When one looks at the history of the Ludington Downtown Development Authority (DDA, aka Downtown Ludington Board or DLB), one should not be surprised that the Board operates out of the dark basement of city hall.  This resistance to transparency and the irregular accounting practices they exercise has a long history and is projected to extend into the future.  

After a year of holding several regularly scheduled and special meetings out of the public eye, and mysteriously finding a couple of hundred thousand dollars in 'saved' money to fund their part of the ambitious Legacy Park project, the DDA look forward to doing almost nothing while collecting nearly four hundred thousand more in 2020 and 2021 in a continuously evolving budget that evokes a lot of questions.  The 2021 budget (found here) describes the issues thusly:

Looking closer at the budget, one can see that the revenues coming in for 2021 will be roughly $187,000 when one ignores the $2.123 million grant from the MEDC, these are somewhat lower than prior revenues.  Squarely $84,300 are slated to go to the Marketing & Communications Director and for administrative expenses, all other expenses from that non-grant revenue are scheduled to add up to $25,800.  That leaves close to $80,000 in revenue without a destination.  

When one looks at the reduction of events, one sees that $84,300 in administration/personnel costs are planned on being used to run the 'Love Ludington' race series and a reduced farmer's market, all other normal DDA events are currently set not to happen.

One can see all of the event money planned for 2020 (events after March) and more has went for unbudgeted contractual services instead, increasing that budgeted amount by $55,000.  One would assume that the money went towards Legacy Park, however, we were told by DDA director Heather Tykoski that the DDA fund had saved their match of the MEDC $2.3 million over the years.

In the City's budget, the DDA never had such a balance, but Tykoski's admission makes one wonder where that contractual service money is going this year.  In the years between 2009 and 2019, the DDA never had a 'prior year fund balance' over $48,000 in the black, at the end of 2015 they actually had a $50,000 deficit.  In those years, the budgeting had the DDA surpluses revert to the general fund, and the deficit of 2015 covered apparently by their past credits.  This defies the accounting principles that apply to the DDA, keeping their fund separate from the City's, but Heather Tykoski was never very good at math.

In 2019 the laws affecting Michigan DDA's were changed significantly, but what didn't change is how they handle their budgets.  Effectively the DDA board is supposed to approve their budget and send it up to the city council for their vote of approval before the DDA can vote to adopt it.  This legal requirement hasn't ever been done in Ludington.  The DDA adopts their own budget in October, and the councilors never see the DDA budget before it's included in the City's complete budget. 

Before 2019, MCL 125.1678 covered the same principle:  "Before the budget may be adopted by the board it shall be approved by the governing body of the municipality."  The city council cannot approve the DDA budget lawfully by approving the City's own budget, nor can the DDA lawfully create a budget and adopt it before the council looks it over and approves it.  

If we could overlook the general corruption inherent in much of the City's actions and policies over the years, one could easily blame the lack of any council oversight on the DDA budget as the cause as to how the DDA can lay claim to $239,000 they don't have and assign nearly $60,000 outside of their budget for unknown contractual services.  Our struggling downtown businesses with an ever-increasing list of casualties in these hard times deserves better.

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This is just mind boggling, these apparent discrepancies in budget and following law (not approved by the city council). Maybe you could draft up specific questions and get some answers from our new city manager.

While coincidentally, MCP reports that the Sportman Bar,  the Mitten and Barley and Rye (all owned by same) are for sale.  Better luck in making it up in Marquette.  Let's buy some more plastic ice rinks, that should help.  Excuse my sarcasm.  I dont believe the $2.1 million dollar Legacy Park will really help either.  What really will help?  Imo, parking.  Plain old parking would be a good start.  Not cramming in more facilities with less parking.

Parking will always be an issue on days where major downtown events are happening (the Fourth, FNLs, NYE ball drops, etc) and most summer weekends, the other 90+% of the time there's usually parking to spare.  We should be able to objectively decide how to optimize parking options, but I don't see any of that coming out of the DDA.  Our state leadership has to be changed, either by mindset or by corrective recall elections, so that even more of our otherwise stable downtown businesspeople don't fold their business or be forced to sell.  If Biden (if he wins) and Whitmer continue their assault on small businesses, there won't be any left in the downtown.

XLFD, where do you come up with the figure of $84,3 for administrative costs for LOVE ludington race and the $500 farmer market?  Just because that's all the activities predicted for 2021?  This is a yearly budget for a marketing director who also give weekly video updates and must do other things?  I get your point.  A few year old position, and the salary/admin. Fee graduates to $84,300 annually.  That's huge.  Our city council can't understand what is going on to allow this to happen, can they?  

I got clocked on my head this last week while hauling firewood logs, so I added the first four figures in my corrupted head and got $84,300 rather than the $75,300 it should be, carried the one to the wrong place.  This total was compared to the non-Legacy expenses which includes the farmer's market and the race series as meaningful programs, and features printing/publishing as the other major expense which likely includes the calendar and pamphlets featuring the city and what it has to offer.  These added up to $25,800, about a third of which is spent on administration and the Tooman.  

Remember, this is the City that has meshed Shop with a Cop and other charity events in with the general fund and made it unnecessarily difficult to follow, rather than set up a dedicated fund.  This has resulted in the City gambling by spending substantial amounts of public money before the charity events earn a penny.  

Even with seeing stars from a chock to your head, X, you see more than most.  The DDA and City of Ludington owes an explanation for this "administrative" fee and others to the business owners, and the citizens.  Though these budget projections are just a place holder for monies in the budget, they seem to float back and forth from account especially when it comes to an accounting with the DDA or for finding "saved" money for Legacy Park.  That so smells of pushing through a pet project, when they see stars in their heads with the possibility of grant money.

Nice leech meme, Willy.  Revenue for the DDA will likely be over $2.3 million next year (including the grant and normal revenue), nearly 99% of that will be spent on Legacy Park or administration.

I couldn't think of any other creature the DDA represents. They truly fill the role as Ludington's premier leech population. I should remind people that the businesses that pay the DDA taxes and the grants the DDA receive are dollars all contributed by the public. Any fees and taxes levied on businesses are passed on to their customers. So congratulate yourselves for providing the funds for all the wasteful projects they have hung around our necks, and that's not counting the necessary continued maintenance of those projects. 

Good point, Willy, but I'd like to clarify who the DDA leeches are sucking the lifeblood from.  The two main revenues come from the 2 mills they collect from those with property in the DDA district, primarily those who own downtown businesses, this is about $45,000 each year forced on less than 10% of the property in the City of Ludington.  

The TIF 'captures' $68,000 each year for the DDA, this money comes from the local taxing authorities in Mason County that affect downtown Ludington.  This includes not only the city and county governments, but ones not usually thought of:  WSCC, the district library, Oakview, Soldier's Relief, West Michigan Fire District, etc.  The DDA leeches have far reaches.

Most of the other non-grant revenue gained come from sponsorships and gross profits from events they normally hold, most of this revenue pays part or all of the expenses of those events.

'The DDA leeches have far reaches." Your a poet X. So let's make it official.

Very good pictures Willy!  Using a homonym and changing a verb to a noun, one could say "the DDA leaches into far reaches" but the backdrop of the leeches is disgustingly graphic.

Good one FS.

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