Applications & Sponsorship Form

The Northwest Side Irish Friends and Family St. Patrick’s Day parade will take place on St. Patrick’s Day Sunday March 17, 2019 and as always, we appreciate the many years of support and participation to this great Northwest Side Irish 16-year tradition and celebration of family, friends, faith and love of our community and the people who reside and do business with the community. 

NWSI is grateful for the support and growth of the parade over the past 16 years. Unfortunately, and due to increase in general cost of City Service Fees, Portable Bathrooms on the route, the extension of the assembly area and cost to maintain the overall parade efforts we must increase the application fee. The application fee cost for 2019 is $75.00. We have not had any increase to the cost of the parade at any level since the inception of the parade in 2004. We have tried to keep the cost to a minimum in order to maximize your business and family budgets and the participants support to the event. We try to be thoughtful to businesses and families that participate and will continue to do so in moving forward. Please note there is no limit to how many vehicles/persons/attendees you have in that slot, the only change is the cost for participating attendees, groups, organizations, etc. There will be no waivers for any groups as this is the underlining cost for any and all participating groups entering the parade. We appreciate all of the NWSI participants and are very much aware of the time and funds you allocate to participate. Thank you to all past and future participants, please know we are here to support your efforts as well. 

For those who have been utilizing trolley’s for their groups this cost too will increase due to City of Chicago Policy changes for trolley rentals. NWSI will now have to include a cost for a security guard for any participating trolleys who have alcohol on the trolley. The assigned security is hired by an outside firm through the trolley company and are certified. They will cause no disruption on your trolley. This is simply a liability issue and mandate by the City of Chicago. There will be an additional cost of $100.00 dollars for the trolley, specific to those who have alcoholic beverages on their trolleys. Also note City of Chicago Police will enforce and ticket any trolley’s who have alcohol and do not follow the mandate. There is no shortcut to this as we must be thoughtful to our Trolley Companies who are required to inform and hold the mandate to its full authority. 

To RECAP:  

2019 Parade Application Fee: $75.00

2019 Trolley: $550.00 + 100.00 = $650.00 plus $75.00 Application Fee TOTAL Parade Participation Cost = $725.00

Thank you once again and we look forward to getting started early as the anticipated number of attendees and participates has increased by the nature of the parade falling on St. Patrick’s Day. If you are a sponsor or are planning on renting trolley’s we recommend you make those decisions early this year. We will also be offering early bird specials for those who put their applications in early well as for our sponsors. Keep and eye on our webpage and FB for more information. We take great pride in our safety track records and want to continue to support our 16th District Police Department and City of Chicago Event Officers and their leadership who work so hard to make this a safe and community friendly event. 

Daniel E. Murray

President, NorthWest Side Irish

Elizabeth Murray-Belcaster

NorthWest Side Irish Parade Organizer