Orange Park merchants not welcoming to festival attendees

Orange Park Town Manager Sarah Campbell said the town’s Fall Festival drew around 45,000 people over the weekend of Oct. 14-15. She said the 40th edition of the event was its largest ever.

Campbell added, however, that many of the town’s business owners blocked access to their parking lots during the festival and discouraged attendees from visiting their businesses.

“They’re like putting up bars to keep people out,” she told the town council during its Oct. 18 meeting.

“In my mind, if I were a small business in the Town of Orange Park and I had 45,000 people coming to see my town, I would want to open my doors. I would want to have a sidewalk sale. I would want to be a part of it,” she said, “and that’s not what’s happening. They’re saying: ‘Go away, Keep out. Don’t bother us. We don’t want you here.’ That’s not from the town; that’s from these businesses.”

Citizen Desiree Allen said many parking lots around the festival site were chained, blocking access to festivalgoers.

“Something has happened in Orange Park,” she said. “There’s been a disconnect of businesses because every parking lot had chains or ropes around them to keep the people from parking. In about the 18 years that I have been doing this festival…I have never seen something like that. Orange Park has been, until now, a very welcoming town. We’ve got to do something.”

The town manager recommended that the municipality’s economic development committee take up the problem and try to find a solution.