Name: Iowa State Fair will decide on 2020 event's fate Wednesday
Brand: desmoinesregister.com
SKU: desmoinesregister-com-72
Availability: OnlineOnly

critic

Iowa State Fair will decide on 2020 event's fate Wednesday

preview

Des Moines RegisterView CommentsBy the time Iowans sit down to supper, they'll know if the Iowa&nbsp;State Fair will be held in 2020.After months of review and discussion, the Iowa State Fair board will host&nbsp;a live vote to decide the fair's fate at a meeting that starts at 3 p.m. Wednesday.Fair staff have long said that a decision would be made by June 15, giving them just under two months to prepare the grounds and event schedule for&nbsp;a possible Aug. 13 opening.&nbsp;“We ask that you continue to be patient as we gather and analyze the many unique experiences that Iowans hold near and dear at the Iowa State Fair,” an update on the fair's website read in early June. “We don’t take this decision lightly and we know that time is of the essence.”The Iowa State Fair is the last big Midwestern fair to decide whether to open for 2020. Rivals Minnesota, Wisconsin and Indiana chose to cancel within the last two weeks, joining previously scrapped fairs in Ohio and North Dakota.Nebraska, South Dakota, Kansas and Michigan have said their state fairs&nbsp;will continue forward despite safety risks. Fair leadership&nbsp;in Illinois and Missouri are still weighing options.Since the pandemic began, Iowa State Fair CEO Gary Slater&nbsp;has been monitoring updates in our state and across the country and staying&nbsp;in communication with his counterparts nationwide, he previously told the Register."Fear&nbsp;of the unknown can be overwhelming at times," he wrote in a letter on the fair's website. "The safety and health of our staff, volunteers, and Fairgoers is our top priority. We never want someone to feel unsafe working or attending the Fair. It is because of this that we are carefully considering all our options."The Iowa State Fair has been canceled only&nbsp;five times in its 165-year history, and never for a pandemic or large-scale medical crisis. There was no fair in 1898 due to that year's&nbsp;competing World's Fair in Omaha, and World War II dimmed the Grandstand's lights from 1942-1945.If organizers do cancel the fair, it won't be the first Iowa tradition to bypass 2020.The Register's Annual Great Bicycle Ride Across Iowa, better known as RAGBRAI, made the "difficult decision" to cancel in April, citing an inability to ensure riders' safety due to the spreading pandemic. The Des Moines Art Fest and 80/35, the annual music festival in Western Gateway, also canceled their 2020 events.The famous Bill Riley Talent Search, which has brought talented youngsters from across the state to perform at the State Fair for the past 60 years, called off the 2020 competition in May."To my knowledge, it's never been postponed in the past," Bill Riley Jr. told the Register. "It's heartbreaking. I'm really going to miss what I call 'summer season.'"Courtney Crowder, the Register's Iowa Columnist, traverses the state's 99 counties telling Iowans' stories. Her favorite State Fair food is the . Reach her at or 515-284-8360. Follow her on Twitter .Your subscription makes work like this possible. Subscribe today at .View Comments

Des Moines RegisterView CommentsBy the time Iowans sit down to supper, they'll know if the Iowa&nbsp;State Fair will be held in 2020.After months of review and discussion, the Iowa State Fair board will host&nbsp;a live vote to decide the fair's fate at a meeting that starts at 3 p.m. Wednesday.Fair staff have long said that a decision would be made by June 15, giving them just under two months to prepare the grounds and event schedule for&nbsp;a possible Aug. 13 opening.&nbsp;“We ask that you continue to be patient as we gather and analyze the many unique experiences that Iowans hold near...

public

Courtney Crowder

desmoinesregister.com

Credible

Speculation

Anecdotal Evidence

Generalization

Stacking the Deck

Appeal to Authority

Straw Man

Slippery Slope

Emotional Appeal

Red Herring

False Dilemma

Illogical

Moral Equivalency

Ad Hominem

Correlation w/o Causation

Semantics

Begging the Question

Faulty Analogy

Non Sequitur

Bandwagon

Dogmatism

Failing Occam's Razor

Biased

Pure Opinion

Hit Piece

Racial Bias

National Bias

Religious Bias

Financial Incentive

Political Agenda

Gender Bias

Misused Image/Video

Study Misinterpreted

Mistake

Misused Term

Science Misrepresented

Factual Error

Satire

Surface Level

Lack of Reliable Sources

Sensational

Not Credible

Investigative

Balanced

Well Sourced

Great Context

sports

entertainment

U.S.

international

business

technology

science

culture

politics

media

health

Iowa State Fair will decide on 2020 event's fate Wednesday

No article scores yet.

CRITIC REVIEWS

PUBLIC REVIEWS