FAIRS

dors, sponsors, volunteers and surrounding community always has been, and will remain our primary concern,” Pinto said. “Having closely monitored the progress of federal, state and local guidelines and after much discussion and hope that the festival could be possible, we know this is the right decision as we all do our part to stop this disruptive virus.

“We are proud that the Milford Oyster Festival is an integral part of the community,” Pinto said. “We ask that you make every effort to support the many local Milford businesses, nonprofit and civic organizations that rely on the festival for fundraising and awareness for their important causes.”

The Norwalk Oyster Festival, which had been scheduled for Sept. 11-13, made its announcement on the same day as its Milford counterpart, with organizers saying that “prioritizing

the health and safety of everyone involved” was their primary objective.

“We are disappointed that we’re unable to hold this highly anticipated event,” said Norwalk Seaport Association President Mike Reilly. “But, based on the information we have today, we know it’s the right decision to make.

“The Norwalk Oyster Festival raises more than $100,000 that contributes to the maintenance and restoration of the historic Sheffield Island Lighthouse and to support our educational programs,” Reilly said. “Without this festival taking place in 2020, we will be facing a challenging year. We are hoping for the continued support of all the friends of the Seaport and the Norwalk Oyster Festival to help us continue with our mission.”

Organizers of carnivals and fairs across the state, both local and regional, told similar stories.

“Sorry to say this year’s Carnival is in fact canceled,” said an organizer of the Orange Volunteer Firemen’s

Carnival in a May 13 Facebook post. “We want everyone to stay safe in this uncertain time, so it’s with a heavy heart we chose to cancel.

“This is our biggest fundraising event every year, but our town is priceless and we can’t risk the lives of our community members as well as our fire department and our volunteers that assist in us each and every year,” the post reads. “Thank you for your understanding. Please stay safe, and we will see you all next year.”

Tom McCarthy, chairman of West Haven’s Savin Rock Festival organizing committee, said that even before the onslaught of COVID-19, organizers were trying to resurrect a festival that already had been canceled for the first time last year.

“It was going to be a new form of Savin Rock Festival,” but “obviously, with the uncertainty, with COVID, when you’re trying to lock in and cut checks to bands and stuff” it makes for a difficult situation, said McCarthy, also West Haven’s

public works director.

But health concerns also “played an enormous role in the decision,” McCarthy said.

In past years, the Health Department’s only role in the festival was to inspect and license the food trucks, he said. “Now, (Health Director) Maureen Lillis is playing the lead role in the COVID response.”

By the time that they made the decision, “We had had several meetings ... so we were down the road. We had established budgets,” McCarthy said. “[But] I think the enormity of canceling the Memorial Day parade sort of put it in focus to us.”

Branford Festival corporate board President Dale Izzo said in her April 19 cancellation announcement that “during this unique and challenging time of COVID-19 we need to come together to support each other and our community.”

And while the festival marks the community’s traditional start of summer, “It has become clear that the Branford Festival Corporate

Board would be faced with a heartfelt decision of canceling the 2020 Branford Festival,” Izzo said.

In their announcement, organizers of the North Branford Potato and Corn Festival said, “With the health and safety of our community being of the utmost importance, it is with heavy hearts that we cancel the 2020 North Branford Potato & Corn Festival.

“While this was a sad decision to make, we know it is the correct one during these unprecedented times and with the uncertainty due to COVID-19,” it said.

“We look forward to coming back in 2021 and know it will mean so much more when we are all able to come together to celebrate with fun, music, rides, games, fireworks, delicious food, and our community,” the announcement said.

June 19 would have marked the second Middletown Pride festival celebrating the history, lives and contributions of Middletown’s LGBTQIA residents.

“Middletown Pride looks forward to coming back stronger than ever June 19, 2021,” said its announcement.

“This was both a hard and an easy decision for us — hard in the sense that we hate to cancel an event that so many people have been looking forward to and working on, but easy in the sense that it was clearly the right call from a public health standpoint — and the Pride committee never wavered in their commitment to put our community’s safety first,” said Middletown Mayor Ben Florsheim in a statement.

“Even though we can’t gather in person this year, Middletown is still a city that is proud of our diversity and of the unique contributions of our LGBTQIA residents past and present,” he said. “We will still celebrate and uplift them all the same this June, and look forward to an even bigger, better Pride event in the summer of 2021.”