Fair board wants to talk to former manager

Great Northern Fair Board members put together a three-person hiring committee Monday evening and chair Paul McCann said they will try and speak to the manager who abruptly resigned before a new one is hired.

“The hiring committee should visit with the person that had that position before and say, ‘What did you find good, or challenging?’ That’s our intention,” McCann said.

McCann didn’t say specifically why Horne resigned.

“I think he picked up employment elsewhere in the community that worked better for him and his household,” he said.

Horne resigned after working 9 months as the latest groundskeeper-manager, but McCann seemed optimistic about Horne discussing his former position.

“He doesn’t have to answer us. I think (Horne) is very interested in helping this organization move forward,” McCann said. “It’d be out of the goodness of his heart to do it, because he had the right to resign and have his own life. He doesn’t have to engage us, but if he does, I think we can learn from him.”

Talk of splitting the position into two had been brought up during the meeting, but McCann said it comes down to finances because the amount of money appropriated at the county level for managing the fairgrounds is small.

“It’s not like you can employ multiple positions,” McCann said. “We don’t have the liberty to just say ‘We want a manger and a groundskeeper.’ We’d love to have both and we’d love it if they were free. … It’d be difficult to split, but it’s something we have to look at.”

McCann said the board hopes to be able to propose the needs and the type of applicant or applicants it will be looking for, largely based on the working budget, by the next meeting, Dec. 20, and began interviewing right afterward.

“Then it’s county hiring process,” he said.

Although the goal is to fill the position as quickly as possible, the goal is also to learn so “we’re not revisiting this,” McCann said, referring to having had three fairgrounds managers within the last two years.