Santa Rosa's big parade marches on Saturday

<p>After 115 years, will Saturday’s Rose Parade be the last to bloom in Santa Rosa?</p><p>Organizers say they are still trying to find more sponsors to underwrite the event or ways to trim costs.</p><p>“It would be a shame for this tradition to fade away,” parade manager Judy Walker said Thursday. “We’re doing all we can to raise money and keep this going forward.”</p><p>The parade has been caught by dwindling sponsorships and declining spectators, leading organizers to trim the budget to $60,000, down from $90,000 a year ago.</p><p>Organizers closed their office at the Santa Rosa Chamber of Commerce, shortened the parade route to avoid having to rent the Veterans Memorial Building as a staging area and canceled an accompanying festival. Instead of trophies, ribbons are given to parade winners.</p><p>Walker said the current budget pays for one part-time staff member, advertising and other costs.</p><p>But none of those cuts were enough to close the budget gap, and with three weeks to go before Saturday’s event, the parade had secured only $25,000. At that point, Tony Alvernaz, president of the nonprofit organization that stages the parade, announced this year’s edition would be the last.</p><p>But last-minute donations, including a $20,000 gift from North Bay Corp. president James Ratto, helped close the budget gap and gave organizers renewed hope that the parade will go on.</p><p>Walker said she does not yet know how much will have to be raised to stage the event next year. That will depend on how many sponsors sign up, as well as possible parade changes that could affect costs.</p><p>One idea she hopes to explore is whether to have the parade on the same weekend as the popular Amgen Tour of California bicycle race, which could build interest in both events.</p><p>She’s also hoping that Ratto’s donation and interest expressed by philanthropist Henry Trione in contributing will provide seed money for next year’s parade.</p><p>Organizers are fighting to prevent the parade from becoming an anachronism in a city where changing demographics and fractures among neighborhoods are viewed as among the major reasons for dwindling interest in the event.</p><p>Unlike parades in Sebastopol, Petaluma, Healdsburg and other smaller communities, the Rose Parade, which features about 3,000 participants, must satisfy a large and diverse audience.</p><p>“As Santa Rosa has grown, it has become less intimate,” Walker said. “I’d hate to see it (the parade) go. There’s such value and culture with this. This is what Santa Rosa needs for this sense of community.”</p><p>Saturday’s event features 16 high school bands and a six-and-a-half foot “mono-wheel,” in which a person spins on the inside, that was used in the closing ceremonies for last summer’s Olympics in China.</p><p>The parade begins at 10 a.m. at the corner of Sonoma Avenue and E Streets and is expected to last from two and three hours.</p><p>For the first time, the event will be streamed live on the Internet courtesy of Santa Rosa’s Community Media Center. The broadcast will be replayed several times over the next two weeks by Comcast on Channel 26, Walker said.</p><p>The Internet stream can be viewed at communitymedia.org.</p>