By: Diane Benjamin
The information below is included in Book 1 of the Bloomington budget: http://www.cityblm.org/Modules/ShowDocument.aspx?documentid=8224
The amount included in the budget is also shown. I believe the Bloomington Election Commission is also housed here, but they aren’t mentioned below.
Hi Diane! My first time writing to you but I read your info every day. Great job! My question on this page of info is: How many people are working in this 62,000 sq. ft. area? Seems like a tremendous amount of space is wasted in the departments that I have been to. Should the government correct the info concerning the Bl. Election Commission also being housed here? This is where you pick up an absentee ballot so I assume you are correct on location. Do you have a definitive answer on how the taxpayers can be certain that the revenue and expenses for the Coliseum are verified? Also, can Butler and company be replaced if they are not bringing in enough revenue to make at least a break even number? If so, is there someone out there that can do a better job or are we locked in to a contract with Butler? Thanks for listening! Jerry Gilbert [email protected]
I have no idea how many people work there. Employees are listed by department in the budget documents, so it can be figured out. I don’t know how many employees are at BEC.
The audited Financial statements for the Coliseum are on line. http://www.cityblm.org/Modules/ShowDocument.aspx?documentid=7481 They show a loss last year of $782,945 before Depreciation. The statement for the 3rd Quarter ending 1/31/2015 isn’t out yet, but from experience it will contain fiction. The auditor always shows greater losses than CIAM. I was just getting ready to post what the City wants to buy for them this year. (only another $2,510,000)
Concessions at the Coliseum are not audited and the City doesn’t verify the information. The Attorney General is working on it, I filed a complaint with them.
The CIAM contract expires next year. It will be negotiated this year. It should not be renewed with CIAM because the contract has been broken over and over and over. There are companies who manage multiple arenas and are better able to book acts because of it. Also the contract heavily favors CIAM, a new contract needs to favor taxpayers with transparency and set fees paid to management. They can be given incentives to earn more for good performance. CIAM has no transparency and no accountability – it doesn’t hurt that City Hall has employees closely tied to them.