Photo by Kazuend
Our featured event this summer is a great big family picnic, and you’re invited! Celebrate this 250th birthday of the US of A in joyful, classic style: eating delicious summer food, dancing to live music, and watching the sky light up with glorious colors after the sun goes down. It’s pure, light-hearted fun, backed up with a serious purpose: proceeds from this party will feed the hungry.
July 4th, after all, is a time to gather, celebrate, and enjoy being together. It’s a holiday that’s long been beloved here in the Hudson Valley.
Fireworks at the Ulster County Fairgrounds will be hosted by Local at Heart New Paltz, a nonprofit that steps up when food pantries have needs to fill in gaps, providing a renovation here, a fridge there, a batch of reusable bags or transport carts, or the funds that can make a stretched budget work out. The leadership had an itch to do something big and splashy for a 10th anniversary celebration.
“Connie [Harkin, Local at Heart’s vice president] said it first,” Local at Heart President Craig Shankles says. “We were tossing ideas around, and she said, ‘I KNOW IT’S A BIG LIFT, BUT WHAT IF WE DID THE 4TH OF JULY?’”
fourth of july family picnic & fireworks
Location: Ulster County Fairgrounds, New Paltz, NY
Date: July 4, gates open at 5 PM
Admission: $5 per person
• Free for children under 10
Parking: Free Arrive via Route 44/55 (Gardiner side) to avoid traffic on Route 299
What to Expect: Live music (5 local acts)
• Food trucks & beer garden
• Kids’ zone (games, water play, sensory-safe area)
• Crafts, puppet shows,
• face painting
• Car show
• Local vendors
• Fireworks at dusk
Fireworks: By Santore’s World Famous Fireworks
Hosted By: Local at Heart New Paltz (nonprofit supporting local food pantries)
Why It Matters: All proceeds help feed the hungry in our community
Sensory safe zone
Carnival games
Water tag
Good food, good music, and fireworks for a great cause.
Shankles knew the minute he heard it that he could make it happen; as one of the directors of the New Paltz Chamber of Commerce, he’d raised money for the Fairgrounds fireworks for years. “I’m a good beggar,” he says. “I ran a profitable company [PDQ Printing, a onetime staple of the New Paltz Plaza] for 30 years, and Mama raised me right, so I always knew you have to give back. And Connie is a genius, because people long for this. I’ve seen it on community social media. People want New Paltz to have fireworks again.” Board members Linda Engler, owner of Ad Essentials and Barbara Londa, owner of Gunks EcoLodge were also fully committed to making it happen.
“We’re going to have earplugs for people who don’t like loud bangs,” Harkin says. “And we’ll have a whole interactive kids’ area, with water tag if it’s a hot day, free carnival games, a sensory safe zone, just all sorts of fun—Dedrick’s stepped up to sponsor that part.”
“We want to amaze you and feed hungry folks. So we’re working with Santore’s World Famous Fireworks. They'll be exquisite.”
O’Connor and Partners LLC stepped up as the major fireworks sponsor. “We couldn’t offer this to the community without their support and monetary contribution,” said Shankles. “You would be very surprised at how expensive an event like this is to put together. So we are very grateful to Joe O’Connor, his partners and all our sponsors.”
Once Local at Heart started getting the word out, everybody wanted to come to the picnic. There will be five great local musical acts, lots of food trucks, a beer garden, a crafting center, puppet shows, face painting, a karate demo, a car show, a variety of local vendors, and the aforementioned kids’ zone, with features like inflatable archery, giant lawn games, and slime making.
“Let’s get together for a hotdog and a beer, or a salad and some lemonade, whatever you like,” Shankles says. “Forget politics for one Saturday night; forget about all our problems, and let’s just enjoy each other, because it is We the People, after all, and we're all in this together.”
Live music by Soul Purpose
Inflatable archery
Carnival games
Carnival games
MyKK Imagine gaming trailer
