MEDINA, Ohio – With more than 100 events taking place in Uptown Park at the gazebo each year, the city is considering some updates to regulations regarding these gatherings.
Parks and Recreation Director Jansen Wehrley explained that the city’s fee structure is currently based upon the size of the gathering at Uptown Park.
“There is a wedding and gathering rate that is for events with 100 to 200 people, a small event rate for events with 201 to 500 people and a large event rate for events with 500 people or more,” Wehrley said. “There are also tiers which include a resident or nonprofit rate as opposed to a non-resident or corporation rate. There have been some challenges to the definition of a corporation so we are looking into changing ‘corporation’ to ‘for profit’ in our fee structure.”
Werhley said the second proposed change has to do with event insurance. He said the city has always asked event hosts if they have event insurance, but it has never been a requirement to host an event at Uptown Park. Wehrley said he spoke with Law Director Greg Huber as well as a representative from the city’s insurance company.
“We talked about the number of events and the size of the events we have and the representative said some cities require event insurance and some don’t,” Wehrley said. “After talking with Greg, we decided it would be a good idea to implement this requirement for small and large events, but not for wedding sized gatherings. We felt it would be appropriate to have the same language and limitations as we require of sports associations.”
Wehrley estimated that roughly 60 percent of the organizations that host events on the square such as Main Street Medina and many church organizations, already have event insurance and added that hosts can obtain event insurance for a nominal fee.