Could Hot July Nights in the South Cariboo be running out of gas

A longtime summer tradition in the South Cariboo is facing a bumpy road ahead.

Since it’s start back in 2008, Hot July Nights has brought people to 100 Mile House from all over BC and beyond.

Now this year, according to their Facebook post, without more Board Members there may not be a show next year.

“We had our AGM about 2 months ago and we had a very poor showing,” Chair Marty Mahovlich said, “I appreciate the people that did show up but we had about 10 people that are willing to take on a role. We need roughly 32 and some people generally take more than one job on but our estimates we are about 15 people short.”

Mahovlich noted that the weekend of this event they never seem to have any problems getting enough volunteers to run it, but the job of doing all the work behind the scenes for the 6 months leading up to it is where they really the help.

“The people that we have are definitely getting burned out. It’s about 4 to 5 thousand hours to put this together, and like I say we have about 10 people that have been taking the bulk of the work in the past years and they’re tired.”

Mahovlich said their estimates are between three quarters and a million dollars a year that Hot July Nights brings in in new money to the town. Last year we estimate we had about 12-thousand spectators show up so there’s definitely value added and we really believe it helps the business community.

“And that’s what we are trying to do. It’s not about a car show for us, we can use the cars as a tool to bring people in from out of town to spend their money and help the local economy. That is our goal.”

Mahovlich said they will be holding an open meeting this Thursday (December 11) starting at 6 pm at the 100 Mile House Chamber of Commerce on Birch Avenue.

“If we get enough help nobody really has to do a lot and everybody can enjoy it and that is our aim.” Mahovlich said, “What we are asking is these people helping out to basically give 30 to fifty hours over the next 6 months, when you look at it on a monthly basis isn’t a lot. We have this event down pat and feel we have a model that works.”

He noted that they are looking for 15 additional people who want to put some time in and help out and do some of the work behind the scenes, it’s that simple.

“If we can get 15 from the people we currently have I think we can make it work, it would be great if we could 20 but 15 would definitely give us a number that we could work with. Nobody’s just going to throw them into a position and say here ya go. Obviously the success of Hot July Nights depends on everyone working together. It’s all organized, it’s just a matter of somebody doing the work.”