Bianca Finister, 18, right, and Maria Finister, 47, from San Jose, watch the fireworks on display during opening night at the Santa Clara County Fair last summer.
Santa Clara County supervisors voted on Tuesday morning to squash an attempt to freeze funding for the Santa Clara County Fairgrounds capital improvements projects.
On the meeting agenda was a referral to county administration to direct the funds, nearly $1 million, to be frozen until the supervisors select the redevelopment program for the fairgrounds. The exception would have been money necessary to make the interim improvement projects ready for further construction. Last year, the county spent $4.5 million to improve facilities on the site, and this year has allocated the money to make general improvements.
Supervisors Ken Yeager and Pete McHugh said there was some confusion about whether the money would be spent on renovating buildings that would later be torn down.
In response to a comment from McHugh that the fairgrounds are losing money, not bringing it in, Gage said there are "a lot of things going on that can enhance the fairgrounds." He said there are different events, not just the Santa Clara County Fair, that bring people to the fairgrounds, an average of 800,000 per year, and he believes with improvements, that attendance figure will rise over one million.
After the vote, Supervisor Blanca Alvarado made a motion that the board be given an update as soon as possible on the status of the redevelopment program. The motion was passed unanimously.
The fairgrounds, she said, "is one of the most widely coveted pieces of property in the city of San Jose and the county of Santa Clara." She added that the board had been trying for years, "in fits and starts" to improve the property and make it more profitable.
"I think we have lost a lot of business at those facilities," she said, referring to the buildings that have no air conditioning or are in disrepair. "I don't recall anybody anywhere along the way saying that the buildings we rehab are going to be torn down."
Marilyn Dubil Marilyn Dubil covers education and law enforcement for The Times. Reach her at (408) 779-4106 ext. 202 or send her an email.
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