Winter Fun Fest

jspeer · Guru

Winter Fun Fest

kspeer · Senior Member

Don't forget the chili cook off. Jspeer has his first place trophy to defend!

jspeer · Guru

kspeer wrote:

Don't forget the chili cook off. Jspeer has his first place trophy to defend!

Shhhh! Now the cat's out of the bag on why I want to help save this event.LOL!

jspeer · Guru

It looks like after this morning's meeting we're leaning towards Presidents weekend, in February. So far we have boxing, broomball, baby races, basketball and bounce houses.....tomorrow we're gonna work our way to the C's and the rest of the alphabet. I'm also happy to see that Scott's on board with the planning. It really is starting to look like this year might be bigger and better than ever and we just started.

kspeer · Senior Member

All things are looking to be a "go" for the fest on the weekend of Feb. 17 - 19. So far:

Friday evening - broomball tourney and a bonfire at Altro Park

Saturday - Snowball game (if enough teams, a tourney), and a scavenger hunt for the kids at Altro

Sunday - Chili cook off, possibly baby races, bounce houses, kids games, a huge reptile and small animal display by Pets Plus, and in the evening....a boxing sparring session, all at the Kenan Center.

If you would like to enter a team in the broomball or snowball, let us know here or call the Youth Dept. at 434-3071. Also we probably need more people to enter their best chili in the cookoff (we are limited on power sources, so 10 teams is probably tops).

We have much, much more in the works and appreciate any ideas or help. Thanks!

shermanwlvl · Senior Member

JOE NEED ANY HELP JUST CALL. IF I HAVE THE TIME I WILL BE MORE THAN HAPPY TO JUMP IN. BROOMBALL WAS A GREAT TIME LAST YEAR.

jspeer · Guru

Thanks, Ray! Any help that you can give would be much appreciated. Are you gonna play snowball this year? How were the pickles and the candy? You made me feel like a cheese ball on the radio....but it was nice to feel needed. Thank you for the compliments. I don't do the stuff I do for them but they are nice.

MBrophy · Veteran Member

How long has LP had a Winter Fest? I don't remember hearing about this. That sounds like fun -- I wish I could go! =(

shermanwlvl · Senior Member

JOE YOUR WELCOME AND FOR ANY HELP DROP ME A LAND LINE CALL. KEEP UP THE GOOD WORK JS. YOU KNOW JOE WITH THE BIG FAMILY I HAVE THE GOODYS YOU SENT WAS ENJOYED BY ALL. YEA KS NEEDS TO KEEP YA. LOL jspeer wrote:

Thanks, Ray! Any help that you can give would be much appreciated. Are you gonna play snowball this year? How were the pickles and the candy? You made me feel like a cheese ball on the radio....but it was nice to feel needed. Thank you for the compliments. I don't do the stuff I do for them but they are nice.

kspeer · Senior Member

A reason to want snow?
By Joyce M. Miles / milesj@gnnewspaper.com
Lockport Union-Sun & Journal

It’s back and it’s bigger.

The city youth and recreation department’s annual Winter Fun Fest will be held Feb. 17 to 19 throughout the city, rescued partly by volunteers who didn’t want to see the tradition fall prey to change.

Mayor Michael Tucker acknowledged last month on WLVL that the festival was canceled because of a major youth and rec overhaul. Planning that normally began five months in advance had not been undertaken, he said, and the department wouldn’t be able to pull it together in so short a time.

Sure they could, local events promoter Joe Speer thought, if they had a little help from friends.

With Tucker’s OK, Speer called on Tony Nemi, the department’s newly appointed coordinator, and asked to be put to work.

“It’s a worthwhile event,” Speer said. “There’s not enough kid events in the city now, and we want to see more things like it.”

Speer and WLVL Dialog host Scott Leffler teamed up with Nemi and new recreation supervisor Melissa Junke to plot out three days of activities that would entice families and showcase the changes under way in the city youth bureau. From a winter carnival at Altro Park on opening day to a rush of sporting and leisure activities at the Kenan Center on day three, the slate is filled with a mix of old and new things to do.

“I am so excited about this,” Junke said. “It’s bigger and it definitely will be better.”

Broomball, synonymous with Winter Fun Fest in the view of hard-core fans, is being expanded to two divisions: teen and adult, the latter a “celebrity” match featuring former all-stars of the game.

“That’s what I’m in this for,” Leffler joked. “Frankly I am an awesome broomball player, when I’m not getting hit in the eye with a piece of ice.”

A boxing subtheme is being written into the weekend complements of Speer and his wife, Kelly, who recruited the Palace Theater to show a classic film and support a raffle to benefit city youth programs. The Palace will show one of the Rocky films and everyone who buys a $3 seat will receive an entry in a raffle of Jake LaMotta-autographed boxing gloves. One-dollar raffle tickets also will be sold at Mills Jewelers and throughout the festival.

Youth and rec staff are looking to Winter Fun Fest to showcase a revamped operation. The department, shaken to its roots last year when the Common Council OK’d a major downsizing and overhaul, is being updated, and day one is devoted to showing that off.

The bureau has been cleaned top-to-bottom and repainted, and a new arcade, video game lounge and restored computer lab should be up and running inside, while staff host a six-hour open house for parents and youths. New programs and upcoming events will be highlighted.

Junke also will be collecting used skates so the bureau can loan them out to kids who don’t have them — a first-time endeavor for the bureau, she said — and its new sound system will be in use during a free, open skate after the broomball tourneys. Hot food and drink will be served all the while and a bonfire is in the works, pending Council approval.

Most previous Winter Fun Fest partners have returned and new partners have been added, Nemi said. Among them, professional golfer Tom Yaeger will host an informal golfers’ clinic and the state parks service will host free snowshoeing tryouts if the weather cooperates.

The biggest change concerns events at the Kenan Center including the Junior Service League-sponsored baby races. They’re set for Sunday this year, instead of Saturday as in the past, because the Kenan already was booked.

“Other than the days, it’s the same concept with a few different features,” Nemi said. “We thought we were doing a downsized version but it ended up bigger. Hopefully, that’s a good thing.”

-I was hoping the paper would mention PC Tony too. He's the whole Jake Lamotta connection.........overall, a good advertisement though. Nice Leffler quote!

-- Edited by kspeer at 10:23, 2006-02-04

MBrophy · Veteran Member

This is really great everybody! Thanks, KS, for posting the article -- it's nice to hear good LP news.

jspeer · Guru

We are raffling off an autographed Jake Lamotta boxing glove to raise money for Lockport's Youth and Rec. Dept. It's a dollar a ticket! Tickets will be on sale shortly at Mills Jewelers, the Brewhaus, and at the Palace on 2/18 during the showing of Rocky 3 at 1PM.

The winner will be drawn on Sunday 2/19 at the conclusion of the Winterfest at the Kenan Center.

-- Edited by jspeer at 10:34, 2006-02-08

shermanwlvl · Senior Member

can anyone enter drawing joe?

looking forward to seeing all your hard work in action!

kspeer · Senior Member

All you need to do is purchase a raffle ticket. They are currently on sale at the Ski Lodge, Josie's and Big Ugly's Pub.

kspeer · Senior Member

In today's Buffalo News:

CITY OF LOCKPORT
Rescued festival packed with winter activities
By THOMAS J. PROHASKA
NEWS NIAGARA BUREAU
2/14/2006
LOCKPORT - Skating, sweeping and slugging will be on tap Friday through Sunday as the city's Winter Fun Fest returns for another year.

The event was in question because the Common Council abolished the Youth and Recreation Department and cut back youth activities in the 2006 budget.

Mayor Michael W. Tucker said it was the city's intention to cancel the fest, but Joseph Speer of Gasport and Scott Leffler, a talk show host on WLVL Radio, took the lead in resuscitating it.

"Generally, it takes four or five weeks to put it together," Tucker said. "They put it together in about two weeks."

"It's actually bigger than it was before," said Speer, who played a role in founding the Taste of Niagara food festival here and has promoted many other Lockport-area events.

Speer said the idea started when he heard Leffler's program one day when Tucker was the guest. Speer called in to tease the mayor about his recent stomach-stapling surgery and resulting major weight loss. He suggested humorously that Tucker could join Speer's broomball team, the defending champions at the Winter Fun Fest.

When Tucker replied that the event was going to be canceled because of the city budget cuts, Speer and Leffler decided that would not stand.

"What we're doing it for is, there aren't enough events for the kids in the city. We didn't want to see another event get cut," Speer said. "The event's been going on for, I believe, 18 years."

Friday's activities will be centered in Altro Park on Willow Street, where the city's youth building will host an open house from 4:30 to 10:30 p.m., with chowder, hot dogs, hot chocolate and candy apples being sold to benefit city youth programs. The Lakeside Blues Band will perform during the open house, with a special guest appearance by Council President John Lombardi III.

The broomball tournament will be held on the adjacent outdoor ice rink. Four teenage teams are to compete from 5 to 7 p.m., with four adult teams - the Police Department, the Fire Department, the media and the J. Speer Renovation All-Stars - taking the ice from 7 to 9 p.m. A free skate will follow the broomball. Also, the "Great Skate Donate" will seek to collect old ice skates to create a supply to be lent to kids who use the rink.

At 11 a.m. Saturday, a "snowball" game will be played on the Altro Park diamond.

At the same hour at Rogers Avenue Park, a kids' hockey skills competition will be held on the outdoor rink, co-sponsored by the Lockport High School hockey club and the Lockport Tigers youth hockey organization.

At 1 p.m. Saturday, the movie "Rocky III" will be shown in the Palace Theater, 2 East Ave. Tickets are $3, which includes an entry in a raffle for a pair of boxing gloves autographed by Jake LaMotta, the old-time middleweight featured in the movie "Raging Bull." The raffle tickets, for $1 each, will be sold at other festival events and are on sale in advance at Altro Park and several Lockport businesses.

The drawing for the gloves will be held at 4 p.m. Sunday in the Kenan Arena on Beattie Avenue, which will be the focus of the final day's events.

Baby races will be held from 12:30 to 1:30 p.m., and Pets Plus will host an indoor petting zoo and reptile display. The Lighthouse Junior Optimist Club and the Lockport YMCA teen leaders will be in charge of carnival games and face painting, while Big Brothers and Big Sisters of Niagara County will supervise a craft corner.

A chili cookoff will be held from noon to 3 p.m.

e-mail: tprohaska@buffnews.com

kspeer · Senior Member

The signed Jake LaMotta glove is now on display at Mills Jewelers. You can buy the $1 raffle tickets there, the Ski Lodge, Big Ugly's, Josie's, the Youth Dept., and various other establishments. OR come to the showing of Rocky 3 at 1PM this Sat. at the Palace, and your admission ticket ($3) will include a chance to win the glove.

Make sure everyone gets up early on Friday morning and tunes in Channel 2 on your TV sets to see the Mayor, Joe, Racin' Ray, Tony Nemi, Melissa Junke, and various others playing broomball and snowball (around 5:15 AM).

kspeer · Senior Member

Channel 2 just cancelled their remote broadcast that was supposed to happen Fri. AM. There's just no way they can raise the boom on the truck in the kind of wind we're supposed to have tomorrow.

Mrs K · Member

Hey Joe Speer;

What happend to the Firemen and Policemen broomball teams?

That would have been great to watch?

kspeer · Senior Member

We are trying to plan a tourney for broomball when there's actually ice. Maybe they can have a team then. The conditions at Winterfest were not ideal for how broomball is played. What can you do about Mother Nature? At least someone played. The whole mission is to raise awareness of what the Youth Dept. has to offer, and to help publicize Winterfest for them. I do believe that was accomplished.

kspeer · Senior Member

Hey, just so everybody knows.......the article in the US&J that sounds like people were bashing the firemen for not being in the tourney is highly inaccurate. This reporter guy was walking up to everyone and asking "Are you disappointed that the firemen aren't here?". That's why alot of the quotes are about them, they are people's answers to a question asked by a reporter with obviously some sort of agenda (or as my friend Pam refers to people like that "a sh%@ disturber")!

shermanwlvl · Senior Member

I'M HOPING FOR ANOTHER SHOT AT BROOM BALL ON ICE THIS TIME DEAL ME IN JOE, JUST MAKE SURE THIS TIME ITS JOE IN CHARGE. MORE FUN THAT WAY!

jspeer · Guru

Yes, we are planning another broomball tournament. I talked to someone from the fire and police departments and they said they will get in this time. I also found out that neither was asked to be in the last one until it was too late to shag teams. This tourny will include about 8 teams. We're gonna have a band, food and drinks and a few more activities to raise money for city youth. So far we have Scott, Mark Provenzano and myself on the commitee. We will be having a meeting in the very near future to iron out the details. I'll post the time and place soon.