State may disband group that receives DuPage fair funding

The Illinois Senate could vote in the next month to dissolve the agency that collects state money for the annual DuPage County Fair.

State Rep. Peter Breen of Lombard announced this week that the Illinois House unanimously has supported a measure that would eliminate the DuPage Fair and Exposition Authority.

The authority was created in the late 1980s to receive annual payments from the Illinois Department of Agriculture to help pay for the summer event.

If approved, legislation that Breen co-sponsored with state Rep. Ron Sandack of Downers Grove will transfer the authority's duties to the DuPage County Fair Association, which is the nonprofit entity that organizes and runs the five-day fair.

DuPage County Board Chairman Dan Cronin, who pushed for the change, said he is pleased the proposal has been moved to the Senate.

"This should be easy for the legislature," Cronin said. "Everybody is in agreement that this fair authority is not necessary. I expect and look forward to the support of the Senate."

When the fair and exposition authority was established, it was supposed to provide oversight of the fair association. It has since become an unnecessary layer of government, Cronin said.

"I am convinced that the fair association (members) are virtuous people trying to do the right thing with limited resources," Cronin said. "So if we can streamline the governance process, free up some of that money, allow them to run the fair as they see fit ... it's just a better model."

Indeed, even members of the fair authority board have agreed the agency should be disbanded.

Plans to dissolve the fair authority were stepped up, in part, because of the discovery of more than 600 code violations at the county-owned fairgrounds in Wheaton.

The fair association - which uses the 42-acre site along Manchester Road as part of a lease agreement with the county - is correcting the violations in multiple structures so the fair can open as planned in July.

Some county board members earlier this year criticized the fair authority because it didn't immediately give the fair association money to fix the fairgrounds.

Cronin said it simply makes sense to have future payments from the state go directly to the fair association.

"It's their (the association's) money," Cronin said. "I'm convinced that they will use it wisely."