IS IT TRUE September 3, 2013
IS IT TRUE City Councilman and Chairman of the Finance Committee John Friend, CPA has released his list of things that need to be made available to properly VET the deal that Mayor Winnecke and the Evansville Redevelopment Commission have made with HCW of Branson, MO to develop a hotel complex in downtown Evansville?…Councilman Friend took it a step further and also issued a protocol for VETTING that includes 20 steps?…it is now up to the Mayor’s office to respond and provide Friend with whatever they have and to gather up the other items in the instance that they do not have what Friend has asked for?…with a 20 step process and some very sophisticated analysis that needs to be done it is all but impossible to do this by the scheduled vote next Monday night?…keeping the information in committee until the VETTING has been completed is Councilman Friend’s prerogative and may actually make the passage of some deal for a hotel a higher probability?…one thing for sure is that if the Mayor’s dog and pony shows had secured 5 “AYE†votes the response to Councilman Friend’s request for information for VETTING would have been met with the same silence it has so far?…this could have started in early August if the Winnecke Administration and HCW would have only cooperated with the justified requests of the Chairman of the City Council’s Finance Committee?…it seems as though there has been contempt for the City Council coming from the Mayor’s office until they finally have accepted that they need to provide this to get closer to what they want?…there are only 2 or 3 members of the City Council locked in to an “AYE†vote based on the dog and pony shows?…it takes 5 to tango?
IS IT TRUE there is an allegation going around that certain officers of the Dunn Hospitality Group have put the Museum on notice that their charitable donations will cease if the Museum board and staff openly support the granting of $37.5 Million for a new downtown convention hotel?…we have not confirmed that this is true but would like to discuss the relationship between charities and their large donors?…large donors in nearly every case are people or corporations of significant wealth who for their own reasons choose to give money to charities?…charities such as the Museum and many others are dependent on the generosity of private contributions?…Dunn Hospitality has been very clear that it is their well researched belief that subsidizing a competitor will hurt their business which will necessarily lead to the diminishment of their wealth, their profits, and their cash flow?…the boards of directors of Museums and other charities need to realize that when they make the conscious choice to support programs that hurt their large donors that those large donors can be expected to be disappointed and are fully within their rights to withhold future donations?…charities need to get off of their idealistic high horses and avoid biting the hands that feed them?…if the allegations about the Museum and Dunn are indeed true, who could blame Dunn Hospitality for cutting the Museum from their philanthropic budget?
IS IT TRUE that the closest Division 1 NCAA football team to Evansville, the Louisville Cardinals are expected to win all of their games in 2013?…after dismantling the SEC powerhouse Florida Gators in last year’s Sugar Bowl the Cards have been ranked in the top 10 for the first time ever at the beginning of the season?…pundits are saying their schedule is too weak to be considered for the National Championship game and they have a point, but the missing piece that is not widely discussed is that the Louisville strength of schedule is better than either #2 Ohio State or #3 Oregon?…it will be interesting to see how things work out for Louisville if they go 12 – 0 with the pollsters and the computer rankings?…it was November 13, 1948 that the University of Evansville Purple Aces defeated the Louisville Cardinals in a football game by a score of 18 – 6?…the rise of the Cardinals and the disappearance of the Aces from football playing schools is one of the symptoms of the difference in a city with a goal, focus, a plan, and commitment of its citizens when compared to one that does not?…imagine the possibility that if Evansville would have done things more like Louisville that there could have been 56,000 people in the stands last Sunday to watch a 49 – 7 victory over a gridiron foe?
IS IT TRUE that August was the highest traffic month for the CCO for any non election month since we began counting our traffic using Google Analytics?…our traffic is now solidly above a Million per year and the unique visitors from Vanderburgh County are well over 100,000 per year?…this is about 400% higher than when our counting started in October of 2010?
Would this be future donations we are discussing here?
http://www.emuseum.org/corporate-membership-roster
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SBA.gov
How to write a business plan.
[snip]
FINANCIAL DOCUMENTS
Summary of Financial Needs
Sources and Uses of Funds Statement
Cash Flow Statement (Budget)
Three-year Income Projection
Break-even Analysis Graph
Actual Performance Statements
Balance Sheet
Summary
SUPPORTING DOCUMENTS
Personal Resumes
Personal Financial Statement
Credit Reports
Copies of Leases
Letters of Reference
Contracts
Legal Documents
Miscellaneous Documents
[snip]
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Did anyone see how that Big Ten team Purdue was B-slapped by Cincinnati of the same lowly conference as Louisville. I guess since Purdue got clobbered by Cincy that Ohio State should not be considered for the national championship either.
I have heard from very reliable sources that the Dunn threats are indeed true, and also were made to the Reitz Home as well as other charitable organizations.
How can you blame Dunn? Are you seriously asking this? Regardless of where you stand on the hotel, excusing the hard handed actions of Dunn to throw money around with threats to get his way is ridiculous. To me, this falls somewhere between bribery and extortion, completely unethical.
I travel quite a bit for work. When I am making sales calls and visits, I always stay in a Dunn type property in the burbs. When I am at a convention or trade show, I usually utilize the convention hotel. These are seperate markets and Dunn of all people should realize that.
I hope these groups not only call his bluff, but expose this sleazeball for what he has done and do what they can to point visitors to non-Dunn properties.
The bottom line is ,it’s Dunn’s money and he can choose who he donates to. That is what makes this country great, you can disagree but you are free to make your own decisions.
This is one thing I will completely disagree with the CCO on. I like John Dunn, he strikes me as a good businessman. I know most of what he’s accomplished was before my time but even my dad says he’s a good man that knows what he’s doing and how to run a business, and he would never hesitate to say he didn’t like someone if they had character flaws.
But with that being said, IF (keyword IF) this is true, this is completely and 100% unacceptable. This right here is why every time a project goes in front of the city or county it ends up being at the wrong location. It’s because too many people in this community are afraid that if they pick something that goes against those who have money, they will be on the outside looking in like these museums.
And yes, the ball fields project is the first thing that comes to mind here that Dunn Hospitality has been one of the prominent leaders in. I can’t tell you how many people who have said, “Things like this are never decided on where the best location is, they are decided on what the best political support is.”
So why should the public waste any time on any of these projects if the city is just going to pick what’s politically best for them because everyone is threatening to pull big money away from them if they don’t get their way?
The amazing thing about it is that Kleymeyer is closer to their US 41 location (http://www.mapquest.com/#e639b1a4797e39d38fd65e8b) than Goebel is to their East Side locations (http://www.mapquest.com/#b004d8e35e8ed91056fb3567).
So if Dunn is against Innkeepers money being spent on a convention center hotel that would bring business downtown, then it should only seem fair that the funds be used to construct ball fields on a central location that benefits ALL hotels.
And no, directly subsidizing a hotel is NOT worse than indirectly subsidizing a private hotel via million and billion dollar roads that wouldn’t be needed if they used existing infrastructure downtown. So, no one is gaining an unfair advantage here. Downtown is just finally get its due.
The only problem is, is that we’re wasting over $30 mil extra on a project that should be in the $8 mil subsidy range instead of the $30-40 mil subsidy range.
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