By Dan Spalding
News New Warsaw
WARSAW — A downtown Warsaw business owner who has been heavily invested in downtown activities is speaking out against a $30,000 study that will look more closely at the idea of a festival street.
Attorney Travis McConnell conveyed his concerns in a letter to the editor to the Times-Union. The letter, titled “Yet Another Study, can be read here.
“We’ve had festivals in Warsaw for over 100 years,” McConnell said. “I don’t think we need to pay to study how to have festivals.”
McConnell said he’d rather see money used for less expensive improvements, such as the installation of permanent tie-downs needed to support large festival tents.
Construction of a festival street is one of many pitched by a consultant who assembled a collection of ideas that would be part of a cultural arts district aimed at attracting more people into the downtown business district.
Renovation of a portion of a roadway for a festival street (Officials have mentioneed part of North Buffalo Street but no decision has beeen made) would turn it into a large flat surface void of curbs to accommodate festival events that are normally held along part of Center and Buffalo streets near the Kosciusko County Courthouse and would be an alternative to having to close off streets for each festival.
If there is community support for cultural improvements, then we already have the local voices, plans, and momentum to act without paying an outside firm, McConnell wrote.
“And if there isn’t community support for a festival street, then we certainly shouldn’t spend $30,000 on a consultant for it either,” he wrote.
Earlier this month, the Warsaw Redevelopment Commission approved a request to spend $30 on a study of the issue.
Top issues involve the location cost.
McConnell conceded that a study might be necessary to open the door for grant money to help fund the project, if approved.
He said he thinks a better understanding of public sentiment on the issue is important and that determining that level of support should happen before spending $30,000.
The topic of some kind of improved festival space has been touched on in at least one report and at least one public conversation hosted by Main Street Warsaw.
Officials with Main Street Warsaw and the Kosciusko Chamber of Commerce have said they plan to provide more details about the festival street concept soon.
