The COVID-19 pandemic has taken down yet another popular event in the Battlefords.
The annual July 1 Canada Day fireworks in North Battleford are not going ahead. That was confirmed after Monday’s city planning committee meeting held on the Zoom platform.
Already several other summer events, including North West Territorial Days and also the Town of Battleford’s parade and fireworks, have been cancelled. The city fireworks are normally staged in the King Hill area.
A more formal announcement on the cancellation is expected from the city this week.
It is still possible the city could put on a fireworks event later this year. Discussed at the meeting were some alternative suggestions, such as deferring the fireworks until the “Send Off to Summer” drive-in movie currently scheduled for Sept. 11.
That would allow the city to still take advantage of the annual grant from the federal government towards the fireworks celebrations, which runs to the end of 2020. Another possibility is to hold the fireworks at another event later this year.
The sentiment at the table was to defer the fireworks until a “celebration” event when it was safe for people to gather again.
That was the preference of Councillor Greg Lightfoot, who liked the idea of an event later in the fall where “we could celebrate that we got through this.”
In any event, the main stumbling block on the July 1 date is the provincial restrictions on outdoor gatherings, currently limited to 30 people outdoors under Phase 3 of Re-Open Saskatchewan.
Fireworks could potentially be accommodated as part of a “drive-in” type of event, where cars are allowed to park and people can watch the fireworks from inside their vehicles.
The thinking was that the Ag Society area might accommodate such an event. But in the end, councillors found the idea unworkable.
It was noted the cars would need to be constantly monitored so as to maintain the 30 person restriction, and there were also concerns they would have to turn people away.
“It’s too much of an onus on the employees of the city to try and do this,” said Lightfoot, referring to the city’s current staff shortages due to COVID-19.
“I don’t think this is even debatable, we can’t have a gathering over 30,” said Mayor Ryan Bater. He made clear he didn’t think a drive-in fireworks show could work.
“Fireworks are not something people can enjoy from their vehicle; you have to be outside, and you have to be on the ground. And you want to be close. It’s really unfortunate, but this is another in a list of a long list of events that have to be cancelled because of public health orders.”
