Just two months after news broke that Riot Fest was moving out of Douglass Park and heading to southwest suburban SeatGeek Stadium in Bridgeview for its 2024 edition, festival organizers on Wednesday announced the music extravaganza will be held at its longtime Chicago venue next month.
According to Wednesday’s announcement from the Chicago Park District, Ald. Monique Scott (24th) and fest organizers, “strong support from the North Lawndale leadership and community” was among the key reasons for the location about-face. The festival is slated to run Sept. 20-22.
The announcement noted Park District Board approval is still needed, but Park District CEO Rosa Escareno didn’t expect any complications.
“We were ready to approve the permit in June,” Escareno said. “As long as they come to the board meeting in September and meet all the requirements again, we will welcome them back.”
She credited local Ald. Monique Scott with putting the pieces of RiotFest together again.
Riot Fest moved to Douglass Park in 2015 after complaints from neighbors at its old location in Humboldt Park. The complaints followed the festival to its new location. Residents and community organizers had long campaigned for Riot Fest and other summer music festivals to leave Douglass Park. They claimed the festivals disturbed patients at nearby Mount Sinai Hospital and tied up park resources for local residents.
Tyler Pasciak LaRiviere/Sun-Times
“The alderwoman strongly believes that this is good for her community. If that’s the case, who are we to stand in the way?”
As of Wednesday afternoon, the festival’s website still reflected a Bridgeview event.
The announcement also noted discussions with the park district “about a longer-term partnership that will secure the future of the festival in Chicago” are part of the deal.
The festival announced its exit from Douglass Park in June after a 10-year run plagued by controversy in recent years between community groups who hailed the event as a viable economic asset for North Lawndale and other community groups and local residents who considered it an impediment to summertime access to the park.
As in years past, 10% of revenue from Riot Fest will be reinvested in Douglass Park. The 2024 festival is expected to generate roughly $712,000 for the park district fund, which will coordinate capital improvement projects, with community input.
In June, festival co-founder Michael Petryshyn told the Sun-Times the decision to move to Bridgeview was due to an “unfair process” during the permitting stage.
As for how the decision would affect die-hard fans, Petryshyn told the Sun-Times “we have the best fans in the world,” but that long-term stability was also important.
“We are in Chicago. We’re not going to be leaving. This is home,” he said.
“This is not how we planned it. … We just did a 360,” Petryshyn added. “When we do moves like this, No. 1, we think, ‘What about the fans?’ This has been debated now for months because without them we are nothing. They are in many ways the soul of it.”
Petryshyn said Mayor Brandon Johnson also influenced the decision to return to Chicago. Ald. Scott helped set up a meeting at the mayor’s request after the move to Bridgeview was announced.
“Sometimes things get lost in communication — or the lack of communication,” Scott said.
“It’s the first time anybody in that position ever reached out to Riot Fest. He just wanted to talk,” Petryshyn said. “I walked out of there seeing a mayor who was authentic and listened,” Petryshyn said.
“It was genuine from the start, with him saying, ‘This is not good for Chicago.’ … Later in the week, I made the decision, maybe there is a way to come back — and that meeting resonated with me. So for the past few months we’ve been working toward that.”
Scott said events like Riot Fest “invigorate our local economy by creating jobs, attracting tourism, supporting our youth and providing a national stage for small businesses and artists from North Lawndale and Little Village. Riot Fest’s return is a win for our community, and we look forward to the continued positive impact it will bring.”
Petryshyn had nothing but praise for Bridgeview.
“In the end, even Mayor Steven Landek, he was happy for us and said you guys belong in Chicago. Our door is always wide open for you guys. … They opened up their doors to us, they were accommodating, they were wonderful to work with, and I will always be grateful for that. … There’s a future of doing stuff there.”
Village of Bridgeview spokesman Ray Hanania said in an e-mail that the village “has no comment to make” on the festival’s move.
Ald. Scott’s brother, Cook County Commissioner Michael Scott Jr., was instrumental in bringing Riot Fest to Douglass Park when he represented the area on the Chicago City Council.
He said he is “ecstatic for the community” that the festival will return. Events like Riot Fest “put an eye on the positive things that happen in the community,” he said.
“You see people from other communities walking up and down the street mingling with residents from North Lawndale. It’s almost like one big happy family. Everybody’s happy to see them come. Everybody’s happy to make a little bit of money off of them. And all of the concert-goers are happy to be out and enjoy Douglass Park, which is a historic, majestic, beautiful park.”
News of the festival’s return came as an unwelcome surprise to some Douglass Park residents Wednesday afternoon.
“It’s kind of just like whiplash for the community because we just got this beautiful park back and everything is clean and organized,” Helix Valentine said. “I think it’s going to disrupt a lot of people’s lives too. It feels like we’re going backwards.”
Valentine said she has lived on the west side of the park near Albany Avenue for two years and has experienced the negative effects the event has on area residents, including adding time to their commute to work. She took issue with fest organizers and Scott saying the community wanted the event back at Douglass Park.
“It’s crazy, just traffic, noise and garbage for weeks and weeks,” Valentine said. “It’s kind of rough.”
Yesenia Trejo, 37, echoed those sentiments. Trejo doesn’t live near the park but she drives her two teenage sons to Douglass to practice with their soccer team on the turf field on the east side of the park. She said the festival takes away space for local children.
“Little kids come to practice and when you take away their space they stop coming, and when they open it again there’s trash everywhere,” Trejo said. “They also come and damage the grass. They say that the money goes back into repairing the park, but I don’t see any improvements.”
Trejo said the park is often the cheapest option for some area residents who want to be outside in the summer weather and can’t afford to go elsewhere.
“They’re taking away something that is free for the whole community,” she said. “I was very happy when they said it would take place at a suburb that’s far away from here.”
Netza Roldan has lived on the east side of the park near California Avenue for seven years. Roldan, who is chief executive of the Binational Institute of Human Development, a nonprofit that help immigrants, was unhappy to hear of the festival’s return.
“This is totally against all of the principles of our rights as citizens to enjoy the place where we’ve lived for many years,” he said, complaining of noise, trash and excessive drug and alcohol use among festival attendees.
“It is really not only an annoying thing, but it is, I think, breaking our peace and our neighborhood,” Roldan said.