Last year, the Parks Department threw community organizations a curveball when it announced that the taxpayer-funded stage that we reserve for our concerts would no longer be offered to us and that only elected officials and city agencies could use it. Council Member Wong offered to cosponsor JPCA’s summer concert series and is covering the costs associated with renting the stage. Then after that was settled, Mayor Mamdani announced that there would be no new events approved during the period when the World Cup was underway. Even though this concert series has taken place yearly for decades, Wong’s office was told that because they applied for the permits rather than JPCA, the concerts were “new events”. JPCA resubmitted the applications under our name, and then they were approved. Thank you to Phil Wong for his patience and for partnering with us to continue this tradition.