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4th of July Festival back in action for 2022

Cassie Denny taking over organizing Independence Day event

After a months-long search for a new organizer, Havre's Fourth of July Festival and Community Picnic is back on track for 2022 after two years away due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Havre resident and business owner Cassie Denny is now organizing the event in the wake of The Fourth of July Festival and Community Picnic Planning Committee losing two key members in Allen "Woody" Woodwick and committee chairperson Sherri Simonson, who left the committee earlier this year.

Last month, Woodwick and Simonson said the event was at risk of being canceled entirely because no one had stepped up, but Simonson said Monday that Denny got in touch with her and Woodwick a couple weeks ago and they've since been getting everything organized for this year.

She said they are still putting together the band performances, but pretty much everything else has been set up.

The celebration started in 2001 with a parade down Fifth Avenue and since has expanded to a major celebration in Pepin Park on Independence Day with food, music and companionship.

Denny said she heard the committee was looking for a new organizer on Facebook a few weeks ago.

She said she'd taken a six-month break from Facebook but when she got back on recently she saw the Havre Area Chamber of Commerce was looking for someone to take over the event and she reached out.

"It's something that I'd love to be involved with," she said.

Denny said events like this are fairly new to her, but she wants to be involved in the community and is excited to be part of the event.

She said she's thinking about possible additions to the event in the coming years, but for now she feels it's best to get familiarized with how the event has been run in the past and get a year of experience under her belt before thinking about any changes.

Simonson said this year's event will begin at noon July 4 at Pepin Park with a flag ceremony and the national anthem followed by food at 12:15 or 12:20 p.m.

She said people should bring their own chairs to the event.

 

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