Organisers are calling for community support to get behind the annual Gumi festival that will still go ahead, despite their decision to cancel the race just days before.
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South Wagga Apex club made the tough decision last night to cancel Saturday's Gumi races due to low river levels.
Event organiser Josh Paul said this decision had not come lightly and the group have been in consultation with authorities for several weeks to determine whether it was safe to proceed.
"Our hands are tied; we can't control how much rain or water is coming out of the dam to get the levels that we need," Mr Paul said.
"We got together as a club last night and instead of cancelling it all together, the community and sponsors deserve it, so we decided to run the Gumi festival as it would have been, just without the race.
"There will still be something for everyone down at the beach and we want to show how resilient Wagga is and how important the Gumi race is to our town, so hopefully the community will come together and have a good time."
Wagga Beach will still be filled with food vendors, beer and wine, rides and entertainment for the children, live entertainment and Movies by Moonlight.
Mr Paul said this year registrations were "well and truly up" than previous years as most are submitted on the day.
"We were looking at about 60 Gumi registrations, which was a huge number this far out," he said.
"This year, we decided that South Wagga Apex would cover the registration cost so that all families and kids could get involved and put a raft on the water, to make it free for everyone."
The club collaborated with the NSW Roads and Maritime Services, the Wagga Volunteers Rescue Association and the State Emergency Services who all deemed the river levels were unsafe.
"We have clear guidelines as to what the river level must be and we have followed them for numerous years," Mr Paul said.
"We have been in consultation with these parties for four weeks and the levels vary from day-to-day and we were somewhat positive, but we had to cancel the race due to no rain in site.
"The dam has halved and with that the river has dropped, so it has not been deemed safe by any parties involved."
The event organiser said for the race to go ahead the river has to be at a level of 1.8 metres, but it currently is sitting at about 1.35 metres.
"This decision was disheartening and for a small community group, this is our biggest project throughout the year," Mr Paul said.
"We have been told we can't put the rafts on the water and so as a group we are doing the right thing by our community.
"It's taken a lot of man hours to get to where we are as the easier work was just ahead of us - to celebrate - but with all our sponsors, advertising and media coverage we didn't want to cancel the entire event."
Mr Paul is urging all community members to attend Saturday's event.
"Although it's a set back, it won't be the end of the Gumi race and there will be something for everyone down there," he said.
"Let's show them we're resilient and the lack of water in our communities isn't going to dampen our spirits."
