This is No Feasibility Study

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