State Fair accident fallout will affect small summer fests

INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) - A church festival that opens tonight offers a lesson about the legacy of the State Fair tragedy.

Over the next three days, Saint Simon in Lawrence Township expects to have as many as 30,000 people sampling its food and listening to its bands. Visitors may not give much thought to the safety rules for tents at such festivals.

But organizers such as Philip Squier know, now, the safety codes can't be ignored. He said, though, it's been a challenge to learn what they needed to do differently this year.

"I think the one thing that is a little unusual right now is that nobody really knows exactly what we're supposed to do,” Squier, the festival’s co-chairman, said. “But I think in a year or two the cities will get together, figure out what we do need to do and it will be very seamless."

The festival committee wrote a safety plan — with its own guidelines for everything from security to weather evacuations. The committee will get weather updates from WISH-TV. Then, one person on the staff, the safety director, has the power to shut down the festival, if necessary.