Shakespeare Festival Organizers Working To Rebuild After Last Year's Vandalism

SACRAMENTO (CBS13) - A year after vandals struck the Shakespeare Festival in Land Park, organizers are ready for a second act and want to rebuild what was stripped from them.

They say a picture is worth a thousand words but for Julianna Hess, she can only think of one.

"It was devastation. In one word, that's all it was to me," she said.

It was devastation to see that someone broke in, stole and vandalized what she loved so much.

"I was furious; because, who would do something like that to our Shakespeare Festival?" said Hess.

"It was heartbreaking to know someone had taken advantage of us being in the park," said Loriann Delappe-Grondin.

It's been one year since that devastating day and the emotions are still raw.

"It's really disrespectful. For a lot of us actors, the stage is kind of like our church," said Matthew Canty.

Delappe-Grondin says the vandals took more than equipment.

"We feel like we didn't have security in the park anymore," she said.

Their sense of security may have been shattered but their resilience and perseverance is still strong.

"We're not going to rebuild the old village. We're going to build something that will work into the park renovation when that happens," said Delappe-Grondin.

A fundraiser through Indiegogo.com is now underway. With one week left, they are still several thousand dollars short in funding to rebuild. The community rallied around them once and they're hoping for help once again.

"No matter what, something that belongs to the community gets burned down or vandalized, people are going to come together to bring it back," said Canty.

The season kicks off June 28. The Indiegogo fundraiser runs for another week.