As we near the July 29th & 30th inaugural Spark!Fishers Festival, Mayor Scott Fadness says the city will be providing cash support to the first year event.
In a podcast interview recorded Monday morning, Mayor Fadness says in the first year of the Spark!Fishers Festival, he expects the cash contribution by the city to be similar to the amount provided in the past to the Fishers Freedom Festival.
“Keep in mind that this is our first year,” the mayor said. “There’s some heavy lifting to get it up and running, but even the fact that they are holding it to one day brings down our in-kind costs, because if you look back in the day when we had to have police, fire and public works out there for two full days, that really started racking-up on overtime bills for the work that we did.”
Fishers Parks and Recreation Director Tony Elliot told me during the same podcast recording session that he expects those involved with the festival will learn a lot the first year and become more efficient in subsequent years.
“I’ve served on the sponsor committee and we’ve learned a lot,” said Elliot.
City Councilman John Weingardt said in a podcast interview last week that he expects the Spark!Fishers Festival to have “very minimal” cash support from the city, but did say he had not seen the numbers.
In 2017, the Fishers Freedom Festival received $45,000 in cash support from the city and $45,000 in in-kind support. In-kind support is from the city departments, such as police, fire and public works.
Parks Director Elliot, in the same podcast recording session, described a very different Geist “Blast On The Bridge” this year. The July 4th celebration will no longer close-off the Geist bridge at roughly 4pm, as in past years, instead concentrating on the local restaurants in that area.
The bridge will close at 8pm this July 4th so people can gather to watch the fireworks display at 10pm.
Finally, when asking about the IKEA-sponsored Maternity Lounge at the festival, Mayor Fadness mentioned his wife Aunna may take advantage of that. Scott & Aunna Fadness are expecting their second child in late August, and, according to the mayor, their second child will be a boy.
You can listen to my podcast cited above at this link.
You can’t prepare apples to apples if the city gave the festival $45,000 in 2017 for a two day event with much more free things for the family to do all day both days to his one day event. He and his council stated many times they can do the same event for less money, when it isn’t the same event at all. They also stated they didn’t believe in funding festivals. Boy has the tide changed.
Megan Elizabeth I hope Spark Fishers is a success and brings the community together as the Fishers Freedom Festival did. The taxpayers deserve a great 4th of July celebration.
There needs to be some clarification. Many of the news media outlets are stating the city funded the two-day festival in 2017 with $85,000 and in-kind donation of parks, public works, police, fire and maintenance staff. That s not the case at all. The organization expected to receive the $85,000 as in the past, but when the check was received in May it was for $45,000. The organization did receive the above in-kind staff. But to our knowledge no other city employee “volunteered” for PTO time. This event was a community led event and was inclusive with a sensory area for years as is the Spark is currently promoting. Spark has a “Fresh New Twist”. They are having the same events, just less of them and this festival is for one day. The fresh new twist is the move to the city hall area and the vendors and activities are spread all over town on the streets.
The reason the non-profit decided to not continue with the event was not solely about the loss of grant money from the city. The city made that decision the beginning of 2017 not to fund the not-for-profit organization. Councilman Peterson told our director that she might as well face the facts that the city parks department could do a better job with the event than her and he did not consider the organization as a non-profit. Several council members stated they did not believe in funding festivals. The mayor and other council memberssaid they could do the event for less than the $45,000 cash contribution.
You cannot have an event without the support of the mayor and council. The city staff plays a huge part in any event. They pulled all cash and in-kind staff contributions knowing the volunteer staff could not set up and tear down the event and pay for every fence section or other equipment used.
Council member Weingardt made a statement that there has been minimal money spent on Spark, but he did not know the numbers yet. Mayor Fadness said there were additional expenses to get the event off the ground this year. Does that mean they spent more than $45,000? The festival always had unforeseen expenses, but had to work within the money we raised. Last year with $40,000 less from the city we had to cut several things to stay within our budget. Thi8s was after orders and deposits had been made.
The city is able to spend whatever they want. They can strong arm their vendors and developers to donate. For years the organization asked for the city to help raise money, but that didn’t happen. Will the taxpayers see an accurate list of all the expenses including park’s staff organizing this event and other in-kind (giving PTO time for city employees to volunteer)? We shall see. The city is all about transparency.
You really cannot compare the two events. Spark is a one-day event and the Fishers Freedom Festival event was two days. So, even if the city spent the $45,000, it is costing them more, however they may save money on some in-kind staff since it is a one-day event. My question is why wasn’t a budget presented before the event? Of course, it will balance at the end of the event.
I hope it is a great event and the residents deserve it. It will be hard to compete with the previous event, but it should be all about the community. As the mayor said, go in with an open mind. I am sure the residents will let us know what they think.