A near unanimous vote at city council means that $30,000 will be provided to the Wake the Giant Concert, which will go towards the stage, lighting, speakers and barricades.
The one individual opposed to the donation was At-Large Councillor Rebecca Johnson, who raised concerns about the price tag. She also cited her issues with this being a donation, meaning Wake the Giant would not have to pay back any of the funds.
“This is just straight outright, give us the money and we need it to put this on,” says Johnson. “I have the report here from the culture, we give back to the community nearly $3-million a year. Now $30,000 dollars in a $3-million budget is a lot of dollars.”
A few other councillors while voting for the motion, questioned the high price of the stage.
General Manager of Community Services Kelly Robertson explains that as we see increased safety regulations, the price inevitably goes up.
“The reality is that the former stage at the waterfront was unsafe and at the end of it’s lifecycle,” says Robertson. “Around the world because of some tragedies related to stages, the standards and the industry and the expectations of supplying these stages have increased immensely, and probably for good reason because there are risks in using in particular the larger stages. There’s a lot of requirements that need to happen to ensure they are erected and taken down in a safe manner, and that has evolved I ‘d like to suggest over the past 10 or 15 years.”
The conversation then veered towards the importance of the event. Northwood Councillor Shelby Ch’ng explains what Wake the Giant means to the community.
“The Wake the Giant Festival came out of one of the darkest periods I think that we’d had in Thunder Bay,” explains Ch’ng. “The inquest has been probably some of our darkest moments. The Wake the Giant Festival has uniquely brought together the business community, the music community, and the Indigenous community, which no other organization has done.”
Wake the Giant this year is scheduled for Saturday, September 18.
