Kentuck Board Mulling Northport's Proposed Funding Agreement, But No Decisions Revealed

NORTHPORT, AL — Uncertainty abounds following a meeting Tuesday of the Kentuck Board of Directors, where no action was taken on a new funding agreement approved by the Northport City Council yesterday.

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As Patch previously reported, the Northport City Council approved the new funding agreement, along with the one-year timetable preferred by Kentuck, in the hopes that the nonprofit will continue to host its annual Kentuck Festival of the Arts in Northport.

The new agreement also provided Kentuck with a one-time special appropriation of $5,000 for the current fiscal year, bringing its annual funding for this stretch to $80,000.

Talks broke down in late November when Kentuck officials said Northport wanted a five-year agreement regarding the festival being held at Kentuck Park but was unwilling to guarantee that the nonprofit could have the festival there for the duration of the agreement.

The agreement was then offered up for consideration by the Kentuck Board of Directors, which prohibited media and the public from sitting in on its closed-door meeting Tuesday.

Kentuck Board of Directors President Bobby Bragg told Patch on Tuesday that the board plans to continue its deliberations and is not ready to make any announcements at this time.

"The Board of Directors and our professional staff take our responsibility as a steward for the legacy and the future of Kentuck very seriously," Bragg said, "and look forward to continuing to run our year-round arts programming and the festival in a first-class manner."

Kentuck officials declined multiple requests for comment Tuesday night following a passionate presentation made by Northport City Attorney Ron Davis, in which he accused Kentuck officials, most notably Executive Director Amy Echols, of wanting to find a new location for the festival for the last several years and working to set a narrative that the City Council was to blame for the nonprofit's decision to begin looking for a new site.

"None of this makes any sense if you're trying to stay in Northport," Davis said Monday night. "In 2019, the City of Tuscaloosa purchased the Tuscaloosa News building [for the Saban Discovery Center]. Amy Echols from that day forward has been trying to move Kentuck to Tuscaloosa. If your spouse wants to divorce you, there's nothing you can do about it and if they are determined to go to Tuscaloosa, there's nothing we can do about it."

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Council President Jeff Hogg also expressed his frustrations to Tuscaloosa Patch following the council's regular meeting, which seems to have accomplished little in the way of repairing a damaged relationship with Kentuck.

"It was very unfortunate [Echols] showed the [Kentuck] board’s true colors in the email where they wanted to set the narrative with a media consultant not only against the elected officials but the citizens who have supported their operations and festival for many years," he said Monday night. "When you are truthful, you don’t need a media consultant or a narrative. You just need the heart to do the right thing."

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