 |
|
|
|
|
WGBPA is quitting its Founder's Day event next month
WGNA, District 6 'trying to salvage' annual celebration
By Kate Carter
Willow Glen has seen its last Founder's Day celebration, according to Willow Glen Business and Professional Association officials.
The six-member association executive board, that has been sponsoring the event for more than 10 years, voted earlier this month, in a closed session, to cancel this year's event scheduled for Sept. 8, association vice president Chris Carris said.
Last week, it voted, again in closed session, to add the traditional Founder's Day parade to its other large street festival that takes place in June, Dancing on the Avenue, and to combine the events in the future, he said.
"Founder's Day will be one of those quaint things we had in the past," he said.
Association president Karen Naegeli said Carris was the group's spokesman for the issue and declined to comment.
The decades-old annual event marks the Sept. 8, 1927, founding of Willow Glen with live musicians, a parade and artisans booths along Lincoln Avenue between Coe and Minnesota avenues.
After last year's event, the business association voted to hold the celebration only on a Saturday and not as the traditionally weekend-long event. It also voted not to invite artisans to participate.
Carris said the reasons for canceling this Founder's Day were three-fold: the group does not have sufficient funds to cover the event's costs, it does not have enough volunteers to prepare for the event and a required Alcoholic Beverages Control class that must be taken by anyone serving alcohol at the event has limited the amount of available drink pourers.
He added that the business association is struggling to find active participants within its own membership or from members of the community. He said the association's recent efforts to solicit help from the Willow Glen Neighborhood Association and District 6 City Councilman Ken Yeager's office were insufficient.
"We want to have the event; there's no disagreement there," Carris said of all the groups. "But there weren't a lot of suggested ways or means. It wasn't enough."
Neighborhood association president John Gibbs said the association will work with the District 6 office to try to find some way to mark Founder's Day.
"Founder's Day means a lot of things to the Willow Glen community," he said. "Founder's Day is celebrated in the fall every year, and the community looks forward to that event. I don't think the community is going to let the business association decide this for them."
Yeager said he and his staff had been "trying to salvage" the event and possibly involve the neighborhood association, but there weren't many options so close to the date.
"We were trying to pass it on to someone else, but who else would it be?" he said. "Time is running out."
Yeager aide Denelle Fedor said the office is already looking at alternate possibilities for an event this year.
"We don't want to interfere with something the community decides to do," she said. "But we're still interested in looking into ways to acknowledge the day."
Fedor also mentioned the business association could begin now looking for event sponsors for next year.
"There's really a lot that could be done to make this a great event, if we work together," she said.
The business association has been plagued by money management problems in recent years. Earlier this year it initiated a San Jose Police Department investigation into possible embezzlement of its funds.
Former association president Bob Waligore has accused former business manager Demetri Rizos of taking more than $11,000 of business association funds. Detective James Ford of the police fraud unit said the investigation into Rizos has concentrated on documentation supplied by Waligore this spring but stalled when Rizos didn't return the detective's calls. Ford said he planned to submit the documentation to the district attorney's office this week. The district attorney's office will then decide whether or not to pursue the case, he said.
The business association is short about $7,000 to make the event happen, Carris said, and added that the amount doesn't reflect other expenses it has to cover. The association raises money at its festivals through alcohol, soda and water sales, but the amount it raised during the Dancing on the Avenue festival in June wasn't sufficient to cover its costs.
"I was getting ready to send out invitations for the parade six to eight weeks ago," Carris said. "It started to become apparent almost immediately after Dancing on the Avenue that we weren't going to be able to pull off the event correctly. We don't want to put something together that is disappointing to start with."
He said Founder's Day costs between $28,000 and $30,000. The association uses the proceeds from Dancing on the Avenue, which was $3,000 this year, he said. It has also received a grant for the past 10 years from San Jose's Department of Cultural Affairs. Because of the association's consistency in sponsoring the event, the grant has grown to $10,000 this year. By canceling the event, the association would have to reapply for the grant next year at the starting amount of $1,000, Carris said.
The association also relies on sponsorships to cover event costs, which is a particular challenge in September following the Dancing on the Avenue event, Carris said, and especially this year because of the slowing economy.
"Founder's Day has always been underfunded for sponsorship," he said. "In a poor economy, we haven't much hope. We don't have an infinite number of contacts."
The association has already garnered about $7,500 in sponsorship pledges for the event, Carris said. Funds from other sources only bring its available money to a little more than $20,000, he said.
In addition, the executive board was worried that the association would not recoup its costs from this year's event, as in the past it has only received between 7,000 and 8,000 visitors on a single day during the Founder's Day weekend, Carris said. The association lost money on last year's event and took five months to pay its event coordinator, Reed Zaro, the amount it owed, he said.
The association is also in the midst of paying $15,000 to trim 182 trees along Lincoln Avenue's business district, Carris said, and has had to halt the project to gather the rest of the money it needs to complete work.
In addition, he said, the association has seen a more than $10,000 drop in the money it receives from the city. The association uses money that businesses in the Lincoln Avenue Business Investment District (BID) pay to the city and that the city then reimburses to pay for projects and activities within the business district.
Carris said the reduced amount of BID funds could be due to the slowing economy and to businesses that are choosing not to pay their dues.
The business association will be vacating its office space at 1275 Lincoln Ave., suite 3A, at the end of the month, Carris said, to save the $900 per month rent. It has not yet located a new office location.
Carris acknowledged that the association has been struggling in general in recent years.
"I'm concerned that the business association, since 1999, we've not been a really effective organization," he said. "I feel that we did what we were supposed to do for Dancing on the Avenue with only our executive board. But we never had enough people."
The association's executive board has not appointed regular board members or held any regular meetings since it was installed in March. Carris said the executive board is operating with two fewer people than it needs and has only had interest from a handful of business owners to fill the 10 regular board positions.
Carris, a self-proclaimed Willow Glen history buff, said he feels bad about the end of Founder's Day, but believes, without it, the business association can better sponsor its other traditional community events: Dancing on the Avenue, trick-or-treating at Halloween and the Christmas tree lighting ceremony in December.
"I looked very much forward to doing the parade," Carris said. "I think it's a loss to the community. But I'm only one person. It takes a great deal of effort. In the long run, it will be better off, and we'll have better financial support for other events that we have."
|
|
|
|
Willow Glen, California Since 1992
