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Inyo to have state fair exhibit |
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Friday, 28 December 2007 |
 The Inyo County informational display and exhibit at the California State Fair has attracted more than its share of attention from visitors and officials. The Independence Chamber of Commerce’s Rich and Kathy White, will once again be heading up the county’s exhibit this year. Photo submitted By Mike Gervais
Register Staff 12-27-2007 Even if a plan to highlight the region via a tri-county exhibit at the California State Fair doesn’t pan out, Inyo County will at least be represented at the two-week event in Sacramento.
The Independence Chamber of Commerce is working with Mono and Alpine counties in an attempt to develop a cooperative, Eastern Sierra exhibit at the expo. But to be sure that Inyo was present at the widely attended annual event, the Inyo County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday declared the Independence Chamber of Commerce as the contractor responsible for developing and manning an exhibit representing the area.
The supervisors approved $10,000 for the exhibit which will help the Independence Chamber of Commerce design, construct, staff and eventually dismantle the exhibit at the 2008 fair.
The Independence Chamber of Commerce applied for $10,000 from the county’s Community Project Sponsorship Program, but, because the chamber had fallen behind in its paperwork and lost its non-profit status, it was deemed ineligible.
The board didn’t want to give up having an exhibit at the state fair, since it draws the attention of thousands of visitors and is a great advertising opportunity for the county, and no other chamber of commerce or other entity expressed any interest in hosting a booth at the fair.
Staff noted that, without any other chambers expressing interest in developing the exhibit, the Independence Chamber of Commerce is the most logical choice for the task because of its “prior experience of a highly specialized nature.”
At an Oct. 29 meeting of the Eastern Sierra Regional Partners Conference in Bishop, representa-tives from the Independence Chamber of Commerce, made a presentation suggesting coordination for a regional exhibit that would include Inyo, Mono and Alpine counties. But the chamber has yet to hear back from Mono and Alpine counties.
Should both counties get on board and offer support for a regional exhibit, Inyo’s cost for the exhibit will go down to $6,667. If only one of the two counties get on board Inyo will be paying $8,500 for its share of the exhibit.
No matter who is involved in the exhibit, Inyo’s share of funds will come from the $25,000 the county budgeted for “advertising county resources” in the regional collaboration budget.
But, if Inyo County is alone in its efforts to advertise the region’s recreational assets, the $10,000 of support money will be taken from the county’s Community Projects Sponsorship Program budget, which currently has a balance of $28,300.
Fourth District Supervisor Jim Bilyeu commented last week that Rich White and his wife, Kathy, with little other help, manned the Inyo County exhibit at the state fair every day of the event last year.
But that isn’t how it always worked. Until 2005, Inyo County’s five chambers of commerce took turns developing, constructing and staffing the Inyo County exhibit at the state fair. The county itself has always appropriated $10,000 for the advertising effort.
That cooperative effort ended in the summer of 2005 when the Coalition of Chambers informed the Inyo County Board of Supervisors that the Bishop Chamber of Commerce was unable to take its turn at the state fair. The notice came too late in the year for any of the other chambers to take Bishop’s place in the rotation and there was no county exhibit in that year’s fair.
After the incident, the Coalition of Chambers told the supervisors that it would review the state fair exhibit and attempt to fit it into its marketing plan and return with recommendations for how the chambers might participate in the future fairs.
“Recommendations were not forthcoming and, again, in 2006 Inyo County did not participate in the counties exhibit at the California State Fair,” staff explained to the supervisors on Tuesday.
In an attempt to break that two-year streak of not having the county represented at the state fair, the Independence Chamber of Commerce requested that the supervisors help coordinate an exhibit for the 2007 fair. They approved and appropriated their usual amount of $10,000 to fund the chamber’s efforts.
That effort paid off when, at the conclusion of the fair, Inyo County’s exhibit, developed and staffed by the Independence Chamber of Commerce, won the fair’s “prized” Superintendent’s Award.
Applications for 2008 California State Fair exhibits are currently being accepted, and, according to County Administrator Kevin Carunchio, “time is of the essence if the county intends to be represented with a prime location in the state’s exhibit.”
White noted that efforts are ongoing to get Mono and Alpine counties involved in a regional exhibit.
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Last Updated ( Friday, 08 February 2008 )
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