The Montezuma County Fair is taking place as scheduled this week, even though it’s been displaced.

When firefighters commandeered the Montezuma County Fairgrounds as a base from which to combat the Bircher Fire, the fair board had only a few days in which to relocate and reconfigure the entire fair. That was a huge task, and fair board members and County Extension staff have performed it admirably.

The fair will look different this year, and it makes sense that it won’t be as well-organized and neatly arranged as it would have been if the organizers’ year-long plans had come to fruition. This year’s fair may actually have a little more relevance to real life, though. Agriculture is not predictable. Sometimes the rain falls, sometimes it doesn’t. Sometimes conditions change at the last minute. Sometimes lightning strikes. Flexibility is an important quality for every ag producer and parent to have, and this year’s Montezuma County Fair will celebrate that. The 4-H and FFA youth will rise to the occasion, and with the help of their parents and leaders, they’ll learn how to deal with changing conditions. That’s an opportunity, not a disaster.

A few malcontents have grumbled that the county commissioners had no right to bump the fair from its home at the fairgrounds. That’s absurd. That piece of property provided nearly everything in the firefighters needed, including roofs and running water, in a location just over the ridge from the north edge of the fire. Forcing firefighters to camp elsewhere, farther from the fire and with less appropriate facilities, would have increased the danger to Mesa Verde National Park and to the residents of the valley below. The fair is important, but safety issues are far more significant, and the commissioners have a responsibility to use their resources wisely. They made the right choice.

The fair board made an appropriate decision as well. Planners didn’t have time to wait and see how soon the fire would be out; they had to assume that the fairgrounds would be unavailable during Fair Week and make other plans. Delaying the county fair wouldn’t have been fair to the youngsters who will eventually go on to the State Fair, nor to all the families who months ago arranged their summer schedules and vacation plans around Fair Week.

Life doesn’t always go as planned, but the fair’s move to the Legion grounds is at worst an inconvenience and at best a learning opportunity. Everyone should come out to see what our youth — as well as the many adults who enter open-class competitions — have done. The focus will be on accomplishment, not accommodations.