Tag: BID
Riverhead has long been compared to Patchogue in the eyes of many, heralded as the next area in Suffolk to blossom into a fully revitalized and vibrant downtown.
Riverhead has long been compared to Patchogue in the eyes of many, heralded as the next area in Suffolk to blossom into a fully revitalized and vibrant downtown.
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There were plenty of frights in Riverhead for the start of the Edgar Allan Poe Festival. (Credit: Katharine Schroeder)
The Edgar Allan Poe Festival looks like it will be doing an encore next year around Halloween.
Riverhead Town Board members discussed the possibility of doing the festival again next year at their work session Thursday with Sal St. George, who organized the event, and Ray Pickersgill, the president of the Business Improvement District Management Association, which sponsored it. (more…)
WaterFire in Providence, R.I.. Credit: Oko Zoko
Light up the Peconic!
A plan to bring “WaterFire” to downtown Riverhead could be in the works. WaterFire Riverhead, as it’s being billed, is a based on similar WaterFire displays around the world — the nearest being in Providence, R.I. — that feature bonfires on waterways while other artistic displays and performances take place around them. (more…)
Sal St. George making his Edgar Allan Poe Festival pitch to business leaders in Riverhead Town Hall Wednesday. (Credit: Tim Gannon)
Port Jefferson has hosted a Charles Dickens Festival around Christmastime for the past 13 years. And now, the man who has been instrumental in the success of that event, wants to do something similar in downtown Riverhead: an Edgar Allan Poe Festival. (more…)
The sample rink will be set up at 117 East Main Street. (Credit: Barbaraellen Koch)
A synthetic ice rink is coming to downtown Riverhead next week.
But don’t head to Dick’s Sporting Goods to pick up that new pair of skates just yet. (more…)
The Riverhead indoor Farmers’ Market is located at 117 East Main Street. Barbaraellen Koch photo.
Less than three weeks after the Riverhead Farmers Market kicked off on East Main Street, it’s already outgrown its space. By far.
“We have a waiting list of 60 vendors,” said Ray Pickersgill, president of the Business Improvement District, and one of the key organizers in the weekend market — along with Community Development Director Christine Kempner and Browder’s Birds proprietor Holly Browder.
Beyond looking for excess space, Mr. Pickersgill — co-owner of downtown’s Robert James Salon — said at Wednesday night’s BID meeting that right now, he’s hoping to extend the market with the help of the two.
“If we could continue it all year, there are enough farmers who are looking to do it,” Mr. Pickersgill said.
While the BID has hosted a farmers market in the past on Saturdays, Mr. Pickersgill said on Thursday that having Ms. Browder on board, as a member of the Long Island Farm Bureau, has been key in gaining momentum for this season’s winter market, which is expected to wrap up in mid-May.
The market got its legs after Ms. Kempner ran into her old neighbor, Ms. Browder. The poultry farmer told Ms. Kempner that the winter market she went to previously, in Sag Harbor, had shut down this season. Coordinating with Mr. Pickersgill, it didn’t take long until they got enough vendors to fill out a market in downtown Riverhead.
Held at 117 East Main St. each Saturday from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m., the market currently hosts 30 vendors in the 8,000-square-foot building downtown that previously housed Swezey’s department store.
The BID is paying $3,000 for 18 weeks in the current location. The building next to it, which was once Swezey’s, is owned by Eli Mizrahi, who is seeking $8,000, Mr. Pickersgill said, indicating that they can’t afford that.
Also at Wednesday night’s meeting, members of the BID management association said that — after first bringing the idea up in 2011 — they are still pursuing putting a skating rink downtown.
Mr. Pickersgill floated the idea of making the rink a pavilion, adding that sliding glass panels and heaters on the ceiling could be installed in the winter to host the farmers market
The Riverhead Town Board approved a resolution Tuesday to petition the Business Improvement District Management Association to hire its current president, Ray Pickersgill, as executive director, for a salary of no more than $6,000 for 2104. (more…)
