The skies cleared Tuesday–literally and figuratively–over the future of the McHenry County Fair.
The fair, which kicks off Wednesday and runs through Sunday and is expected to draw more than 100,000 people to the fairgrounds in Woodstock, got a reprieve from both the weather and the McHenry County Board.
Rain that had started in the morning had stopped by mid-afternoon, though more is predicted in the coming days.
Pat Skinner of Skinner Amusements watched as her crews bolted together the midway rides. For Skinner, whose rides have been a fixture at the fair for the past 20 years, the weather can trigger a boom or a bust.
“The weather is our partner,” Skinner said. “It affects everything from the number of people attending to the number of rides we have to shut down because they would be unsafe in the rain. And, besides, I don’t like to keep my employees standing out in the rain.”
The fair weathered another type of storm earlier in the day when the County Board voted unanimously to renew the county’s lease with the McHenry County Fair Association for another year.
The renewal depends on the county and Mid-West Acquisitions Inc. of Chicago agreeing to extend an Aug. 31 deadline by which they were to complete a deal for Mid-West to buy nearly 20 acres, part of which includes the fairground’s grandstand area.
That extension appears to be a foregone conclusion, as the county and Mid-West are jointly suing Woodstock to force the city to accept Mid-West’s development plans for the property.
The fair association owns about 60 acres of the fairground property. It has been leasing an additional 15 acres from the county for $10 a year.
Fair association Treasurer Bo McConnell said he believes the County Board “broke an unbreakable lease” when, in 1995, it decided to sell the property it owns at Illinois Highway 47 and Country Club Road, including the portion leased by the fair association.
Mid-West agreed to buy the property for $2.25 million and announced plans to build a 160,000-square-foot shopping center anchored by a Jewel Food Store. Mid-West received preliminary approval from the Woodstock City Council in 1997, but a few months later a newly elected council refused to approve the plan without more road work to reduce traffic on Illinois 47.
Mid-West opposed the changes, which held up the purchase of the county property and put the development on hold. In 1998, Mid-West sued Woodstock over the new requirements. The County Board then joined Mid-West in the suit. The county needs the payment from Mid-West to build a new Highway Department facility outside Woodstock.
“We’re grateful and thankful it’s worked out this way,” McConnell said after learning the County Board had voted to extend the lease. “We’re in a position where we don’t have input into this whole thing. We’re at the mercy of the lawsuit, the city, the county and the developer. I don’t know how this will be resolved, how soon it will be resolved, or if it ever will be resolved.”
