Ten different musical acts across two stages. Two “food pods” of ubiquitous local truck vendors like Hearth and Soul Pizza and Cousins Maine Lobster. Tribal belly dancing. A classic car show.
This is the Oak Grove Festival. In its sixth year, and twice as big as it was last year, the event saw visitors in the hundreds crowd into downtown Oak Grove on sunny June 29.
“Every year we try to get feedback from attendees to say, ‘What do you want more of? What worked? What didn't work?’” said Eleanor Hunter, one of the event organizers. “We're always working to increase the infrastructure of the festival, to create a community, sort of identity building and community building in the area.”
Most of the over 100 vendors are local. Local people. Local businesses. They used to have large information booths. A lot of them. Now they’re smaller and fewer in response to visitor requests for more entertainment.
The festival is put on by a group of business owners and community members known as Historic Downtown Oak Grove, or HDOG. They received their nonprofit status in 2018 with an eye toward bringing awareness and community interest to historic downtown Oak Grove. They accomplish this through community revitalization efforts and events, like the festival
“We always have the North Clackamas Parks and Rec district come to do all sorts of children's area activities,” Hunter said. “The sheriff comes by and does stuff. The fire department has come earlier. They bring the fire truck and hand out the wonderful little plastic hats and stickers for the kids and everything like that. All sorts of wonderful stuff. We make sure that we cater to all different ages."
North Clackamas Parks and Recreation District took over an entire corner for the “Kids Zone” that included a magic show, ballon animals, cotton candy, crafts and more.
Local magician Stefano Iaboni, a transplant from Rome, Italy, spends much of his time teaching others through comedy as a team-building trainer. At the festival, his performance shone in the faces of the children watching and engaging as he threw an invisible ball into the air and “caught” it in a paper bag. How he got the bag to appear to have something heavy dropped into it is still a mystery – but the kids joined in without question, tossing the invisible ball they’d been handed only to see it hit the bottom of the bag as Iaboni “caught” it.
“Just a little magic. Just a little entertainer for everybody,” Iaboni said. “I just want to say thank you, everybody, for being here and enjoy this lovely day. It's such a beautiful, warm, sunny day. I'm so glad to be here.”
As for North Clackamas Parks and Recreation District, it is in the process of updating a 20-year plan for the district. The system plan requires input to effectively serve the community, so NCPRD staff passed out little orange stickers for participants to provide community input on parks, facilities, programs and services by placing stickers near the picture and description of their preferred choice displayed on easels in front of the booth. They also passed out cards with QR codes to scan and a website to visit in case people weren’t interested in the stickers.
“We're asking for community input on what residents would like to see over the next 20 years out of their parks and recreation parks, facilities, programs and services,” said Erin Reome, principal planner with NCPRD. “This is a great way to connect with the Oak Grove community and beyond.”
The festival is just one event put on by HDOG. They also have a “Trunk-Or-Treat” event in which participants sign up for a spot and decorate the trunk of their car, wear costumes and pass out candy to around 1,000 children, as well as the “Oak Grove Winter Gala” that offers hot drinks, charcuterie cups and merriment.
The Oak Grove Festival, like other HDOG events, is about building community and increasing the vibrancy of the area. HDOG works with other community organizations to help people discover a network of service providers.
“A lot of the kids who go to (a) new urban high school, they don't have stable home lives. They don't always have enough food,” Hunter said. “One of the things we try to do is help connect those dots, so our community is a resource for our fellow community residents, and it's a wonderful thing to see that happening and more and more connections being made.”
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