Sarnia's 15th annual Artwalk will receive a helping hand from the city.
City council decided Monday to provide up to $4,000 in relief assistance to the popular downtown summer event.
Newly elected board President Nathan Colquhoun told council most of the board members resigned after a storm wreaked havoc on the 2016 event.
Winds gusting at 45 km/h and horizontal rain dismantled at least two big tents and forced over 200 vendors to pack up their wares.
Colquhoun says a new group has formed in its wake -- with fresh energy and excitement.
"We did our best to automate everything," says Colquhoun. "We moved all registrations online. Set up recurring payments for First Friday and had board communication moved online as well."
But, he says the board inherited debt.
"With the news that Artwalk has to start paying road closure fees and fees to use city space, such as the parking lot, it really does make Artwalk unsustainable," says Colquhoun. "We operate on a thin budget and when 10% of the overall budget is going to fees that weren't there before, it puts us in a tight bind."
Councillor Brian White described the event as "incredibly valuable to our cultural identity as a city."
"I think that the thousands and thousands of volunteer hours that have been poured into this over the last decade plus, could not be measured in a simple grant request, but its contributions to our downtown has been invaluable in assisting in what has been a fairly grassroots level revitalization of our downtown," says White.
White says it's the least they could do as a city, which is collecting taxes from merchants downtown.
"To be honest, I think we should be closing the streets on a regular basis downtown and we should be encouraging people to volunteer or to invest in activities like this -- to create more of an attraction downtown," says White. "This to me is a no brainer."
With the grant, the fees will be reduced to $790, similar to events held within Sarnia's parks.
The funding will be paid from the city's major Events Assistance Fund, for the next three years, subject to annual review.
Over 20,000 people are expected to attend the two day event the first weekend in June.
