Clark County Fair: Fairly Alien

o What: Clark County Fair

o When: Friday, Aug. 6, through Sunday, Aug. 15.

o Where: 7402 N.E. Delfel Road, Ridgefield.

o Tickets: Admission $10 adults, $8 seniors, $7 children ages 7 to 12; advance tickets ($8, $6 and $5) available online and from sponsors such as Fred Meyer and Riverview Bank until Thursday. Parking is $6 ($5 advance) and carnival wristbands are $25 or $30 ($22 advance).

o Website: clarkcofair.com.

Space aliens, tigers and the Scorpions.

All attractions, but Clark County Fair Manager John Morrison hopes there will be another draw for this year’s fair, which opens Friday.

He wants a certain something to ensure that everyone coming to see a scary exhibit, exotic animals or German rockers has a great time, something that will encourage people who are fair-weather fans:

Sunshine.

While he can’t book it in advance, he sees dry weather as essential to a successful fair, along with entertainment, exhibits, concessions and the carnival.

Attendance at last year’s fair was down 8 percent from 2008, and Morrison attributes the decline to rain as well as to the recession.

Three times the amusement rides had to be shut down because it was so wet. He said Butler Amusements, which operates the carnival, hadn’t had to shut down rides because of rain since the mid-1990s.

“That was a significant hit to our revenue,” Morrison said.

County commissioners join Morrison in hoping for sun.

At a July 28 work session on finances, commissioners were reminded by county financial analyst Mark Gassaway that the fair fund — which includes the annual 10-day fair as well as the event center and the horse arena — lost $514,000 last year.

Through the second quarter of this year, the fund was $213,000 ahead of 2009 figures, Gassaway said.

The county relies on the 10-day fair to turn enough of a profit to help sustain the events center and horse arena. Gassaway put commissioners on notice that since the $514,000 deficit wiped out the fair fund’s reserves, the fund might need an infusion from the county’s fragile general fund should the fair have another bad year.

In 2008, the fair brought in $2.7 million and turned a $250,000 profit, Gassaway said Monday.

In 2009, the fair brought in $2.9 million, despite a lower attendance, but had higher expenses and broke even.

Morrison said he hopes two themed features will be crowd-pleasers.

The features share the same exhibit hall. On one end is “Walk on the Wild Side,” which showcases exotic animals including lions and tigers and reptiles. The other end has “The Day the Fair Stood Still,” which will be set up to look like a small town that has been invaded by space aliens. Friendly aliens will be out front, and older kids and adults who want a scare can enter a spooky hallway that has exits every 50 feet in case the freak factor proves too much.

Morrison’s also pleased to offer more free entertainment at the grandstand this year.

“This is the biggest free entertainment package we’ve ever offered,” Morrison said.

Since the three musical acts — country singer Miranda Lambert and the Randy Rogers Band on Friday, the Scorpions and Dokken on Saturday and pop act Boys Like Girls on Monday — have been moved to the Sleep Country Amphitheater, Morrison will stage two free shows a day at the grandstand. Those shows include a jousting tournament, a Wild West show, bull riding, a demolition derby and monster trucks.

New this year, a Monster School Bus will be available for kids to ride.

Tickets are still available for Lambert and Boys Like Girls, but the Scorpions sold out a long time ago. The amphitheater, which under its contract with the county can’t have shows during the fair because of traffic considerations, has room for 18,000 people. But because of those same potential parking and traffic problems, the fair can’t fit more people in the amphitheater than it could in the grandstand, so ticket sales for fair shows are limited to 9,000.

Concert tickets include admission to the fair.

The fair opens 8 a.m. Friday with a free pancake breakfast sponsored by Fred Meyer.

The forecast calls for mostly sunny with a high of 78 degrees.

Stephanie Rice: 360-735-4508 or stephanie.rice@columbian.com.