By CASEY NEILL
Falling numbers and date clashes leave festivals in doubt…
TWO longstanding Sandown Racecourse festivals could be leaving Greater Dandenong, taking tourist dollars and ratepayers’ money with them.
Clashes with cars and dark days of the past have left next year’s Chilean Latin American September Festival without a home.
About 50,000 people usually celebrate the Vietnamese New Year at the Springvale venue but the Vietnamese Tet Festival will next year leave after a decade – and take $12,000 from ratepayers with it.
Vietnamese Community in Australia (VCA) Victoria president Bon Nguyen said attendance had dwindled in the past five years.
“Maybe people from the other side of the city think it’s too far,” he said.
So the event will move to the Melbourne Showgrounds in an effort to attract more Vietnamese people from Sunshine, Footscray and Richmond.
“Once we engage the community we can move it back to Sandown and bring them with us,” Mr Nguyen said.
He said he didn’t expect the number of attendees from Greater Dandenong to drop.
“I know that they know the quality of the festival at Sandown,” he said.
“The majority of the people from Springvale will go to the showgrounds.
“We want to bring the festival back.
“We won’t stay gone forever.”
Greater Dandenong community services director Mark Doubleday confirmed that the council had endorsed a $12,000 sponsorship to the VCA to support next year’s TET Festival, despite its Melbourne venue.
“Council’s endorsed funding will remain in place for the 2016 event and the future location can be reviewed after the 2016 festival has concluded,” he said.
The Chilean Latin American September Festival has also has taken place at Sandown Racecourse for the past 10 years after outgrowing its original Dandenong Showgrounds venue.
Latin American Friendship Fonda la Clinica of Victoria president Miguel Santana said Sandown gave verbal confirmation the group could next year hold the event on Saturday 17 and Sunday 18 September, but had since advised the dates were unavailable.
“The management of Sandown offered as alternatives the weekend prior or a week later,” he said.
“One week earlier, the Chilean people are in mourning.
“It coincides with 11 September 1973 – a date that is forever associated with a bloody coup d’etat and deposing and murder of the elected president Mr Salvador Allende and many other thousands of Chilean country men and women.
“A week later the Chilean community do not celebrate, hence holding the festival on the date nearest to 18 September is key to the success of the festival.”
Mr Santana said he’d assessed other venues but none met the festival’s requirements.
He urged the council to lobby Sandown to change its decision.
In July the council approved a $3000 one-off boost for the Latin American festival on top of the $12,000 Greater Dandenong Council sponsorship grant allocated in June.
Councillor Maria Sampey said the festival catered for people from 13 countries and that visitors travelled from interstate and spent cash in the municipality.
Cr Jim Memeti said it was a “fantastic event” and was one of the “biggest on our calendar”.
An MRC spokesman said the festival occurred about the same time as the Sandown 500 and that the events would clash next year.
“The Sandown 500 is an event that attracts some 60,000 attendees across its four days, with its origins dating back to around the foundation of the venue itself in the 1960s,” he said.
“Given the size and long-standing nature of the Sandown 500, and the enduring relationship and arrangement between the club and V8 Supercars, that event takes precedence in terms of use of the venue.”
Mr Doubleday said the council had offered the Chileans a council venue for next year’s event.
“It is understood the organisers are considering the location options,” he said.
