Orange : High Insurance Cost Imperils Street Fair

The Orange International Street Fair, an annual Labor Day weekend celebration that drew 350,000 people last year, may be scaled down or canceled because of the high cost of liability insurance the city would have to buy for the fair.

Bob Paul, president of International Street Fair Inc., organizer of the event, said one insurance company has estimated the cost of insuring the event at $25,000. Only one other company still insures such events, Paul said, and the organization is waiting for its estimate.

The City Council, which held a public hearing Tuesday night on the issue, has been concerned about liability since the city withdrew from an insurance pool last year and has gone without insurance ever since.

Councilman Don Smith, who is a member of the city’s street fair committee, said in a report to the council last month that the council could either: cancel the fair altogether; hold the fair but forbid the sale of alcohol; limit the fair’s participants to Orange residents or buy special insurance coverage just for the weekend.

Smith said he believes that everyone on the council wants to hold the fair, which for the last 13 years has featured performing groups and international foods.