Jack Frost planning underway

By TOM LAVENTURE

[email protected]

Ironwood — The Ironwood Area Chamber of Commerce has started planning for the 2021-2022 Jack Frost Festival, according to a report to the Downtown Ironwood Development Authority on Thursday. 

The Jack Frost Festival page on the chamber website has the seasonal calendar of events from Nov. 18 through Jan. 29, 2022, said Michael Meyer, chamber director. The events listed are verified as being planned with the organizers and more will be added as they are confirmed, he said. 

“There will be more events, because I have several iffy’s out there which people are thus far, unwilling to commit to,” Meyer said.

The website contains the registration forms to have a float in the Jack Frost Festival of Lights Parade downtown at 6 p.m. Dec. 4. The deadline to register is Nov. 30. Other forms for the business decorating contest and other activities will be online in the near future.

Northwind Natural Foods Co-Op at 116 S. Suffolk St., will serve as the official Jack Frost ticket headquarters and will sell the 50/50 raffle tickets. The store is open daily, where the chamber office in the depot is not. 

“That’s going to really help with the convenience of people to be able to walk in, because I’m not always there at the chamber on Sunday,” Meyer said. 

The chamber’s annual Fall Social had a low turnout with only 37 people attending to hear guest speaker John McHugh, director of public relations and training for Kwik Trip. The company has around 28,000 employees at more than 700 locations. 

“I was rather crushed by this,” Meyer said. “But I did learn a valuable lesson about how things are here.”

There were business people in attendance which made the event worthwhile, he said. The feedback on McHugh’s talk was that he provided an important message about employee-employer relationships, and on business relationships with the community, he said.

“The whole concept of being more than a store just selling bananas and gas, but having an important impact in the social life of the community, and assisting community members as well,” Meyer said. “It was really an excellent presentation and so many people needed to hear that message and so many people were not there.”

The planning for the chamber’s Ironwood City Commissioner Candidates Forum is underway, he said. So far three of the eight candidateshave responded to attend. 

If the forum doesn’t have most or all candidate participation then it won’t be held, Meyer said. The forum is meant to help the community understand the candidates and the issues and so would not serve its purpose with partial participation, he said.

Mayor Annette Burchell, who serves on the DIDA committee, said Meyer shouldn’t allow a low turnout at the recent event to diminish the importance of the work. She encouraged the chamber to hold the candidate forum. 

“Just because I think that you would get more last minute participation,” Burchell said. “I think it’s just so important for our electorate to have that opportunity and that information. For those that don’t show up, I think it’s a reflection, slightly.”

There are days reserved to hold the event at Gogebic Community College should the event go forward, he said. 

The chamber has a new intern. Ella Darrow, a senior at Luther L. Wright High School, who is also taking courses at GCC. 

“She is exceedingly bright and knows her way around a computer,” Meyer said. “She is very helpful and she’s already taken charge of a couple of planning meetings.”

In other chamber news, the volunteer fair is tentatively rescheduled for Nov. 13. The event had been planned for mid September but was postponed.

The DIDA downtown lighting subcommittee met recently regarding holiday decorations, he said. The members discussed the improvements to downtown over 2021 and the adjustments that would be required for lighting this holiday season. 

For people who did not get the opportunity to view “Route To Elsewhere,” a documentary film partially filmed in Ironwood that premiered as part of recent Emberlight Festival, there is work to hold another screening sometime in November at the Historic Ironwood Theatre, he said. The premier was well attended and there was good feedback, he said. 

“They really, really liked it and I thought it had a powerful message,” Meyer said.