
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, March 15, 1995                   TAG: 9503150035
SECTION: CURRENT                    PAGE: NRV-2   EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY 
SOURCE: RICK LINDQUIST STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: RADFORD                                LENGTH: Medium

MAIN ST. MUST MATCH CITY'S FESTIVAL SUPPORT|

This year's scaled-down Septemberfest may get up to $5,000 worth of help from the city, but Main Street Radford, the festival's prime sponsor, first must match that amount on its own, City Council has decided. The vote was 4-0.

Last month, council deferred action on Main Street Radford's money request and asked for specifics on how it would be spent. Monday night, Bud Jeffries, the downtown redevelopment group's executive director, was back before council - a proposed budget in hand - looking to the city to fill a $5,000 hole.

Main Street Radford has budgeted $17,000 for Septemberfest, just over half the cost of the more grandiose festival last year, when country star Hal Ketchum entertained thousands in Bisset Park and the city kicked in $10,000.

This time around, Jeffries said, there will be no free concert in Bisset Park, and the stars will be regional, not national. The two-day affair will focus on "the business district we represent," he said.

Or, as Main Street President Fred Heilich more bluntly put it, "It is not a citywide festival anymore. It is Main Street."

Heilich said this year's Septemberfest represents "a stop-gap effort" until a proposed permanent festival committee and budget are in place to mount a "world-class" annual citywide celebration with top entertainers. Council has not acted on that recommendation.

Initially, Main Street had hoped to maintain the momentum from last year's event, and had asked council for $12,000. But the group's board had second thoughts and opted instead for a more low-key event, with entertainment Friday evening in the city's West End and a street festival all day Saturday along Norwood Street in the East End

Jeffries said Main Street Radford will put $3,500 of its own money into the festival. Another $8,500 would come from Radford University, vendors, concessions and commissions on sales. He told council he was confident Main Street would be able to raise the necessary $5,000, but worried about having the full amount on hand before the festival. Council agreed to match Main Street's own $3,500 contribution up front and to match the balance as Main Street collects it.

In other business Monday, City Council:

Without a formal vote, gave City Engineer Jim Hurt permission to bid some $300,000 in paving and sidewalk work for 1995-96. Hurt told council this year's paving projects were 90 percent complete.

Accepted bids totaling just over $29,000 for new trees. The city expects a $15,000 matching grant from the Virginia Department of Forestry. Trees will go in along DeHaven Drive in front of Radford High and Dalton Intermediate schools and at the centennial time capsule, as well as along Tyler Avenue to replace trees damaged by last year's ice storm and others that failed to thrive.

Approved a resolution designating April as Environmental Awareness Month and setting April 22 as the date for the city's annual Cleanin' 'n' Greenin' day. The resolution also reduces by half the cost for special trash pickups during April.

OK'd spending $2,400 for initial engineering analysis of a planned sanitary sewer project.

Agreed to sell for salvage four older, city-owned vehicles damaged by recent flooding.

City Council meets again Thursday, 7 p.m., when the School Board presents its budget request.

by CNB