Upcoming ¡Viva Oviedo! Festival now officially a city-sponsored event

A week after an impassioned City Council meeting about its status, and just days before the actual event, the ¡Viva Oviedo! Festival is officially an Oviedo city-sponsored event.

The volunteer-run and privately funded ¡Viva Oviedo!, which will hold its second-annual festival on Oct. 17 at Oviedo on the Park, was recognized as a city-sponsored event through an agreement with the city following a unanimous vote at the City Council’s Oct. 12 special session.

“It took time, it took some difficult conversations to get here,” ¡Viva Oviedo! Festival’s chairman of the board Abe Lopez said at the special session. “With clear expectations and a shared commitment to our community, this agreement matters because our volunteers are building something worth sustaining.”

The agreement states that ¡Viva Oviedo! is to put on the event without using any taxpayer funding or subsidies, and agrees to pay all necessary city fees as any other nonprofit event would. ¡Viva Oviedo! will also need to provide the city with attendance estimates and vendor or business feedback.

In turn, the city will provide approved event areas, like Center Lake Park and its related facilities, annually, and coordinate with the festival on permitting, public safety, street closures and traffic control, sanitation and other related needs. 

Additionally, the city will list the event on its official calendar and promote it on digital platforms, such as email and social media.

The festival’s reserved dates for its next two years are between Oct. 15 and 17, 2027 and Oct. 20 and 22, 2028.

The festival celebrates Hispanic heritage and saw thousands of attendees at its inaugural event in October of 2025.

While ¡Viva Oviedo! is now afforded a number of similar benefits to Oviedo’s three signature events — Cops and Cars for Kids, Taste of Oviedo and Great Day in the Country — it is not one. Currently, the signature events receive about $10,000 each to cover costs, including police, road closures and other city services, something that ¡Viva Oviedo! organizers have not asked for. 

¡Viva Oviedo! raised nearly $40,000 in donations to fund its 2025 event, and is expected to raise about $60,000 for this year, Lopez said. 

“Our community gives this celebration its purpose,” Lopez said. “This partnership gives us greater certainty to plan for [the] future and meaningful recognition for what our volunteers contribute each day.”