Freedom Festival, City Hall hope they can reach accord to get fireworks back downtown

Officials from the Freedom Festival and City Hall on Tuesday both said negotiations between the two were headed in the direction of bringing the festival's Fourth of July fireworks show back downtown.

Russ Oviatt, the marketing director for the Freedom Festival, said the central stumbling block between the festival and the city is the cost the city wants to charge the festival for providing police and fire services for the fireworks event.

However, Oviatt and City Manager Jim Prosser both said a Tuesday meeting between the parties was productive, and Prosser last night said the festival may look to use some private security rather than Police Department off-duty officers to lower the cost of security.

Prosser said the city understands that it is “an attraction” to have the fireworks back downtown, “and certainly it's not our intent to prevent that from happening,” he said.

Oviatt noted that in 2007, the last time the Freedom Festival held fireworks downtown, the cost billed by the city was $1,300 for security. In 2008 and 2009, the event moved from the flood-hit downtown to Kirkwood Community College, and last summer, the city's bill for security leaped to about $19,000, a figure that caught the festival by surprise.

Oviatt said one city estimate put the cost to bring the event back downtown at about $30,000.

So high is the estimate, Oviatt said, that city staff moved to reject the festival's request for a city permit to hold the fireworks show downtown because the city didn't feel the festival could afford the cost.

The Tuesday-morning meeting between city staff and festival staff was an attempt to find some common ground, Oviatt said.

Oviatt said the festival has asked the city to look at “deployment schedules” of officers to see if there can be some savings there while the festival will put more energy into trying to raise money for the fireworks event, Oviatt said.

Oviatt predicted that the fireworks show, in the end, will be back downtown.

Mayor Ron Corbett on Tuesday said he wants the fireworks show to return to the downtown.