Subscriber Benefit
As a subscriber you can listen to articles at work, in the car, or while you work out. Subscribe Now
The Indiana State Fair has been canceled, organizers announced Thursday, and will be replaced with a modified State Fair 4-H Livestock Show featuring additional activities.
The Indiana State Fair Commission and the Indiana State Fair Board said “the difficult decision was driven by the impact of COVID-19.”
“Unfortunately, key elements including vendors and partners of the Fair began falling off and so we pivoted, and found a way to still serve our communities,” said Brad Chambers, Indiana State Fair Commission chairman, in a written statement.
Last year’s 17-day fair attendance was 878,857, an increase of 2.1 percent over the previous year.
The fair had been set for Aug. 7-23 and officials had held out hope of holding it as the governor has said he planned to lift most statewide coronavirus restrictions July 4.
Fair officials, however, said preparing for the event requires collaboration with hundreds of businesses and thousands of part-time workers.
“We simply can’t hold off any longer for the sake of the staff, vendors, exhibitors, entertainers, sponsors and partners,” organizers said on the fair’s website. “While we are not sure what August will look like, we have to make decisions based on what we know today.”
The first Indiana State Fair was held in October 1852 on the grounds of what became known as Military Park. The first state fair on the present site along East 38th Street was held in 1892. The fair has been canceled or modified before, during the Civil War, Spanish-American War, and World War II.
State fairs have also been canceled in several other states this year, including Ohio and Minnesota.
“Safety is our No. 1 priority. We’ve spent months working through options that would allow us to host the fair,’ said Cindy Hoye, executive director of the Indiana State Fair Commission, in written remarks. “Agriculture and youth are the foundation of our mission and the heartbeat of the Indiana State Fair, so we are determined and proud to honor our 4-H members with a version of that State Fair experience that allows Indiana’s youth to be recognized for their dedication and hard work.”
Please enable JavaScript to view this content.
Let’s be honest here…..given the fact that a huge portion of fair goers are also the same people that refuse to wear a mask, refuse to social distance etc etc etc – it’s the right call. The fair would have had all sorts of mandates and rules that the vast majority of people that go to these types of events wouldn’t abide by anyways.
Shame on you. “people who go to these types of events”? What kind of people are they, exactly? What type of events are these, exactly? Tell us Brian!
So you’re talking about the protesters and rioters, who are allowed to gather in large groups and not wear masks? I doubt it.
‘So sorry to hear of this; our favorite day of the year…our day at The Indiana State Fair!
If only we as a country and a unique culture would learn from all this: Don’t trust the Communists running China who seek to overtake us, nor their acolytes at the World Health Organization. But we won’t: We’ll continue selling our sovereignty and our soul for cheap stuff.
If ever there was proof that the love of money is the root of all evil, here it is!
More kill joys. Why not just call off the riots? Tell those people out there that they had to go home as the “protests” had been cancelled due to COVID 19 concerns. Maybe that would have worked. Many of the “essential” stores have been open for months and have been packed with people as were the streets of the cities of the U.S. the last 6 nights. Focus on treatment, protect the most vulnerable and most likely to die from the virus and get on with life. Preemptively trying to prevent the virus from spreading by trying to quarantine the healthy does not work, will not work and indeed, has never worked throughout history.
Why not be honest about calling the fair off due to the riots? People can’t go to church or to a theater, but looks at mobs in so many blue cities across the country. There is a double standard for the mobs.
Yes
And simple question
Who’s running Marion county???
Very poor decision
It should be reversed
This is very ridiculous and poor thinking.. there are so many ways to let it happen and all the people that have strived towards it to succeed … a terrible decision for probably the wrong reasons
Calling off the fireworks, baseball games, outdoor concerts and now the fair? This has gone too far. We cant quarantine forever! Many people are out and about already – why cancel something that is 8 weeks away? Dumb dumb decision based on WHO reports and false models showing we are all going to die. Nonsense.
Get on with life!!!!