Santa's Holly Trolley Visit Goes From HoHoHo To NoNoNo For Hopeful Children

It was supposed to be a routine, celebratory, visit between hopeful children brimming with Holiday cheer and the jolly fat man in the red suit and white beard: Santa Claus. But it didn't go quite as planned and the children that were ready to welcome Jolly Saint Nick were left out in the cold. Yes, something funny happened on the way from the North Pole and the annual Dyster Holly Trolly - sans Santa - failed to deck the halls much to the chagrin of broken hearted youngsters.

The Donna Owens inspired Holly Trolly has been a Dyster administration Christmas season staple since 2008. The trolley is actually a rented bus touring around town and pulling curbside at a handful of scheduled locations. On board the jolly holly trolley are the city administrator, mayor, select dignitaries and Santa. Usually, Santa, but not this year. After the Holly Trolley jaunt concludes the special people on board usually repair to city hall for a VIP reception.

So, why no Santa this year? Well, this is where it gets a little sketchy. Apparently the Holly Trolly planners failed to plan for Santa's visit: at the last moment no one could find a Santa suit or a would-be Santa to wear the suit that couldn't be found. The suit was used in the 2014 Holly Trolly event, but suddenly no one could remember where it was or who had seen it last...even though the event planners had one year to schedule the suit's use. Yes, you cannot make this nonsense up, it just writes itself.

Should we be surprised that the mayor - who's planning a 2016 city-wide reassessment to help close a $7.4 million deficit he created - couldn't deliver a simple Santa Comes to Town program for city kids?

Mayor Grinch? That's putting it mildly.