MW Crazy Water Festival on the horizon
Oct. 4—MINERAL WELLS — A city would be crazy to ask its residents what they want their hometown to look like next year —or in 20 years.
Welcome to Mineral Wells, where folks enjoying the 42nd Crazy Water Festival will get the chance to do just that.
"The best ideas come from when everyone has input," Friends of the Festival member Carol Elder said of the plan to take input from people who don't often get asked for urban development advice. "And the best ideas can come from people who never have any input."
Elder was referring to the Activation Opportunity, a crazy phrase for a professional survey which will be the public's first opportunity to add ideas to a 20-year comprehensive plan the city council has hired consultants to map out.
Planners are banking that residents, visitors and returning sons and daughters will stop along NW First Avenue, behind the Crazy Water Hotel, and contribute their own vision for Crazy Town.
That's in between feasting their eyes on Crazy Chalk Art as it's made, just plain feasting at more than 20 food vendors, feeding their inner axle addict on vintage cars, taking the kids to a nutty bounce obstacle course in the Crazy Kids Area, tossing some Crazy Cornhole or sailing high on the inaugural voyages of the new Crazy Ferris Wheel.
Set from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday in downtown Mineral Wells, the Crazy Water Festival was established on the premise that a festival can benefit local nonprofit groups. The Center of Life, Backpack Buddies (school meal program) and other local helping organizations will staff the booths beneath the sycamore trees along the festival's stretch of NW First Avenue, also known as Historic Norwood Boulevard, and beyond.
"They get to use those as their fundraiser," Elder said. "The Crazy Water Festival celebrates, just, the heritage of Mineral Wells and its mineral water history and how it evolved from the days in 1877 when the mineral waters were discovered"
Speaking inside the Famous Mineral Water Co., where those crazy — and many say, healing — mineral waters have been tapped since 1904, Elder was enthusiastic about another first at the annual soiree — the Activation Opportunity.
Festival attendees strolling along NW First Avenue will encounter "a series of activity stations," according to planning consultants Kimley-Horn, offering several avenues for their input into the city's future.
There will be interviews with the consultants, photo boards and other places to write down ideas for the future of that specific block of city history and beyond — for parks , mobility, public safety, entertainment, what grocery stores they want to lure to town.
"And also just on the 'everyday' — how that public space will interact with people for, like, walking or park space," Elder said. "It's a space for the public, so you want it to reflect their ideas."
City Manager Dean Sullivan was crazy like a fox as he emphasized two things when pitching the 20-year plan to city council members — it will produce improvements which can be started immediately as well as implemented long-range, and that public input to the plan will be critical.
"Mineral Wells' Comprehensive Plan is an opportunity for all who have an interest in Mineral Wells, Texas, to help share her future," Sullivan said this week.
Later opportunities to contribute ideas to the 20-year plan are in planning stages.
Elder urged those interested in Mineral Wells' future — one which has taken an upturn in recent years — to use it or lose it when it comes to input opportunities that kick off with the festival.
"We're real excited about the Activation Opportunity that is just another step in the whole revitalization of Mineral Wells," she said. "It's your opportunity to let your voice be heard."
The insanely good times actually begin Thursday night when two acts take the stage at Texas Frontier Trails Park, 103 NE First Street. The kickoff concert features Kaitlin Butts and The Great Divide. Tickets are $30 per person and the purchase of four tickets comes with a free parking pass to sidestep that $10 fee.
Children 2 years and younger get in for free.
Gates open at 5:30 p.m. There is no reserved seating, and music lovers are encouraged to bring blankets and chairs. Food trucks will be onsite.
Music will fill the air from two downtown stages throughout Saturday.
The Main Stage at the Famous Water Co. Gardens, 209 NW Sixth St., will get noisy at 10 .am. with Jimmy Baldwin, followed by Ragland, Ryan Wilcox and the Sunday Shakes and The Vandoliers.
Music takes the Street Stage, at First Christian Church a block to the west, at 11 a.m. Acts are Joe & Joe, Tho & the Fort Worth Song Writers, Roger Moore and Richard Hausman.
"All the musicians this year have the best musical lineup that we've ever had," Elder said.