Rainy weather blamed on lower attendance than predicted

By Sarah Cormier
C & G Staff Writer

MOUNT CLEMENS — The looming black clouds last Friday afternoon didn’t stop St. Clair Shores resident Diane Michael from planning a full day of fun at the Stars & Stripes Festival in downtown Mount Clemens.

Michael, along with her future daughter-in-law, son and their 15-month-old daughter — all visiting from Ohio — had already been out viewing many of the activities at the festival and were planning on checking out some of the concerts later on before heading nearby to view the fireworks.

“We got a whole bunch of people … and we are going to the fireworks,” she said, referring to other family members that were planning to meet up with the foursome later.

Celine Lanuzza, along with her two daughters and husband Tom, had enjoyed some of the rides at the carnival and were taking a break to eat some lunch before heading back out to enjoy the festivities.

“We always come down to all the art fairs and the festival,” said Lanuzza, who said that the family lives in Mount Clemens.

According to Joe Nieporte, producer with FunFest Productions, the company that puts on the Stars & Stripes Festival, about 350,000 visitors attended the event. Last year, around 300,000 were there.

“Everybody is kind of in agreement that it was slightly more than last year,” said Nieporte.

Rain all three days appeared to mar attendance, which was originally projected to reach about 500,000. Nieporte said that each day of the festival, there was bad weather in the morning.

“We got hit with rain the first two or three hours every day,” he said, adding that he felt the rain stopped them from meeting a “goal of half a million.”

Nieporte did say that despite lower-than-expected attendance levels, the company hasn’t heard any negative stories about the festival and considers the event a success.

“We thought the event went extremely well,” he said.

Vivian Powell, alumna of Mount Clemens High School and Ann Robinson, from Clinton Township, would probably agree.

They ate lunch in the city, then decided to saunter through the activities and see what was going on, all the while talking about what Mount Clemens looked like back in the day.

“We just wanted to reminisce,” said Robinson.

Powell said that the pair heard about the Stars & Stripes Festival and all of the activities going on and quickly decided that they wanted to be included in the action.

“We heard about all this nice stuff going on and decided to be a part of it,” she said.

Michael said that she sure is glad that she decided to come to the festival.

“This is awesome. Mount Clemens outdid themselves,” she said.

“I think everybody really had a good time,” agreed Nieporte.