By Craig Westcott/March 10, 2022
The organizers of the Mount Pearl Frosty festival still had to lay out money for entertainers and other costs even though the annual winter extravaganza didn't go ahead this year.
But Mount Pearl city councillors say that was necessary still worth it.
"The Frosty Festival was all ready to go this year – everything was ready to start and Covid hit, the festival was cancelled due to the outbreak of Covid," said councillor Bill Antle, who chairs the community development committee. "But many, many of the events were already planned and scheduled with advertising circulation and many, many commitments were already made that they couldn't back out of. We had some entertainment that was also booked and deposits were paid, and they couldn't really get out of that."
Antle said the Frosty festival organizers are working with the entertainers to see if they can use those payouts to secure their bookings for next year. "And the Frosty board, even though we didn't have a carnival this year, they still had costs regardless of whether the festival went ahead or not," he added.
Antle offered the remarks as a prelude to making a motion to pay the festival committee the first installment of its annual operating grant, this one in the amount of $17,500. Councillor Chelsea Lane seconded the motion.
"That was a good explanation," Mayor Dave Aker told Antle. "We didn't have a festival this year but sometimes some of the funding has to be laid out beforehand and a lot of this will be salvaged when they do finally celebrate number 40."
Councillor Mark Rice agreed.
"A lot of these groups have to be booked a year in advance," Rice noted. "And we always provide the best possible entertainment and do what we can for Frosty Festival, because it's very important to book groups out in advance. If we can see a time maybe sometime this summer to have some of those musicians and activities take place, I'd love to see that happen. I am sure we're going to have much discussion going forward on this, but I certainly put my support behind giving this (installment) payment out."
Deputy Mayor Nicole Kieley echoed Rice's sentiment.
"I want to just honour and commend the significant number of volunteers who are attached to this organization," Kieley said. "Predominantly the large scale events that we see are being done by a tremendous component of community volunteers. I know over the past two years it's been an exceptionally difficult time for the Frosty committee, for community organizations, for arts and culture in our province, directly related to the impacts of Covid."
Kieley said she fully supports whatever the City can give to the Frosty festival committee to ensure that next year it is able to keep going.
"We know it's not easy making decisions moving forward, working in the environment of Covid during these times, trying to navigate from one month to the next whether we can have a large event," Kieley added. "This is no easy endeavour. I'm hopeful that moving forward in the next year we're going to see Frosty again, and we're going to see some of that spirit and work, and I know that a lot of the work the volunteers wanted to do this year will come back."
