Town Of Monterey Takes Helm Of Standing Stone Day Festivities

The Town of Monterey will take over the responsibilities of running Standing Stone Day on October 14th this year.

The Board of Aldermen voted in a special called session Monday night. Cultural Administrator Rafferty Cleary said to his understanding, the Standing Stone Day Committee was planning on only doing educational outreach for this year’s holiday and not the secondary activities, including the pageant, a parade, and entertainment for the day.

“I don’t think any of us want to see nothing happen, it’s the premier event of the town,” Cleary said. “I know in previous years it’s not been what it had been at its height. But to me, doing nothing doesn’t seem like a very good option.”

Cleary said he prepared in advance for the possibility of the city having to run the event. He said he was able to line up someone to organize the pageant, book the entertainment, and started the process to create vendor applications.

Cleary said in total, a healthy estimate for the cost of all of the activities would be around some $5,000 out of the Healthcare Fund account. He said the Board can decide if it wants to take on the event full-time in the future.

“If we’re talking bout money the one option we have is the Healthcare Fund account which is stagnant it’s not being added to, won’t be added to again based on the new deal we have with the Standing Stone Healthcare board and it has some 14 something in it (thousand dollars),” Cleary said. “And it’s got to be spent on the community. It’s stipulated. It’s not different than the tourism fund that we’ve opened up that has to be used on economic development, well the healthcare board money has to be used on the community some way somehow. In the past we’ve spent that money on acquiring new property at Meadow Creek, we’ve bought playground equipment with it.”

The Standing Stone Day Pageant is set to take place September 30th at the Monterey High School auditorium. Cleary said this year’s sponsor will be the Monterey High softball team.