There’s a story on lfpress.com today about how attendance at the Western Fair was down sharply this year.

Only 178,110 people attended, compared to 217,987 last year and 277,010 in 2000.

In fact, the numbers have been declining steadily over the last decade.

Fair bosses admit something must be done, but they don’t seem to be aware that the foofaraw over admission for handicapped folks may have hurt their event. All that negative publicity must have had an impact. It’s also not clear if they’re contemplating cutting prices.

I have an idea.

Forget cutting admission. Why not make the fair free? Why not stop charging for admission and let folks park for nothing?

Before you reject the idea out of hand, consider this: Free works for downtown festivals like Home County and Sunfest, so why not apply the same model to the Western Fair? If it can work in Victoria Park, why not at the fairgrounds?

They can still charge for midway rides and such, but why not make admission and parking free of charge?

The Fair brain trust is going to have to make some kind of drastic change — and soon. If they continue as in the past, it won’t be long before the Fair goes out of business.