St. PETrick’s Day returns after reschedule by FOGAS

Community

ELLIJAY, Ga. – It may be the end of April, but citizens are still feeling the St. Patrick’s Day spirit as the Friends of Gilmer Animal Shelter (FOGAS) partnered with local animal shelters and raised money with the return of St. Petrick’s Day. The event saw cancellation earlier this year as inclement weather and snow moved in during the Saturday, March 12, event.

FOGAS

Sheriff’s Office K-9 units Arlo and Milo walk proudly in the St. Petrick’s Day Pet Parade.

Instead of allowing the event to fall victim to the same cancellations of the last two years due to COVID, the FOGAS board rescheduled the event. With a beautiful Saturday this weekend, the event kept its rescheduled date and saw new success with an increase in funds raised. According to FOGAS Vice-President Sylvia Harris, the event raised $2,600 for the Gilmer Animal Shelter and provided meetings and pet adoptions for those attending. Despite the reschedule. the fundraising saw an increase from the last time the event was held according to Harris.

With 25 vendors and booths set up for the festival, the celebrations continued into the afternoon with entertainment from Voltage Dance Factory’s competition team.

FOGAS

Grand Marshall, Denise Fleck, the Pet Crusade, leads the parade of pets through Ellijay on April 30, 2022.

An estimated 300 people attended the Saturday and many of those participated in the Best Dressed, Owner-Pet look-a-like, Most Unusual Pet, and Best Vocal Performance. However, it wasn’t just citizens attending the event. The Sheriff’s Office saw all three of its K-9 Units Milo, Arlo, and Novak joining the pet parade to show off the animal side of our law enforcement, an “invaluable” side of the office as Sheriff Stacy Nicholson stated last year when a grant saw new vests for two of the dogs.

Special guest Denise Fleck served as the parade’s Grand Marshall. Denise Fleck is an award-winning author & radio show host and animal care instructor who developed the curriculum for her Pet First-Aid & CPCR Classes after training with dozens of schools.

FOGAS

Locals and tourists alike brought pets to visit downtown during the 2022 St. PETrick’s day celebration after weather caused a reschedule from the March 12 original date.

She attended with Tico, an Akira breed dog that Harris said Fleck has previously adopted from Gilmer’s Animal Shelter. Harris stated that she had shared pictures of Tico with Fleck before and when she had visited Amicalola, she traveled into Gilmer to meet and adopt the dog.

With the success of the day’s events, Harris said that FOGAS has already begun talking about next year’s St. Petrick’s Day. However, she noted that with continuing issues over recent years in early March, they could be looking to keep a later event date and possibly looking to keep the event in April next year as well. She said that this is still early discussions and they have much planning to do but noted that due to this year’s reschedule they were not able to advertise the April date as much as they wanted.

The event was originally supported through a partnership with the Gilmer Chamber for advertising and inviting locals to celebrate their pets while also inviting tourists to bring their animals with them when they visit Ellijay. The event set up mainly on 1 Broad Street next to the courthouse and took over most of the downtown area as the parade traveled along North Main and the square before following down Dalton Street.

Leave a comment

Back to Top