Simi Valley Days Kicks Off With Barn Dance : Festivals: Eight-day celebration ‘brings out the Western flavor.’ It opens today with a chili cook-off and car and horse shows.

Harking back to Simi Valley’s small-town, Western heritage, the annual Simi Valley Days country celebration kicks off today with a chili cook-off, horse show and barn dance.

Simi Valley Days, which runs intermittently for the next eight days, includes a series of family-oriented events that will be capped off with a parade, carnival and rodeo.

Most of the festivities, including today’s chili feast and car show, are put on by local charities and service clubs.

In past years, organizers have credited Simi Valley Days for raising as much as $70,000 for local charities.

They predict the event will continue to grow, with more than 30,000 people expected to attend this year’s carnival, which will run today through Sept. 17. Up to 5,000 are expected at this weekend’s activities, event organizers said.

“This is a chance for the whole city to come together, just as it did when it was a much smaller town,” said organizer JoAnn Macek. “It really brings out the Western flavor that still exists here.”

That flavor is particularly abundant at the annual barn dance, a high-kicking, spirited country-Western musical event that for 13 years has raised money for the city’s historical society, Macek said.

The dance will be held at 6 p.m. at the restored barn at the Strathearn Historical Park, and includes two country-Western bands, a barbecue and a horse-shoe competition.

As with the dance, most of the Simi Valley Days events find their roots in Pioneer Days, a short-lived but long-remembered town festival organized by the area’s founding families in 1932.

In 1962, the local Jaycees revived the event, setting up the parade, carnival and rodeo. And in 1985, the festival was moved from the spring to the fall and took its current form, occasionally adding new events, such as the car show, craft fair and bingo game.

This will be the third year that an independent nonprofit group will head up Simi Valley Days.

“The closer we get to the start, the crazier things get, but I have the sense that this year will be a big success,” Macek said.

Ivan Delman, who is overseeing the auto show that will coincide with today’s chili cook-off, said he thinks this year’s turnout will be higher than ever.

“Just from the interest in the auto show, I can tell things are going to go well,” he said. “We’ve got every kind of car and motorcycle imaginable coming out this year.”

“Simi Valley Days is the kind of thing that the whole family enjoys,” Delman said. “It makes adults feel like kids again.”

While nearly all of the events charge admission as part of the the fund-raising effort, organizers of the chili cook-off said they will waive their $2 fee for anyone who comes with five gallons of chili.

“We expect a lot of people will show up the day of the event with their chili and participate,” said Michelle Foster, a chili cook-off organizer. “It’s not just for the so-called professionals.”