COVID-19 losses force Wichita Riverfest to cut a third of its staff, including new CEO
Wichita Festivals Inc., the nonprofit group responsible for putting on the annual Wichita Riverfest, has cut a third of its staff, including the just-hired President and CEO.
The organization announced on Wednesday afternoon that its board of directors had approved an “office retrenchment” plan that has eliminated three of its 9.5 positions, including that of CEO Ty Tabing, who started in November.
“It was a difficult decision, definitely, for all involved, but it was the right one for the organization and for the city,” said Shane Stuhlsatz, the incoming chairman of the festival board.
The cuts are necessary, the group said, because its revenue is down 90 percent in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, which in the spring forced the cancellation of its biggest event — the Wichita Riverfest — and also resulted in the staff having to make last weekend’s Autumn & Art a virtual rather than live event.
The nine-day Wichita Riverfest had been scheduled for May 29-June 6, but in late March, Tabing announced that because of COVID-19, the event was being canceled for the first time in its 49-year history.
Tabing’s last day was Wednesday, he said. The other two positions that were cut were an account and project manager’s job and the job of director of operations, which was vacated a couple of months ago and will remain unfilled, Tabing said.
Tabing said he was sad about the development, especially since he never got to experience leading a festival. But, he said, it was “the right move.
“It’s disappointing that it didn’t play out the way I had hoped,” he said. “But I think a lot of people can relate to that, especially this year.”
The festival also announced that it would have to postpone Wonderfall, an event planned for early November as a replacement for the Wichita Riverfest. Finding a way to maintain social distancing with a big crowd proved to be too big an obstacle, Mott said. The event would have happened downtown during the first week of November.
Instead, Wichita Festivals Inc. is partnering with the city and local and state arts groups to assemble an art installation that will serve as a salute to the people and events that have shaped Wichita during its 150 years of existence.
It will be called “Depth of Field: A Wichita Photo Album” and it will involve photos being installed in street-facing windows in the downtown area. It will start on Nov. 1 and run through Nov. 16.
The group is also trying to salvage the River Run, a popular race that’s usually a component of the Wichita Riverfest. It will happen virtually on Nov. 7, and those who register at RiverRunWichita.com will get a race T-shirt and a medallion.
Time to diversify
Tabing said on Wednesday that his biggest accomplishment during his 10 months with the festival was helping to create a new five-year strategic plan that will help it move forward during a time that’s so difficult for the event and festival business.
Work on the plan started just as the pandemic was ratcheting up, and those who crafted it realized that the organization is too dependent on the festival to keep it solvent, he said.
“We’ve been reliant on the Riverfest to provide 90% of the organization’s revenue for the last five to 10 years,” Tabing said. “So even before the pandemic was on anyone’s radar, being overly reliant on one event is not a way to diversify your portfolio.”
To that end, Tabling also helped set up a new legacy fund at the Wichita Community Foundation that will allow people to contribute to Wichita Festivals through their estate plans, insurance policies and multi-year donations, he said.
But it’s also going to take help from the community to sustain the organization, which is self-sufficient and doesn’t get city funding, Tabing said.
Mott said that a new “emergency fundraising initiative” called The Hey Neighbor campaign will get underway on Oct. 8. It’s asking people to think back on good times they had at the Riverfest, decide what those memories are worth and donate what they can, whether it’s $5 or $50,000.
Wichita Festivals Inc. is among many organizations that put on community events across the country that are suffering, and with the pandemic so fluid, no one knows when the suffering will end, Stuhlsatz said.
The group will rely on the remaining staff to help it find a path forward. It will be looking at different types of events it could put on.
“As in-person events are slowing down, we’re trying to figure out what that path looks like,” he said.
The remaining six staff members at Wichita Festivals Inc. will now report to Stuhlsatz. He said that he anticipates the board will eventually bring in a new President and CEO.
“But I don’t have a timeline for that now,” he said. “This is just kind of where we are now. It was an elimination, and down the road, we’ll reevaluate our leadership needs.”
This story was originally published September 23, 2020 at 1:37 PM.
.jpg)