City approves staging of three traditional spring regattas on the Schuylkill

The city of Philadelphia has approved the application of three prominent rowing organizations on the Schuylkill River and their integrated COVID-19 mitigation plans that will allow spring rowing regattas on the river after a one-year absence.

The Schuylkill Navy, the governing body for Boathouse Row and amateur sports on the river, joined with the Dad Vail Regatta Organizing Committee and the Philadelphia Scholastic Rowing Association in announcing the city’s decision on Wednesday.

The approved regattas will take place on consecutive weekends in May: The PSRA’s Philadelphia City Championships for high school athletes May 1-2; the Jefferson Dad Vail Regatta for college athletes May 7-8; and the Schuylkill Navy’s Stotesbury Cup Regatta for high school athletes May 14-15. In addition, the PSRA will host three high school regattas on consecutive Sundays in April. Those events were not conducted last year due to the pandemic.

All regattas will have COVID-19 safety measures in place. No spectators will be permitted. No food or drink will be on-site and masks are required to be worn on land at all times.

Bonnie Mueller, commodore of the Schuylkill Navy and the lead representative of the rowing organizations in talks with the city, said Thursday the decision on spectators was two-fold.

“No. 1, the sheer volume of student-athletes at these events is big, bigger than most people recognize,” she said. “No. 2, we want to be supportive of Mayor Kenney’s and (City Health Commissioner Thomas) Farley’s continued balance of reopening with continued caution, and knowing that these would among the first of large events in the city, we wanted to do our part to send the message of the importance of continued extreme caution.”

She warned that parents and friends of the members of participating teams who show up at the river to watch the regattas could have their teams disqualified.

“We are requiring each of the teams to pro-actively make a commitment to keep their own fans away at risk of potentially being disqualified from the event if they fail to do so,” she said. “That’s how serious we are.”

Mueller said the discussions were held with the city’s Managing Director’s office, the Office of Special Events and Philadelphia Parks and Recreation, “and together they helped us to coordinate with the most important of departments, the Department of Public Health.”

A city spokesperson said the Office of Special Events reviewed the permit application while the Department of Public Health reviewed the COVID-19 operating plan.

“With needed precautions in place and working together with these event organizers, we’re delighted to welcome athletes once more to safely compete at the birthplace of American rowing,” Deputy Managing Director David Wilson said.

Mueller said her group went in with a “good sense” of the type of approach that would get approval.

“So there was not a lot of negotiation or back and forth because in advance of the submission, we already knew what would likely be required,” she said. “We had made the decision, both on our own and confirmed with the city, to take a fairly aggressive approach in terms of working to mitigate any transmission risk.”

The Dad Vail Regatta will be the only event where the contestants, coaches and support staff of teams must show evidence of a recent negative test for COVID-19, said Jim Hanna, president of the Dad Vail Regatta Organizing Committee. All teams must be accompanied by a chief medical officer.

“Since January, we’ve been eating, sleeping, dreaming about what couldn’t we do to stage this regatta,” Hanna said. “We finally said, let’s sacrifice everything so the kids can race. So we put in our plan. There’s going to be no spectators, no athlete feeding, no vendors. It’s for racing. We’re asking everybody, the general public, please stay away because we can’t risk this not being a safe event.”

The Dad Vail Regatta, which will be staged for the 82nd time, usually welcomes more than 100 teams and 3,500 rowers to the banks of the Schuylkill. However, some crew programs that attend annually are not racing this season because of the pandemic.

Hanna said because time is tight, schools have been given one week to register for the competition so regatta officials can know how many races to schedule.

“We’re telling them that the reason we’re holding it to a week is because we need to design the scope of the regatta to fit the demand,” he said. “We’ve asked everybody to stay flexible.”