Festival Moves From Soka to Ranch
The site of a weekend community festival has been moved from Soka University to Paramount Ranch after the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy allowed some of its adjacent land to be used as extra parking.
Calabasas Chamber of Commerce officials said Thursday that Paramount Ranch was their original choice for the two-day Pumpkin Festival, but that they were forced to move to Soka because that was the only place they could find enough parking for the Oct. 24-25 event.
The decision to hold the festival at Soka was criticized by some residents unhappy with the university’s plans to build a 4,000-student campus on land long coveted by the National Park Service.
But event organizer Alan Ungar said the criticism had little to do with the decision to hold the event at Paramount Ranch. “Our first choice was always Paramount Ranch,” he said.
Holding the festival at the ranch will require trucking in portable toilets and portable electrical generators, but those costs will be covered by the city, which is an event co-sponsor, Ungar said.
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