POLAND – A group of local women who want to create low-income housing for aging Poland folks will hold an auction Saturday as a fundraising kickoff.

Local auctioneer Dan Boyd plans to sell furniture, appliances, antiques and several gift certificates.

All money raised will be used as startup funds for the local charity, said Linda Laskey, president of the group.

Eventually, the group hopes to buy land and build apartments.

“I love my neighborhood,” Laskey said. “But I’ve seen my neighbors have to leave Poland.” Some had grown too ill to care for their homes. Others couldn’t afford the rising taxes, she said.

She worries more people will be forced to leave. At 56, the retired elementary schoolteacher worries she might also have to leave one day.

Laskey began the group, Lifesprings Inc., two years ago. Its first job was to poll attendees at the annual town meeting. The group received a warm reception. The 18 members have garnered nonprofit tax status and raised a little money.

“God bless the people who’ve come forward,” Laskey said.

She has grand plans for the project. She hopes it may one day go beyond apartments. She imagines assisted living units, housing for people with dementia and even a nursing home.

“We just need money and land,” she said.

So far, people are sticking with the project, she said.

They followed up the first poll in 2007 with a second poll at this spring’s town meeting. Like the first, it encouraged Laskey and her group to keep working.

“I get discouraged, then something like this happens,” she said. “I get all pepped up again.”