Weekend events delayed 3 weeks

By Sam Waller

The Albany Chamber of Commerce has postponed the Home of the Hereford Cookoff and Cornhole Tournament scheduled for this weekend until the weekend of Oct. 23, Chamber manager Mary Beth Jones announced on Tuesday.

Jones said the decision was made because of the threat of rain in the forecast for the weekend.

“I think people have been watching the weather, and we have not had that many enter,” Jones said. “They were waiting until this week to see what the weather was going to do, and the weather is telling us it’s not going to happen.”

The postponement has cost the event some of the originally planned activities. Jones said there will be no karaoke the night before the judging and the Albany Masonic Lodge has cancelled plans to sell hamburger meals because of a scheduling conflict on Oct. 23.

“People can still come Friday night (Oct. 22) if they want to,” Jones said. “The cookoff and cornhole tournament will be on Saturday.”

Efforts are being made to have concessions for the entire day and not just lunch.

Jones commented that one benefit of the move is fewer conflicting events – the new date coincides with the Albany High School football team’s open date – and also allows more time to take entries.

“We’d like to have entries for the cookoff in by Oct. 20,” she said. “For cornhole, participants can enter up until 10:00 a.m. on Oct. 23.”

Jones added that participants will be allowed to camp overnight at Webb Park.

“Those who want to bring their travel trailers will have to be out of the park by 10:00 Sunday morning,” she said.

The event will raise money for downtown fall and Christmas decorations. Fall decorations were put up throughout Albany last Saturday.

“We had a great turnout of volunteers to put the decorations up,” Jones said. “All the sponsors who have sponsored the cookoff and cornhole are to be thanked because they are helping us make downtown look fabulous.”