By Lily Theilmann
After breaking even for the first time since 2004, Ottawa’s Capital Pride festival has a lot to be proud of.
The festival, which celebrates gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transsexual pride and diversity, has faced serious debt issues and was denied funding from the city this year. But after putting on a self-sustaining festival this August, the committee hopes to continue the trend and begin paying down the remaining debt.
“When it came down to the crunch, people really came together for it and realized that it was something they wanted,” says Darren Fisher, chair of the Pride committee. “They took ownership of it.”
Financial difficulties have plagued the committee since 2001. According to the Ottawa Citizen, this year’s committee started off over $130,000 in debt total, and looked to the city for a $20,000 loan to get the festival up and running this year. The city denied their request and for a brief period, it did not look as if Ottawa would have a Pride festival. However, Capital Xtra, Ottawa’s gay and lesbian bi-weekly broadsheet, decided to chip in the $20,000 in a last minute decision.
“If you take this year all on its own,” says Fisher, “we made roughly $15,000 without the rain insurance.”
That $15,000 went to paying for festival services up front, some purchased from creditors previously owed. Environment Canada’s official tally of rainfall for that day must come to four millimeters for the committee to able to able to claim rain insurance.
If the insurance comes through, Fisher says the committee can begin a debt-restructuring program and start to pay off the original debt of $50,000 owed to the city and other creditors.
The gay community and other sponsors were not willing to contribute to an event that might be cancelled, says Fisher. Solving the cash flow problem attracted more sponsors to the fore.
Robert Giacobbi, manager of gay sex shop Wilde’s, says although he allotted $7,000 in his budget last year and another $7,000 this year, he was not approached by the committee to be a sponsor. He also says he isn’t sure if the festival is salvagable, or if the community support for the festival is still there.
“I just think we don’t have people with passion,” says Giacobbi, “And the people who try to do it have very little resources to make it happen.”
Giacobbi says signs from Wilde’s were lost by the 2004 committee. He withheld $400 in funds to make up for the loss.
Afterwards, Giacobbi says his relations with the committee became strained, and that it no longer sought him out for funding or advertising. Giacobbi says he still wanted to be a part of Pride, and so sponsored another event which was doing fundraising for the festival.
Fisher says this year’s committee worked hard on trying to improve relations with sponsors. Sponsors who were upset were unhappy with their specific treatment says Fisher, and it’s an issue that the committee hopes to focus on even more next year.
Three-year Pride sponsor Glenn Crawford says he was impressed with this year’s committee. His business, Jack of All Trades Design, did the graphic design for the event, and was the second-biggest sponsor next to Capital Xtra. Crawford says he was well-treated and that he challenges other organizations to support Pride.
“I’m proud to be a sponsor of pride, it’s an organization I really believe in,” says Crawford, “I know that they’ve been struggling to get back in the black and put on a financially sustainable festival, and they did it this year.”