Oshkosh Saturday Farmers Market shoppers may notice higher prices this year from vendors if a special events fee isn’t waived, one of its organizers cautioned.

The Oshkosh Common Council will on Tuesday consider a request to waive the special events fee for the nonprofit Oshkosh Saturday Farmers Market, which will return June 2-Oct. 20 for its second season on North Main Street.

Special events fees, which were waived last year for the market’s first year at its new location, cover the setup and takedown of barricades and upgrades to the electrical outlets. The fee is listed as $2,340 in the farmers market’s waiver request.

“If we were not granted the waiver, we would have to increase the fees for our vendors,” said the farmers market’s Dennis Leatherman, who co-manages the farmers market with his wife, Karlene. “Those fee increases would most likely be passed down to the customers.”

Vendors currently pay $36 per week to reserve a booth; that fee would likely go up an undetermined amount if special events fees weren’t waived, he said.

Oshkosh’s special events ordinance took effect in January 2011. It requires event organizers to submit an application that multiple city departments review to determine extraordinary costs the city may incur associated with events. The city manager can recommend whether the fee should be waived, but the council makes the final determination.

Two special events received waivers last year: the farmers market and Sawdust Days. The farmers market’s 2011 waiver was for $1,700 worth of fees for barricades. The 2011 Sawdust Days waiver was for $19,291.80, which covered police overtime and barricades.

City Manager Mark Rohloff last year recommended waiving the fee – for 2011 only – for the farmers market because market organizers were asked to move from the City Hall parking lot due to construction on Church Avenue.

“Part of the reason for my recommendation was to give them the opportunity to be successful at their new location, which included absorbing the cost of barricades that were a new cost they would have to incur. Now that we know how successful the Farmers Market has been, and knowing the number of vendors at the Market far exceeds what we had at City Hall, I believe that it is both appropriate and necessary to charge the Leathermans for these special events cost,” Rohloff wrote in a Jan. 19 memo to the council.

He adds in the memo, however, that because of the market’s benefit to the whole community, that could be an acceptable argument should the council wish to waive the fee.

Rohloff said Friday the Sawdust Days celebration had not requested a waiver yet this year, but if or when its organizers do, the request would likely be considered differently than the farmers market’s request because of the fireworks show Sawdust Days provides, valued at about $25,000.

The city does not provide a blanket waiver for all fees, Rohloff said, adding that whatever fees were waived last year for Sawdust Days would probably be waived again.

Rohloff said he feels he must be true to the statements he made last year regarding the farmers market’s one-year waiver.

“(The farmers market) was just clearly so much more successful on Main Street than it ever could be in the City Hall parking lot,” Rohloff said. “Now that it’s had its success, I think it’s gotten its legs. I’m hoping that (refusing the waiver) isn’t a detriment.”

The move to North Main Street allowed the farmers market to double in size; the number of vendors increased from an average of 50 in 2010 to 101 in 2011.

Leatherman stressed the mutually beneficial relationship between the farmers market and the city, mentioning that Oshkosh refers to it as “the city’s farmers market” when it is independently managed by a group of volunteers. He has proposed listing the city as a sponsor in exchange for having the special events fees waived.

Leatherman said he worries the market will suffer without the waiver. He said the farmers market receives donations, but those are usually earmarked for a specific purpose. The low prices are part of what makes the Oshkosh market unique, Leatherman said, and without the fee waiver, they might not be sustainable.

“It’s not like we’re some money-making corporation,” Leatherman said. “It’s more like we’re out there working our tails off to make something good for the city.”