DDA making plans for America’s 250th celebration 

The Downtown Development Authority is looking toward its upcoming annual crawfish event, while keeping an eye and mind on how they can help the community celebrate the country’s 250th anniversary.

DDA Executive Director Glenda Berry brought this up during last week’s meeting, saying they want to have events in downtown leading up to July 4 and on that day, as well.  

“We are trying to be realistic about what we can do,” she said. “Right now there sounds like there is not a lot going on for the Fourth of July.” 

DDA board member Jason Keyton informed everyone that Southern Pines will shoot fireworks this year on Friday, July 3.

“I feel like we need to have something on the day of July 4,” Keyton said. “On that Saturday, the Farmers Market will be open. We can show some love there and make the Farmers Market our bread and butter on Fourth of July. We need to have some kind of celebration. We’ll have another meeting between now and then and we’ll have something going on at the market.” 

There are several events leading up to the 250th anniversary that Keyton mentioned. One of those was the Children’s Patriotic Bike, Trike and Stroll on June 13 on Madison Street. 

“LaGrange has been doing this for 60 years,” Berry said. “We are modeling it from them. If it has that type of longevity, that sounds like a great thing.” 

The sixth annual Bon Temps Crawfish Festival will be held on Saturday, May 16, in downtown Dublin. Tickets for the festival and crawfish dinner are $25. For those who just want to enjoy the festival, but not eat the mudbugs, cost is $15 for adults, $10 for those 6 to 12 and free for those five and under. 

“The biggest change is that we have different ticketing options,” Berry said. “If you do not like crawfish, you can pay for that only.” 

Tickets can be bought at the gate or by calling (478) 272-2560.

Board members signed a letter to ask for accommodations to serve beer and wine at the Crawfish Festival. Once they signed, the plan was to give it to Dublin City Manager Josh Powell, who attended last week’s meeting.

“We set that up to bring legitimacy to these events,” Powell said. “We don’t want to have some random person to have a special event and serve alcohol at it. This will be reviewed by a board, and as long you all sign off on it saying that this is a valid event for the DDA or Downtown Dublin, then you are a screening process for us.” 

Berry later called Dublin Community Theatre’s production of “Annie” a success, selling more tickets than any of the previous nine shows.

“The revenue from it was great,” Berry said. “We did well with concessions and did well with ticket sales. It is a lot of work and a lot of commitment on the time of the actors who are involved. What I love about it, aside from the economic impact because it brings a lot of people into town, it is really instilling in young people something they can carry for the rest of their lives, even if it is just being able to do college interviews or job interviews.”

The only negative was patrons arriving to the show only to find out they had been scammed.

“When they showed up, (the tickets they had) were not showing up on our print out,” Berry said. “Not only did we not get tickets from our ticket sales, but we also had to scramble to make sure they had a seat.” 

If people were scammed, the community theater will give them a ticket for a future show. DCT shows cost $20 (for regular seats) and $25 (for VIP seating). For all shows and questions about prices for DCT shows at  Theatre Dublin, people can call (478) 272-2560.

The next show will be “Grease” on July 16-19. Auditions for those ages 13 to a youthful 26 are set for 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. Saturday, May 9. Participants are asked to sing one minute of a song, move on stage and read from the script. 

Downtown Development Authority operations manager and market manager Nichole Padgett gave an update on the Farmers Market.

“We are averaging around 34 to 39 vendors each week,” Padgett said. “Last year we were only around 29, so this is awesome. We’ve had 16 new vendors so far this year. Our overflow has worked great. We have extended it out into the grass.”

The market is averaging 29 new SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) customers each week. Padgett compared the token sales made in 2025 and 2026, this is when they use debit cards or credit cards to receive tokens to be used at the vendor’s booths. 

“In 2025, it was $1,419 for the first week,” she said. “Our opening week this year was $2,014. The second week (last year) was $1,110 compared to this year’s $1,681. We’re not having much of a drop off. In the third week, was $969 compared to $1,356. People are coming to the market.” 

Earlier in the meeting, the board approved a facade grant for Dough Bros restaurant, which requested 50 percent of the cost for two new signs at the business. Berry informed the board that she would like to do a check presentation within the next few weeks.