Art League A No-Show For Sponsorship Request

A request by the Highlands Art League requesting sponsorship for its Historic Downtown Sebring Craft Festival was tabled Monday when no one showed up to speak to the Sebring Community Redevelopment Agency agenda item.

The event is scheduled for Saturday, March 7 and Sunday, March 8.

The Art League sent a sponsorship request form to the Sebring CRA, stating that art festivals of this nature annually draw about 25,000 residents and visitors to the downtown.

Based upon a successful show last year, this year the Art League again enlisted American Craft Endeavors of Howard Alan Events Ltd., to produce the two-day event, the solicitation request stated. The promoter expected to bring in more than 100 crafters "from across America" to Sebring.

"Our community will be the recipient of a signature craft event which will generate national exposure and tremendous traffic for the weekend," the request stated.

Pete Pollard, CRA executive director, pointed out that someone from the Art League was supposed to attend the meeting and could not offer an explanation at the time why no one did come.

CRA Commission President Gene Brenner stated that it has always been customary for someone representing an organization requesting money or sponsorship to speak to the agenda item.

On Wednesday Pollard said that he spoke Tuesday with Jeri Wohl, Highlands County Art League president. She told him that regrettably it was a scheduling error on her part.

Due to the no show, Brenner entertained a motion to table the agenda item. However, the CRA board will not meet again until March 9, after the event has passed.

In other CRA actions, Charlie Kidd of Kidder Capital LLC applied for and was awarded a façade grant for proposed improvements to a property at 427 Poinsettia Ave., in Sebring.

Kidd requested $1,915.20 toward the $6,384 project to replace the roof, and scraping and painting the exterior and replacing some screening on a porch.

Barbara Walker with Rebuilding Together received more than she asked for Monday for an improvement project at 744 Booker St., in Washington Heights.

The plan was to pressure wash, prime, paint and replace screens on a porch. Total cost for materials was $279.05 and Walker was requesting $83.72 as the 30 percent façade grant. No labor was included because it was submitted as a self-help project.

However, the board unanimously decided to award the project the entire $279.05 for materials.

In his project status report, Pollard told the commissioners that the Washington Heights Neighborhood Plan text had arrived from its engineering firm Keith and Schnars, but the graphics portion had not.

He notified the commissioners that he was in discussions with the Florida Department of Transportation regarding curb and gutter improvements and replacements for The Circle as part of the departments resurfacing project.

The details of the streetscaping between the city and the FDOT are yet to be determined, Pollard said, because CRA staff is still working with them, but so far the feedback has been positive.