Record goal targeted for Tet Festival 2010

The new leader of the organizing committee for the Tet Festival at has set a challenging goal for this coming fest: To break the $1million mark, on the cummulative amount of money the UVSA donates back to the community.

Phong Ly, the new President of the Union of Vietnamese Students Associations of Southern California, and the incoming Tet Chair, told the Bolsavik that he’s aiming to “make the Tet Festival so profitable that, after deducting other expenses, we can donate back to the community enough to break the $1 million mark, cummulatively.”

Including the 2009 Tet Festival, UVSA has donated in the neighborhood of $880,000 over 7 years, Tet Vice-Chair and UVSA Treasurer Tieu-Y Nguyen told the Bolsavik. To break the million-dollar mark means they would have to donate $120,000. Which means they would have to net a profit of $300,000.

That’s a tall order, considering that consumer confidence (and therefore propensity to spend) is still low, and after the 2009 festival (pic above, and more here) the group netted $206,466.99; and donated $73,233.50, according to Viet Bao here. The year before, they donated $106,000 (see here).

To break the $1 million cummulative mark, the UVSA would need a whopping 50% year-to-year increase. But then again, what’s life without a little challenge? Who knows, maybe they will.

Every year, of the profit from the Tet Festival, the UVSA sets aside $60,000 as seed money for the following Tet Festival, and then divide the remaining money in half. Half is donated to community groups, and the other half goes to support UVSA activities.

Last year, the UVSA won a unanimous vote by the Garden Grove City Council to renew the organization’s 5-year contract to hold the annual Tet Festival at Garden Grove Park. The park is located next door to Bolsa Grande High School, which has a majority Viet student concentration.