“This is a wonderful community event. It’s our own live, little Hallmark movie. The community gets to come together to celebrate Christmas,” said Shelby DeForge, who organizes the event with husband Bryan.

The event, set for 5 to 7 p.m. Monday, includes free cookies, hot chocolate, hot dogs and chili. Santa will arrive on the rescue squad. Warming barrels will be set up throughout the area to ward off the chill.

The 55-foot evergreen tree that grows in park will be lit with 1,100 commercial-grade lights, which they funded by organizing a wine walk two years ago. Funds from the walk were also used to purchase a big star.

DeForge said they took over the event from Main Street Makeover.

Ellery DeForge and Addilynn Stec enjoy the lights at the 2024 Niagara Christmas Tree Lighting. (Karen Klenke photo)

“Main Street Makeover did it one year and it was so pretty and so my husband and I wanted to do it again. We had the wine walk to raise the money, bought the lights and put them on the tree and my husband said, ‘Well, you can’t put new lights on the tree and not have a tree lighting,’ so here we are,” she said.

She said normally they would take the lights down, but they decided to leave them on the tree year round, unlit.

“It’s a whole-day process to take them down and a whole day process to put them back up,” she said. The lights are installed using a lift.

In conjunction with the tree lighting, the Little Christmas Village will also be lit up that night, Audrey Fredrick, city manager/clerk/treasurer said.

The event organized by Tracy Daun serves as a fundraiser for the Niagara Area Emergency Unit and other local charties. The displays run along the fence of the baseball field.

Fredrick is also hoping another great turnout. “Last year we had beautiful weather,” she said. “Don’t miss this magical community tradition.”

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Marguerite Lanthier can be reached at 906-774-3500, ext. 85242, or mlanthier@ironmountaindailynews.com.