Today, in response to my written request to John Patterson, Chief Administrative Officer for Ogden City, I received a copy of the only feasibility study in the files of Ogden City re the Rec Center.
This study was finally found and discussed in a meeting by John Patterson, Dave Harmer and Mark Johnson before it was given to me as the official study on which the Rec Center is being promoted for a vote Tuesday night.
This is no feasibility study of the Rec Center.....
It is a feasibility study supposedly for Fat Cats. It isn't even that.
It is a hodge podge of 69 pages done by a bowling association representative who has copied pages of ads in magazines and statistics on bowling all over the country. There is one page that attempts to list some numbers that do not make sense.
It lists the lease payments from Cat Cats as $360,000. per year to Ogden City. It is my understanding that bond payments for the Rec Center will approach $80,000. per month.
This is an affront to the Ogden City Council members who are supposed to vote Tuesday night on a massive 25-year debt when they have no adequate financial information on which to base that vote.
This is unforgivable on Dave Harmer's part, who says he is a CPA.
You can bet that he would not make a personal financial decision based on this study. He certainly wouldn't invest his own money with no study to look at on Gold's Gym.
So why is he pushing this debacle for the Mayor? Can he need his job bad enough to give up his professional integrity?
The Utah Code does not cover stupidity on the part of government officials.
The Utah Code does, however, cover the oath of office that these elected officials must take.
An official must perform with fidelity in his position. There has been no part of due diligence nor fidelity on the part of Ogden's Mayor.
And now he wants to put the City Council members in the same position of failing to perform with due diligence by witholding pertinent information for their decision making process.
All City Council members should vote to table this Project until they receive some accurate financial data.
They have sworn to uphold their office with due diligence and they should force the Mayor to allow them to do so.
Dorothy E. Littrell, CPA
© 2005 - 2014 Weber County Forum™ -- All Rights Reserved
11 comments:
Enough of this crap...It's getting soooo old, as old as the people who oppose OGDEN. Rudi, Have you noticed a drop in your readership and posts, and an influx over at the "GOOD" In Ogden? Why? Because when you started this blog, it was with an unbiased approach to Ogden and it's leadership. You have now become Ogden's Michael Moore!
Enough!
If people want to read about the sky falling and how bad our leaders suck in Ogden, we can renew our long since canceled subscription to the Standard Examiner!
Point of information:
At last night's public informational session, Mr. Harmer, Mr. Brown and Mr. Cook confirmed that the agreed monthly lease amount for the Health & Fitness Master Lease is $56,000/mo., which would work out to a sum of $13,400,000 to be paid over the life of the proposed 20-year lease.
"Have you noticed a drop in your readership and posts..."
No. Readership keeps increasing, and there has been a short lull in my own WCF postings due to my temporary involvement in creating another web project, now that the election has been very successfully resolved.
Sorry.
We'll continue to focus on Ogden issues, BTW, although it's my present intention to broaden the scope of discussion here to embrace other northern Utah issues from here on out.
Other northern Utah issues, eh?
To be honest with you Rudi, I've always found it interesting that this site is called Weber County Forum when it seems like 95% of the time your posts are just about Ogden. Now of course the response to that would be "Things that happen in Ogden effect the rest of the county." And this is true, but it seems to me that a blog called Weber County Forum would have also taken some time to look at some of the municipal elections in other Weber County cities, as well as some issues in other parts of the county.
But don't get me wrong, I think this blog is great, or else I wouldn't check it as often as I do. I just think that the name is a little misleading.
No intelligent and responsible business person would make this Rec Center deal without having the signature of Larry Miller and Jake Boyer, on paper, for a 20 year commitment. In other words a guarantee to the tax payers (investors) that they won't get screwed on this deal like they have with so many other Godfrey/Reid fiasco's.
Once the Council commits to this Rec center, without the signatures of Miller and Boyer, then the aforementioned duo will have the city by the balls!
And if we build it and they do not come then we are totally screwed and Wells Fargo owns down town Ogden just like they did with First Security - on the cheap!
If Larry and Jake do decide to come to Ogden's "rescue" they will have all the power in the negotiations and will royally screw the good Mayor and all his minions - like you and me - the true "investors". They will have all the cards and we will have none. If they are not willing to sign on the dotted line in front, along with the city, then this IS NOT a good deal for the city. Any CEO in any industry would be fired on the spot for making such a one sided deal and putting his stock holders money at such risk. This kind of situation is strictly amateur nite in Dixie in the business world.
And look at those juicy fees the bankers and lawyers are pulling out of the middle of this thing! Did Dian say it was 800 grand? By the time it's over the hustlers are going to take several million out of the hides of the tax payers. Hell, the current city "development" executives and their staffs and perks drain a million a year straight out of the general fund and they don't build anything!
The bottom line is that if Miller and Boyer don't come in and own the whole down town on a fantastic deal, then Wells Fargo AKA Northland Securities, will end up with it at about 42 cents on the dollar.
Big Biz - plus forth million -vs- Tax Payers - minus forty million
The tax payers get to take all the gamble on this wild assed scheme. Miller, Boyer or Wells Fargo will make all the money if there is any made. So the best we can hope for as Ogden City Tax payers is to break even if the whole deal is a big success! If it is not we will have to make good, one way or the other, for at least a $40 million dollar loss. More simply - we take all the risk and get none of the benefits.
The vote - Sasten, Stevens, Filliaga, Burdett, Jorgensen - Yes
Garcia, Wicks - No
Hopefully this will be the last time this dismal gang of 6 can abuse the public. If this thing turns out like it looks, then it will be the biggest financial disaster in Ogden's history. This numb skull gang will have their names attached to it in the history books. Slight consolation for the good people of Ogden that will have to make good on all this non sense to the tune of forty million dollars plus.
It's no wonder why you're not a realtor any more, Larsen. Or lost the election, big time. Due diligence, in having faith in the qualification of private enterprise without the recreation center? You are not getting out at the top floor, pal.
The recreation Center is not Ogden's saving grace. I'm still wondering where that idea came from. A gym/arcade controlling the future of Utah's 3rd or 4th largest city. My, don't that look just dandy.
I will say this though, Ozboy is right freakin on. 5-2, again. Rec Center passes, fails, and then what? Gary the Slug Nielsen walks away scott free while we pay his freight. Wells Fargo owns downtown Ogden for less than a half a buck on the buck. But it signals the end of Madd Godfrey, so there is a silver lining, eh!
Excuse me, Steve... But that last comment demonstrates why the Ogden townsfolk are relieved that you didn't sneak into office on Mayor Godfrey's very frayed coat-tails.
The burden is on the Rec Center proponents to make their case to the City Council that the mall project is a "good idea." Can you comprehend this?
After that, and only after that, it becomes the opponents" burden to refute whatever "case" the proponents may have made.
So far there's nothing available to the council in terms of REAL feasibility studies that a REAL fiduciary -- A COUNCIL MEMBER -- OR THE GENERAL PUBLIC --can rely upon to support a "yes" vote on the mall project -- except blue sky promises. The proponents haven't made their case, in other words. Thus, the opponents don't have to prove S**t.
These adminstration schmucks (your pals) don't even have the contractor under contract. They don't have either of the Fatcats/Golds guys signed up either. Gary Nielson told me last night that he could "kill the whole deal" himself, by just not signing the papers, That's how flakey this deal is. The unsigned Larry Miller, of course is laughing his a** off about this. He has Mayor Godfrey by the "short and curlies," and he durned well knows it, as Ozboy eleoquently points out.
The problem is that Ogden City has pursued this "deal" under the misplaced assumption that private lenders would do their own due diligence for the private finacing.
The lenders "bailed" on the "plan;" so now we're "pledging whatever cash-flow is available on the eleventh hour to make the deal happen anyway, even without a "public study" of the issue. The problem is that the taxpayers don't now have a proper "feasibility study," which is something that ought to have been prepared by an independent CPA/Attorney.
These are PUBLIC funds we're talking about gambling here. I spent ample time Wednesday night at the Mt. Ogden Jr. High informational session, just trying to get "Porsche Dave" to admit that -- which he finally did.
For some odd reason, our Mayoral Adminstration thinks it's OK to recklessly gamble the public's money, so long as our tax bill isn't raised.
What we have now is a lame-duck GANG-OF-SIX that is likely to plow on, due mainly to their emotional involvement and their abject business and legal stupidity.
I'll be laughing my a** off, and wondering how the likes of Donna Burdett and Kent Jorgenson will move about this community, after they do their inevitable damage.
And yes; there WILL BE lawsuits over this.
And YES, Jorgenson, Burdett, Filiaga, Stephenson,and Safsten will be named-defendants.
I hope for their sake their malpractice insurance is "paid up."
What really irks me, is the fact that Gold's Gym is already downtown, do you people really think that we are going to draw that many more sweaty people to the mall site to see a movie or go to the tree house or go shopping after they work out at the Gym? Not one bit of the Rec Center adds up. Mayor Goofey is grasping for straws. We already have the land the City has made its' commitment to aquire the property, tear down the existing structures, with the exception of the shitty parking lot, which by tyhe way is one of the reasons that the old mall failed, Women were scared to death to park in it, how much more commitment do you people think that the City has to have? Lets just give anyone with a hair-brained idea, millions of dollars and we'll bond for it, who cares if our children have to pay for the screwups that we allowed to happen? I dont. Let's just live for today and dont worry about tommorrow. Dont worry be happy
Curmudgeon politely takes note of the sudden interest on this blog in feasibility studies, the importance thereof, and the significance of the lack thereof with respect to the proposed rec center. He also notes the apparent absence of any feasibility study for the proposed four-season Malan's Basin Resort and double gondola scheme linking it to WSU and downtown. The Malan's Basin as yet unbuilt "world class" resort, Ubergruppenfuhrer Godfrey has informed us, is necessary to provide riders for the downtown to WSU leg of his gondola/gondola scheme. No successful resort, no financially self-sustaining city owned and operated gondola.
And so far, no feasibility study for the scheme either. Imagine that.
So many questions. So few answers.
You are absolutely right Crum, but the City Council isn't planning to vote on 18.5 Million worth of bonds for the resort or gondola on Tuesday night either.
The resort is private and so far has not even requested public money to finance it, so any feasibility study on it is currently the responsibility of the developer. As for the gondola, if and when the thing is actually proposed and discussed by the council then there better be a feasibility study for them then.
What gives....nothing new for days from either the blogmeister or the bloggers. But the other site is rocking, dudes.
Rudi?
New comments are not allowed.