One Poker Night Raised $50,000 for Santa Monica Police Activities League

That's more than a fifth of the $223,982 the youth league's nonprofit took in during its last reported fiscal year.

Ninety people came out for poker at the Santa Monica Moose Lodge on Oct. 17, with Clippers superfan Clipper Darrell running the mic. By the end of the night they'd raised more than $50,000 for the Santa Monica Police Activities League, the Santa Monica Daily Press reported Tuesday.

For this group, that's a big night. PAL's nonprofit reported $223,982 in total revenue for the fiscal year that ended in June 2025, according to ProPublica's summary of its federal tax return. That makes one tournament worth more than a fifth of a full year's take, or a little over $550 per participant.

The money goes to a setup most people don't know about. The City of Santa Monica operates PAL's youth center at 1401 Olympic Blvd., which runs free after-school programs for kids ages 6 to 17 who live in the city or go to public school there. A volunteer nonprofit board raises money to help keep it going, the city's PAL website says. The tax return covers the board's money, not the city's.

The board's revenue has fallen two years in a row. It took in $518,957 in the year ended June 2023, then $326,269 the next year.

The year ended June 2025 was tighter still. The nonprofit spent $259,280, which is $35,298 more than it brought in. Its net assets slipped to $534,464, down from $569,762 a year earlier.

The poker total doesn't line up neatly with any one line on that return. ProPublica's summary lumps all of the nonprofit's events into one figure: $103,355 in net fundraising for the year ended June 2025. The Daily Press didn't say whether the $50,000 was counted before or after the night's costs.

Moe Ansari won the tournament. Eula Fritz, PAL's director, said everyone who played helped make it "a winning hand for our youth," the Daily Press reported.

Whether that hand holds up will show in the books for the fiscal year the tournament falls in. That year doesn't close until June 30, 2027.

Source: smdp.com, retrieved October 27, 2026. Other sources: projects.propublica.org, the city's PAL website (smpal.org).