As Downtown Greer prepares to host the Chamber of Commerce Arts and Eats festival this weekend, City employees will be hard at work too.
“We spent a great deal of time prior to the event early morning hours, five or 6 o’clock in the morning getting those barricades they’re getting them in place getting them, put it into the streets,” Public Services Director Travis Durham said.
Durham says his team often does the preparation for these events that goes unseen.
“Event set up preparation, working the actual event, and then tearing down and cleaning up after the event are probably one of those things,” Durham said.
This includes efforts during the events too.
“We have custodial duties that we’re doing we’re picking up trash or emptying trash cans were running roll carts in and out of the event,” Durham said.
Now, Durham has a better idea of exactly how much manpower is needed from his team.
“We’ve been watching these events since November 2022, where we can actually track how many folks and how many labor hours were spent on that event,” Durham said.
For Greer’s biggest event …
“This past year for Freedom Blast, we had, 336 labor hours that the public service staff alone worked,” Durham said.
For last year’s Arts and Eats, Public services had 27 employees who worked 260 labor hours. Durham says the tracking is all in an effort to make sure enough hands are on deck to pull off these events.
“We’re able to calculate that tax dollar closer than we’ve ever been able to in the last year,” Durham said.