Merritt Mountain Makeover

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Merritt music festival changes tune
John Colebourn, The Province
Published: Wednesday, September 19, 2007
It's a hurting song the party animals at the annual Merritt Mountain Music Festival do not want to hear.

Organizers of the hugely successful July music festival in Merritt yesterday said Campground C, the area of legendary debauchery since the event began 15 years ago, will be closed.

Bowing to what they called changing demographics, organizers said Campground C will be more low-key with noise curfews, designated camp spots and zero tolerance for naked women and all-night hell-raisers.


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Merritt Mountain Music Festival vice-president Lynn Robertson and manager Claude Lelievre announce big changes yesterday to the annual event at a news conference in Vancouver.
Jason Payne, The Province

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Font: ****Tent City, the other place on the festival site where people party hard, is to be turned into a golf course and resort complex.

At a news conference announcing the changes, Lynn Robertson, vice-president of Active Mountain Entertainment, the company that puts on the event, said out-of-control partiers caused headaches for festival organizers and the RCMP.

In the changes, Campground C will have 1,500 camp sites that will have to be reserved before the event. In the next three years, Robertson said the plan is to have permanent washrooms and even misting stations "to make it a pleasant place without all the dust."

Campground C was each year the talk of the festival, with people bringing in things like hot tubs, refrigerators, couches, dance floors and kegs of beer.

"The festival has gone through a lot of evolution and the timing is right to get back to our roots," said Robertson.

"Perhaps there is a small portion that will miss the party. They are still welcome but we just have a few different rules."

Festival operations manager Claude Lelievre said despite RCMP getting a steady stream of calls due to drunkenness and disorder in Tent City and Campground C, "there was no pressure" to boot out the rowdies.

He said Campground C did not live up to its reputation this year: "Campground C this year was quite toned down."

Ticket sales next summer are to be cut off at 12,000. This past July about 18,000 people bought tickets.

Despite reducing the number of tickets sold, organizers said they still plan on getting top-name acts.

City of Merritt Coun. Elmer Reimer said the changes are "a positive thing for the festival." He said one of the concerns residents had was the damage to the Coldwater River and the fish habitat with so many people going into the water.

"Campground C had a reputation for being a bit wild," he said. "So in terms of the quality of the music festival it can only help."

Among the worst years for problems at the festival was 1999, when RCMP arrested 75 people.