In 2009, it adopted a policy that the common can’t be used for money-making purposes. “We don’t allow profit-making on the Town Common,” said Robert Judge, chair of the Selectboard.
Anne M. Messier, of Holyoke, shops for childrens shirts on the South Hadley Town Common during the Columbus Day Fair in this file photo. SOUTH HADLEY – For the past three years the Selectboard has come up against a sticky wicket concerning the Town Common.
In 2009, it adopted a policy that the common can’t be used for money-making purposes. “We don’t allow profit-making on the Town Common,” said Robert Judge, chair of the Selectboard.
Here’s the problem. One of the most beloved traditions of the town, the Columbus Day Fair, relies increasingly on for-profit vendors – usually small-scale, often one-person, businesses.
The fair is the annual fund-raiser for United Methodist Church in South Hadley. The church charges for-profit vendors more than what it charges nonprofits like the Historical Society or the Boy Scouts. So it’s to the church’s benefit to include as many for-profit vendors as qualify.
“Some people,” said Judge, “say the private businesses are squeezing out the nonprofits.”
Carol Brunelle of United Methodist, who organizes the fair, said the event would not exist if not for private vendors.
“We have to have for-profit vendors, or we can’t have the fair,” said Brunelle.
Not that United Methodist makes a big profit. Though it’s famous for its apple dumplings, proceeds from its booth and from the rental of nonprofit booths would not cover the cost of putting on the fair.
It’s the for-profit vendors who pay for advertising, Department of Public Works fees, portable rest rooms, off-duty police officers and all the other things the fair requires, said Brunelle.
She said her team of about a dozen volunteers begins planning in winter.
So far her request to hold this fall’s fair has gone unanswered by the Selectboard, and Brunelle said it’s hindering her operation.
“We have to send applications to hundreds of vendors,” she said, “and they are seeking other places to sell on Columbus Day.”
Brunelle said the fair helps the whole town. Piggy-backing on its success, dozens of tag sales spring up along Route 116 on Columbus Day, and churches near the common sell books and baked goods.
Besides, said Brunelle, what money the church does make goes back into the community, in the form of giving to the Food Pantry, adopting a low-income family at Christmas, and other missions.
Judge is asking residents what they think about the situation. The Selectboard has mixed feelings. As vice-chair Francis DeToma has said, “Perhaps the policy ought to reflect certain realities about the cost of mounting the Columbus Day Fair.”
The board is considering whether the policy on the Town Common should be changed, or whether would that set a precedent that would commercialize the common.
South Hadley residents are invited to send comments to Selectboard@SouthHadley.org or to go to http://southhadley.localocracy.com/issues.
The Farmers’ Market on the Town Common is governed by special rules, namely state laws passed to encourage the spread of farmers’ markets.