A former treasurer of Canal Fest has pleaded guilty to stealing more than $26,000 in a plea deal with Niagara County prosecutors.
Carrie Heyn, 45, of Sanborn, pleaded guilty Monday afternoon to a charge of fourth-degree grand larceny during a brief proceeding before New York State Supreme Court Justice Mario Giacobbe. Heyn also made a $9,000 partial restitution payment to the Canal Fest organization as a condition of her plea.
She will be required to pay the remainder of the stolen funds as a condition of her final sentence. She faces up to 1 1/3 to 4 years in prison when she returns to court in May.
Giacobbe made no commitment on sentencing. He could give Heyn a term of probation and no prison time.
In taking the plea, Heyn admitted that she stole $26,881.07 from the organization between December 2023 and August 2025. An audit by the organization, in September, showed $17,752.75 was missing from a Canal Fest account through unauthorized withdrawals.
In a sworn statement, given to North Tonawanda police later that month, Heyn claimed she had only stolen $11,249.75 from the festival’s KeyBank account.
Heyn also told police that she was the only person responsible for the theft.
NFPD detectives originally charged Heyn with third-degree grand larceny.
Peter Cheiner Jr., the new Canal Fest treasurer, said he was satisfied with Heyn’s plea.
“She pleaded guilty to a felony that will follow her,” he said. “We followed the process and the process did what needed to happen.”
The full restitution payment, Cheiner said, will make the organization “financially whole.”
“We’re confident we did what was right,” Cheiner said.
Publicly available nonprofit IRS 990 filings from Canal Fest show it had a nearly $42,000 operating surplus for 2024 before having a nearly $41,000 deficit the following year. It reported $254,000 in expenses for 2025, compared to $212,000 in revenue that year.
Both are notable increases compared to $171,000 in revenue and $156,000 in expenses for 2023 and $194,000 in revenue and $152,000 in expenses for 2024. Reported assets for 2025 were $33,300, less than half of the $74,800 reported the year before, but comparable to the $37,200 for 2023.
Canal Fest has announced that it will move all of its activities for 2026 from the Tonawanda-North Tonawanda downtowns to North Tonawanda’s Gratwick Park. City of Tonawanda officials reportedly declined to participate in the festival after a dispute over the public safety costs associated with the event.