OKEECHOBEE — Teaming up to help those who help others, OMF and HeadCount proudly announce their partnership to bring Participation Row, an activism village, back to the Okeechobee Music & Arts Festival this March. HeadCount, a nonpartisan organization that uses the power of music to register voters and promote democracy, will establish a presence in OMF’s Chobeewobee Village, alongside various art installations and craft exhibitions, to bring awareness of the service organizations set up to benefit the Okeechobee community.

Fans exploring Participation Row who visit four or more nonprofits will have the chance to win a signed OMF D’Angelico guitar. Attendees will be issued stamp cards, where one stamp can be collected from each nonprofit once a positive action is taken. Once a card has at least four stamps, attendees visit the HeadCount booth to enter to win. Each attendee will receive a free pair of SAXX Underwear while supplies last, and their completed stamp card will serve as a raffle ticket to win the D’Angelico guitar signed by various Okeechobee performers. Fans can also take action with HeadCount now for a chance to win VIP tickets and camping accommodations to OMF as well as a meet-and-greet with Kaskade.

Fans can visit propeller.la/okeechobee2020 for more information.

Lake Okeechobee News/Katrina Elsken
At the 2018 Okeechobee Music Festival, many who visited Participation Row stopped at the Martha’s House booth to help create artwork by painting their hands with colors representing their emotions and then adding a handprint to a canvas.

Okeechobee’s 2020 Participation Row will include:
• Big Brothers Big Sisters — Providing children facing adversity with strong and enduring, professionally supported one-to-one relationships that change their lives for the better, forever.

• Helping People Succeed — Transforms lives by realizing potential, creating hope and building futures through education, counseling, training and employment.

• Healthy Start — Dedicated to establishing legislation that guarantees all women have access to prenatal care and that all infants have access to services that promote normal growth and development.

• Martha’s House — Dedicated to working to end domestic violence, and to serve survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault, through a 24-bed emergency shelter and 24-hour hotline, while providing outreach services, violence prevention education, court hearing accompaniment, victim’s compensation and more.

• Okeechobee Substance Abuse Coalition — Educates youth on the dangers of drugs and alcohol and provides them with positive activities.

• Treasure Coast Food Bank — To alleviate hunger by obtaining and distributing food and other essentials in Indian River, Martin, St. Lucie and Okeechobee.

• Archbold Biological Station — Dedicated to long-term ecological research with staff, visiting investigators and students conducting research primarily focused on population ecology and conservation biology, emphasizing ecological changes over local and regional scales, and demographic shifts in ecologically sensitive species.

• Humane Society — Working to end animal cruelty practices, care for animals in crisis, build a stronger animal protection movement and increase capacity to drive global change.

• Thank You For Your Service — Providing active duty military, veterans and first responders with information on post traumatic stress syndrome (PTSD), traumatic brain injury (TBI), suicide prevention and other military and veteran support organizations.

• Okeechobee Main Street — Designed to improve all aspects of the Okeechobee downtown district by improving economic management, strengthening public participation and building on its rich architecture and new businesses.

In 2018, the Treasure Coast Food Bank asked festival fans to write their thoughts about hunger on paper plates, which were then sent to elected officials in Tallahassee and Washington, D.C., to promote programs to fight hunger in the United States. The Okeechobee Substance Abuse Coalition also invited participants to sign a banner that was sent to show support to Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School.

Since 2016, Okeechobee Music & Arts Festival has donated more than $320,000 to local nonprofit partners and contributed to the social impact of the community in a variety of ways. Nearly 7 tons — 13,868 pounds — of food have been rescued and donated to the Treasure Coast Food Bank.

More than 7,000 positive social actions have been completed since 2016 in Participation Row, while registering 3,000 new voters.

MF strives to positively affect the local communities.

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