The Bloomington Board of Public Works passed a policy at a meeting Tuesday to move all large-scale events held in the streets to three designated festival areas. Advocates for the annual Fourth Street Festival of the Arts and Crafts, which is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year, attended the meeting in opposition.
Resolution 2026-01 requires all events with over 1,000 attendees to relocate to one of the designated festival areas: Kirkwood Avenue from Walnut to Indiana; Courthouse Square, Kirkwood to the south and 6th to the north; or the Trades District, Madison and Makers Way.
Eleven community members representing the Fourth Street Festival filed into the council chambers. They came with concerns about what the proposed policy would mean for the local art festival, which attracts 120 artists and thousands of attendees each Labor Day weekend.
Due to its 50th anniversary in 2026, the Board of Public Works already incorporated an exception into the policy so that the Fourth Street Festival can be held in its current location for one more year. However, advocates for the festival still had concerns.
Pamela Davidson has served on the board of the Fourth Street Festival for 25 years and attended the meeting with a printed list of concerns, including the impact to the Bloomington community.
“This change would destroy decades of carefully cultivated and costly marketing outreach and name recognition,” Davidson said. “How do we market Fourth Street on Fifth Street?”
Juliet Roberts, president of the Fourth Street Festival, also attended the meeting. She said she was concerned about the future of the festival.
“It really comes down to the stability of the festival, and, like, the perception of stability,” Roberts said. “It takes a really hard, a really long time to build up an art festival that artists see as viable and as a reliable use of their time and money.”
Other concerns from attendees included the lack of shade in hot summer months on Kirkwood Avenue and the business that the festival brings in for local restaurants on Fourth Street.
Special Projects and Operations Manager of Public Works Cassie Werne said that the policy has been developed over the past year in conversation with organizers of large-scale events in Bloomington, including Lotus Festival, Granfalloon and Taste of Bloomington.
Director of Public Works Adam Wason said that public safety was the main driver behind the policy, emphasizing throughout the meeting that the city does not intend to negatively impact the Fourth Street Festival. Wason identified public safety concerns, including mass shootings and risks from vehicles, that require clear plans from the city.
Wason said that there are 51 points of entry to the Fourth Street Festival that have to be barricaded to prevent vehicles driving into crowds. He said that temporary barricades have to be placed on Fourth Street that “do not provide the same level of safety” compared to barricades on Kirkwood Avenue.
“This is all about public safety and putting the public in the safest locations in the city,” Wason said. “We understand the restaurants are there. We want to still be good partners. We want your event to last for another 50 years, and we’re going to help you do that.”
The policy identifies plans that event organizers can follow for each of the three areas and is in collaboration with law enforcement and public safety officials. Werne said that this would streamline the event planning process and make fees for events consistent with the Bloomington Municipal Code, allowing the city to retain some of the costs incurred by street festivals.
Kyla Deckard, a member of the Board of Public Works, asked the board to consider passing the resolution as written but with the addition of a review in October or November of 2026 to consider whether the Fourth Street Festival will need to move in future years.
The policy passed with the addition.
