Uncorked wine festival cancelled, organizers say

The Uncorked Wine and Food Festival set for Aug. 5,6,7 has been cancelled, according to the event's organizers.

Ian France owns the entertainment company responsible for the planned festival. He claims the Town of LaSalle wanted fees in excess of $40,000 to host the event in the town.

"The public works and the preparation for the park really put us over budget and unfortunately we looked at it over the weekend and we looked at making a fiscally responsible decision," France told CBC News. "A bill of $42,000 would put an event of this magnitude in jeopardy."

France said he'd planned to pay for costs for policing and firefighters, but other expenses from the public works department put the event over budget.

LaSalle Mayor Ken Antaya said the town's fees and stipulations for allowing the festival to take place were a matter of public safety. He added other large festivals in the municipality pay a similar amount.

"It's not something that the municipality intended to sabotage," Antaya said. "It just that is the cost of operating in the Town of LaSalle for that type of an event. We have no experience at it and we want to assure that it's not going to be subsidized by the town."

France declined to provide specific numbers on how much he'd be losing from the cancelled festival, but said it was a "significant enough" amount.

Any purchased tickets will be refunded and any registered participants in Sunday's 5K run/walk for cancer have been refunded.