Salisbury Festival canceled, alternatives considered

The 32-year-old Salisbury Festival has seen its final year, according to the Salisbury Area Chamber of Commerce.

Chamber spokeswoman Sophia Smecker said the event will not return in 2015 and a committee is currently exploring options for later in the year to replace the annual event.

"It's just time to retire it and look at some other events," Smecker said. "We have a steering committee and we'd been working on the event and looking at the potential of other events."

An annual event in the downtown area hosted by the Chamber, the festival was a family-friendly happening toward the end of April with various live musical acts and carnival rides.

Smecker would not give more specifics about the reasoning behind its cancellation Monday, but the Chamber said in a statement it will work with the city in creating new events to reflect efforts to revitalize the downtown area.

"As downtown Salisbury continues to grow and evolve, it will be the Chamber's mission to aid in this growth by producing new and fresh events that will be relevant to our vibrant and ever changing community," the statement read.

The Chamber has retooled its schedule of annual events a few times this year. In August last year, the Chamber began exploring picking up the Delmarva Chicken Festival after it was announced it would no longer be held.

Additionally, the city is considering creating monthly "First Saturday" music festivals, meant to compliment their "Third Friday" downtown arts festivals.

Mayor Jim Ireton said officials with the Chamber have begun meeting with the city to possibly create a new event for the city in October, proposed to take place by the east prong of the Wicomico River. The tentative title is "Fire on the Water."

"It's a major surprise, but not something we can't get over," Ireton said in a statement. "I think most of our citizens are going to be scratching their heads, wondering why this tradition has to come to such an unceremonious end."

He said the idea of moving the event away from Main Street does come at a convenient time for the downtown section of Salisbury, which will see major construction in the upcoming months.

"Main Street is going to be pretty cut up in the next couple of months," Ireton said. "We've got $8 million worth of work coming to Main Street."

Wicomico County councilman Marc Kilmer said he'll miss going to the event with his two young children.

"The kids enjoyed the rides there. They were just old enough to start enjoying (the festival)," Kilmer said.

He said he'll miss the event as a venue as a way for non-profit organizations and local legislators to get their name out into the community, saying local Republican groups "always had stuff there during election years."

"It was always something that part of our schedule," Kilmer added.

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