THE battle for New Year’s Eve fireworks supremacy between Bathurst and Orange is taking a new twist with Orange’s Party Under The Stars in danger of becoming a fizzer.
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For years there has been parochial rivalry between the neighbouring cities over who can put on the biggest and best New Year’s Eve bash.
Bathurst’s neighbour has spent more than $50,000 a year on its shindig in recent years and has boasted of being the best, even suggesting Bathurst residents would be better off making the 45-kilometre drive west.
Real estate agency McCormack Barber has been the Orange event’s organiser and major sponsor, chipping in $25,000 every year since the Party Under The Stars kicked off in 2011.
Orange City Council has kicked in $30,000 a year and other sponsors have also chipped in, but this year the council has rejected a request for $20,000 from McCormack Barber.
It is instead offering $10,300 and the balance in in-kind support.
Organiser Peter McCormack said he would continue to seek funding, but there were two possible scenarios at the moment.
“Either the event won’t happen at all, or we will just have a fireworks display only,” he said.
He said the in-kind portion of the support was not necessary.
At this stage, Orange City Council is looking to see if it can find extra funds for the event.
Bathurst Regional Council’s Party In The Park at the Adventure Playground on New Year’s Eve has gone from strength to strength since it began in 2009 as an initiative of former mayor Paul Toole.
At the time, he said Bathurst had a gap in its New Year’s Eve celebrations and the opening of the $1 million adventure playground presented the ideal opportunity to use that venue as the base for festivities.
Orange played follow the leader a couple of years later and instigated an event of its own, splashing out $20,000 that year compared with Bathurst’s budget of $10,000.
However, the event is now big business and Bathurst Regional Council has allocated $52,500 in this year’s management plan for the Party In The Park, up from $51,200 in 2014.
Cr Greg Westman said he didn’t feel threatened by Orange.
Mr Toole said it was nice to see Bathurst’s event had become so popular, saying he would take Orange copying his idea as a compliment.