Y-fest organisers plan for future

Organisers of Warracknabeal’s biggest event of the year have cancelled Y-fest Easter celebrations in order to prevent the spread of COVID-19.

Yarriambiack Shire Council advised organisers to cancel the event following Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s announcement to cease all gatherings of more than 500 people.

Y-fest committee secretary Jean Wise said while she was disappointed in cancelling the event, which can attract more than 3000 people to the rural community, the health of people in

Warracknabeal came first. “We’ve got an aging population here,” she said.

“We’ve got to make sure we take care of them first.

“Rather than risk bringing the virus in, the decision had to be made.

“We’ve got a duty of care to our community – we don’t want our community to suffer emotionally from this virus.

“Y-fest would have been a good way to lift spirits, but we’ve got to make sure the community’s wellbeing is maintained.”

Ms Wise confirmed the Y-fest street parade and a busking competition had been cancelled, while a horse racing meet would likely still go ahead, spectator-free.

She said individual groups who organise other attractions over the Easter weekend – including a vintage rally, art show, golf, show and shine, community garden and a community market – would meet to make their own decision.

Ms Wise said Warracknabeal businesses would miss out on a great deal of tourism-related revenue due to the cancellations.

“Those who have booked their accommodation and motel owners are going to miss out,” she said.

“They’ll have people cancelling left, right and centre. There will be a rollon cost, not just for the organisers but also the individuals involved.

“However, with the event being three weeks away – it could be worse.”

She said making the call in advance had saved the committee financially.

“We just had news from WINTV that they would reimburse for the airtime for our televised advertisement. But we can’t get the production cost back,” she said.

“We’ve been lucky. Certainly over $1000 had been spent from a budget of about $11,000 – a lot of that is prize money, paper and radio advertising, which we hadn’t started.”

Ms Wise said advocacy group ‘Warracknabeal Action Group’ was discussing ideas to bring another event to Warracknabeal later in the year.

“Obviously we cannot do another Y-fest until next year. But, the Warracknabeal Action Group had a planning meeting last week to discuss another event in Warracknabeal sometime through the year,” she said.

“At that point it was only ideas on paper.

“But I would say now, considering the circumstances, something will likely come out of that.”