A recent Strawberry Festival at the Los Gatos Civic Center featured a variety of entertainment.
By Sarah Lombardo
Come next June, it'll be strawberry-picking time in Saratoga. The 37th annual Eastfield Ming Quong Strawberry Festival is scheduled to be moved to West Valley College in 1997.
According to Tom Green, West Valley College dean of budget and planning, discussions between the college and EMQ have resulted in an agreement to bring the festival to the campus June 7-8, 1997. All that's left, Green said, is for EMQ officials to sign on the dotted line.
"They need to fill out a contract and make a deposit," Green said. "The event is scheduled on our calendar. There's just the formality of the paperwork and the deposit."
Green said that in lieu of a rental fee, EMQ has agreed to make a $3,000 donation to the college's Emergency Book Fund for needy students.
For the past few years, the strawberry soiree has been held at the Los Gatos Civic Center, but Tanya Lonac, of EMQ's Office of Business and Development, said the festival has simply grown too big for the site.
"We've really kind of outgrown the civic center," said Lonac.
According to Lonac, EMQ officials decided to move the festival to provide more parking for attendees and to allow the festival to grow.
"The Strawberry Festival is our biggest fundraiser. It's grown and kind of evolved," Lonac said. "This is not the first time that we've moved. It's just part of the process."
In addition to better parking and expansion opportunities, the space-rental cost for the festival is slightly lower at West Valley. "But that wasn't a factor," said Lonac. "It was mostly for parking and more room."
The Strawberry Festival, which Lonac said attracts 70,000 people each year and can raise as much as $70,000, has moved three times. The first festival was held in 1960 in the back yard of volunteer Ida Tupper's home in Santa Cruz, and was designed to raise allowance money for the children of Ming Quong. In 1961, it was moved to the Ming Quong campus in Los Gatos on Loma Alta Avenue with the help of the Ming Quong Women's Auxiliary. The Strawberry Festival became a two-day event in 1968, and in 1980 the festival was moved to the Los Gatos Civic Center to give it more room.
EMQ President and CEO Jerry Doyle said this next move should not be taken as anything personal against the town of Los Gatos.
"We made the decision because of space, really," Doyle said. "It was a very difficult decision, actually, because of our affection for the town of Los Gatos."
Doyle said the decision was made even more difficult by the fact that EMQ has always received a great deal of support from Los Gatos residents and town officials.
EMQ volunteer Harry Murray, chairman of the Strawberry Festival Committee and vice president and manager of Alain Pinel Realtors in Saratoga, also said the decision did not come easily.
"It was gut-wrenching to make the decision to move out of Los Gatos," he said.
Murray said the committee had to decide what was best for the future of the festival as well as what would be best for the children of EMQ. Murray said he thought the festival might lose some of the small-town feeling that came with holding the bash in Los Gatos, compared with the larger WVC campus.
"The quaintness of it, the feeling that Los Gatos brings, might be lost," he said, "but on the other hand, our goal is to make more people aware."
Murray said what future festivals might lack in small-town appeal, they will make up for in convienence and overall enjoyment. Murray even said moving the festival might encourage more Los Gatos and Saratoga residents to attend since they won't have to battle for parking or shade in the summer heat.
Although the festival's new location will provide more room, Doyle said that festival-goers should not expect any increase in its size, at least not this year.
"We're going to concentrate on making it a smooth transition this year," Doyle said.
News of the festival's move to Saratoga has city officials buzzing. "I think it's great," Saratoga City Manager Harry Peacock said.
Councilman Jim Shaw also expressed excitement. "My first take is this is a good idea. Available parking at West Valley makes the location ideal for affairs of this kind," Shaw said.
Shaw said he recognized that some neighbors may be concerned about the idea, but that the festival should not be too disruptive because it is on a weekend.
Eastfield Ming Quong is located in Campbell and Los Gatos. It reaches more than 3,000 children and their families each year through residential treatment, school-based day treatment, 24-hour crisis intervention and chemical dependency programs.
This article appeared in the Saratoga News, December 18, 1996.
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