MARSHALL — The Lyon County Fair will be held later than usual this year for the second time in a row. A representative of the Lyon County Ag Society said this week that fair organizers were trying to work together with 4-H members to make accommodations for their school and state fair schedules.

“We’re doing some things to allow the 4-H members that are winning state 4-H trips to leave the fair early,” said Bob Richards of the Ag Society. “Between the 4-H and the 4-H families, they thought that would be a positive thing, just for the fact that there was not a lot of time for their animals to rest between ending the fair on Saturday night and Sunday, and when a lot of them had to be up at the State Fair.”

Richards gave a report on the Ag Society’s activities, as well as plans for the 2025 Lyon County Fair, at Tuesday’s Lyon County Board meeting.

Richards said the Ag Society had a “pretty positive report” on the 2024 Lyon County Fair.

“Financially, we are right in line with the last two or three years,” Richards said. “We didn’t make a tremendous amount of money, but we didn’t lose any money.”

Richards said the Fair Board had also filled all of its positions, from every district in the county.

“That’s encouraging too, that people want to get involved and be part of the fair,” he said.

This year’s fair will be held Aug. 13-17, which would put it on the third weekend in August. Richards said that’s a week later than Lyon County normally tries to schedule the event. However, this year that was the time frame that worked for the carnival company that usually comes to the fair.

“We’d like to have it on that second week. But with the (schedule) conflict of the carnival and the shortness between the Fourth of July and Labor Day … There’s one less weekend there for the carnival to do his tour, so to speak,” Richards said.

The 2024 fair faced a similar scheduling problem, and was held later than usual. A group of Lyon County 4-H families said holding the 2024 fair on Aug. 14-18 cut things too close to the start of the school year and other activities. A spokesperson for the group said more than half of Lyon County 4-H members attend school in the Minneota and Lakeview school districts, which both start class in August.

Commissioner Rick Anderson asked how the Fair Board was working together with 4-H exhbitors.

“How is that going, in trying to figure out with a one week late start? You had set up a committee to try and accommodate some of those shows,” Anderson said.

“We worked with the 4-H on that,” Richards said. “One of the things that they recommended is that we can let the State Fair trip winners leave (early), and the rest of them would all stay. They were all very positive about that.”

“Was there any talk about changing when some of the show times would be?” Anderson said.

“We encouraged that,” Richards said. “It’s not really up to us as a Fair Board to decide when the 4-H is going to have their shows.”

Richards said Fair Board members were “100%” supportive of 4-H working to hold events when it works best for exhibitors and animals. Some 4-H events, like the dog, horse and llama shows, were already held before the county fair.

“We’re kind of encouraging, whatever you have to do to allow this to work, to do it,” he said.

Richards also gave updates on other plans for the 2025 fair. He said some of the same entertainment activities as in past years are scheduled, including the rodeo and the demolition derby, he said.

“And this year we have the Whitesidewalls back on Wednesday, which is a huge hit with the steak fry. So that’s a positive thing,” Richards said.

Richards said fair organizers had discussed the possibility of bringing in a new event to try and boost fair attendance on Sunday afternoon.

“Because of the cost, and the question of whether we can draw people out there for the amount that it would cost, it was kind of tabled for now, to get more input,” he said. For example, the fair board had discussed the possibility of having a motocross or Baja racing event, but the cost would be between $10,000 and $17,000.

“So to get them to come and know if we can have a crowd that will pay for it, we just want to do a little more research,” Richards said.

Richards said the Fair Board was requesting $40,000 in county funding support. He said they also wanted to ask if the county would be willing to provide $6,000 in funding for portable toilets, like it did in 2024.

“I would like for at least the finance committee to meet before we commit that money,” Anderson said. He said the county finance committee would meet later on Tuesday. County Administrator Loren Stomberg said the county had budgeted $40,000 for the fair.