It was the final night of the 2019 Gilroy Garlic Festival, and Gene Sakahara was racing through the grounds, as he had done every year for four decades, when he heard what sounded like fireworks. Then he saw the screaming crowd and realized what they were: gunshots.

Sakahara and the others ran to herd a nearby group of children, including his two grandchildren, into the shelter of a barbecue. With a hotplate in one hand and a knife in the other, Sakahara stood guard over the crying youths, unsure of where and how many shooters might be.

Later that night, Sakahara and his family escaped unharmed, but the attacker injured 17 people and killed three — 6-year-old Stephen Romero of San Jose, 13-year-old Keyla Salazar of San Jose and 25-year-old Santa Cruz resident Trevor Irby — leaving an indelible scar on the community.

Following the mass shooting, the Garlic Festival as the community knew it came to an end, ending a beloved tradition and a vital source of funding for city nonprofits and local organizations.

Five years later, a growing group across the city is hoping to bring back the festival, pushing for a smaller, safer event that could give back to the community. While the desire for the festival is nearly universal among those interviewed by this news organization, would-be organizers face rising insurance rates and safety concerns in their efforts to bring it back.

“I don’t think we should let a crazy killer decide our fate in the future,” Sakahara said. “Let’s bring it back because it’s part of Gilroy, part of Gilroy’s identity.”

Before the disastrous events of July 28, 2019, the Gilroy Garlic Festival enjoyed international recognition as a beloved food festival. From humble beginnings in 1978 as a humble luncheon, it grew into a phenomenon with annual attendance of about 100,000 for nearly four decades, attracting curious foodies, celebrity chefs and garlic fanatics from around the world for garlic ice cream, shrimp scampi and pepper steak sandwiches.

“It’s like a holiday in Gilroy. It’s Christmas in July,” said resident Steve Williams, who has attended for decades.

Sakahara has been involved with the festival since its inception, most notably as one half of SakaBozzo, a cooking demonstration duo with fellow festival stalwart Sam Bozzo. He said the festival has led to a profound change in Gilroy’s reputation and civic pride. Before the festival, he remembers being sometimes embarrassed to be from “a town that stinks of garlic,” but the festival made it “posh and stinky.”

The event was run almost entirely by about 4,000 volunteers and gave away hundreds of thousands of dollars each year, providing a lifeline to more than a hundred charities and nonprofits across the city and providing about a third of the funds for the Chamber of Commerce. In the wake of the shooting, many organizations are struggling to find new sources of funding.

The festival also brought in business, filled hotel rooms and brought in the taxes that went with it. When the festival went, so did a source of income. “Financially, it was a huge success,” said Jane Howard, interim president of the Gilroy Chamber of Commerce.

Efforts to bring back the festival began in 2020 but were hampered by COVID. In 2021, the Gilroy Garlic Festival Association, which organizes the festival, attempted to hold a smaller edition at local amusement park Gilroy Gardens, but its insurance liability ballooned from $6 million to $10 million after the shooting. At that rate, the festival association wouldn’t be able to afford to have anyone insure it, said City Council member Tom Cline, who also served as the association’s president from 2019 to 2021.

Since then, the festival has taken on a half-dozen smaller iterations, such as a drive-through festival with live music in 2021 and a pasta dinner and songwriters concert this year, among others. But Cline and others are committed to bringing the event back to Gilroy.

Wedge nostalgically described the previous festival as a combination class and family reunion, calling it “the heart of Gilroy.”

“If there’s anything I’d like to see done, it’s to see it come back,” Cline said. “That’s kind of my mission in life.”

Even some who were there the day of the shooting are hopeful the festival will return. Both Steve Williams and his wife, Anabel Williams, fled the sound of gunfire Sunday, but they say they would go to the garlic festival if it returned. “It’s the only thing that’s stabilized Gilroy,” Anabel Williams said. “It’s helped so many people.”