The New York Lottery’s Yolanda Vega today presented an over-sized check worth $5 million to Dana Graffunder of Voorheesville. The new Lottery millionaire - Albany County’s second of the year - said the check represents a level of financial freedom that he never expected to achieve.

Graffunder, 60, retired from his job as a warehouse receiver soon after his wife, Leslie, gifted him with a top-prize winning Set For Life scratch-off ticket. Leslie Graffunder quickly followed suit; retiring from the skilled nursing facility where she worked the overnight shift.

Leslie said after purchasing the ticket and scratching it outside the Stewart’s Shop on South Main St. in Voorheesville, she looked at it quickly and threw it in her purse to re-check later.

“I always re-check my tickets,” she said. “The second time I looked at it, I noticed a match on the number 26 so I started to scratch off the prize and saw the letter L as in LIFE. Then, I started to scratch a little faster.”

Dana, who admits to playing the Lottery “only when the jackpot gets really big,” said he learned of his wife’s plan to gift him with a scratch-off ticket worth $5 million as he lay sick in bed, at home.

“She called me and just kept repeating herself saying, ‘Oh, my God. Oh my God,’ over and over again,” he said. “She always told me she was going to win a big one, and she finally did.”

Leslie said the trick to winning is never straying from your strategy. “Never take the first ticket or the last ticket on a roll,” she said. Her husband agreed, saying “I think it’s a great strategy. You certainly can’t argue with it now!”

Dana Graffunder chose to receive his prize in a single lump sum payment totaling $4,172,112 (net $2,761,104).   The Graffunders agree that the win will change their life for the better.

Dana said, “We both expected to be working until we dropped. This will let us pay off bills and help our son get out from under as well.”

Leslie echoed her husband’s comments adding, “No gems, baubles, furs; nothing like that for me.  We’ve been talking about buying a house by the ocean for the past 20 years. We just want to be by the ocean, that’s all.”

The New York Lottery contributed more than $42,561,880 in Lottery Aid To Education to school districts throughout Albany County during fiscal year 2015-2016.

About the New York Lottery

The New York Lottery continues to be North America’s largest and most profitable Lottery, contributing $3.30 billion in fiscal year 2015-2016 to help support education in New York State.  The Lottery’s contribution represents 14 percent of total state education aid to local school districts. 

New York Lottery revenue is distributed to local school districts by the same statutory formula used to distribute other state aid to education.  It takes into account both a school district’s size and its income level; larger, lower-income school districts receive proportionately larger shares of Lottery school funding.