Fair Board holds emergency meeting

PLAINS – The Sanders County Fair Board assembled for an emergency session last week at the county fairgrounds in Plains.

The fairgrounds pavilion was filled with interested observers and energetic participants as the Sanders County Concessions Group, non-profits who operate a variety of booths during the county fair, and the fair board attempted to come to a decision regarding a lease agreement for this year’s fair.

The session took place in the evening on Monday, April 27.

Earlier in the month, during the fair board’s April meeting, there was palpable tension as the concessions group flatly refused to sign the 2015 lease agreement in its current form.

The group took exception to the $24,000 flat fee in the lease agreement, which they believed to be a substantial amount of funds to put up before the fair when attendance differs at the fair from year-to-year.

Additionally, Katy French, who represented the group at the fair board’s regular meeting in mid-April believed the non-profit vendors were being charged substantially more than the profit vendors, an issue she noted was quite damaging to community groups.

“We feel the commercial vendors, who are not part of this community, are getting a better deal,” French said.

During the special meeting last week, both groups were determined to come to an agreement and there was a willingness to come together and compromise on both sides.

Fair Commission Chairman Chris McGuigan set the tone for the meeting at the session’s outset, stating he hoped to reach an agreement in a civil manner.

“Let’s try to keep this meeting as pleasant and productive as we can,” McGuigan said.

The crowd in attendance was cognizant of this request and several individuals raised particular issues they had before the meeting moved to its negotiation phase as the two parties succesfully hammered out a proposal that was amicable to both groups.

After a polite back and forth discussion between the fair board and the concessions group, a decision was reached.

Under the 2015 lease agreement, agreed upon at last week’s meeting, the concessions group agreed to pay 20 percent of their gross sales at this year’s fair, using an average of gross sales from the last three fairs to determine a minimum and maximum of 20 percent of the 2015 gross.

In addition to the aforementioned agreement the fair board agreed to split the repair costs of a fryer with the concessions group and hold a walkthrough of the fairgrounds facilities to ensure the booths operated by the local non-profits were all in working order come fair time.

“I think we are happy, I think we can work with this,” McGuigan said, as the terms were agreed upon.

The concessions group also received confirmation they would have a booth for bingo, a big money raiser for the non-profits due to the booth’s low overhead costs.

French also noted the importance of the bingo booth describing how the concessions group had spent substantial time and effort working with state legislators to ensure bingo at the county fair could run throughout the fair’s proceedings and not be restricted to a select window of operation.

At several points during the evening’s negotiations, a span of roughly two hours, the chairman made it clear the fair board wanted to come to an agreement that would help the non-profits of Sanders County be a viable part of the annual fair.

“We are all here for Sanders County. We are all on the same playing field,” McGuigan said.

The agreement, which was reached at last week’s meeting will be in effect for one year and will be renegotiated once the fair commission hires a new fair manager.

Current Fair Manager, Mike Hashisaki will retire in September following the 2015 county fair after 23 years of working in his current capacity.