Ogden festival committee to meet tonight

The Ogden Festival will be bigger and better this year if organizer Kelly Cooper has anything to say about it.

“We hope to attract more participants, vendors and spectators,” she said. “We want to be able to bring some fun and liveliness back into the community at least for a weekend.”

In order to do that Cooper is looking for more volunteers for the festival committee.

The committee meets on the second Tuesday of every month at 6:30 p.m. at Ogden Village Hall.

Cooper said the committee is hoping to see the festival, which is held in August, grow bigger with more cars in the car show, more vendors at the flea market, additional food vendors and more activities for children.

Last year, the biggest challenge was planning a festival from the ground up.

“I had never done something like this,” said Cooper. “It was huge undertaking.”

Cooper said the festival committee, who had helped with previous events, helped her make sure the event was successful.

“ I wanted to make sure that it was well organized and ran as smooth as possible,” she said.

Cooper said the goal of the committee was to offer activities for a wide range of ages as well as making sure to have activities that were free.

Another challenge was making sure the event had enough volunteers.

“We were short on volunteers but were very grateful to all that helped us and hope they will again this year,” Cooper said.

Cooper said the most rewarding part of working on the festival committee was seeing Ogden residents enjoying themselves at the festival.

“It ran really smooth and people were surprised as to what we had to offer,” she said. “I was so happy with the turn out of participant for the car show, flea market, kiddie tractor pull and the event in general. This all could not have been done without the help of the committee, sponsors, village board or the spectators.”

Cooper said anyone interested in volunteering should attend the festival committee meeting tonight.

“It is a rewarding feeling to know that one is helping the community even if it is for a short period of time,” she said. “We are going to try to offer something to the people that volunteer to help attract them and make it interesting. I can not express how much appreciation goes out to those that help us make it a successful event, without them it would not be possible. We hope to be able to have more volunteers with ideas and open minds to help us this year.”