Park City and Salt Lake City have crafted a bid to keep the Sundance Film Festival in the state, likely involving financial inducements and other carrots.

But the Arts Council of Park City and Summit County wants to also show Sundance what the event has meant to the community over the decades. The group has drafted a questionnaire that inquires about someone’s experience with the festival.

The two key questions:

  • “Tell us your Sundance Film Festival Story! What has opened your eyes, changed your mind or your heart? Have you connected with someone new or unexpected? Tell us how having the Festival in Park City impacted you positively!”
  • “Are there any places in the Park City area that you have great Sundance memories of? Tell us about that place and what makes it special?”

It was not clear early in the week whether the answers will be made public.

“We are looking for stories about how the Sundance Film Festival in Park City has impacted lives and what makes this event special to our community, volunteers, film makers and visitors,” the questionnaire says.

The open-ended nature of the questions could solicit a wide range of answers in praise of Sundance as well as those critical of the festival’s impact on the community. There have long been Sundance supporters and detractors in Park City. The supporters see the festival as an opportunity for Park City crowds to watch some of the best works of independent film before they are widely distributed and point to the economic impact of the festival, which is the most lucrative event on the calendar in the community. The detractors, though, bemoan the traffic, parking restrictions and crowds the festival brings to Park City.

The questionnaire was posted amid a high-stakes process by Sundance as it considers whether to move the event elsewhere. City Hall and Sundance have an agreement that covers festivals through 2026, and the 2025 and 2026 events are scheduled as normal. Any move would begin with the event in 2027.

A combined effort between Park City and Salt Lake City, with the capital city envisioned as having a greater role in hosting Sundance, has advanced to another phase of the selection process. The others that advanced are Atlanta; Boulder, Colorado; Cincinnati, Ohio; Louisville, Kentucky; and Santa Fe, New Mexico. Site visits by Sundance officials are underway. Trips to some of the other finalist communities have drawn media attention.

Sundance is the top marketplace of independent films in the U.S. and one of the elite festivals on the international circuit. It generates some of the best economic numbers of the year in Park City sectors like the lodging, restaurant and transportation industries.

The questionnaire is available online at: https://tinyurl.com/es3pwzzz.