North Fair Oaks Community Festival Happening This Weekend

The following is a news release form the San Mateo County Sheriff’s Office:

The 13th Annual San Mateo County Sheriff’s North Fair Oaks Community Festival is coming to Redwood City this Sunday from 11am to 6pm on Middlefield Road between First and Fifth Avenues.

The festival is a free, action packed event celebrating the multicultural diversity of the North Fair Oaks area and will draw a likely 20,000 people. This is a true down home event that displays the ethnic diversity of south Redwood City.

Every year the Sheriff of San Mateo County sponsors the North Fair Oaks Festival with the dual purpose of solidifying community ties and raising money for the San Mateo County Sheriff’s Youth Programs. Monies raised benefit the gamut of Sheriff’s youth activities including:

•S.T.A.R. Camp, an annual event aimed at reaching out to underprivileged youth throughout the County;

•the Sheriff’s Activities League provides elementary school children opportunities in athletic, performing arts, creative arts, leadership and scholastic activities;

•the Sheriff’s Explorers Programs introduces teenagers to the many aspects of law enforcement operations and search and rescue;

•the Sheriff’s Diversion/ Intervention Program works with parents, guardians and first time offending youth to help avoid future interactions with the juvenile justice system.

This year’s festival begins at 11 am with a colorful parade featuring a variety of exciting entrants. Food booths of all kinds will feature world cuisines all along the main fairway. The climbing wall will enthrall the kids as well a whole host of amusements ranging from face painting, an arts and crafts area with hands on projects, a pony ride and petting zoo, mechanical bull, five rounds of lucha libre all afternoon, bungee trampoline, Kaiser Permanente obstacle courses and much more.

Community information booths will provide valuable material covering a breadth of subjects. The culmination of the day’s events will be the coronation of the 2014 North Fair Oaks Queen of the Festival. The Queen is selected based on a competitive process and will receive $10,000 in scholarship money and the recognition of her community. Four other finalists will receive an additional $13,000 in scholarships. This program has awarded $123,000 in scholarships since its creation eight years ago.

Schedule for Main Stage Events

11:00 am Parade

12:00 pm Mariachi Mexicanisimo

1:00 pm Welcoming Ceremony

1:30 pm Fuego Nuevo Salsa

2:30 pm Presentation of the 2014 Queen of the Festival and her Court

2:40 pm Banda Reinas de la Bahia

3:45 pm Banda El Desastre de Tierra Caliente

4:45 pm Grand Prize Raffle Drawing

5:00 pm Rocio y Su Sonora

A second stage will feature local youth performing arts groups including Mariachi San Jose, Mariachi Nueva Generacion, Brazilian carnaval dance troupes, Aztec dance and dance performers from Peru and Mexico, acrobats from amongst many others.

Please note: For safety reasons, bicycles will not be permitted within the Festival area.

The Festival is a non-alcohol event.