Park City and Salt Lake City are continuing to guard many of the details of the bid to retain the Sundance Film Festival in the state.
But the governor of Utah and the leader of the Park City Chamber/Bureau have recently entered the scene with limited information.
Sundance organizers are amid a high-stakes process of selecting a location for the festival starting in 2027. A combined effort by Salt Lake City and Park City is one of the finalists, alongside Boulder, Colorado, and Cincinnati. Sundance is expected to make a decision in coming months, and the uncertainty is looming over the festival this year.
Officials in Park City and Salt Lake City have provided few details of the bid as they attempt to maintain competitiveness with the other two finalists. Even so, there have been some details publicized this month by others.
In a Park Record column this week, the president and CEO of the Park City Chamber/Bureau, Jennifer Wesselhoff, provided a glimpse of the possibilities of a festival split between Park City and Salt Lake City. She described a scenario calling for a “vibrant opening weekend” of Sundance in Park City with downtown Salt Lake City apparently becoming the broader festival hub. There is also what she describes as a “Main Street to Main Street” theme to the proposal between the two cities.
Gov. Spencer Cox, meanwhile, is recommending $3 million be included in the state’s 2026 fiscal year budget for the effort to retain Sundance.
There has been little else made public about the details of the bid.
Park City officials this week referred questions about the bid to the municipal government in Salt Lake City. The office of Salt Lake City Mayor Erin Mendenhall indicated the bid remains active, details are not public and “the contents of the bid won’t be released until Sundance makes a decision.”
Both of the governments declined to provide answers to a series of questions from The Park Record. They included:
- Whether the proposal includes any public funds from the municipal government in Park City and, if so, the total dollar figure, the number of years any funding would cover and the funding mechanism. The current agreement between City Hall and Sundance pledges an annual municipal contribution of $270,000 in cash, fee waivers or other relief, with adjustments for inflation. The 2025 inflation-adjusted contribution is estimated at $372,000. City Hall estimates its total financial contribution in 2025, including the $372,000, totals $1.3 million. The total includes agreement-required monies such as those spent on transit, police services, a range of other municipal services and the hiring of a firm to assist with the municipal operations like parking management during Sundance.
- Whether the proposal includes any pass-through money, meaning funds provided by other organizations but provided via the governments.
- Whether the proposal involves a delineation of festival screening locations, such as outlining that a certain percentage of all film showings occur in each of the cities. The current agreement includes a clause requiring that Sundance needs to “use its best efforts to hold at least 70% of its official events (including screenings) during the festival within Park City and the Snyderville Basin in Summit County.”
They declined to comment about two issues related to the scheduling of the festival, which separately involve the Martin Luther King Jr. Day holiday and the 2034 Winter Olympics.
Martin Luther King Jr. Day was a crucial topic when Park City leaders and Sundance officials crafted the current agreement. Sundance made a key concession to slightly move the dates of the festival in years when there would otherwise would have been an overlap with the holiday. The Park City tourism industry desired that clause with the hopes of a strong three-day ski weekend over the holiday followed by the festival’s typical economic boost. It is not known whether the holiday is a point in the discussions about the current bid, particularly since the Sundance footprint in Park City under the concept would not be nearly as large as it is now.
The prospects of the state hosting a second Winter Olympics is also addressed in the current agreement, in the same clause that notes the holiday in honor of the slain civil rights leader. The agreement indicates Sundance organizers may return the festival to an overlap with the holiday should there be a “Park City or national event so large as it would materially alter the logistics and transportation systems such as hosting the Winter Olympic Games.”
Sundance in 2002 moved its dates up slightly to provide additional time between the end of the festival and the start of the Winter Olympics, when the Park City area hosted upward of 50% of the competitions. The extra time between the festival and the Games was needed for the final preparations. It seems likely the topic would be addressed again if Sundance selects the bid by Salt Lake City and Park City with the Winter Olympics in 2034 having been awarded to the state.