“It’s coming down to the wire; we’ve all got our fingers crossed on this one,” Park County Commission Chairman Joe Tilden said Tuesday, after getting an update on the construction of the new multi-use facility at the Park County Fairgrounds.

The building is about 90-95 percent finished and should be ready for the July 21-25 county fair, said Ron Yount, representing project architect Plan One.

“The kitchen will not be completed ... and the conference area will not have flooring in it, but other than that, all of the project should be complete,” Yount said. Synergy Construction plans to do that “finish-up work” after the fair, he said.

Yount and Commissioner Lee Livingston both praised the quality of the work that Synergy has done to date.

Poor weather threw the project off schedule last fall and Synergy Construction has been working to make up the lost time to have the building ready for fair use.

Action Electric, meanwhile, is working on separate but related improvements to the fairgrounds’ electrical grid. They expect to finish hooking up power to the new building by July 15 — meaning the State of Wyoming Fire Marshal’s Office can’t inspect and certify the facility as being fit for occupancy until that date.

However, Park County Events Coordinator Echo Renner said that to get ready for the fair, it’s critical that the building be available to store display cases and other items by Tuesday, July 14.

“That’s about the latest I can do,” Renner said.

Yount said he’s known fire marshals to allow storage in a building before it’s officially cleared for occupancy, and he’s asking the local fire marshal if that’s OK in this instance.

Yount said there have been some problems with the water pressure at the new building and some nearby fair buildings, but crews believe switching out a smaller water meter with a bigger one will help.

This week, Synergy Construction plans to work on the asphalt around the building.

Since work began last year, commissioners decided to replace more of the nearby pavement than originally planned and Yount said that will up the cost of the roughly $3.1 million project.

Commissioners are hoping community members and businesses will eventually donate $500,000 to help offset the county’s costs for the new multi-use facility.

Renner asked if the county could hold off on putting up a sign on the building that says, “Exhibit Hall,” given that they may want to name it for a donor in the future.  However, she was told the new sign had already been installed.

“We’ll just have to make sure whatever we name it lines up with ‘Exhibit Hall,’” Commissioner Livingston joked, to laughter.

“They’ll have to find somebody named Exhibit,” quipped Yount — or perhaps a Mr. Hall, suggested Livingston.

“Alright!” riffed Commissioner Bucky Hall. “We’ve got half of it covered!”

“Bucky Exhibit Hall” was thrown out as an option, though Commissioner Loren Grosskopf joked that his fellow commissioner would need to pony up $500,000 to make that happen.