The St. Thomas-St. John Agriculture and Food Fair Organizing Committee has announced the cancellation of this year’s fair, scheduled for Saturday and Sunday, a victim to the recent and relentless rainfall.
Organizers expressed deep regret Monday over the decision. Carlos Robles, UVI extension specialist and vice president of the Fair organizing committee, said the committee met last week to consider alterative locations, or postponement of the celebration, but no viable alternative was available.
"We wanted to ensure that we still would have the quality presentation we are accustomed to," Robles said. "We only had two farmers registered as of last week, because of their losses suffered in the rains."
The event was scheduled for the Reichhold grounds at UVI, which, according to Robles, "are soaked, like a wetlands, just not usable."
Robles said the committee looked at other locations, including Emancipation Garden and Addelita Cancryn Junior High School. "However," he said, "we need a place where we can collect an entrance fee. One-third of our income comes from the gate. There’s no way to collect at Emancipation Garden and Cancryn already has something scheduled, plus there’s a number of other events this weekend."
Aside from the dearth of farmers and produce, Robles said the food vendors "didn’t even break” 18 this year. "Usually we have 20 to 25," he said.
It was a perfect storm of problems, Robles said. On top of everything else, there is no security available. "The Civil Air Patrol always provides security. They sleep on the grounds at night – it’s part of their training. The group was dissolved last week."
Robles said this is just the second time in the event’s 27-year history that it has had to cancel. He wasn’t sure of the exact dater of the prior cancellation, but it was, again, because of the weather.
He expressed deep regret from the committee over the cancellation and any inconvenience it causes.
Fair applicants may collect their refunds at the respective offices where application fee payments were made by Monday, Nov. 15, 2010. Concerns or questions may be directed to committee members by calling the UVI Cooperative Extension Service at 693-1080 or the Department of Agriculture at 774-5182.