Kings Dominion Cancels Annual College Hip-Hop Fest

Black Entertainment Television and Paramount’s Kings Dominion theme park in Virginia have pulled the plug on their annual College Hip-Hop Fest. According to a press release, the festival was yanked due to poor attendance. The annual event drew students from nearby black colleges in the area, as well as others up and down the east […]

Black Entertainment

Television and Paramount’s Kings Dominion theme park in Virginia have pulled

the plug on their annual College Hip-Hop Fest.

According to a

press release, the festival was yanked due to poor attendance. The annual event

drew students from nearby black colleges in the area, as well as others up and

down the east coast.

"We are disappointed

but unfortunately, the number of students participating has declined to the

point where it doesn’t make sense for us to host it," said Richard A. Zimmerman,

executive vice president and general manager of Kings Dominion in a statement.

The park refused

to divulge their actual attendance numbers and the statement made no reference

to the shootings that took place after the daylong festival in the past two

years.

Last year, two

men were shot in the theme park’s parking lot as thousands of people were

leaving.

In an attempt to keep trouble out, organizers

of the event made it more difficult for people other than students to attend

the festival, requiring students to present a valid college ID to purchase tickets.

Additionally, over

100 deputies were assigned to work Kings Dominion’s parking lots and police

stepped up their presence by putting almost four times the regular amount of

officers on the streets of nearby Richmond.

"The relationship

with our sister Viacom company Paramount’s Kings Dominion has been a mutually

successful one, and we’re grateful for all of the hard work and dedication shown

over the years," BET President Debra Lee said in a statement.

During the seven-year

annual event, Kings Dominion and BET helped raise over $250,000 for black colleges,

as well as $50,000 for BET’s campaign to raise awareness about HIV in

the black community.