County fair looks to enhance
e Montgomery County Fairboard is enhancing the 2013 county fair and working toward future goals for the fair’s long-term sustainability.
New to this year’s fair, which is July 16-21, will be a country western band and beer garden following the annual bull buck off.
Fairboard president Kerry Confer said they got the idea for the concert at a state fair convention in Des Moines last year and hope the bull ride attendees will be a captive audience for the concert/dance.
Also for the first time this year, camping will be available at the fairgrounds. The recently completed campground on 4th and Alix St. has 18 available sites with electrical hook-ups and a dump station. It will cost $15 a night with a discounted rate for 4-H families during fair week.While it will open for the first time this season June 1, Confer said they hope to have it available from April-October in the future.
This year, the children’s area will be revamped and moved near the Pittsburg School. It will feature the standard petting zoo and magician along with a new sandbox.
“The fair is always a big part of the summer,” Confer said in response to the fairboard’s goal of enhancing the fair. “I don’t want it to die. So, we’re going to do what we can.”
While they don’t track attendance, Confer said the fair does attract far less people —participants and visitors — than it did 40 years ago when he was in 4-H.
The fair used to have around 300 cattle on display, now that number is around 65. However, the number of poultry and rabbit showings increases every year.
Confer said that shift is partially because of the economy, because it’s cheaper and doesn’t require as much land to raise smaller livestock.
In response to the smaller livestock trend, Confer said the fairboard is currently raising money to tear down the 60-year-old poultry, rabbit and swine barns to build one large barn that can also serve as a show arena.
He said the new facility will cost $450,000 and won’t be available for a few more years, but he thinks it will be a more flexible addition to the fairgrounds, allowing easier transportation around the grounds since animals will be housed within the arena. The space will also be available year round for other community events, like the Gold and White Fair Buildings are now.
“We want to be more user-friendly,” Confer said. “There are 5,000 people that live within a mile of the fairgrounds, but probably only 20 percent of them walk through. We’d like to see that change. Right now it’s basically only 4H families.”
Also in an effort to attract a larger audience, Confer said the fairboard has met with the Red Oak Chamber and Industry Association to potentially hold Junction Days the same time as the fair.
Originally, Confer said it was recommended to move the fair to the end of June with Junction Days, but he said that wouldn’t work with breeding schedules for some of the livestock. Now, the discussion is to consider moving Junction Days to July.
“Nothing has happened yet,” Confer said. “I won’t say that it won’t happen, though. There’s an opportunity for both the Chamber and the fair to have more activities and maybe draw more people to both events.”
Pride in Red Oak Committee member Chris Amos said both the fair and Junction Days are two big events and combining would require a lot of negotiation.
“Our dream is to some day have people come from other counties to see a big name band at Junction Days,” Amos said. “Maybe we could put together our funds, and they certainly have a good location with the arena. We both don’t want to lose our identities, though. It’s a discussion.”
“We want to be progressive, not reactive,” Confer said about the future of the fair. “There’s room for growth if we can make it all happen. So we need these new ideas to draw a bigger crowd.”