Fair board has discussion regarding local rodeo

A lengthy discussion between a member of the community and the Great Northern Fair Board was held during the board’s monthly meeting Tuesday night in the Timmons Room of the Hill County Courthouse.

Community member Clint Solomon, during the events portion of the meeting, raised the issue of how much the rodeo pays the fair board. He added that the rodeo was struggling to draw people and it was becoming too expensive to put on.

“We’ve been taking all expense and putting money back into it. It doesn’t seem like we get any appreciation,” he added. “It seems like you think you want to take more of a percentage of all this stuff.”

Board member Chelby Gooch asked Solomon why all the other organizations have to pay a percentage, but he shouldn’t.

Solomon said his rodeo group is who mostly fixes up the fairgrounds and he felt like other groups weren’t doing that.

Board Chair Tyler Smith asked what he was supposed to tell the other groups when they asked why Solomon doesn’t have to pay anything. He then asked what the ticket sales were for last year’s rodeo, and Solomon said he didn’t have that information.

Solomon said he had a contract with the fair board and Gooch said she had not seen a contract from Solomon presented to the board.

“Instead of talking about a bunch of stuff in the past,” Smith said. “Put together a list of what we can do for you and how we can work together to make this better.”

Smith said he wanted Solomon to go and look for the contract and also to supply the ticket sales for the rodeo from the past three years. He added that Solomon can bring it to the next meeting and the board will address the issue again after looking at the financials.

Smith said that he installed the 2-inch water hydrant and during the installation process, discovered a separate sewer line. He added that it is set up for use but is capped right now. The line is located on the south side of the Bigger Better Barn.

Board member Ray Kallenberger said he looked into a couple of quotes regarding replacing some of the buildings on the fairgrounds. However, the cost for the buildings was between $400,000 and $800,000. Kallenberger said he would keep looking at estimates, but Smith said he was sure that it would be costly no matter what.

An application was received for the open fair manager position at the fairgrounds. Smith said he would leave the posting up for a couple more weeks before taking it down. He added that he will announce the hiring for the secretary position at the same time as the manager position.