The OC Fair & Event Center (OCFEC) is a 150 acre event venue in Costa Mesa, California. The site hosts over 150 events attracting 4.3 million visitors annually, and is home to the Orange County Fair, Centennial Farm, Costa Mesa Speedway, and Pacific Amphitheatre. The OCFEC is managed by the 32nd District Agricultural Association, a state special-purpose district in the Division of Fairs and Expositions of the California Department of Food and Agriculture formed in 1949. Its board is appointed by the Governor of California.

Facilities

History

The Orange County Community Fair Corporation sponsored the first county fair in 1890 in Santa Ana, the county seat. In 1894, it was taken over by another group, the Orange County Fair Association. In 1916, it was passed again to the Orange County Farm Bureau, before passing to an Orange County Fair Board in 1925, when it was relocated to Anaheim. After World War II, the state formed the current association and purchased land then occupied by the Santa Ana Army Air Base for use as the fairgrounds, which became part of the City of Costa Mesa at the latter's incorporation in 1953. On March 18, 2009, this venue was also the host of a town hall meeting held by President Barack Obama on his visit to Southern California. In 2016, then candidate Donald Trump held a campaign rally here.

Proposed sale

In May 2009, then Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger recommended the Orange County Fairgrounds be listed for sale. He had decided the fairgrounds were "surplus or underutilized" assets, although the Fair hosts more than one million visitors each year and is utilized virtually every day of the week with multiple community activities. OC Weekly reported, "What followed was a story of deception by a small group in a position of power within the fairgrounds hierarchy. Through various contractual agreements between people of wealth and power, a move was made to privatize that public land in what members of the Orange County Fairgrounds Preservation Society call one of the largest, most deliberate land grabs in the county's long history of land grabs." The Preservation Society quickly stepped in to halt the sale. They contended that the OC legislators in Sacramento had been remiss in intervening to stop the transaction, that the proposed deal to sell public land was both "Ill-advised and illegal." Both the Del Mar Fairgrounds and the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum were saved by just such an intervention by the legislators. A public auction was held, but before any sales agreements could be signed, there were two lawsuits filed and the sale was stopped. The Preservation Society, and Tel Phil Enterprises filed in the Court of Appeal and asked that the new governor Jerry Brown have the sale categorically dismissed. Lawsuits by two former building commissioners that Schwarzenegger had fired, however, stalled the proposed sale long enough for incoming Governor Brown to have the final word.

OCFEC Board of Directors response

After a closed session on January 27, 2011, the OCFEC Board of Directors issued the following policy statement regarding the sale of the fairgrounds: We believe that the 32nd District Agricultural Association and Orange County Fair belong in public hands. As such, the Board of Directors have instructed its Sale Committee to engage with the Governor's office in a meaningful negotiation regarding revenue sharing as a possible way to work with the State in the financial crisis that we're experiencing. On February 8, 2011, the 32nd District Agricultural Association sent a letter to Governor Jerry Brown, which can be viewed as a PDF at the site.

Gubernatorial response

In February 2011, California Governor Jerry Brown told the Los Angeles Times, "This is not the best time to be selling real estate. I think we have time to consider what we ought to do with that." He also said that his predecessor's plan, rather than helping California's budget crisis, would "have cost taxpayers far more in the long run." Assemblyman Jose Solorio (D-Santa Ana) stated that Brown's comments were "a good sign."