Isaac Flaenders, 13, shows off his black Minorca rooster inside the Poultry Barn Friday at the Santa Cruz County Fair which runs through Sunday. (Photos by Tarmo Hannula)

Santa Cruz County Fair officials were celebrating Thursday, marking the financial resuscitation of the fairgrounds.

Two years ago, the fairgrounds found itself more than $300,000 in debt and its financial future seemed uncertain, but after a lot of effort and hard work, officials say the fair is in the black again. They celebrated the victory with a bank-note-burning ceremony attended by supporters, board members and employees.

“We were $300,000 to $350,000 in the red in 2007,” interim CEO John Kegebein said. “And now, this fair is paid for and we hope to have enough money to make some improvements to the fairgrounds.”

Members of the present board of directors and past boards credited Kegebein with much of the work done to get the fair back on its feet. Sort of like the NFL’s Brett Favre, Kegebein came out of a second retirement to lead the fair back to solid ground, but he did it as a volunteer, saving the fairgrounds about $100,000 in salary.

“That really helped tremendously in pulling us back into the black,” said Sue King, a former member of the fair’s board of directors and currently a board member of the Santa Cruz County Fair Heritage Foundation.

Bruce Oneto said Kegebein’s leadership was instrumental because his volunteerism has led to other similar acts of charity.

“To me, he’s like Mount Shasta — the mountain — he’s just so solid,” director Bruce Oneto said. “His trustworthiness — if John comes to you for a dollar to buy a board, well, you know he’s going to put his own dollar in as well and buy two boards. He has the total trust of the community.”

Loretta Estrada, a longtime director at the fair, said the fairgrounds found itself in such a hole due to some mismanagement and a lack of diligence.

“We gave away a lot of passes and a lot of things weren’t really accounted for,” she said. “But this is a business and for the past two years, it has been run as a very tight business.”

Estrada was effusive in her praise of Kegebein as well, but said many volunteers have also stepped forward to help. Jody Belgard-Akimoto, president of the fair board, put her own money on the line to help. She personally signed a line of credit for the fair for $200,000 so it could continue operating. It was a generous move that few people even knew about for many months.

“I was not even aware of it for about six months,” Kegebein said. “She did that out of her sole concern for the fair.”

Kegebein said the fairgrounds now pays attention to every transaction and has created a purchase-and-order system to monitor them.

“We watch our fuel and energy consumption, control labor costs and we’ve been bringing in more revenue,” he said.

Deputy fair manager John Scurfield said the rental program is up, with more activities happening at the fair than ever. There are more horse shows, RV rallies, and other events like the new Certified Farmers’ Market on Sundays.

“We’ve increased the use from just weekends to about six days a week,” he said.

Fair board director Patrice Edwards said that 14 county fairs in the state are having financial problems and the Santa Cruz County Fairgrounds is being used as a pilot for how to recover. Mike Treacy, director of the California Department of Food and Agriculture’s Division of Fairs and Expositions, was in Watsonville Thursday congratulating the fair board and staff on the recovery.

“He was in awe,” Edwards said. “They are looking at us, what we did and how other fairs can follow in our footsteps. Unfortunately, we can’t clone John Kegebein.”

Kegebein said he is now working on a master plan on how to improve the fairgrounds. Among the improvements planned are new tables and chairs for the Harvest and Crosetti buildings, repairing leaky roofs, a new bathroom and improving the fair’s signage.

“We want a new lighted sign off the highway that we can put sponsors and events on,” he said.



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