Simi Needs Someone to Reign on Parade

The Simi Valley Days festival starts this weekend, and officials admit they are a little concerned about one missing ingredient in the annual celebration.

Nobody seems to be jumping at the chance to serve as grand marshal of the festival parade.

So far the city has been turned down by actress Sally Struthers, comedian Tim Conway and a bunch of Los Angeles radio disc jockeys.

Television weatherman Fritz Coleman also has declined the opportunity.

With the parade scheduled Sept. 22, near the end of the festival, there’s a touch of desperation to the comments of some festival officials.

“Right now we’ll take anybody,” said Andy Macek, the festival chairman.

But Macek and other organizers said they still firmly believe that things will work out in time.

Festival officials are now talking to actor Claude Akins and another Los Angeles television weatherman, Christopher Nance, about heading the parade.

It’s not that the celebrities approached so far have anything against Simi Valley, officials stressed Monday.

Macek said they were all either too busy or would be on vacation during the parade.

With time running out, Macek was definitely on the pessimistic side of the festival spectrum Monday in speculating that the city would be able to land a genuine celebrity as grand marshal.

“We may end up having to put a mask on somebody,” he said.

Sherida Simmons, who is coordinating the parade, was more optimistic.

“I’m not concerned about it,” Simmons said. “I believe we’ll have someone.”

Simmons said there was a similar problem last year, but she wound up getting actor Jan Michael Vincent to serve as honorary host of the parade about a week before the event.

“This is not unusual,” she said, declining to discuss what she will do if she fails to find a grand marshal. Asked about the possibility of the mayor or some other city official sitting in, Simmons said the entire Simi Valley City Council is already participating.

She would not say whether she was considering asking comedian Bob Hope, who has figured big in Simi Valley politics in recent weeks because of his efforts to have the city annex his proposed Jordan Ranch housing development. “We haven’t ruled anybody out,” she said.

The parade, which will feature high school marching bands and floats, has drawn about 20,000 to 30,000 people from throughout Ventura and Los Angeles counties in previous years.

This year’s festival--to include a carnival, a rodeo, a chili cook-off and a tractor-trailer pulling contest--will be held on a 70-acre site at Madera Road and Los Angeles Avenue.

The sixth annual festival will start Saturday and end Sept. 23. A related golf tournament is scheduled Sept. 28 at the Simi Hills Golf Course.

Festival officials said this year’s theme, “Community in Harmony,” reflects on the work and effort put into this year’s event by various community clubs and organizations.

Macek described the festival as a “miniature version of the Ventura County Fair,” adding that Simi Valley Days has traditionally drawn about 80,000 people.

In addition to the immediate problem of finding a grand marshal for this year’s parade, Macek said festival officials are also working on a long-range project concerning the festival’s future.

Officials are searching for a permanent site for the Simi Valley Days festival. The current site is expected to be developed in the near future.

Macek said an ad hoc committee is concentrating on land behind a drive-in theater at Tierra Rejada and Madera roads.