Car Shows

Ok, I guess it's been to long since I've written because all of a sudden I've got three topics to talk about, 2 of which I'm just not liking right now.  So over the next week I'll have several post that will go over each of the 3 things.

But let me start with a car show that we are PAYING for to come.  Now I'm not 100% up on all of the details, but know enough to know that you don't pay for car shows to come to your town.  And get this, Gonzales Mainstreet is paying $14,000 + 25% of the take to a promoter out of Lockhart - Joel Aaron Gammage/Hat Rod Productions.  

So what are my problems with this?  Where do I start? 

1) This is a Saturday right in the middle of the OUTSTANDING Friday Night Concert Series.  This series is the best thing, to me even better than the winter fest, for our town that Main Street does and is what they should be concentrating on. Why wouldn't you do an additional event in another month when there are no functions going on?

2) While I'm not a car show expert, we've had several in town put on by several car groups.  NEVER ONCE, REPEAT NEVER ONCE have we the city paid a dime to sponsor one of those shows!!!!  Car shows are NOT something you pay for someone to promote and sponsor, ESPECIALLY not with city money.  

3) This board has just turned down at least 3 different request for money because they'd run out for downtown development, signage, and other request, and yet they've found $14,000 to do this show.  As a board member of GEDC (I've been on since May of 2014) I can tell you our board will be looking at this for any future monies we give to Main Street.  

4) I'm pretty certain that this car show was not a line in the Main Street budget, and if rumor is correct it came out of the Christmas budget.  I will be putting in for a freedom of information request to verify this.  If so then that is improper use of funds as approved by city council.  

5) We have websites and tickets being sold for a function that hasn't even gone before City Council for their approval.  So we've spent, again if information is correct, $3500 unrefundable has been paid to , for something we don't even know will be approved by the city council.  In their current mode I'm thinking the council will have more sense then Main Street on this issue and reject their proposal.  

6) Ok, so want to guess who is the 'event marketing' firm?  None other than the cities Rockin' S Marketing & Design - Loretta Shirley.  Now isn't there a conflict of interest when you are ALREADY being paid to bring people to Gonzales and then get paid again to a city sponsored event?  I have a HUGE issue here with this as unethical. 

7) So we as a community need to get all the facts.  Bottom line is when this was asked on the web page the questions and the even picture were removed from Facebook.  Instead of answering the question they so that EVERYONE can know exactly what's going on they are hiding and transparency is not to be seen on this item.  Our city managers is keen on transparency, so I'm hoping this will be rectified quickly.  

Ok, so later in the week I'll post about JB Wells (I have a meeting with City Manager Allen Barnes on Monday), and their losses out there last year, and about the Charter Amendments that we'll be voting on in May.  So please stay tuned. 

God Bless,
Dennis Nesser

Update - I received an email from city manager Allen Barnes today with the following points in it: 

Please understand the following:

1.        Main Street is a 501 (c)3 that in many ways operates separately from the City, but like EDC is very closely associated with the City.

2.      The Main Street Director is an employee of the City of Gonzales and as such falls under the ultimate supervision of the City Manager.

3.       The City Manager directed the Main Street Manager, as a City Employee, to NOT obligate the City of Gonzales in anyway with regard to the car show.

4.       No monies have been paid to the promoter of the car show, or to anyone with regard to the car show.

5.       No activities of a for profit nature will take place on City owned or controlled property without the expressed approval of the City Council, by written resolution.

6.       The promoter of the car show, may or may not desire to proceed with the car show without Main Street funding.

7.       If the promoter wants to proceed with the car show without the Main Street funding, the Council will consider his request prior to any staff level approval.

8.       The Main Street Board will meet on March 24 at noon to discuss this issue further.

  

 Look if this guy wants to go on his own without city money (501c3 or not) and resources then I'm ALL for it, that's enterprise and something going on down on the square, go for it!!! The only thing I see that council could be concerned with is the desire to have 400 cars downtown.  I know the Come And Take It car show puts 100 cars down there and 4 times that would be a bit of a struggle, but I'm willing to let them try. 

If they want to proceed with city money, well let's say I'm still against it.  

JB Wells Park or JB Wells Arena?

If I understand it correctly it was 1996 that the JB Wells idea was brought to life.  It was brought to the citizens of Gonzales as a place for ALL of Gonzales to be able to enjoy. In nearly 170 acres there would be walking trails, sports fields and courts, and much more with a great arena as a crowning jewel.

Since then citizens and city have worked together with state agencies to make phase 1 happen.  The areans and several other buildings are out there.  We've even added to the original parking/rv slots not once, but twice.  We've had several attempts to basically double the size of the rodeo facilities.  We've had additional 'studies' done about the arena portion of the JB Wells Park.

Then Tuesday night came.  That's right our city council had on their agenda to spend $18,000 for a feasibility study for...wait....oh do you know already?.....it coming...yes a second arena AND...here's the good part, the 20,000-50,000 sq ft building (*snifff...yes, that's the smell of the Texas Center coming back*...the rat sticks to high heaven!).

Now during the meeting City Manager Barnes alluded to the fact that every time we have an event that the work crews had to move the sand from the current arena to replace the sand and it cost the city serious money.  Not so.  What he told me the next day was fees are about $4000 to move the sand, and the cost to Gonzales is about $500 to do.  He made it sound like it was costing us serious money every time we had to this, not that we were making $3500. (**** insetered 10/11 - I was told I misunderstood, and that's we make about $4k a rodeo so the $500 is covered****) He then told me the next day he's more concerned about manpower than dollars.  REALLY?  I understand we're fighting oil companies for labor, but there is manpower out there.

I spoke before the meeting  addressing the fact that 1 segment of Gonzales has been promised, and promise delivered for what belongs out at JB Wells.  And while I love the arena, there is a huge portion of Gonzales that are still waiting for their end of the promise to be upheld.  That once the rest of the community had been delivered their end of the promise I would, if it was fiscally responsible, support growing the arena, but not until.

This was NEVER meant to be JB Wells Arena.  It was always JB Wells Park, that had an arena in it.

I understand that we could get larger rodeos if we kept expanding.  But I know that we have soccer leagues playing in cramped quarters instead of nice fields at JB Wells.  I know that there are lots of people that would use walking trails.  I know we have a great volley ball league.  I know that a pool over there would be used not only by citizens but by visitors alike.  And that's just a start.

And for the records, feasibility studies were done BEFORE we started working on JB Wells.  Texas Parks and Rec gave us money to build not an arena, but a park.  I'm a bit miffed the state hasn't come down and asked for their money back or for the project to be completed as approved.

With the exception of maybe the museum, there hasn't been a bigger drain on our tax dollars than JB Wells arena over the last several years.  Even now we still don't have it where we can just pull a budget and P&L on JUST the arena like we were promised 2 years ago.  But last I heard Mr Barnes anticipated it to break even, but said it was definitely NOT in the black this year to date at the downtown town hall meeting.

So that's on the arena, what about this building?  "Oh, no this is not the Texas Center".  Really?  A large building for community usage is the Texas Center.  Metal building or not.

"We rent tents at about $15,000 a year for rodeos, and this would eliminate that need".  And apparently there is some private money willing to help with this.  THEN WHY AREN'T THEY PAYING THE $18,000 FOR THIS STUDY???  That's yours and my dollars.  Trust me I understand the difference between renting and buying.

So am I for a second arena and a building out there?  Yes RIGHT AFTER the rest of the citizens see what they were promised almost 25 years ago when this started.  Put the bulldozers out and start the courts and playing fields, the paths and THEN and ONLY THEN am I for spending another dime on the arena expansion.

If Dr Graham would like to haul his bulldozers over there to make it happen, I'm all for it.  Even better.  But the 97% of Gonzales that is still not represented out at JB Wells needs to get their fair due before we lose all vision of a great family park and it becomes what most people grumble about it has ALREADY become JB Wells Arena. 

I heard this week a quote that I loved and think applies here, "Our projects started need to equal our projects finished."  Well we have an outstanding project out at JB Wells that needs to be finished before we start another project.

God Bless,
Dennis Nesser

Property Taxes

Ok, tomorrow (Tuesday night at 530) we have a public hearing on raising the property taxes in Gonzales. There will be a second hearing at the regularly scheduled council meeting September 6th.

Now I want to make this clear, I don't want to misrepresent the situation at hand.  At the last council meeting Councilman Logan made the motion to keep the rate of our taxes the same as they were last year.  Per state law though this is actually an increase because of the increase in property values, and as such they must have these public hearings and vote on it as an increase in our tax rates.  It is not because they have increased the percentage of taxation on the value of our homes.

In order to keep the amount of taxation the same, the council must (and still could) vote to have the effective tax rate put in place where the percentage would go down, but our individual taxes would be about the same. 

So here we go, and I actually have 2 trains of thought here, one of them probably not as popular as the other one. 

First to keep the tax rate the same will increase taxes by $21,000 for the city of Gonzales.  To quote our Interim City Manager, "This won't even buy a new vehicle for the city".  Now he was trying to say how little this was, and I'm going to tell you for all it's worth it's not even enough to purchase a new vehicle, so way are we wasting our time and money going through all this effort?

Additionally, and more importantly, if we wanted  $21,000 all we would of had to do is cancel any one of the council meetings over the last 6 months.  In that time they have added to our already 1.5 million dollar deficit at the rate of about $100,000 a meeting.  We've added to the airport (don't you use it?), we've paid study after study after study and consultant after consultant that in my personal opinion could have waited till we till we have recuperated from the debacle of our previous management. Even on tomorrows agenda there are what appear to be unbudgeted items. 

I always thought that's what we had a budget process for, you budget, you work the budget, and unless it's an EMERGENCY then you work towards next years budget to get the new stuff added.  I haven't seen anything that was an EMERGENCY at any of the meetings I've attended (which is a vast majority of them).  Why bother putting together a budget if we're not going to follow it?

Additionally I keep hearing about all this oil money, and yet our income actual vs budget was down by 3% last time I looked, meaning we're 3% shy of what we were anticipating receiving in funds for the city this year for this time period.  In addition to that we were over budget in spending, in no small part to JB Wells excessive over budget spending YTD.  So we're not getting as much as we hoped, and we're spending more than we said we would.  Surprise!

So to be very clear, I'm in NO WAY SHAPE OR FORM in favor of the proposed tax rate the way it is laid out right now.


Now comes the part I'm sure a few more will not agree with.  I'm not all together opposed to a tax increase.  I don't think economically it's really the time, but here's what I told one of our council members. 

If the council would come up with a real plan for road and infrastructure improvements, and say we have a 5 year plan, I would be ok with a real tax increase as long as they would decrease the taxes at the end of that 5 years. 

I've seen it done in San Antonio, and it can work!  BUT and I mean BUT that has to be a set in stone, the money from that increase goes to specific projects that we the people have approved, and at the end of the time period the increase has got to drop back down and the city not count on any of that money in the future.  Way to often a council will come up with any excuse to keep the taxes up, but that can not happen! This can not become another "vote for the lottery to pay for our schools" slogan either.  This has to be very specific what these monies would be raised for and when they were the taxes would go away. 

But if those conditions would be met and our infrastructure was the target of the needed money I would be in support. 

But I promise you that the $20,000 that our council is dealing with is a waste of the public hearings and nothing more than a game someone is playing.  Let your councilman know that you expect him to vote for the "effective rate" in 2 weeks. That there is ABSOLUTELY NO EXCUSE to vote for the rate as it's proposed right now.  How about make a trip to one of the 2 city council meetings and speak up for yourself?  Tomorrow at 5:30 or next Tuesday at 6. 

God Bless,
Dennis Nesser

Show me the money!!!

Interesting fact this week.  Since our city manager has taken over our city of Gonzales almost 1/2 of our city reserve money has been spent.  That's right, over $2,300,000.00+ is GONE! Gonzales, the town of 7,000, has had to dip into their rainy day funds to the tune of over $2,300,000.00+.  That's $325+ for every man woman and child in Gonzales. I have a family of 6, that's $2,000 for my family. Hmmmmm, nope, I haven't seen my 2k worth of expenditures.  All I see are pot holes everywhere.  Look on Ft. Wahl, College, Church just for a start.

So when do you stop the bleeding Gonzales? Why isn't our Mayor and council stopping this bleeding right now? This isn't a case of we didn't raise taxes, so we've had to go through the money.  It's a case of we don't want to do what it's going to take to run a balanced budget in the long run. I honestly think it's a case of we don't have a clue of how to stop the spending. I don't think the mayor has ever met a program that cost us money that he didn't like.

If you or I ran our household like this we'd be in bankruptcy court. Guess what? We keep up spending like this the City of Gonzales will also be declaring bankruptcy.  You think it would be bad to have to cut back on some services now? Wait till the town has no money what so ever and we have to cut back! This will effect you and I directly. 

Want to know how they rate you for interest for loans or bonding if we need to get any? It's based on your spending, and on your ability to repay.  I can hear the broker now, "Lets see, you've just spent 5,000,000 and you want another $5,000,000 to replace that? Sure, it will be 21% interest."  Who do you think pays that? It's YOU and me!

Ask your councilman where that money is going.  He's suppose to be on top of it.  Remind him he's running a business here, and right now he's running it into the ground.  He needs to change course and right this ship so that we're not in a bind and going to have to shut down the entire city! And oh, by the way, let's not wait another meeting, let's start now! I don't know about you, but I don't have a spare $2,000,000 to pay in taxes. Times are hard for everyone, and that means cities too. 

I think our city manager and council would rather keep their head in the sand and ignore the problems then to deal with them.  Then WHY ARE YOU SITTING THERE? Move over and let someone who will deal with them take the positions.

I do want to point out there as I have watch the voting in our city council there is consistently one vote against all the spending.  Unfortunately that one vote is not enough to sway the city spending.  But that is councilman Lorenzo Hernandez.  I've watched over the years as the vote has been 3-1 and 4-1 over and over and over again.  I've never seen the others vote against the mayor on anything.  Wondering if they can think on their own? Would love to hear in this forum what they are thinking about and how they plan on stopping the bleeding.  Hear that mayor? Bobby? Gary? I know some of you read these blogs, how about a response and let your constituents know why you are going through our money so fast?

Just more food for thought Gonzales.

On a different note, I will probably repaint the board Wednesday of this week. So weather permitting there will not be anything on the board till Friday morning.  But have no fear, I'll be back Friday morning after breakfast, weather permitting. :-)

God Bless
Dennis Nesser