🔒As city support ebbs, nonprofits turn to private sector to fund Hartford’s cultural events

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When the nonprofit iQuilt Partnership announced recently that Hartford's Winterfest, complete with free ice skating in Bushnell Park, was a go for another year, event supporters breathed a collective sigh of relief.

The holiday festival and other special events in Hartford, from parades to an annual fireworks display, have been feeling the pinch from city funding cuts that started last year.

Those cuts have forced nonprofit organizers to place a greater emphasis on chasing down private donations to put on many events. So far most, but not all, have found success. Still, there's a lingering question of whether or not relying on the private sector, as well as foundations and individual donors, to underwrite city events is a sustainable model.

Most city and nonprofit officials agree there may be no other choice, at least in the short term. While the city of Hartford has avoided bankruptcy for the time being, its long-term fiscal challenges remain and city leaders are currently trying to renegotiate union contracts and restructure bonded debt.

For a second year, Hartford's budget cut funding for special events, which previously received more than $800,000 from the city, much of it in staffing support.

“The city can no longer subsidize these events,” said Hartford city council Majority Leader Julio Concepcion, who is also a vice president at the MetroHartford Alliance.

Concepcion said he has been calling on the private sector to step up “and they have in incredible ways.”

The iQuilt Partnership, for example, raised more than $255,000 this year from about 163 individual, corporate and foundation donors, to support Winterfest, which, in addition to free skating, provides no-cost skating lessons, photos with Santa and $1 rides on the Bushnell Park Carousel.

The largest donation — $30,000 — came from United Bank, which recently moved its headquarters to downtown Hartford from Glastonbury.

Jackie Gorsky Mandyck, managing director of the iQuilt Partnership, acknowledged that because of natural disasters in California, Texas and Puerto Rico, fundraising was difficult this year.

“These disasters deserved corporate and individual donations,” she said. “Still, I'm gratified that so many people found money to support Winterfest.”

Mandyck said the city, which actually used to run Winterfest, at its peak provided up to $150,000 to support the event. That funding has since dried up, but she hopes some of it will return in the future.

If not, “We'll have the same mountain to climb next year,” she said.

Bar, restaurant owners step up

Hartford's St. Patrick's Day parade is a long-standing tradition.

“Forty-six years ago, our founder put the parade in Hartford,” said Eileen K. Moore, a member of the Central Connecticut Celtic Cultural Committee, which organizes the event. “And we want it to remain in Hartford, and it will remain (there),” including this coming March.

But making sure the parade happens has become a more difficult task.

The parade costs up to $90,000 to put on, including nearly $60,000 for police and other staffing support. In previous years, the city subsidized a large portion of those expenses. In fiscal 2017, most of that support was cut.

“They just don't have [the money] and we're cognizant of that and we understand that,” said Moore, the parade chair.

In 2017, the parade did receive $25,000 from a special transition fund adopted by the city council. The West Indian Day Festival and Greater Hartford Festival of Jazz also received some of that special funding, which is not expected to be available moving forward, a city official said.

This year the parade committee also had to raise about $17,000 from local businesses. Concepcion helped with the outreach effort and local business owners like Johnny Vaughan, owner of Vaughan's Public House on Pratt Street, also rallied support.

“Bar and restaurant owners downtown are a very tightknit and strong group,” Moore said.

While organizers were successful in drumming up sponsorship money, Moore admits she worries about the sustainability of that model, particularly for an event that she describes as a “unique niche” and perhaps not a good fit for some potential donors.

“We rely on smaller businesses, which are also tapped out,” she said. “The risk is always there that they may just not have that extra cash in the budget to give to us. It's always going to be a crapshoot.”

Fireworks, cultural events

Nonprofit Riverfront Recapture, which puts on myriad Hartford events, has also had to deal with funding cuts. In fact, the group's annual Riverfront Fireworks festival on the Connecticut River was scrubbed in 2016 after the city and East Hartford cut off financial aid.

The fireworks made a comeback this year, said Riverfront Recapture CEO Mike Zaleski, thanks to support from various individual and corporate donors like Travelers, Mohegan Sun and Hartford Steam Boiler.

A grant from the “Summer in the City” program, which was funded by United Technologies Corp. and administered by the Greater Hartford Arts Council, also helped.

Zaleski said Riverfront Recapture, which operates a $3.2 million annual budget, 37 percent of which is from donations and grants, has had to figure out ways to cut costs without city support, which used to pay for police and fire services.

This year's fireworks display, for example, operated with a $155,000 budget, down from $200,000 a year earlier.

“We worked hard to rework the event to decrease costs,” Zaleski said. “The Hartford Police Department and East Hartford Police Department were especially helpful in crafting a public safety plan that decreased costs but maintained public safety.”

Tightening municipal and state budgets and a changing corporate landscape have made funding events more difficult, Zaleski admits. Events, large and small, are feeling the pressure and some, including a couple Riverfront events, have not continued.

Other Riverfront Recapture events include the Riverfront Dragon Boat and Asian Festival and the Taste of the Caribbean and Jerk Festival.

Zaleski said there is still strong business community support to prop up events, which benefit the economy.

“These companies understand the importance of supporting local organizations and the events that enhance our quality of life in the region,” Zaleski said.

Mayor Luke Bronin said he's been pleased to see the private support for cultural events. He's even helped whip up some of that funding. He also acknowledged it's a model that likely should have been adopted sooner.

“I think this probably is how it should have been all along,” Bronin said. “(These events) should have the capacity to be privately sustainable and attract private investment, and they've shown the ability to do that.”