Archive: Around Town

Lansing Harbor FestivalIMPORTANT MESSAGE: With Lansing Harbor Festival postponed due to the daminging storm Friday, the organizers are hoping that most or all of the entertainers will be available for the September 1 date.  We'll have an updated lineup for you in the next issue of the Star.

If you weren't thinking of going to the first annual Lansing Harbor Festival Saturday, think again -- the day promises to be full of music, food, and fun.  The festival will take over the entirety of Myers Park from 10am through 8pm on August 25th, and you should plan to come early and leave late.  Admission is free, and there is plenty of parking, with overflow parking at the Lansing schools and shuttle busses running between the parking lots and the park all day.

Plan to be at the new Band Stand for your favorite bands.  The day starts off at 10am with the Lansing High School Cabaret.  At noon the Ithaca Concert Band will be playing, followed by Tom Knight and the Blue Moon playing in their distinctive swing style at 2pm.  Backtalk Band will be rocking and rolling at 4pm with their huge repertoire of Motown, Classic Rock and Roll, Rythm and Blues, Jazz and Swing.  The Burns Sisters complete the lineup with a concert at 6pm.


While the music lineup is impressive, there will be plenty to do throughout the day.  Be sure to come hungry, because the Lansing Lions Club, The Cinnamon Shoppe, The Lost Dog Cafe, North East Pizza, Wok Village, The Elizabeth Restaurant, and Ice Cream by Dick Brecht will all be serving in the food vendor's area near Pavillion B.

The musicians will become a little piece of Lansing History, as they will be the first bands to perform on the new band stand.  The gazebo is a gift to the Town of Lansing by the Lansing Lion's Club, which not only raised the money to build the structure, but actually built it with volunteer labor by club members and well wishers.  While the band stand isn't 100% finished, it has received a temporary permit so that the Harbor Festival bands can inaugurate it.  In the future it will be used for the Park Department's concert series as well as other public and private events.


More than 35 local vendors are lined up, with diverse offerings from Amish furniture to health and nutritional products, from alpacas to hand made pottery, flowers, and Tupperware.  Tompkins County Solid Waste plans a booth, as does the Lansing Community Library Center, Lansingville Ladies Auxiliary, and Lansing Housing Authority.  Lansing Chiropractic, Wood Wind Sundries, and Francine Designing Jewelry are among the many businesses that will be represented.  Retired Lansing 6th Grade English Teacher Judy Hinderliter will have plenty of games for kids at the Youth Activities Pavilion, right next to the food vendors.

One of the highlights of the day will be the first annual Baker Cup Chicken Barbecue Sauce Competition.  Contestants will go ladle to ladle to impress a panel of judges that will include WHCU's Dave Vieser and Geoff Dunn, Village of Lansing's Mayor Donald Hartill, and Lansing Town Supervisor Steve Farkas.  The competition honors Bob Baker, the 'Edison of the Chicken Industry,' who developed more than 50 innovations for preparing chicken, and is probably most famous in Lansing for his Cornell Sauce.  Vieser will be MCing the entire festival.

But the main feature is the community itself.  With businesses, organizations, not-for-profits, and service programs all represented, festival chair Karen Veaner says the event will provide a unique main street for the Lansing Community.

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