End of Lardner Park Motorfest - Celebrate Its Achievement

The organisers of the 2018 Lardner Park Motorfest have, after much debate and investigation of options, decided they can not proceed with the event.

For eight years a partnership between the Rotary Club of Drouin and the Gippsland Tuff Streeters, with significant and ongoing input from many local clubs and community organisations, has delivered this very successful and popular eventwhich, at its peak, was attracting nearly 5000 spectators. An estimated 22,500 hours in volunteer labour has been provided over that time.

Since 2010 Motorfest has generated an income in excess of $1.2 million, while costs approached $800,000, a majority of which has gone to local and regional businesses.

Also most significantly, the event has enabled in excess of $453,000 to be given to the community and its organisations.

Some significant beneficiaries have been: Rotary Centenary House ($43K); local hospitals and health services ($50K); local schools and education facilities ($50K); Scouts, Guides, local CFAs, Drouin Men’s Shed and many more local organisations and some national and international projects.

All profits were distributed and also provided key income for many of our ‘helper’ organisations.

The difficult decision to cancel the event was reached for a range of reasons including:

There is a huge workload to prepare for this event and it could not be covered by the available;

The costs of delivering the event had increased significantly; volunteers

Finding and coordinating the 120-plus volunteers needed to run the event over the two very long days was becoming more difficult; and,

Changes to safety and security arrangements for an event like this have become more stringent and require a lot more work for the organisers.

Drouin Rotary and the Tuff Streeters would like to thank all the local businesses and sponsors who have supported the event over the eightplus years since we began, and to the hundreds of volunteers who have worked to make it the great success it has been.

They would also like to thank the thousands of spectators who have attended the event over the years.

The organisers are pleased and proud to have been able to give you a very popular and highly respected burnout competition for eight years.

And now Rotary will look for new opportunities while continuing to deliver the monthly Drouin Market and the upcoming Drouin Swap Meet on 22nd April at Lardner Park. And they have a major entertainment event coming up in May, about which more will be said soon.