By COLE REIF
Great Bend Post
(This is a corrected version of the story that originally ran on Dec. 6)
The expenses on the upkeep of Expo I and II at the Great Bend Expo Complex have been exceeding the utilization and revenue brought in from the venue for the past few years. With a question of who actually owns the buildings, the Great Bend Chamber of Commerce is looking to surrender their management of the buildings over to the City of Great Bend.
Construction started in the 1970s on the buildings as a way to attract the 3I Show and then later the Farm and Ranch Show. The Chamber paid the Industrial Revenue Bonds (IRB) to manage two of the three buildings, the other is operated by the Barton County Fair Board.
Chamber CEO Megan Barfield said with the cancellation of the Farm Show, the Chamber
is losing money each year with the upkeep of the buildings.
"We have 563 chamber members, and every dollar that we take in through our membership dues and sponsorships goes back into our programming to promote and serve the business community," said Barfield. "If we have this asset sitting on our financials that is bleeding, that's hurting our membership."
For more than a decade, the Great Bend Farm, Ranch & Hemp Expo called Great Bend its home. The show directors decided to relocate the event to Hutchinson in 2023.
On average, there are five to seven annual uses or reoccurring events utilizing the Expo buildings...the Barton County Fair, F&E Auto Auction, Pontiac Uprising, 4-H shooters, Red Barn Pet Products, KanEquip and SRCA. There were six private events held in either building in 2022. The Chamber uses both buildings during the winter months for the public to store recreational use items such as campers and boats. Reservations are currently down by half compared to last year.
At the start of 2020, the Great Bend Chamber of Commerce stopped handling the
city’s economic development. Because of this and the fact that the Chamber
operates with a limited budget, Barfield said the Chamber Board had to rethink
if the Chamber wants to manage buildings, especially ones that have resulted in
a $60,000 loss over the past four years.
"I've been asked if I could figure out new and more things to bring out there," said Barfield. "I could and I have a lot of ideas, but coming back to our mission, is that the Chamber's role? We've done what we can with these buildings, but we don't have the revenue stream to sustain our mission."
Listen below to the entire discussion from the Great Bend City Council's work session on Dec. 5, 2022 regarding the Expo buildings.
While the intent in the 1970s was to have the Chamber take ownership of the buildings, no formal document states clearly who owns the buildings and no one has been paying property taxes on the facilities.
"An argument can be made that the city owns them," said City Attorney Allen Glendenning. "It still can be made that the technical requirements weren't made for the transfer to the economic development (Chamber), but then I think it's clear that was the intent that the city does not own the buildings. If somebody wanted to argue about that, it could be argued."
Paying off the bonds in full in 2000, the Chamber stated they have invested $528,000 into the facilities. The Chamber does collect revenue from the two Expo buildings, but invested the money to construct and maintain the structures.
The Chamber proposed surrendering the management of the buildings to the city,
possibly charging the city to buy the two structures with 40,000 square feet of
interior exhibit space combined.
Outside of the Barton County Fair, there is limited use of the Expo Complex
buildings, thus making utilities, insurance and maintenance outweigh the
revenue. Although the Chamber is prepared to walk away from the Expo Complex management
by next March, Great Bend City Council member Cory Urban said there is hesitancy
from the city to pay money for an asset that is losing money.
"As the Chamber serves businesses, we (city) serve the tax-paying public, and you're asking for them to pay for it," said Urban. "That's why, I have the feeling, that a lot of us up here have the pushback that if you don't want them anymore, I don't see a scenario where the city doesn't end up with them. It's just a matter of are we going to pay money to have something that is losing money the second we take possession of it."
While there are other events that utilize the Expo buildings, the Barton County
Fair is the major player considered if the ownership changes.
"I would like to see everyone put their heads together to figure out how we can continue to make those buildings pay for themselves," said Troy Miller, Fair Board member. "Without building one and two, our fair would go south really quick and then we're stuck with one big building on city property."
The Fair Board is already booking musical acts and extending contracts for next summer's fair and needed to know the future status of the venue.
"I think there there are some things the Fair Board is trying to build back better, stronger and look to the future of growing something out there," said Miller. "We're happy to jump in and do whatever we can to help make this work because we're pretty much stuck."
The Chamber was hopeful of exchanging ownership over to the city, rather than selling the buildings to a private owner, so arrangements with the Barton County Fair and other entities could still exist.
"We don't want to just completely walk away from them, but at the same time, we have an organization that they could bleed dry if we continue down the path that we are on," said Barfield. "We're very interested in exploring what those opportunities look like."
The city will organize a committee early next year to search for the best
recommendations for the future of the Expo buildings.