The Glens Falls Collaborative announced Wednesday Sept. 8, that its FitFest will be rescheduled for the spring. The date is yet to be determined. Collaborative president Robin Barkenhagen said that the popular Grandma’s Table event, scheduled for early October may have to be cancelled as well, but he would know more after a meeting of the group on Monday.
FitFest was scheduled for Saturday, Oct. 2, but enough vendors were scared off by the rise in COVID rates that the committee that plans event thought it best to pull back, the group said.
“It is with incredible sadness that we have to postpone another event. COVID has made an unfortunate return, and with numbers spiking, vendors are more reluctant to attend or send people to events,” said Robin Barkenhagen, the president of the group.
"They [the organizing committee] didn't want it to come off as ameraturish,” with too few vendors on site for a real festival, he said in an interview today.
FitFest has been an annual event in downtown Glens Falls highlighting the fitness, health and wellness businesses and related organizations in the area. It typically includes sample fitness classes, interactive demonstrations, vendor booths, children’s activities, and more, a press release said.
Amy Collins, the director of tourism and business development for Glens Falls said many of the vendors which would come to the FitFest event are also in the healthcare industry, so they may not have the people to spare for a festival.
“They are up to their eyeballs in what they do for a living,” she said.
Earlier this month, the Collaborative postponed its Wing Fest and Pet Fest events.
"It's too bad but it is understandable,” Barkenhagen said, adding as a reminder: "We are still in a pandemic.”
Since the start of September, the Warren County’s cases of COVID have risen from 4119 to 4286, a rise of 167 cases, or 18.5 new cases on average per day. 4,033 people have fully recovered. The latest cases are affecting unvaccinated people more heavily. Warren County Health Services said on Wednesday Sept. 8, that another person died of COVID-19. The delta variant of the disease is highly contagious.
“An individual in their 40s, who lived at home before becoming ill, died in a hospital. This person became ill late last week, had been healthy before contracting COVID-19 and had not gotten a COVID-19 vaccination,” the statement from the county says.
The trend has been upward in the last few weeks, Don Lehman wrote in an email today. He is the county's director of public affairs. However, hospitalizations have stabilized in the last week or so.
So far, the COVID news has not shut down the Collaborative’s Halloween event, Boo 2 You; the Adirondack Nationals car show this weekend; the Americade motorcycle rally in Lake George Sept. 21 to 25; or the Adirondack Hot Air Balloon Festival Sept. 23 to 26; nor has it shut down the related Balloon Festival Block Party in Glens Falls, Thursday Sept. 23.
Collins, who works with the nonprofit collaborative as part of her role at the city, said many events will feel different in 2021 than they did pre-pandemic, but the region has to figure out a way to keep these events going.
“We really have to provide a plan to go forward” safely, she said. She pointed to the success of the collaborative's Take a Bite this summer.
The city’s economy, especially small businesses, cannot afford another “PAUSE” she said, using the New York State acronym for the system of shelter and relief that was implemented last year at the height of the pandemic.
“We’re practicing social distancing. Most of our events are outdoors.” Collins said, “We need to go forward. The virus is not going anywhere.”
FoothillsBusinessDaily.com is the media sponsor of the Glens Falls Collaborative.