SC Fair Board considers funding

PLAINS – The Board of Directors of the Sanders County Fair had their November meeting recently and discussed how more money could be brought in during the week of the event.

The board held a brainstorming session to consider ways of bringing in more income. One of the big things they considered was an increase of promotional efforts and advertising for the event; this would include emphasizing the quality of the animals displayed by 4H, and other events, as well as the cowboys at the rodeo.

“We’d like to promote that and get more people coming to the rodeo,” said Dede Steinbach, manager of the fairgrounds. 

The board also wants to promote more camping around the fairgrounds. Steinbach noted there were year round campsites under the fairgrounds’ management but their use was limited during certain times of the year; the board felt getting more people using the sites would be a big help. 

These discussions were largely just exchanging ideas and no decisions were made during the meeting. The board tossed ideas around for what they would like to see happen and will discuss things in more detail at a future meeting.

There were no members of the community in attendance; as a result, there was no public comment on any of the agenda items or other issues.

The board also discussed aspects of the contracts for the rodeo and the carnival at the fair. Other than those items, the board went over some things with Steinbach about her job as manager of the fairgrounds, since she is fairly new to the position. This was their first opportunity for this discussion as they cancelled their October meeting due to not having a quorum.

The board will not have a meeting in December, due to scheduling around the holidays. The fair board’s next meeting will be on the third Wednesday in January.