NEWBERRY — The Ag+Art Tour was a success, according to Michelle Long, executive director of the Newberry County Chamber of Commerce.
Long presented a report to Council on the Tour. County Council proved $10,000 seed money for the Ag+Art Tour.
“We were pretty successful when it came to some of the fund revenue. We had a total income of $26,625 and we had expenditures so far a little over $16,000, and ended up with a net gain of about $10,055,” she said.
Each of the six sites on the tour had a sign-in sheet and a person counting visitors, Long said they are still tallying up those numbers.
“Of course it is difficult to know who our repeats were, but we did have at least for two sites a total of 1,000 visitors. If that rings true for the remainder of the sites, had a total of six sites, that will surpass our 2,000 goal of visitors to Newberry County,” she said.
Long said that from all accounts, from the chefs, servers and attendees at the Farm to Table dinner, all the way to the Ag+Art Tour, they were all very pleased. She has received positive responses from visitors as well as the hosts, and the sponsors are pleased as well.
“Saturday we had the most visitors, but not much money spent. On Sunday they had fewer visitors, and far more money was being spent on the farms,” Long said. “This was a great experience. Was everything perfect, no. However we will figure out how to do better next year.”
Councilman Henry Livingston added that he thought the tour went wonderful. He visited all but two of the sites and said he felt like people were enjoying it.
He added that he spoke with several vendors, and they have made good contacts through the Ag+Art Tour.
Other business:
• Council approved the first reading of an ordinance to rezone 7.02 parcel from Single Family Residential to Rural. The parcel is located near Count Sausage Road, and the owner would like to rezone the property to permit horses, which are not outright permitted in the present zoning.
• Council approved the first reading of an ordinance to rezone an acre parcel from General Commercial to Single Family Residential. This rezoning would allow the owner to continue to use the property for residential purposes.