No midway, no giant pigs but there’ll still be a Saanich Fair

There’ll be no traditional Saanich Fair this September, but the group that runs the popular event is determined to keep it alive online.

“It’s going to be put on in a different way,” Dave Hamer, president of the North and South Saanich Agricultural Society, said Monday. “We’re going to have something that will be virtual. It’s not going to be your traditional Saanich Fair where 50,000 people come in for three days.”

Moving the event online will maintain an unbroken thread for Western Canada’s longest continually running agricultural fair, which dates back to 1868 — 13 years before B.C. entered Confederation.

“We’re just barely keeping it going, but we can still say it’s happening,” Hamer said.

It won’t be the same, though. There’ll be no crowds swarming the livestock displays, no noisy throngs of children piling onto the rides at the fairgrounds on Stelly’s Cross Road.

“There’ll be a lot of upset people,” Hamer acknowledged. The change will hit not only the fairgoers and exhibitors but participants ranging from West Coast Amusements, which runs the midway, to the sports team that earns revenue by handling parking and security. Eighteen nonprofit groups rely on the money they earn from food concessions. The society itself — with 500 volunteers and six full-time staff — uses money from the Labour Day weekend fair to maintain the fairgrounds.

Hamer said there might be some sort of presence on the site on the Labour Day weekend — a farmers’ market is one possibility — but it will have to be small.

Health guidelines that promote physical distancing, limit the size of gatherings to fewer than 50 and urge people to conduct their interactions without lingering do not lend themselves to what fairgoers would normally expect.

“It’s the complete opposite of what we want to do at the fair,” he said. “We want you to stay all day.”

That said, the society said it supports the B.C. government’s guidelines. “The health and wellness of our community is foremost and we recognize that extraordinary steps need to be taken now so that we can get back to a normal life sooner than later,” a news release from the group stated.

The release spoke of plans to use social media tools to host educational and entertaining activities online. “This is a challenging time but we are resilient, creative and fun — the show must go on! As we begin planning for unique online events and activities, we’d love to hear your ideas for a virtual fall fair experience. If you have questions or ideas please contact us at info@saanichfair.ca or call 250-652-3314.”

The society also said it looked forward to returning to a more traditional format on Sept. 4-6, 2021.