Ornaments on Parade canceled this year

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Ornaments on Parade canceled this year

County News

Friday, 30 November 2012 15:33

By Ken Jackson

Staff Writer
If the blocks of downtown Kissimmee along Broadway looks a little less festive this holiday season than in the past it isn’t because the Grinch stole anything.
The Ornaments on Parade program, which featured decorative wooden ornaments lining the grassy median and gracing storefronts in downtown Kissimmee and raised funds for cancer research, is taking this year off.
Former Kissimmee City Commissioner Jerry Gemskie, the program’s driving force, is traveling up north this year for the holidays, concluding a very long year for him.
“I’m taking a Christmas vacation,” he said, as he’s had standing plans to visit family in the Chicago area this year. “I told the (Downtown Business Association) board I’d help in whatever way I could, but this year, it’s just too much.”
Gemskie ran and lost in the Republican primary for the district 1 Board of County Commissioners seat in August then saw his 10-year tenure on the Kissimmee City Commission end due to term limits.
The program had run rather successfully for seven holiday seasons, raising more than $15,000 since Gemskie and then-City Manager Mark Durbin came up with the idea.
“I pitched something like this to him and he asked me, ‘Do you have any ideas that don’t cost us anything?’” Gemskie said. “It’s been a good advertising tool for the businesses.
“When the schools had them, kids wanted to bring their parents to see their ornaments, and it brought new people to downtown. In January when we would display them at City Hall, it’s the most viewed art we’d have there all year.”
But those who like to be put in a festive mood when strolling and shopping the downtown area should not fret, as Kissimmee Main Street is planning something in its place while the ornament program is on what is hoped to be just a one-year hiatus.
The Main Street group is working to paint holiday art on storefront windows along Broadway. Executive Director Kelly Trace and her team did a test painting Tuesday night at Gallery One Artists at Main and Darlington streets, more as a test to make sure the right acrylic paint was being used on the windows. A few more locations will be painted, starting today at 9 a.m.
The Main Street Design Committee, with designs created by art student from Osceola and Gateway High Schools and the Osceola County School for the Arts, is heading up the work.
“Since this is the first year we’re doing this we want to smart small,” she said. “If we start today we’ll have all of the windows done in time for the holiday parade (Dec. 8).”
While excited to work on a new project, Trace, a lifelong Kissimmee resident, had gotten used to seeing the ornaments annually. And she isn’t the only one, she said.
“I am a little sad we won’t see them this year,” she said. “We’ve had people calling the office and asking about them.”