NEWS

ExpoPark campsites not open to public

Jenn Rowell
jrowell@greatfallstribune.com

Some Great Falls-area residents who own RVs and were looking to use ExpoPark's sanitary dump sites noticed that the gates were locked over the holiday weekend.

According to county officials, those dump sites are no longer open to the public.

The fairgrounds has 30 RV hookups that were open to the public until last year when the county ended that practice after the fair.

Susan Shannon, ExpoPark director, said they didn't want to compete with local businesses and that several places in town offer free dump sites for RVs.

Those include the TownPump across from the ExpoPark, the Cenex at Mountain View Co-Op and the Flying J truck stop on Gore Hill.

"We got out of the public RV business," County Commissioner Jane Weber said. "We do allow people if they're renting the facility for an event, then they may use the sites since there's a rental agreement."

Shannon said the public campsites were taking away sites available for event rentals.

The ExpoPark has an arrangement with Calumet Montana Refining if their employees are having a hard time finding a place to stay, then Calumet makes the arrangements with the county.

Some Calumet employees are there now, Shannon said.

The Calumet employees pay fees to use the sites and Shannon said renters who use the sites for events also pay fees.

Shannon and Weber said the public sites were difficult to manage and it wasn't possible to track whether the people using the sites and RV hookups were county taxpayers.

The ExpoPark has maintained its vehicle storage program that is typically full every year, Shannon said.

The program runs October through April and storage is available in the non-heated Heritage and Mercantile buildings for boats, RVs and classic cars.