City of Roswell looks to hire company to organize future UFO Festivals

                                           

“So, I’m all for it,” said Karen Perry, a downtown shop owner.

The city says it’s time for the UFO Festival to take a giant step forward. They realize to do that, the city needs to hire some help. Downtown store owners say that could breathe new life into the festival that has grown very stale.

“You cannot stay the same without growing stagnant and that’s part of where the festivals gotten [sic],” said Perry.

Perry is excited to hear about how the festival will incorporate more of Roswell, than just Main Street. New events could bring new visitors to Roswell and be a big increase in revenue for the town.

“They need somebody with large festival experience and background and how to properly manage it; to keep it growing without putting a burden on the rest of the city,” said Perry

The City of Roswell and Mainstreet agreed that Mainstreet nonprofit will not organize the UFO Festival in future years, so it could concentrate on the other means of supporting downtown businesses; it had run the event for the last six years.

“I think it’s important to explore options. I think that there are ways that people from the outside could assist or internally as well but we’re really just looking at, checking out the options that we can,” said Stephanie Mervine the Tourism Manager for the City of Roswell.

The city believes an outside firm has better connections to bring in new acts and more people to the UFO Festival. City councilors will vote on the recommendation at Thursday night’s meeting. The city would pay the firm $40,000 to organize the festival.

ROSWELL, N.M. (KRQE) – The UFO Festival had to be held virtually this year because of the pandemic but next year the City of Roswell wants it to be bigger and better than ever; that means taking a different approach.

 

Corey King 

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