Changes Could Be Coming To The Corn Festival

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Changes could be coming to the 2018 Tecumseh Corn Festival.

For the past few years, the town had been looking for a community organization to take over the management of the festival from the town. Currently, a committee of community volunteers appointed by Council is tasked with helping to organize the festival under the guidance and administration of the Manager Recreation Programs & Events.

However the town says that although there was some interest in the operations of the licensed tent area, the commitment to assume the responsibility for the overall operation of the Festival was lacking.

In addition, the local community organization that has provided the services of the Festival’s licensed tent informed the town that 2017 would be their last festival.

To keep the festival tradition alive in 2018, town Administration is recommending that council approve the festival managed by the Parks and Recreation Department as a program similar to other community events operated by the Department such as Christmas in Tecumseh.

This move would eliminate the requirement for a formal committee structure and would reduce administrative labour as a result of eliminating committee meetings with formal agendas and minutes.

The festival would also be reduced to three days from four, eliminating Thursday. Some Thursday programming would move to the other remaining days.

The festival would continue to include a midway carnival, parade, pageant, vendors and family-friendly entertainment, but the festival would close earlier on Friday and Saturday at 10pm.

The festival would also not include a licensed tent area. Administration states that other local municipally organized events and festivals have begun to eliminate the serving of alcohol at family-friendly events, and they have indicated that the elimination of this particular service has had no negative impact on the overall attendance/success of the event.

Following the 2018 Festival as proposed above, Administration will prepare a report for Council’s consideration on the overall operations of the festival with recommendations for future years.

Town Council will make a decision on the festival future at their meeting on October 24th.