All City and Advertising and Promotion commissioners except James DeVito met June 10 to discuss revenue losses and Event Planning in collaboration with Phase II of the Gov. Asa Hutchinson’s pandemic directives.
Phase II will permit restaurants, bars, and clubs to seat up to 66 percent capacity and maintain six feet between adjacent tables beginning June 15.
This directive directly affects the CAPC and its tax collectors by opening a previously cauterized income source from 33 to 66 percent. Commissioner Bobbie Foster said she has temporarily closed her restaurant, Mud Street Café, during Phase I but plans to reopen during Phase II arguing that 33 percent was not enough to earn a profit.
“I can’t just open and not make money,” she said. Discussing the revenue projections for the year Finance Director Rick Bright said, “I’m not concerned at where we are at, my concern is the wintertime.” He said that many tourist-based businesses depend on healthy summer and fall earnings to span the gap of a slow winter.
Commissioner Jeff Carter said he would like to focus promotional spending on events after Sept. 1 through the end of the year, and for Bright to consider cutting another $150,000 from the annual budget. Carter believes those businesses that are open are bringing in revenue but also indicated that he wants to respect Mayor Butch Berry’s directive which currently freezes all public event licenses through Sept. 1.
This freeze has been scrutinized by some business owners/managers and event organizers who view the lack of events such as parades, outdoor music and diversity weekends as lost revenue opportunities and unnecessary local sanctioning.
The mayor’s halt on event licenses negates opportunity for event planners to follow the events section of Phase II of the Arkansas Governor Directive requiring advance approval from the State Secretary of Health if they want to plan an outdoor gathering of more than 100 people.
Jay Wilks, director of Out in Eureka and organizer of Diversity Weekends, has openly thanked the mayor, council, and the CAPC for upholding public health directives.
Wilks agrees that events are one reason why tourists come to Eureka Springs, but he has asked everyone to support the safety initiatives, “I ask that you, for the safety of all, please support Mayor Berry and the many locals who want us to ease back into life, but in a safe manner.”
Tracy Johnson, the CAPC events planner, indicated her frustration with the safety sanctions and is anxious to start booking events in Eureka for the summer. Johnson voiced her opinion on social media stating, “So… if “peaceful protests” are allowed… why can’t we just have an outdoor concert and call it an organized protest against outdoor music?”
CAPC Chair Carol Wright asked Johnson about her comment. Johnson’s reply included, “No I’ll tell ya that’s really just somebody looking at my private personal Facebook page and seeing a statistic I posted about California’s new guideline – completely taking it out of context.”
Wilks stated Johnson’s social media comment was “appalling and disrespectful as a CAPC representative.” Wright directly asked Johnson if she was working on organizing a protest.
“A protest? Good God!” Johnson said.
Ironically just before Wright asked Johnson about her social media comment Johnson had just quazi-scolded the commission saying, “The words that we speak, and people of positions speak, they have incredible power over everyone else, so instead of saying something like ‘we are cancelling all events until September’ what I would really like us to do so that we don’t damage ourselves… saying it’s too early for us at this time to determine if this event will or will not happen.”
Commissioner Terry McClung indicated he would like to see the mayor loosen his hold on the license restriction but, “Until Butch is willing to, you know, open it up where we can do things… we’re in a holding pattern until we get that.” McClung said he is in support of promoting summer events and notified the CAPC of the presentation planned for council by a group of business managers/owners in town to plan “Six Weeks of Summer” events.
“I think it will be a good opportunity,” McClung, who said he would consider challenging the mayor to lift the event restrictions especially for fireworks.
Interim-Director Gina Rambo said that the group giving the presentation would like to hold a variety of events including weekly fireworks. “Ideally they would like to get enough funding for six weeks – every Friday night,” Rambo said before adding that the mayor was all for it.
Rambo stated there would be no CAPC funding support to this group, but she and Johnson are involved in the group’s efforts to organize revitalization events for the summer tourist campaign. Johnson said that other cities are implementing festivals in the middle of June.
Wilks urged for public health and safety support saying, “At this time, the proposed event of Six Weeks of Summer should be placed on the back burner until next year. The mayor’s office, city council and the CAPC must all work together as one team, without outside influences or intimidation, in order for Eureka Springs and our businesses to climb out of this deep hole and into a new light of 2021.”
Johnson said she believes Eureka Springs is through the hard part of the pandemic and should now begin to launch a revitalization program with activities to redevelop tourism as soon as possible. “Things are looking great and we are moving forward,” she said.
The next CAPC meeting is scheduled for Wednesday, June 24 at 6 p.m. in the Aud.