Bureaucracy in way of block party

Does anyone out there remember when the city of Whitefish had culture? Reminisce beer barters in the streets? Can you recall dancing to music in the parks? Chili cook-offs? Is there any recollection of those times when bands used to frequent our town and bless us with their musical prowess?

It wasn't that long ago that all of this really happened in Whitefish. Now it seems that unless you are organizing a craft show, the Winter Carnival or a sporting event, you have less of a chance to be successful.

My name is Jason Callihan, and I have lived in Whitefish for about 15 years now. I assist my roommate with the operation of a small business out of our house.

Chronic Don Productions has been a promotion group for a decade plus. We deal in the exposure of local athletes from sports which, until recently, don't traditionally receive as much publicity as say baseball, football or basketball.

We also produce music, promote local artists and organize community parties. All of which is done without any sort of profit. Annually, we have a Christmas party and a block party.

For the past two years, our block party has been located on Columbia Avenue. There never was an altercation, injury or any other type of incident during either of them. It is a great way to bring neighbors and people from all over town together just to hang out and enjoy the day with each other.

I have since moved from the Columbia block and cannot have the party there anymore, so I needed an alternative venue. During the winter this past year, I rented the armory building and had a celebration of the season there. Once again, there were zero altercations and everything went off without a hitch.

Therefore, I decided that this year we should hold the block party there. After some great cooperation from Kelly at the Whitefish Parks Department in early May, I had filled out all the necessary paperwork and the party was approved. I had fliers printed up to inform the community of the event, began receiving sponsorships from a few choice establishment such as Spirit Skate Shop, and had everything all planned out.

Karl Cozad, the city's new parks director, has 33 years of parks experience in California and Oregon. He has been our parks director for a very brief time since Dan Keyes stepped down. He is so concerned about his job, that he had to make it more difficult for me to attain permission for the event, so that he didn't "stub his toe on the first event of this type."

In short, he's more concerned about his job than the citizens of Whitefish, whom he is serving as a public official. In my opinion it is a disservice to the community to make such events more difficult to organize.

He did provide concerns to me. Liability was an issue. It seems that there is a huge difference between public parties and private parties. If I don't invite the public to come, then I don't have nearly as many hoops to jump through to have some fun.

Apparently, if I don't invite the town, then the city isn't liable, but if I do, then the city won't let me hold an event without liability insurance. Makes a lot of sense right?

He was also concerned about noise. The noise ordinance, which he wasn't at all familiar with, states that no noise considered a nuisance by a law official may continue during the hours of 10 p.m. to 8 a.m. I provided testimony that the police had been to both our previous parties, each in the middle of town, and did not consider the music to be a nuisance.

A third concern was alcohol. I instructed him that I would personally be checking IDs when people would attempt to enter our beer garden. The garden was to be separate from the rest of the area and fenced off. Once again, testimony was presented that I had performed this task in the past without any problems or worry from the police.

None of these concerns seem truly conclusive to keep me from holding an event built to bring the community together. We have fewer and fewer of these types of events occurring, and I fear it will only get worse with this type of obstructive bureaucracy. My friends, our culture is dwindling and the inability to organize an event to entertain the community as a whole isn't helping.

The block party will continue on a smaller scale at my home. It won't be the same, and we definitely won't have near as much space, but I can't let public officials who don't actually serve the people and their interests, get away with this. Let's bring the culture back, with or without the city's help.

Jason Callihan, of Chronic Don Productions, lives in Whitefish.