Greetings! 

Since forming in 2008, the Patchogue Arts Council's volunteers have worked tirelessly to fulfill its mission to support, promote, and encourage the arts throughout the greater south shore of the Town of Brookhaven.  There have been many events over the years that have led up to PAC's most successful yet, the first PAC MAC Festival! Patchogue was ready for an art, music, and cinema event of this scale, and you helped make it a success!

While hopping from one festival stop to another, I thought back on PAC events of the past. Patchogue has surely marked its spot as a cultural destination. It has been just six short years since PAC's first two events, the Patchogue Walking Arts Tour (WAT) and the Patchogue Arts Festival (PAF, held in partnership with the Patchogue Theatre for the Performing Arts). What a different, yet similar place Patchogue is.

I recalled rushing among various locations over the years with my WAT co-chair, Beth Giacummo, and the many volunteers who assisted us. The area's emptiness would weigh heavy on us as we would meet with a building owner who would grant us entry into one of the many vacant retail locations in order to fill its windows with art.

What was most striking at the time was that during the weeks following the installation excitement and people filled the very same vacant sidewalks! Artists would be ushering their friends and family around to view the exhibit. Prior to this, the only time large groups of people were walking through town was before or after a performance at the theatre.

PAC provided an additional culturally based reason to come to Patchogue; a yang to the theatre's yin.

Walking through today's Patchogue to experience arts and culture is very different from the walk of 2008, and yet there is an air of similarity.  You see, all of the people who made the revitalization of Patchogue happen are still here; still volunteering, still coming up with the next great idea to keep things moving forward. They are still working tirelessly in many organizations and on many committees to keep people coming to town. New enthusiastic volunteers join the ranks regularly.

I want to personally say thank you to all the collaborators, volunteers and financial sponsors that made PAC MAC happen. Thank you, for all you do, to keep our community moving forward.  And thank you to everyone who comes to Patchogue - to shop, dine, and participate in not just PAC's events, but all events throughout town.

Without you and your feet on the ground, there would still be many vacancies. 

Thank you,
Jessica McAvoy
Past PAC WAT Co-Chair and PAC Founding Member
and the PAC Board of Trustees