- December 18, 2024
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Due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, several annual Christmas celebration events in the city of Ormond Beach have been canceled.
This includes the Home for the Holidays parade, Breakfast with Santa and the Casement's Guild Christmas Gala. The Casements will still be decorated inside and outside, however, and visitors are invited to tour the house throughout the month of December. The house is open 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday and 8 a.m. to noon on Saturday.
City Manager Joyce Shanahan informed the commission of these cancellations at the meeting on Wednesday, Nov. 4.
“I know this is really awful," Shanahan said. "I hate to be the bearer of these types of news.”
Instead of the usual tree lighting ceremony, the city will hold a virtual event where the ceremony will be uploaded on Facebook.As a replacement for the annual parade, Shanahan said the parade committee, city staff and Ormond MainStreet are working to develop a multiple-day "drive-through" parade where merchants will be encouraged to decorate their storefronts and windows according to a theme. Santa Claus would then drive through the downtown each evening.
The Home for the Holidays parade is put together by the parade committee, and they recommended against holding it this year.
“It’s really difficult to stage all of those bands and floats to have the parade," Shanahan said. "We just can’t do it. Nobody else in the surrounding area is really having parades.”
City Commissioner Troy Kent said he was disappointed the discussion didn't take place during a commission meeting.
“I would have like to have heard how the other elected officials feel about it," Kent said. "I know other communities didn’t go with a parade, and I was disappointed in those decisions, but I thought, ‘that’s not my community.’"
Because the Ormond Memorial Art Museum is closed for the upcoming renovation project, its annual Starry Starry Night event has also been canceled.
