The Mathews County Board of Supervisors voted Tuesday to provide $1,148 to pay for liability insurance for vendors during this year’s Mathews Market Days, which will be held Sept. 6 and 7 in Mathews Court House.

During Tuesday’s meeting in the historic courthouse, Sandy Smith of Port Haywood, told board members that she and other members of the Market Days Committee had learned from Mathews County Administrator Mindy Moran in April that the yearly festival would have to begin providing its own insurance.

Smith said that the cost of insurance through the Virginia Municipal Program would be $2,500 a year if individual vendors didn’t provide their own insurance certificates and $1,700 a year if they did. Diggs Insurance of Mathews could provide less expensive event insurance because of a relationship with the provider, said Smith, but it would leave Market Days committee members vulnerable because the festival is not incorporated.

She said the committee is considering incorporation, but would need help with insurance costs this year.

In response to a question from Supervisor Janine Burns, Smith said that the amount of money that will be awarded in grants from this year’s festival is being limited to $3,000 rather than the usual $5,000 to $7,000 because of the problem. She said that vendors could not sustain increased booth fees because there wouldn’t be enough profit to cover the costs.

Burns asked if the committee could once again be put under county auspices so the county’s insurance could cover the festival, and Smith said the committee plans to meet with Moran to discuss the matter.

During discussion of the matter later in the meeting, Moran explained to the board that the reason for the problem is that the county is not the sponsor of the event and that the board of supervisors doesn’t take an active role in its planning. The difference between Market Days and the annual fireworks display on the 4th of July, said Moran, is that the fireworks display is run by board member Charles Ingram, while Market Days is run by an independent committee. To qualify for insurance, she said, the festival would have to be “more directly run by a board member.”

Burns said she recalled that there had always been a board liaison to the Market Days Committee but that the board had decided a couple of years ago that it was no longer necessary. Supervisor O.J. Cole said the board needs to have one or two people sit on the committee.

Supervisors’ chair Edwina Casey said the reason there was no longer a board liaison to the committee was that she had been fired from the committee when she served as liaison. She said there had been meetings she hadn’t known anything about and that the then-chairman had told her if she wasn’t going to come she didn’t need to be on the committee.

“If we had a seat at the table,” said Cole, “it wouldn’t be that person’s decision to make.”

Supervisor Neena Putt moved to provide the funding and the board approved it unanimously.