The Longest Days Street Festival may be coming to an end.

Chris Dray, the executive director of the Yukon Arts Centre Corp., said recently he will no longer manage the fair.

He said Chris Sorg, president of the Mainstreet Yukon Society, will also no longer take care of sponsorships for the fair.

With their departures comes the end of the current street festival, unless a group of youth want to pick up where they left off, said Dray.

The festival started out as a kind of demonstration project to show the Yukon is ready for another major cultural venue to complement the well-used arts centre.

The Longest Days Street Festival began after a partnership organization called the Artspace North Society proposed a new cultural centre for the downtown riverfront. The fair was a way to demonstrate that culture could expand tourism and draw people downtown, increasing commercial activity for local retailers.

After the first year of the fair, Artspace North, of which Dray and Sorg are key directors, commissioned a government survey to assess the value of the event.

'We have a lot of very strong comments for the fair,' said Dray.

Artspace North also received many 'helpful suggestions,' said Dray. Those suggestions were applied to this year's fair, which went off without a gripe, said Dray.

That's a good thing because now that the festival is up and running smoothly, the veterans who got it going are walking away.

The Yukon Arts Centre had pledged two years of management that included applying for funding. The Main Street Yukon Society pledged two years of seeking private sector sponsorships to push the fair ahead.

Those two years are now up.

'People have said this is valuable to us,' said Dray, referring to the fair.

With the two years up, Dray said it was up to his arts centre directors to decide what they want him to do about the fair. But Dray already has an idea, an idea that fits nicely into the centre's mandate.

Dray wants Yukon youth to step up and take the fair over. He said it is already starting to happen.

'It's becoming a venue that the youth can own and call their own,' he said.

Last year, the fair was managed almost entirely by what Dray called 'old guys'ó50-year olds who are well established in the art and business communities.

This year, Dray made a conscious decision to have more young people involved in the festival. He did it because he thinks the youth are not active enough in the cultural community.

'The 20-somethings are a little disenfranchised,' he said.

He was referring to the fact that most successful funding applications for cultural projects are written and received by the 40- and 50-somethings like himself.

'How do we help these young kids do the things they want to do and get funding?' asked Dray.

The street fair may be just the thing, he believes.

Dray said that if a group of youth steps forward to take over the fair, he will mentor them through the whole process and teach them the ins and outs of grant applications, community partnerships and many other duties.

That mentoring would also fit perfectly with the centre's mandate to promote the arts.

'I'll go back downtown next year if I have a group of young people that want to take over the fair.'

If anyone is interested in becoming involved with the street festival, they can call Dray at the arts centre at 667-8577.

Meanwhile, at the arts centre, there is new paint in the auditorium and lobby after 14 years.

The old paint didn't look too bad but it was time for a fresh coat. Dray wanted to get the floor done too, but couldn't find anyone to do the work.

The current carpet is stained and well worn from thousands of feet, Dray said.