IS IT TRUE August 13, 2013

IS IT TRUE that the meeting of the Evansville City Council on Monday with respect to the Mayor of Evansville and the Evansville Redevelopment Commission’s desire to give away $37.5 Million of your tax dollars to HCW of Branson, Missouri ran into a well prepared cast of opposition and what some may call a VETTING COMMISSION?…that Monday August 12, 2013 will mark the day that the real VETTING and DISCOVERY period for the hotel project began?…it was blatantly obvious that Mayor Winnecke was ill informed from the minute he slipped and made the errant claim that the downtown Evansville TIF would generate $700 Million per year in additional taxes?…upon being corrected by Councilman Dan Adams for this 9,900% mistake the Mayor stuttered “oh yeah it is just $7 Million”?…this is just the kind of thing that demands a reasonable period for financial assumptions to be rigorously questioned over a period of time so that no more haphazard rookie errors like this one sneak into the pro-forma unchallenged?…when the CEO of any company or city makes 9,900% errors in a public forum it becomes clear just how UNVETTED this or any project is?…that the Winnecke Administration’s sacrificial lamb ERC Chairman Ed Hafer was no more prepared to answer even simple questions than Mayor Winnecke was?…last night neither of these long term Evansville good old boys even deserved to share the stage with what was to come?

IS IT TRUE in what was perhaps the most honest discussion that has been held regarding this project HCW representative Rick Huffman stood like George Washington before the cherry tree and could not bring himself to tell a lie?…when Mr. Huffman was asked pointedly by City Council President Connie Robinson “how many people will you hire at the new hotel” he honestly answered that he was not in a position to answer that question?…it must be remembered that Mayor Winnecke and others have claimed publicly that the new hotel will create 250 full time direct jobs?…this claim is financially impossible even at the minimum wage as a minimum wage job with benefits cost and employer roughly $100 per person per day or just about the rate that the 253 rooms in this hotel will rent for?…to have enough people on the payroll to consume the entire revenue stream of the hotel at 100% occupancy is simply some baseless fantasy concocted by either the Mayor or one of his propaganda ministers?…when pointedly asked how much the jobs in the hotel would pay Mr. Huffman did throw out a 6 figure number for the general manager and $30,000 for a desk clerk, but could not tell a lie about the rest of the jobs?…if one cannot tell a lie the best thing to do is to remain mute?…Mr. Huffman did just that?…in perhaps the most honest confession of the night by Mr. Huffman he said “We still haven’t gotten into finance in any depth”?…the truth has set this man free and the CCO appreciates this man’s willingness to stay silent rather than corroborate the nonsensical claims that the Winnecke Administration and it’s alter ego organization have spewed forth?

IS IT TRUE that Attorney Joe Langerak who happens to also be the son-in-law of Indiana Representative Gail Riecken was hired by a consortium of 14 local innkeepers to rebut the assertions of the Winnecke Administration regarding using taxes collected by their private businesses to finance a competitor?…Mr. Langerak literally dismantled every argument put forth by the administration for doing so?…Mr. Langerak took the Winnecke Administration to school last night and the immediate feedback is that he made a lasting positive impression on the City Council as well?…we encourage Mr. Langerak and of course CCO commenter Brad Linzy who also tore Mayor Winnecke’s youtube video to shreds to go to all six of these townhall meetings and make their cases as they did last night?

IS IT TRUE the tax revenue increases shown by project proponents last night that project $800,000 in new taxes per year just from the hotel fall well short of the $2.6 Million in bond service that Mayor Winnecke spoke about?…even if the downtown TIF achieves everything it has been projected to (and you know how those projections are) and brings in $7 Million it will not cover the bond payments of both the Ford Center and this new hotel?…$2.6 Million + $5.7 Million = $8.3 Million?…arithmetic as we learned in the 1st grade tells us that $8.3 Million is more than $7.0 Million?…that is nearly as indefensible as confidently stating that the TIF will bring in $700 Million per year?…City Councilman John Friend, CPA will pilot the Monkey Boat from Mesker Zoo down Main Street with a boat load of monkeys before a TIF in Evansville will bring in $700 Million per year?

IS IT TRUE the VETTING has finally started, the administration was not prepared, and the ERC rubber stamped this proposal without seeing numbers because as Mr. Huffman said “We still haven’t gotten into finance in any depth”?…if the administration does not make a better case for this than it made last night the people of Evansville may just demand that their City Council vote not to fund this?…at any rate voting on this on September 9th would be an utter insult to both the people of this city and show contempt for truth in advertising?…if this is the best that the City of Evansville can muster then they need to stop mustering?…the crowing statement of the night also came from Rick “George Washington” Huffman when he admitted to speaking in the recent past against a public subsidy for a hotel that would compete with one owned by HCW?

IS IT TRUE the City County Observer Mole Nation reports that the Edmund L. Hafer, Chairman of the Evansville Redevelopment Commission is also President of Evansville Regional Business Committee located at in a plush Executive office at One Vectren Square on the Seventh floor of the Vectren building?…we wonder who are the other members that serve of the Evansville Regional Business Committee located in the Vectren headquarters building happen to be and just what contributions to local prosperity this rather secretive group has made?…we wonder who is subsidizing the entire operation of the Evansville Regional Business Committee?…we wonder would appoints members to serve on the Evansville Regional Business Committee?…we also wonder what the mission of this group is and how they have been able to operate in such a stealth manner for so long? ….we wonder if this committee is registered with the IRS and whether they are for profit or a non-profit entity? …our readers look forward to either Mr. Hafer and/or Vectren’s response to just why this difficult to Google group merits accommodations in the showcase floor of a company that enjoys a monopoly over electric and gas utilities in SW Indiana?

IS IT TRUE the recent readers polls in the CCO have been solidly against the City Council voting to borrow money to give to an out of town hotel developer without a sufficient amount of time to thoroughly VET the project?…by a margin of 3 to 1 our readers agreed with the statement that the ERC is a lapdog organization for the Mayor of Evansville?…our readers also voted by a 3 to 1 margin that the City Council should not even vote on funding the hotel until 45 days after the end of the 2012 audit of the City of Evansville’s accounts?…the current poll at the time of this writing is running 5 to 1 in favor of the City Council waiting until 45 days after they have a copy of the entire business plan including critical assumptions and a pro forma for the hotel project has been in their possession to evaluate?…Councilman Al Lindsey did sponsor a resolution during the last year to strip the ERC of any ability to obligate the City of Evansville to any spending period unless pre-authorized by the City Council to do so?…this will be the subject of tomorrow’s poll?

IS IT TRUE the ERC is nothing but an appointed commission with enough mayoral appointments to turn it into an alter-ego of the Mayor whomever that is at a given time?…during the last 5 years the ERC has authorized the purchase of a $603,000 parking lot that sold for $125,000 at auction, supported Mayor Weinzapfel in his McCurdy ambitions that fell flat on their face, authorized three different hotel deals without doing sufficient VETTING of the companies on the Mayor’s preferred list, and managed the cash flow for the construction of Ford Center after biting hook line and sinker on a pro-forma that had the Ford Center profitable by now including servicing the debt?…the ERC has even had to endure the indignity of seeing one of the appointed members caught up in an alleged money laundering scheme for drug money?…in all honesty we cannot think of one damn thing the ERC has made an informed and competent decision on in the last 5 years?…it is time to just disband this appointed commission of puppets for the Mayor of the month and let the City Council assume these responsibilities?…if you agree with this premise the CCO would appreciate it very much if you would let your City Council member and all three of the at-large council members know this by phone or email today?

IS IT TRUE that prudent policy would be to vote on Councilman Al Lindsey’s resolution to clip the wings of the ERC before bringing any other funding vote to the floor for discussion?…the CCO believe it or not does recognize that a convention hotel will aid Evansville in bringing conventions to town?…we also recognize that conventions are going the way of the buggy whip and vinyl records?…there are still some stodgy old fogeys around who do the convention thing but the internet, “go to meeting”, and social media are rendering expensive travel to attend conventions obsolete?…attendance at conventions are down all over America but communication is increasing?…we therefore question the rationality that conventions are a significant enough economic force today or in the future to merit handing $37.5 Million of taxpayer dollars to a hotelier on the basis that the Centre will make up for that cost in new convention revenue?…the Centre lost money when the Executive Inn was open and run fairly well and will continue to do so with or without a new hotel?…for these reasons learned people in the financial spectrum need to do a thorough job of VETTING the payback to the City of Evansville in terms of real new tax dollars before proceeding with this project?…the case for this is not made because if it was we would not need tax dollars to make it happen?…the recent excuse of every other city does it does not hold water either?…we challenge those who use that argument to show us one that has worked with a 10 year track record of real results?…we don’t think they will be coming forth with any example of success?

Evansville Redevelopment Commissioner Ed Hafer in an email to City Council Budget Chairman John Friend, CPA admits that the ERC voted unanimously in favor of the downtown hotel project without having current projections and pro-formas from the developer. An excerpt from the correspondence from Hafer to Friend is as follows

“With respect to the information you are seeking; I believe you are under the
impression that I have far more information than I actually have. All I have are
early projections as to the hotel operations and a one page pro-forma that was
completed in February that is very close to the final room count, but I do not
know if it conforms to their latest assumptions with regard to occupancy rates,
room rates, expenses etc.”

To Which Councilman Friend Responded as follows:

“Ed

Not sure if you received my email concerning confirmation that I can meet
with Rick Huffman tomorrow at 1 pm at my office. During our meeting with the
Mayor, last Tuesday morning, when I asked for the Business Plan, you pointed to
reports in front of you and indicated that you would have to speak with Rick
Huffman about releasing what clearly appeared to be an extension document. Now,
you are indicating that you do not have a comprehensive document, in some
circles a private prospectus and in others, a Business Plan. Please don’t tell
me that the ERC would take up such a multi-millions dollar project without the
benefit of receiving the comprehensive business plan, with pro forma information
over at least three years, the assumptions and assertions, management team
expertise, those sort of things. If this is the case, obviously, this would be
outside of the definition of “Best Business Practices” Please note that I will
be expecting to receive a comprehensive business [prospectus] Plan with all the
necessary assumptions, etc. therein tomorrow from Mr. Huffman…. Thanks, John