LEWISTON — A Twin Cities July country music festival is coming to the area, but not necessarily downtown Lewiston, according to promoters Mike Shea and Dean Staffieri.

“We are going to do this, but we’d prefer to do it in Lewiston-Auburn,” Shea said.

Shea said promoters are considering downtown Lewiston’s Franklin Pasture and the Auburn-Lewiston Municipal Airport as possible sites for the concert.

“We have other sites in surrounding communities, but we really want to do this here and start building something in Lewiston-Auburn,” Shea said.

The two presented a sketch of their plan to host a two-day festival at Lewiston’s Franklin Pasture on July 25 or 26 or Aug. 1 and 2.

The concert would be sponsored by L-A Harley-Davidson and Portland radio station 99.9 The Wolf. Shea said the radio station has promised him to sign at least one “Class A” and several “Class B” bands.

Class A bands would be popular country bands that would draw a big crowd, such as Lady Antebellum or Kenny Chesney.

“Class B bands could be like someone who won ‘The Voice’ recently,” Shea said.

“They’d still be really well known, not just somebody playing locally,” Staffieri said.

Staffieri said the festival would be designed to attract as many as 14,000 spectators.

“We are hoping to do something really major,” he said. “We are thinking of something the state may not have seen before. We are thinking big.”

Tuesday night, city councilors and Mayor Robert Macdonald said they had some issues with hosting the concert so close to Lewiston High School.

According to Shea, the stage would be in the high school’s practice field, which is northwest of the school. The city’s Marcotte Park would be used as a staging area. A beer truck with a fenced-in drinking area would be elsewhere on the site.

That was Councilor Mark Cayer’s big objection.

“Having an 18-wheeler beer truck in our high school parking lot, I take issue with that,” he said. “I think it’s a great idea. I just have a problem with the location.”

Mayor Macdonald said he is worried about 14,000 concert-goers fanning out into the surrounding neighborhoods when the show is over.

Councilor Kristen Cloutier said she was concerned about concert noise bothering neighbors.

Deputy City Administrator Phil Nadeau said the group had originally wanted to host the concert at Simard-Payne Memorial Park downtown, but that area needs additional exits to host bigger crowds. With only three emergency exits — one across the bridge to Auburn, one north of the park and one exiting toward Lincoln Street — the park can host up to 5,000 at a single event.

But Shea said the promoters have other options. They have worked with Auburn-Lewiston Airport manager Rick Lanman to put the concert away from the runway.

“It would not interfere with any plane traffic,” Shea said. “It overlooks the whole airport. It would actually be very beautiful. We could have planes taking off and landing behind the stage. It could be very cool.”

Auburn Mayor Jonathan LaBonte said Tuesday that the city would need to amend its rules to let the concert sell alcohol. City rules do not allow outdoor sales at gatherings with more than 1,000 people.

“We are hoping that we can get a beer brand as a sponsor, so we need to have that truck,” Shea said. “If we did not have that sponsorship or the revenue from the alcohol, ticket prices would be considerably higher.”

Staffieri said they hoped to settle the question of where the festival would go within the next two weeks.

“We need to start booking the acts now, because they are getting set through the summer now,” Staffieri said.

Shea is the concert promoter behind August 2009’s Heroes of Woodstock concert at Livermore’s Barnyard All Terrain park. That show brought in about 8,000 people. It was initially expected to draw up to 20,000 spectators.

staylor@sunjournal.com

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