Mission
Downtown Newark’s Events Committee has been working on improving existing events and adding new events for downtown since the beginning of the DNP in 1998. Each event, however, brings forth its own leaders, responsibilities, challenges and tasks, and therefore, the Events Committee is actually composed of several Ad Hoc Planning Committees, one for each major Downtown Newark Partnership event. The Ad Hoc Committees are:
- Restaurant Week Committee
- Food and Brew Fest Committee
- Main Street Mile Committee
- Taste of Newark Committee
- Wine and Dine Downtown Committee
All of the members of these committees are considered part of the Partnership’s Events Committees for the year they participate. The separate committees each have unique committee members and meeting times.
Events not listed as having committees, such as Newark Nite, Community Day, the Spring Concert Series, Halloween Parade, and Winterfest are handled by the City of Newark’s Parks and Recreation Department, with some assistance from the DNP. The City Parks and Recreation Department does an outstanding job each year of organizing these special events with their own group of volunteers. The help of this dedicated group of volunteers and capable staff allows the Partnership staff and Ad Hoc Committees to focus on creating new events and improving the events, which they plan. The result is a full calendar of diverse, fun and well-run events!
Also another extremely successful event – the 6th Annual Newark Film Festival was held at the Newark Cinema Center in the Newark Shopping Center, September 23 – 30, 2010. This year’s Festival; featured 100 screenings of 25 films – and boasted record attendance. The Newark Film Festival is planned by Barry Schlecker, with the assistance of others. Downtown Newark is proud to host this fabulous film event in Newark. And for the second year in a row has received a 30 second commercial to from an independent filmmaker for our ad campaigns through event sponsorship. What a great deal for downtown Newark! Not only do we get to host this popular cultural event in our community, reaping the economic benefit of hundreds of visitors, but we also get tools to continue our promotional efforts!
