COVID-19 will continue to impact on the Southern Riverina’s calendar of events in 2021.
Two of the biggest events planned for Finley early in the new year have been forced to make changes in the past few weeks.
February’s Finley Community Tractor Pull has been cancelled, and the Finley Rodeo will be postponed in the hope the COVID-19 situation will improve further by April.
Finley Community Tractor Pull Committee president Dean Pascoe said they could not be sure traditional competitors would be allowed to travel freely by the time the event rolled around in February.
And he said waiting longer to make a decision was not an option because of the planning involved.
‘‘We have a lot of tractors that come from South Australia and Victoria, and we can’t guarantee they would be able to come by February,” Mr Pascoe said.
‘‘It costs so much to run the event and time was too short to organise it and ask for sponsors, especially in this difficult financial time.
‘‘We also run the risk of spectator restrictions at a ceiling of 1000 people, which isn’t enough for us.
‘‘You need to have really good crowd numbers to hold a successful event.”
Mr Pascoe said with the 2021 event lost, efforts would be made to make 2022 even bigger.
The Finley Rodeo is coordinated by Finley Apex, and its president Andrew Stephan said crowd and travel restrictions also threatened the viability of its January event.
He said the committee chose to postpone the event to Easter Sunday, April 4 in the hope restrictions would be more generous, or removed altogether.
The NSW public health order currently states non-ticketed events with no seating areas can have no more than 500 people, and ticketed events with seating are capped at 25 per cent of capacity.
Mr Stephan said neither option was viable for the local event.
‘‘But we are still eager to hold the rodeo this year,’’ he said.
‘‘We’ve put a lot of effort into changing the set up of the grounds and we think it will encourage larger crowds and a better atmosphere.’’
Mr Stephan said the decision to change the date will make it a big one for the whole Southern Riverina.
He said with the Deniliquin Rodeo planned for Easter Saturday, competitors and their families will be staying in the area for at least two days over Easter.