Blue Mountain Health System is going back to the '70s for its April 22 gala event at Blue Mountain Ski Resort.

"It's our cornerstone fundraising event," vice president of Fund Development Joe Guardiani said. "This year it's the 'Staying Alive,' disco gala, and we're going to be celebrating all things '70s and the early '80s, hearkening back to those days when dancing 'The Hustle.' all of those kind of dances were popular."Lisa Johnson, Blue Mountain Health System's vice president of public relations and marketing, said that the theme seemed like a perfect fit for the gala."Every year we try to come up with a theme," Johnson said. "We had everything from 'Arabian Nights,' to 'A Night of Decadence,' to the Kentucky Derby. When we looked through the list, we hadn't done disco yet. It's funny, because there are some of us on the committee who can remember the '70s and disco when we were kids. There are some that had not been born and were past disco, and some who were in the thick of the disco scene. … It just lends itself to the gala nicely."The gala will kick off with a cocktail hour, along with a silent auction. From there, dinner will be served at food stations throughout the resort's Alpine Room and Vista Ballroom. Following dinner, the Vista Ballroom will host a casino night."We have a casino purveyor come in. Gambling will go on. We'll have a DJ spinning all the disco hits for everyone to enjoy," Guardiani said.He said that the goal of this event is to raise $90,000 or more. The annual goal of about a half-million dollars predominantly comes from special fundraisers."About $300,000 of that annually is from the four events," Guardiani said. "We have two older facilities. We're trying to stay alive. We're trying to keep the magic going, keeping health care available to the community locally. We have these assets to the community in Carbon County, we have to maintain them. There are lots of needs that we have from campus to campus. The money that we gather from the fundraising events gets applied right back into the infrastructure and the charitable mission that we do."These charitable operations include the mobile dental van, as well as health care for underinsured or uninsured women.In addition to funding some much-needed programs for the hospital, the gala also serves as a celebration for physicians who have crossed the 25-year mark with Blue Mountain. Edward Manzella, M.D., Daniel Muser, M.D., John Welkie, M.D. and Joseph Zacher, M.D. will all be honored for their service."It's an opportunity for the medical community to come together, give those guys their props, as it were, and have a nice night of collegiality," Guardiani said.The group is expecting around 200 or more attendees for the event. Anyone can contact the fund development office at 610-377-7183 for a formal invitation and ticket for the gala, at $150 each. Just make sure to get your disco threads ready, and practice those dance moves."We all kind of want to try to do the Hustle," Johnson said. "So many people say, 'I don't know how to do that!' I say watch 'Saturday Night Fever.' What better way is there to have everybody come out and have a good time and raise money, all in the same venue?"