Skateboarding, an activity that can trace its origins to the turn of the 20th century, is enjoying another resurgence. With its inaugural competition in the most recent Summer Olympics, there finally seems to be a real possibility for skater kids to turn their hobby into worldwide recognition and become the next Tony Hawk. Most of these youngsters get their start in a local skate park, and these spaces can be havens for kids and teenagers looking for an outlet. But skate parks, like the one on Moores Lane in Greenport, require constant maintenance.
This year’s Sound & Skate Festival, which raises money for the renovation of the Greenport park, is set for this Saturday, July 13, from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. and will feature music from local performers, a live painting showcase, vendors and a skate contest hosted by Will Angiulo of Limitless Culture. And this year, fundraising for the park is more vital than ever.
Built in 1998, the park has seen a decline in recent years. While children continue to use the facility, it is in need of updates, which has not escaped the notice of a few dedicated locals.
After seeing a social media post about the state of the Greenport Skate Park in 2019, local business owner Rena Wilhelm felt a tug on her heartstrings.
“I saw these photos of the skate park and … it was just graffiti everywhere. The concrete was cracked. It had pieces of plywood you could put your foot through … I saw those and thought that this was awful and tragic,” Ms. Wilhelm said.
She began posting in the same group that put up the photos, asking what could be done, and learned about the previous incarnation of the Sound & Skate Festival. And with that, something clicked.
“I had some experience with recruiting artisans,” Ms. Wilhelm said. “I had once hosted a small boutique of vendors. So I thought, ‘I could do this.’” Unfortunately, just when festival preparations started to gain momentum, the COVID-19 pandemic hit. The pause proved fruitful, however, as more people came to the cause. “In a way, it was good that I didn’t try to take that on by myself in 2019, because over the next couple of years there were other people who jumped on board, like, ‘hey, we heard you were trying to do this. How can we help?’” she said.
Among these individuals were Dan and Colette Galvez. In 2021, they joined with Ms. Wilhelm to form a 501(c)3 called Greenport Skate Park Inc. and held their first event, a fashion show and skateboard deck auction. The success of that event inspired them to revive the festival the following year. “We had our first festival in August of 2022, which was tremendous,” she said. “It was very, very large, and it was very, very hot, 90 degrees. It was nuts. That included a skate contest, and we had live music, and then we also had like 24 artists from Long Island, New York City and New Jersey that painted these murals live at the event.” Last year’s event was rained out.
Around the same time, the team applied for a grant from The Skatepark Project, formerly the Tony Hawk Foundation. Due to a backlog of applications from the pandemic and an internal restructuring of the foundation, they only recently learned that they were turned down. Although the foundation said their application was well done, they will need to reach a certain level of fundraising to be considered.
“I believe The Skatepark Project offers maybe 5% of your total budget, and our budget for the first phase of our project is a million dollars,” Ms. Wilhelm said. “We need at least 30% of our goal. So that would be [around] $300,000 before they start considering us for being a grant recipient. We’re a little over $100,000 right now, so we have a ways to go before we would be able to apply for that grant again.”
This makes fundraising at a local level more critical than ever. There are multiple ways donors can contribute, including an online auction, a GoFundMe page and a coupon brochure. The group is also eligible for donations from organizations that wish to support the community, children or sports. “If their mission sort of aligns with our mission, then they could possibly give us an allotment from whatever their yearly budget is for supporting other nonprofits,” Ms. Wilhelm said.
Other events scheduled for later in the year include a concert and live outdoor video game event in August. They are also hoping to host a screening of the documentary “Humanity Stoked,” directed and co-written by Michael Ien Cohen of Huntington, at the North Fork Arts Center in Greenport. In addition, many of the paintings produced at the festival will be auctioned off at a later date.
Despite her passion for the project, Ms. Wilhelm does not have a strong connection to skateboarding specifically.
“I was very athletic as a kid, but I definitely did not skateboard,” she said. “My husband and I don’t have any children, so we don’t have kids that use the skate park … it was just like, wow, this is, this is tragic, let’s do something.”
Still, Ms. Wilhelm sees skate culture as something wholesome and community-oriented, which speaks to her heart.
“This is a family-friendly event,” she said. “We’ve got a whole area just for kids and crafts and stuff. It’s all about community when we do these celebrations. It’s merging art, music and sport together.”