FERRIDAY — The Lake St. John Recreation and Water Conservation District Commission needs money, but the commission members don’t want to levy taxes, even though they have the power to.

Instead, they’ll have a fundraiser this Saturday, the Lake St. John Harvest Festival.

“We would rather it be volunteer than taxation,” Commission President Tom Bell said. “We are trying to keep the taxation issue away.”

The festival will be at Neely’s Spokane Resort from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m., and will have vendors, a cakewalk, a casserole sale, a silent auction and live entertainment, Festival Chair Jane Vaughan said.

“The thing we are most excited about is the silent auction,” Vaughan said. “That is going to be our big drawing card, and we are going to have some very nice things.”

Food — including hamburgers, hot dogs and jambalaya — will also be for sale, she said.

The commission’s responsibilities include maintaining the water level on the lake and maintaining, refurbishing and replacing buoys, and Bell said the commission has also done maintenance work on the weir that controls the level of the lake.

The commission would like to raise approximately $6,700, enough to make up for money it had to borrow this year and to cover expenses for next year, he said.

“One of our major expenses is a gauge that was placed here by the U.S. Geological Survey,” Bell said. “This gives us hard data every day recording the level of the lake elevation, and it also records rainfall. The two go hand in hand.”

The USGS covers half of the cost of the gauge, and the lake commission has to cover the other half of the costs, approximately $3,000.

The commission is a state entity composed of five members who are also full-time residents of the lake.

The police jury, lake groups like the flotilla committee and the commission itself can nominate members, and ultimately the local legislative delegation selects the nominees, who are then approved by the state legislature.

The commission doesn’t receive any public funds, and because it hasn’t levied any taxes doesn’t have a source of income, Bell said.

“We have a bad taste in our mouth about taxes, so we are trying to do this without imposing taxes on the residents,” he said.