Community Festival Needs Its Space

The Los Alamitos Area Chamber of Commerce is looking for an empty parking lot, or an unoccupied parade ground, a vacant lot maybe, any place--really--to hold a community festival.

Chamber officials had proposed to hold a Fourth of July community festival at Laurel Park and the adjoining Los Alamitos Elementary School grounds but were turned down by city and school district officials.

“It’s a bit of a disappointment,” said Connie Pedenko, CEO of the chamber.

The chamber was hoping to raise $10,000 from the event, Pedenko said, to pay for various business development programs, scholarships and travel expenses to send representatives to the state Capitol. “It’s not a lot of money,” she said, “but it would be enough to let us do things.”

A smaller event in April on the grounds of the Orange County High School of the Arts raised a few thousand dollars for the organization. “But it wasn’t fulfilling the need,” Pedenko said. “We want to build a community festival where the nonprofit organizations and the businesses of the community can come together to raise awareness.”

After the chamber’s annual installation of new board officers on Friday, Pedenko said the new group will sit down to brainstorm a way to get the festival on the ground.

Pedenko knows there are few locations for such an event in Los Alamitos and said that the chamber will pursue Laurel Park again next year.

City Council members did not disapprove of the festival itself but objected to plans to have exclusive use of most of Laurel Park for seven days, including a holiday weekend.

David Dugan, chamber board chairman, told the council they needed the full week for the setup and tear-down of about 15 carnival rides that would be part of the festival.

Dugan said they had looked at using the Armed Forces Reserve Center and Los Alamitos Race Course for the event, but found they could use neither.

Base officials were concerned about security over such a length of time and the $5,000 fee to use the race track was far beyond the chamber’s budget, Dugan said.

City officials had met to work out a compromise with chamber officials, but that also fell through because the school district plans to reseed the grassy area which would have been used by the festival. School officials feared that the grass wouldn’t be grown in by the time school starts again next fall.

“It’s a circular issue,” said City Manager Robert Dominguez. “I don’t know what private or public agency would be able to give them that much land for that length of time.”

Dominguez said the city is supportive of the chamber. He and Councilwoman Marilynn M. Poe will be attending the chamber’s Friday installation event.

If the chamber is willing to schedule a shorter event on a non-holiday weekend and use fewer carnival rides, Dominguez said the city would likely support the festival.

“We’re looking for ideas,” Pedenko said. “We do have our annual golf tournament, but with all the other chambers [doing similar events] there just isn’t enough to support our programs.”

“Our businesses [in Los Alamitos] are very supportive of the chamber,” she said. “But we cannot keep putting our hands out to our small-business community.”

Chris Ceballos can be reached at (714) 966-7440.