City Stages is this weekend in Birmingham, and the Montgomery Advertiser is out today with the losses for this year's May 23-24 Jubilee CityFest ($27,000). Organizers say rain did in the 2009 Capitol City event (though I think they make a mistake in not having it over three days instead of two...it helps your odds against the rain).
City Stages keeps losing money..and The Birmingham News' Joey Kennedy says it is time to pull the plug after 20 years. Imagine how much these events would lose if not for all of the volunteers who run them! I know at least two of the businesses that operate 365 days a year in downtown Montgomery that were disappointed with turnout this year.
Sure it's a nice thing to see people coming to the downtowns after dark (such a novelty!) but at what expense? Maybe if would be a better idea to hold a series of smaller events, and put an effort in to making the downtowns places where people want to go without a huge musical festival.
[UPDATE: check out Wade Kwon's blog for an excellent examination of the City Stages financial assumptions that led the city council to "contribute" another $250,000 to this year's event. You know what Mark Twain wrote about figures...there are "lies, damned lies, and statistics"...and the same is often true with mathematical projections. Another example is a recent TV story that including a politician bragging that some new jobs would be multiplied by even more jobs added in "second tier" positions. Yet you never hear them saying the loss of jobs will be even worse because of the same factors.]
I've been to City Stages... when it was in it's prime. Now, I don't think I'd go if I was given free tix and an expense account... like Joey Kennedy.
ReplyDeleteIt's time for Bummin'ham to FACE THE MUSIC (pun most definitely intended)!
Those nincompoopers (nincompooper scoopers?) CAN'T find their way out of that wet paper bag with a rope tied to their hands, instructions, a flashlight and another person calling out step-by-step to 'em!
Give it up... and abandon Bummin' ham.
Criminal elements - in City Hall, and throughout the Tragic City.
The ONLY city in AL that taxes the working man and woman.
They're (city - and prolly' county officials) are incompetent and corrupted... and that's about the best thing I can say for 'em.
It's strange how other Alabama music festivals - Huntsville's Big Spring Jam, BamaJam in Enterprise, Mobile's BayFest, W.C. Handy Music Festival in the Shoals (including nearby Bonnaroo in TN) - are EVERY ONE making money but the El Stupidos in The Tragic City can't!
Thanks for the link.
ReplyDeleteCity Stages has had more than enough chances to stand on its own financially. Yet it keeps failing, and the city keeps bailing it out. Sad all around.