Who has the best Fourth in the North?

MARQUETTE — It’s never too early to begin preparing for the Fourth of July.

The city of Marquette has formed an umbrella group in hopes of passing on their belief of providing the best fourth in the north. The collaboration consists of the exchange club, kiwanis club, the rotary club, and the fireworks committee. Travel Marquette and the Chamber of Commerce are assisting as well.

“We’re brand new,” said Marquette Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Jason Schneider, “we’re six months old and really excited to be involved. One of the main reasons we exist is for collaboration across boundaries whether it’s service organizations, municipalities, or business boundaries. We’re 6 months old with just under 60 members, we’re here to provide whatever support we can, we’re just glad to be involved.”

The team effort will benefit all of these groups, and their supporters even more.

“It will really save people from the community from being done several times for fundraising,” said Marquette Area Fourth of July Fireworks Committee Chair Tom Baldini, “we hope to do that by collectively doing that. What we try to do is raise funds so that we don’t go into the next year in a panic mode. Two years ago we had to do that. But now we’ve begun to work, the generosity of the people who do this, the people who give us the money and we’ve been able to build some funds for the future.”

The exchange club will still be in charge of the activities at Mattson Park, the Kiwanis Club will still be in control of the parade, the Rotary Club will continue their 50/50 raffle and the fireworks committee will still play the lead role in firework preparation.

The new collaboration simply adds strength in numbers that they plan to pass on to everyone who attends any 4th of July event in Marquette next year.