The roofing replacement and repairs are significant and the county isn’t going to hand over those funds to a dying institution like the county fair
The fairgrounds in my county have been there since the 1800’s. The buildings aren’t that old, but I think they have been there for fifty years or more. All of the buildings could use a facelift. Sadly, there isn’t a lot of money in the county budget to fix up the place. People have moved out of the country and into the city and there’s no money coming into the budget for improvements like that. After last week’s storm, I don’t think there’s much hope that the fairgrounds are even going to remain open. We had 2 inches of rain on Friday and then another inch of rain on Saturday. On Sunday, we had another inch of rain and that’s when the winds were the hardest. Some of the wind gusts were up to 70mph, including the wind gust that ripped the roof off the top of the grand stand. The roof was scattered in bits and pieces all over the fairgrounds. The next day, the clean up crew scrambled to clean up the mess before the next surge of rain began. When the commercial roofing company came to assess the damages, I was working in the office. I was listening to the commercial roofing contractor that came to give my boss an estimate. The roofing replacement and repairs are significant and the county isn’t going to hand over those funds to a dying institution like the county fair. The money would be much better spent to fix up the youth center. The building and the parking lot has been abandoned for six years and it’s a real shame that the place sits vacant.