The return of a downtown rib festival next summer is increasingly likely.

Randy Rossey, city codes and planning director, said the Comprehensive Plan task force has discussed the rib festival for next year, while Jim Decker, WCCBI president, said Warren Worx is ready to help with the event.

“We’re working with city staff on bringing ribfest back to downtown Warren,” Decker said. “I think that’s pretty much a done deal if we can get ribbers, right? We look at our events special projects funding as possibly a kickstarter for some of the expenses there.”

Restarting a rib festival in Warren became a topic of conversation over the summer, when members of the Downtown Development task force traveled to the Celoron Ribfest near Jamestown to meet with organizers and then later attended the event to talk to various “ribbers” to find out if they might be interested in coming to an event in Warren. Councilman Maurice Cashman suggested sending a group to Pittsburgh to attend its rib festival, which takes place the same weekend as a University of Pittsburgh football game.

While Decker said the ball is essentially in the court of the ribbers, Rossey said in June that some of the Celoron Ribfest attendees were interested in adding another nearby competition.

“There are ribbers that are interested in coming into Warren,” Rossey said. “This group will be working going forward to identify what ribbers would like to come into Warren and then look at some dates. It’s possible the dates could be late spring or early summer.”

While there hasn’t been a ribfest in Warren in years, a three-day Ribfest with live music and ribs was held in Youngsville at the end of May, sponsored by KAMS Logging Supplies and Outdoorwear. KAMS is looking to offer another Ribfest next year.

The annual Warren Ribfest, which brought nationwide talent to the community for a week, has been gone for a decade. The event had been held at Betts Park for several years before moving to the Warren County Fairgrounds. The event started out with a private organizer before it was taken on by the Warren Main Street group and then by the Warren County Chamber of Business and Industry.