By JAMES BELL
Hays Post
As cleanup continues across Ellis County from heavy sustained winds during a storm Tuesday, the Ellis County Fair Board is seeking help at 10 a.m. Saturday to begin work to clean up the heavily damaged fairgrounds.
“It took a whole set of bleachers and lifted them up over the rodeo arena and smashed them against the crow’s nest and bucking shoots,” said Jill Pfannenstiel, fair board president. “They are totally destroyed.”
Trees and light poles were also destroyed, along with Rolling Plains Motor Speedway buildings.
The track grandstands were damaged, as well as the commercial building.
“In the race track pit area, they had a scale house that was totally destroyed, along with their concessions building,” Pfannenstiel said.
Damage at the track forced the cancellation of Mod Invasion night planned on Aug. 24, which was one of the larger events for the track with the planned inclusion of NASCAR legend Kenny Schrader.
There is a lot of trash across the fairgrounds, and the board wants to get the destroyed buildings cleaned up in the pit area, Pfannenstiel said. Once the cleanup starts, the full scope of the damage can be assessed.
“We are going to try to salvage what we can, but we want to get them off of there to see what kind of damage we have,” she said.
They are also awaiting an evaluation from their insurance adjuster and are hopeful insurance will cover the cost of repairs.
“It should be (covered), but at this point, I don’t know that if they are going to depreciate stuff so if we will get our money back to replace the bleachers,” Pfannenstiel said.
Even if insurance covers the repairs, planned revenue from the three race events planned at RPM Speedway will not arrive and will hurt not only the track but will have larger economic impact, according to RPM Speedway president Glenn Unrein.
“It’s a blow to the racers and our community,” he said. “Like with the Fall Nationals, you have people travel a long distance — last year from 13 states and Canada — they all come in and rent motels shop here and spend money lodging, food and everything else. It’s a real blow to us.”
Unrein is hopeful repairs can be completed before championship night scheduled for Sept. 21 — the final night for track points for the racers before Fall Nationals on Oct. 4.
“It’s a major event for this community and our race track,” he said of the nationals event.
Around 225 to 250 races cars typically participate in that event and the event cannot be moved to another track.
“No facility in several hundred miles of us could handle the amount of cars and people that come in for that,” Unrein said.
While the rodeo grounds were damaged more significantly, there were no more events planned there for the year.
“We’re lucky there,” Pfannenstiel said.
During the cleanup Saturday, she said she hopes they can get the rodeo bleachers off of the crows’ nest and bucking shoots and is asking that anyone that wants to participate in the cleanup bring gloves, power tools, impacts, socket sets and quick-e saws.
Despite the devastation to the grounds, Pfannenstiel was grateful it was not worse.
“We are thankful that it did not happen during the fair and that nobody got hurt,” she said.
