Miami officials call for suspending music festival over coronavirus

Miami officials have raised concerns about holding the upcoming Ultra Music Festival amid the spreading coronavirus outbreak, with two calling for the event to be postponed, according to the Miami Herald. 

The festival, which has a capacity of 55,000 attendees per day, draws fans from more than 100 countries for a long weekend of electronic dance music.

On Tuesday, Miami-Dade County Mayor Carlos A. Gimenez (R) tweeted that the festival would continue as planned, saying, “We’re not canceling any major events … such as Ultra, following the guidance from Florida’s Surgeon General on #Coronavirus.”

The Hill has reached out to Gimenez’s office but has not immediately heard back.

Organizers of Ultra reportedly met with elected officials on Wednesday to discuss suspension of the three-day festival scheduled for March 20 to 22 at Bayfront Park.

Commissioner Joe Carollo, chairman of a government agency managing Bayfront Park, specified that the city did not want to cancel the festival, according to the Miami Herald.

“We’re saying suspend it to a later date when we’ll have a better idea of where we’re heading with the coronavirus,” he said.

The state of Florida has reported a total of three cases of COVID-19 in cities along the western peninsula, according to data from Johns Hopkins.

Miami Mayor Francis Suarez (R) expressed more concern over the upcoming festival and said the city had received multiple requests from residents to postpone Ultra, according to the report.

“I can tell you that just in the last 24 hours, I have received countless emails and messages of all kinds urging the city to act,” Suarez said. “That is another major motivator to have this conversation before it gets too late.”

Suarez said that the city has the authority to cancel the festival as part of the contract agreement with the company, although the festival remains on schedule for now.

Ultra hosts multitudes of festivals each year in different countries around the world. An Ultra event in Abu Dhabi was canceled last week by local festival organizers. The country has reported 22 existing cases of COVID-19, according to Johns Hopkins data.