Friday as people waited for dusk to fall before arriving at the parking lot behind the Knights of Columbus for an evening to benefit TomatoFest, an annual fundraiser for local food pantries.

Early comers listened to '60s and '70s music of The Baggs, a group that includes Auburn guitarist Jeff Delbel, a Cayuga Community College professor, who volunteered for the dance.

Lee Vanderpool and Mike Padula, Knights of Columbus members and organizers, proposed the cookout and outdoor dance as a fundraiser.

For $5 admission, people could munch hot dogs and drink beverages outside and dance. Patty Scozzari sold food and beverage tickets while Knights worked the grill and served cold drinks.

Raffles including 50/50 and baskets for a silent auction were also part of the event. Co-chairs of TomatoFest, Janice Sanders and Padula, helped Deanna Curran with the tickets for both.

Darlene Garreson and Sharon Van Fleet, both of Aurora, were moved to dance to the beat of “Honky Tonk Women,” along with Debbie Anthony of Auburn. “Hound Dog ” and other rock 'n' roll favorites got people moving.

Vanderpool said that his involvement with the TomatoFest began about four years ago when he received calls from Padula and Sanders, telling him the event had lost its main sponsor.

“They were hours from canceling the event,” he said, adding that once he began to work on TomatoFest he was very impressed with “a core of 10 or 15 people that absolutely give it their all.”

Padula, now with the TomatoFest for 13 years, said the $2,400 fee paid to Cayuga County to use Emerson Park has remained the same for a number of years. People began to take the event for granted, he said, putting it on the back burner in favor of other things going on in the community. The board was also short on people the same year there was a falloff in funding.

“We put our heads together and someone said, 'Pitch it out to the public.' Sponsors started pouring in then,” Padula said. “We were just 15 people then, all concentrating on the local community.” He added that the public knows how important TomatoFest is to the community and that the outcome of its failure would be an increase in county taxes.

A portion of proceeds from TomatoFest goes to nine food pantries in Auburn and surrounding communities. Padula said he was pleased to have four or five alumni from the Leadership Cayuga program on the board, who have come up with a five-year plan to turn the TomatoFest into a destination event. They are going out to promote the event statewide. New vendors are coming in as a result, he said.