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County fair gets grounds

By S.I. ROSENBAUM
Published March 30, 2007

They're singing God Bless America under the live oaks and the blue sky. A skinny, owl-faced boy runs his border collie through her paces: Sit up, lie down, stay. Her leash is tied around his waist. Nearby, a girl in a 4-H T-shirt strokes the rooster cradled in her arms.

The 80 acres around them will become the new permanent home of the Hillsborough County Fair.

For fair board members, it has been a long struggle - a road paved in permits, business plans, revised business plans, and state and county red tape.

"We had to spend $7,000 on a study to come tell us there were no gray squirrels here," fair association president Betty Jo Tompkins said.

But in the end, the board achieved its goal: a long-term, $10-a-year lease on county-owned land at the corner of State Road 60 and Sydney-Washer Road.

Carrie Dickerson, 15, said she was thrilled at the new site.

Her sheep, Dawn and Darla, were tied up behind the crowd, watching the fairgrounds' inauguration from a distance. "It's my first time coming out here. I really like it."

The fair has had to rent temporary sites wherever the board could find one. It has been homeless since about 1990, when the Florida Strawberry Festival gave up the county fair charter to focus solely on local Plant City farmers.

A group of residents picked up the charter and struck out on their own, said Charles Parker Jr., the fair board chairman.

For some years, the fair was stuck inside Tampa's Raymond James Stadium. It was stuffy, nothing like this site, said Carrie, looking around. A kid was swinging from one of the vines of a live oak on the recently cleared land.

"I'm really excited," she said.

Parker said the fair association needs about $3-million to get the fairgrounds into shape and construct permanent buildings. How they'll get the money, he's not sure.

The association has started fundraising. They also have a $500,000 grant from the county in phosphate-reclamation money, because the site is a former phosphate mine.

But Parker said the fair will be held here in the fall, come what may.

Joanne Wagner is looking forward to that. She remembers when her daughter asked to be in 4-H. She agreed, not really knowing what it was. Wagner grew up in the city.

They got a chicken. Then another. Now there are chick incubators in their living room. Wagner is wearing a dress with chickens on it. Her daughter Brandi, holding their rooster Peapod, rolls her eyes.

"I think the site is going to be really nice," Wagner said. "I'm glad we finally have a place we can come to."

S.I. Rosenbaum can be reached at 661-2442 or srosenbaum@sptimes.com.

[Last modified March 29, 2007, 07:27:56]