Festival attendance may have set record in 2015

With some help from the weather, the 80th Louisiana Shrimp & Petroleum Festival may have seen record crowds at the five-day event, according to festival organizers.
“In some areas … we have been hearing that it may have been a record year,” festival Executive Director Darby Isham said. “But we have to wait a couple of weeks on all the numbers and stuff to come out.”
The festival began Thursday evening and concluded Monday night.
Isham, who is in her first year as festival director, said the festival turned out “really great.”
Isham took over as director in January, replacing the late Lee Delaune, who died Sept. 20. Delaune served six years as director and had helped with the festival for 43 years.
This year, Isham was excited that the weather mostly cooperated with the exception of a couple showers, she said.
Isham described her first year as festival director “as a learning experience.” Isham was more relaxed than she thought she was going to be during the weekend, she said.
“I was actually able to enjoy the festival. I was in the park at night until it closed, and it was really fun,” Isham said.
Planning for the festival is a “group effort,” and Isham has a few ideas for next year’s festival that she wants to discuss with the festival board and other festival organizers, she said.
Law enforcement authorities had a mostly uneventful weekend at the festival and didn’t have to respond to many incidents, Morgan City Police Chief James Blair said.
On Saturday morning, police did respond to a crash at the La. 70 curve by Lake End Park involving one of the visiting festival queens. She missed the curve and ran her vehicle into a drainage ditch but was uninjured, Blair said.
Authorities made a few arrests for minor offenses including a couple drug arrests at the festival, Blair said.
“But, other than that, everybody was well-behaved. We didn’t have any major issues at the festival,” Blair said. As far as Blair knows, police didn’t have to tow any vehicles and didn’t have any parking issues, he said.
“Everything went beautiful other than the few little, minor arrests we had,” Blair said.
In Blair’s 30 years with the Morgan City Police Department, the 80th Louisiana Shrimp & Petroleum Festival was one of the smoothest festivals, from a law enforcement standpoint, that he’s worked.

This story was written by Zachary Fitzgerald of The Daily Review staff. Reach him at zfitzgerald@daily-review.com.