ROCHESTER - A long-sought overlay district for the Rochester Fairgrounds is now in the works following initial conversations between Rochester’s Codes and Ordinance board and RAMA, the nonprofit that owns the Fairgounds.
Marcia Brown of Brown Law, the attorney for RAMA (Rochester Agricultural and Mechanical Association), said an overlay district would be the preferable outcome, because it would allow the Fairgrounds its own special district, with unique allowances for special events the association needs to cover the vast expenditures necessary to keep RAMA and the Fairgrounds solvent.
Interestingly, Brown mentioned during the codes meeting that there was a move afoot ro return the name of the annual September fair back to the historic Rochester Fair, which began its long history in 1874.
“We may be going to return to the Rochester Fair, because the new name doesn’t conjure the same warm memories so many local residents have,” she said.
For those who don’t know RAMA and the city were at loggerheads for about five years as the city tightened its requirements for RAMA to hold nonfair events, putting them in dire straits finacially.
That all changed a year ago when a court settlement was reached that allowed the Fairgrounds to at the very least hold most if not all of the nonfair events that they have held over the last several decades.
Some of those events include car and motorcycle races, concerts, community gatherings, a Phantom Gourmet barbecue, Parrothead concerts and food truck festivals among many others.
Brown as well as former city councilor Sandra Keans and Nancy Gilbert, both RAMA members, were also at the codes board meeting advocating for an overlay district that would make it easier for event planners to get quicker approval from the city to bring their concert or car racing to the Fairgrounds.
Rochester Finance Director Mark Sullivan suggested to the codes board that he would be agreeable to sit down with Brown and begin preliminary talks about what an overlay district proposal might look like.
Codes chair David Walker, who last year advocated for an overlay district said that however it gets started, it will probably end up going through the planning and codes boards before it goes to the full City Council.
Brown told the codes board that the people of Rochester want the city and RAMA to work together and end their contentious relationship that has infuriated many the past five years.
“When the settlement agreement was announced on the RAMA Facebook page last year, the public was excited,” she said. "A few hours after it was posted we had 6,000 views, 4,000 likes and 600 positive comments.”
A New Hampshire Press Association member