Community Leaders Plan New Arts Festival to Replace State Patty’s Day

State Patty’s Day may soon be no more.

If everything falls into place the faux-holiday drink-a-thon could supplanted by a multi-day arts and music festival in a similar vein as summer’s Central Pennsylvania Festival of the Arts.

State College Borough Manager Tom Fountaine has helped fight the Penn State student-created, drinking-centric holiday for several years in his role as co-chair of the State Patty’s Day Task Force. He’s seen some success, with a consistent decrease in the number of participants over the last two years.

However, some of the tactics in place – such as paying various bars and taverns to shut down for the day – were never intended to be long-lasting or economically sustainable solutions, even with the help of university funds. He says the task force came to a realization as they held conversations with community members and local businesses — if they wanted to dismantle State Patty’s, they’d have to replace it with something else.

Enter THAW Fest: a new event with national and local bands, comedians and film screenings, combining aspects of major events like the Sundance Film Festival and the South By Southwest Arts Festival. THAW Fest will be held February 28 through March 1, the same weekend that the drinking holiday traditionally occurs.

“In a way, planning something like this is like jumping off a cliff every time,” says Arts Fest CEO Rick Bryant, who’s been helping plan the event. “You can do your research, you can know an artist is popular, but there’s always that leap of faith that the public will actually respond – especially for a first-time venture.”

Bryant’s has worked as a consultant on the project, lending his experience from running the ever-popular Arts Fest to the taskforce. Tim Crockett, manager of Levels Night Club, has been reaching out to a number of bands and performers to fill the stages over the two-and-a-half-day-long event.

Bryant says the lineup of performers isn’t solidified, but the process is ongoing and exciting.

The annual College Town Film Festival, now entering its third year, will compliment the live performances throughout the weekend, film fest organizer and Penn State professor Matt Jordan says. The film festival will start early, running Wednesday to Saturday, and will feature a combination of new films on the festival circuits and independent films.

“We’ve been making a lot of attempts to get some first run and pre-screening films, as wells to get the filmmakers associated with them,” Jordan says. “These can be a basis for really interesting conversations, and can educated people about how films are made and the importance of the medium. 

Fountaine envisions the THAW Fest to become an annual, permanent replacement for State Patty’s Day, but says the future of the event depends on the response this first year.

 “We think that this is a very positive event that could become a permanent fixture on the calendar,” Fountaine says. “If it turns out otherwise, we’ll reevaluate – but that is not our expectation.”