Community member Harris Mills made what he may have thought was a very simple request of the Grand Marais Park Board at its regular meeting May 3, 2011, but he did not get a simple answer. Mills said that he plays guitar and sings mellow, ballad-type music and asked if he could do so in Harbor Park this summer – with his guitar case open or a hat set out for donations by passersby.
Mills realized that because he would be accepting donations, he would need a permit. He planned to play mostly during the supper hour on weekends. Musicians perform music in this way in Duluth’s Canal Park, he said.
Park Manager Dave Tersteeg said that musicians must audition to play in Canal Park. Board member Bill Lenz said he didn’t want to “open up a can of worms” and create a competitive situation with other musicians. Tracy Benson said oversight could get complicated if other musicians wanted to do the same thing but requested electricity for amplification. To allow this, she said, she thought the park board would need to create more structure.
Board Chair Walt Mianowski said an alternative would be to play in front of a private business (this would require permission of the business owner). The board talked about arranging performance schedules with a booking agent such as the North Shore Music Association or the Cook County Visitors’ Bureau.
Tersteeg said he would investigate the issue and let the board know what he finds out.
Street performers are also known as buskers, and laws regarding them address everything from panhandling to peddler’s permits and vary from city to city. Some cities allow buskers but require vendor permits if people want to sell merchandise such as CDs or amplify their sound.
The online encyclopedia Wikipedia attributes to actor George Burns the following quote on experiences as a busker: “Sometimes the customers threw something in the hats. Sometimes they took something out of the hats. Sometimes they took the hats.”
Painful choosing bid
The board labored over which of two electric businesses would be awarded a contract to upgrade 14 sites to 50-amp service. Nordic Electric’s bid was $301 less than a bid from David Bartz and Jonathan Hedstrom.
“We have an excellent relationship with Nordic,” Tersteeg said, “but we try to maintain relationships with others.”
“It’s a tough job when you deal with people,” Mianowski said. “I know all these people, and they’re all good workers.”
The board decided to go with the lower of the two bids and will forward to the city council its recommendation to hire Nordic Electric.
As the budget allows, a total of 20 sites in one area will be upgraded to meet the needs of large RVs. The city council had already approved hiring SEH to do the design work and Edwin E. Thoreson Inc. to install sewer lines. The existing sites with sewer hookups have always filled up, Tersteeg said.
In other business
The park officially opened May 2. Two seasonal residents were already in the park and at the May park board meeting. Tersteeg reported that two people were hired to clean bathhouses out of a pool of 20 applicants.
Overall use of the Grand Marais Municipal Pool is up over last year at this time, and most of the increased use is from local residents.
Kayla Gotchie’s water fitness classes brought a combined total of 218 people to the pool in April.
Summer pool hours start Friday, May 27 – Memorial Day weekend. Hours will be 7:00-11:00 a.m. for adult swim Monday through Friday and open swim noon to 9:00 p.m. Friday and Saturday and noon to 8:00 p.m. Sunday through Thursday.
Gunflint Hills Golf Course is now open. Manager Mike Kunshier reported that despite the cold weather and the fact that it’s “a little wet up there,” he anticipated golfers soon.
Tersteeg said work is underway preparing the harbor for boating. Mianowski said it sure doesn’t feel like summer is close — it doesn’t even feel like spring is here! He called it “one day of spring, two days of winter!”
The board granted permits for three summer festivals: Grand Marais Arts Festival (July 9 and 10), Dragon Boat Festival (July 29-31), and WTIP Radio Waves Music Festival (September 10-11).
Dragon Boat organizers Sherri Moe and Karl Hansen commended park staff for all the hard work and time they put into this event. Hansen said it couldn’t happen without all the volunteer time Park Manager Dave Tersteeg puts in during the dragon boat races each year.
The park’s new website design at grandmaraisrecreationarea.com will be easier for office staff to update, Tersteeg said. It includes “lots of fun photos,” he said, and has a great map of the campsites.
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