Future Cityfolk Festivals, as we know them, could be in jeopardy

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By Ron Rollins, Staff Writer 7:18 PM Thursday, July 2, 2009

This afternoon, lots of you will head downtown for the final concerts in this year’s Cityfolk Festival, while others will have already spent time over the weekend expanding your musical horizons with bands such as Son del Caribe, Afromotive and Feufollet — a diverse, eclectic lineup perfectly in keeping with the festival’s open-minded tradition.

But keep this in mind, too: Just because there has been a Cityfolk Festival for many years, doesn’t mean there will always one.

And if there is, there’s no guarantee that it’ll be free.

The times, they are a-hardenin’. And as noted in this space in recent weeks, that fact is hitting local arts groups so hard that even an event like the Cityfolk Festival — a summertime institution enjoyed by hundreds of thousands of people — is not immune from the pressure.

“The timing, for us, couldn’t have been worse,” Cityfolk’s executive director, John Harris, said of the nation’s economic meltdown. “It was already the case that several of our biggest corporate sponsorships were up after the 2008 festival. We weren’t concerned, because we had several other big corporations who were ready to fill their places. And then it all hit the fan....”

About 60 percent of the $375,000 it takes to put on the three-day festival comes from corporate sponsorship, Harris said, and “we lost over half of that.” Companies had to renege on pledges made in better times.

Cityfolk started scrambling. They got the money together by finding new sponsors, or getting the ones they had left to give more. NewPage was one that raised its donation; other sponsors can be found at cityfolk.org.

“It’s not all gloom and doom,” Harris said. “We have some really great corporate supporters.

“But while there are some really great corporate citizens in Dayton, the world has changed. Many corporations don’t necessarily have the allegiance to Dayton that they used to, and this is how it manifests itself. Many companies don’t feel obligated, or that it’s in their best interest, to be really strong members of the community like many were.

“And here, I’m talking about big companies. Our success has been with reaching out to small and medium-size companies, but it obviously takes a lot of time to get lots of $5,000 contributions instead of one big $50,000 contribution.”

And since he, like most arts-group CEOs, already spends more than 80 percent of his time fundraising — “true in the best of times,” he says — the problem emerges.

So, what does the money go for? Mostly for artists’ fees and infrastructure — the staging, tents, lighting and such that undergird the festival. The city of Dayton and Five Rivers MetroParks, as partners, provide the park, security, electricity and such for free.

Since the festival is a fundraiser for Cityfolk’s year-round programs of Celtic, jazz, bluegrass and world music — shows it organizes with a staff of five and an operating budget of about $1 million — that’s a big help. Harris said that for the most part, people shouldn’t have noticed any big differences in this year’s festival due to the economy, since the scrambling worked. “We’ve managed our finances well enough that we’re on pretty solid ground,” Harris said, “and we’ll be able to withstand this once. But not twice.”

Meaning what, exactly?

“Going into next year, we have basically three options — quickly find a new, major sponsor; charge admission; or cancel the festival.

“We have some work to do to make it come back. It’s our goal and ultimate desire, but it’s not a gimme like it has been. We’re going to have to work to make it happen.”

As fans know, the festival has been free all the way back to its 1996 beginnings as the National Folk Festival. Others will recall that tight finances forced the festival to skip a year in 2002. Harris admits that the logistics of charging admission for the sprawling, multistage event are daunting, and would be tough to work out.

But something has to change if the festival is going to survive. “If people believe in what we’re doing, we’d love it if they’d write us a check,” Harris said, laughing but not joking.

“Just because it’s free to the public doesn’t mean it’s free.”

Contact this reporter at (937) 225-2165 or rrollins@DaytonDaily News.com.

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