Sutherland says event needs to stay with current schedule
A county board vote to approve a liquor license request for a sixth season of Bands on the Bricks stirred debate Monday, not with the event itself but rather with scheduling a downtown concert on the same night live music is on the agenda at the Hamilton County Fair.
Sara Sutherland, a member of the Aurora Chamber of Commerce board who introduced the idea and helped launch the event six years ago, explained that the liquor license request is an effort to allow Bands on the Bricks guests to enjoy a beverage on county property under the shade of the trees, rather than having to remain inside the ropes on the street where beer is sold on city property. County board chairman John Thomas said he is in favor of Bands on the Bricks, just not on the Friday night of the fair.
“We’re totally in support of six weeks of concerts out here, just not on the night of the fair,” Thomas told Sutherland. “I think that’s a totally reasonable request.”
Thomas then made a motion to deny the Chamber’s request to allow alcoholic beverages to be consumed on county property all six Friday nights, running from July 7 through Aug. 11. That motion failed on a 3-2 vote, with Thomas and Francis McDonald the only yes votes. Commissioners Nancy Salmon, Nicole SaBell and Rich Nelson opposed the motion, though SaBell and Nelson each paused at length before voting, saying they really struggled with this issue.
“It’s changing, to the point where that is one of the bigger events at the fair and they are really trying to draw a crowd on Friday night,” SaBell explained. “That’s what I’m struggling with. If we could only come to a compromise.”
After Sutherland and Thomas explained their thoughts more in detail, it became clear that compromising on the July 28 Friday of the fair was not going to happen.
“When we started this in May of 2018 we had a group that helped us in a way to launch it to be as successful as possible,” Sutherland recalled. “You’re going to overlap dates with something going on in the community regardless of what you try to pick. We’re a free country and people get an opportunity to go where they want to go and spend the time where they want to spend it and there is no doubt that people who want to be at the fair on Friday night are out there. The ones who are still with us that evening are not people that are going to end up at the fair that night, so what it’s doing is it’s giving a greater population of our people something to do in town without feeling like they have to leave.”
“You’re missing the point,” Thomas responded. “I think we all think this is a great thing. We’re in favor of it. What I’m not in favor of is it conflicting with the county fair.”
Asked again why she was not willing to skip a week during the fair and continue the downtown series later into August, Sutherland said she is following a summer concert series model she believes is part of the reason for the event’s success.
“I firmly believe that the reason this event has been successful is because we’ve followed the model and I will not change the model as long as I’m in charge,” she said.
“When we got the map for how to execute an event like this to be its most successful in our community, the blueprint that was given was that the ideal number was six weeks and part of that is they were to be consecutive in order for people to know (the schedule),” she explained. “The second you would take a week off people would forget about the last two, so you’re literally asking me to cut the season in half when I have people begging me to actually go longer.”
On that point, Thomas said he disagreed, saying people who attended Bands on the Bricks before the fair would return weeks after the fair as well.
Sutherland then shared that she had done some research on the question of the concurrent night, which this year falls on July 28.
“I polled them,” she said, referring to an informal survey she conducted on Friday night of the county fair. “I walked around the crowd and I asked them,” reporting that many people said they had no plans to attend the county fair, even if Bands on the Bricks wasn’t scheduled that night.
Sutherland noted that the event itself is a go for 2023, as the Chamber already has approval from the Aurora City Council to block off the street and sell liquor for those six consecutive Friday nights.
“That very first summer we did only host the designated area on the bricks of the streets because we knew the city could be slightly more cooperative, honestly, than the county commission, so this has proven to play out exactly how we anticipated,” she said. “So that first year we only went to the City of Aurora and we got the concert up and running … What we noticed was a lot of people enjoyed the shade of the trees, so a lot of the crowd did end up on the courthouse lawn around the bandstand and there was a separation that was happening with their families.”
That, she said, is the reason for the request to the county to allow beverages to be consumed on the courthouse lawn. With the 3-2 vote, however, that request was denied, as it was last year.
“I understand where you are coming from, but I’m also responsible for creating the most successful event as we can,” she said. “The city is in full support for this event for all six weeks. We can just have it on the street like we did the first year, no problem, but I think that’s going to look poorly on you versus coming back on us in any way.”
Thomas said he understood Sutherland’s point, but agreed to disagree.
“I appreciate your point of view,” he concluded. “I just wish you weren’t having it on Friday night of the fair.”
With no compromise on the table, Commissioner Nancy Salmon then moved to approve the liquor license request for Bands on the Bricks on all nights except for July 28, which Thomas seconded. That motion passed by a 4-1 vote, with McDonald voting no.