LA GRANDE — As fall approaches, so too does one of La Grande’s growing arts traditions.

The 12th presentation of the Eastern Oregon Film Festival is slated for a hybrid presentation this year, with in-person and virtual events for Oct. 21-23. Prior to festival passes going on sale, a virtual sneak peek fundraiser is on Wednesday, Sept. 15.

“We’re going to pull back a bit and be safe about things,” Eastern Oregon Film Festival Director Chris Jennings said.

A big alteration to this year’s film festival will be the limited availability of in-person passes for only official EOFF members and visiting artists. This decision comes in the wake of the surge in COVID-19 cases and uncertainty of venue availability.

“For us to be able to manage the festival this year, we have to limit that all-access festival pass to just our members,” Jennings said. “Because we’ve had such a large response in artists who are coming, we need to make sure we can serve up the festival in-person to visiting artists and major members as well as having everything else available online virtually.”

Festival passes for in-person access now are available on the festival’s website, while virtual passes will be available to purchase online starting Sept. 17. The sneak peek fundraiser event marks the deadline for festival sponsorship opportunities. Further details on streaming the event will be available at www.eofilmfest.com.

Despite the hurdles COVID-19 presents, Jennings is happy with how the festival has grown in popularity. The festival is showing more films than ever this year and received its largest number of submissions. Visiting filmmakers contributed 40 short films and 13 feature films to this year’s exhibition. Jennings already is expecting at least 30 visiting filmmakers to present their works in person in La Grande.

“We have a lot of interest on the filmmaking side, so hopefully we can make a nice networking party for the visitors and engage them with our members while still distributing a program that works virtually,” he said.

Like many events and organizations in the area, EOFF is rolling with the punches when it comes to COVID-19. After having hosted the festival virtually last year, Jennings is confident in the festival’s technical setup and infrastructure available to present a quality product this time around. In addition to the pandemic, venue accessibility is playing a role this year.

With construction continuing at the Liberty Theatre, Jennings is crossing his fingers the space will be ready to host viewings in just over a month. He expects the festival will use a pop-up screen and may have to acquire a special occupancy permit to hold showings at the venue. The film festival also will utilize the McKenzie Theatre and Schwarz Theatre at Eastern Oregon University, as well as the Lodge at Hot Lake Springs and HQ on Depot Street in downtown La Grande. The venues have varying capacity limits ranging from 60 at Hot Lake to more than 400 at Eastern Oregon, which is causing headaches in planning.

“That’s why we wanted to limit it to members and that way we can plan ahead for the capacity at all our venues,” Jennings said. “Then, if it’s safe and things are good and we can do it, we’ll open a day-of box office for the films and things going down.”

Jennings said the festival will take it one step at a time and determine in-person availability in October. Once the total number of member passes and visiting filmmakers can be determined, in-person tickets for nonmembers may come available.

“We will have an in-person festival,” Jennings said. “It will be an artists’ festival and a members’ festival, but there will be public opportunities depending on capacities.”

Even with certain limitations in place due to COVID-19 and venue accessibility, Jennings is hoping to continue the film festival’s growth and foster La Grande as a cultural destination.

“We’re definitely going to put it out there in the safest way we can and manage it in the best way we can,” Jennings said.