Farmingdale and Patchogue cancel New Year's Eve ball drop events
Farmingdale Village has canceled its New Year's Eve ball drop event. Credit: Marketing Masters NY
Patchogue has canceled its Midnight on Main Street New Year's Eve Celebration due to staffing issues and COVID concerns, a Chamber of Commerce official confirmed.
The decision was made Tuesday morning during a meeting of those involved in planning and staffing the event — it became clear that the event would be short-staffed on Friday, said Greater Patchogue Chamber of Commerce executive director David Kennedy. Many public safety agencies that were involved are suffering staff shortages due to COVID, he added.
"For us to hold an event like this without proper personnel, even without COVID, would have been a difficult thing to do," Kennedy said.
The decision was also made due to concerns of COVID, specifically the omicron variant. The celebration was expected to be large in size, Kennedy said.
The Greater Patchogue Chamber of Commerce will now livestream its annual "30 Days of Dining Raffle," which was supposed to take place at the event. Up for grabs are two baskets, each containing 30 gift cards for restaurants throughout Patchogue. The winners will be announced on the Chamber's Facebook Live broadcast on Friday at 4 p.m., Kennedy said.
"We’re just disappointed," he said. "We certainly apologize to those looking forward to this event, but we’re planning on bringing this back again next year and we're very hopeful that will happen."
Farmingdale also canceled its New Year's Eve ball drop event due to rising COVID concerns, the village mayor confirmed.
The ball rises to start the New Year with fireworks in Patchogue. Credit: Greater Patchogue/BennyMigliorino
Mayor Ralph Ekstrand said in a statement Monday that the board of trustees called off the event that was expected to take place on the Village Green Dec. 31 out of an abundance of caution given the current spike in COVID-19 cases.
"The health and safety of the community are most important to the board," he continued. "When situations permit, we look forward to continuing a robust program of community activities." Farmingdale last held its village ball drop in 2019.
Rachel Weiss joined Newsday in 2016. As a real estate/living multimedia reporter, Rachel writes feature stories and contributes to and appears in on-camera video packages. She was the lead reporter on Newsday’s LI Acts of Kindness series.
