Woodstock 50 Denied Permit By Vernon, NY for Second Time with Just 30 Days Until Festival Date

We are entering the crunch time for Woodstock 50 to find a location, with just a month remaining until the event’s scheduled date. The coordinators of Woodstock were just once again denied a permit for the festival in Vernon, NY, this now being the second time they have attempted to get the event approved there. Just last week the organizers were denied a permit on the grounds that they were too disorganized and did not properly fill out their application. Michael Lang and the rest of the Woodstock 50 team are now going to need to rush to find an entirely new location for the festival. The planning of Woodstock 50 has been a much more difficult task than originally thought, with a slew of problems facing the organizers at every turn. 

Originally planned to take place in Watkins Glen, NY, Woodstock 50 lost the venue after failing to turn in the proper deposits on time. The organizer missed the deadline on a $150,000 payment to secure the venue, a payment that was missed due to the other legal troubles facing the festival. Over the past few months, Lang and the other organizers have been embroiled in a legal battle over a few million dollars worth of funds that the organizers of Woodstock argue one of their investors embezzled from the event. After the courts decided in favor of the investor, however, the event found itself out of funding and unable to pay the deposit to Watkins Glen.

Watkins Glen is a speedway which had an estimated capacity for Woodstock of around 70,000 people, perfect for the size of the festival that organizers were originally shooting for. After losing the location, however, organizers turned to the town of Vernon for their next pick. This location would have only been able to hold 45,000 people, a large drop from their original plans. Now that Vernon is out of the picture again, the Woodstock 50 team is going to need to find a venue at least as large, preferably one closer to the original size of Watkins Glen. If a new location isn’t found soon, who knows what will end up happening with Woodstock 50.