By: Diane Benjamin
The Bloomington City Council has until April 1st to fire VenuWorks: PDF page 2 http://www.cityblm.org/Home/ShowDocument?id=10901
The Coliseum (Grossinger Motors Arena) continues to fleece taxpayers. The audited loss for last year was $2,168,534. https://blnnews.com/2018/11/18/the-media-wont-report-this/
Taxpayers were deceived by the consultants before it was built – against the wishes of citizens. They predicted revenues of $7,000,000 a year and gross profit of $2,319,000 – more than enough to pay the construction bonds. https://blnnews.com/2017/12/20/city-should-have-sued-their-consultants/
Both numbers have always been MILLIONS off. Former mayor Judy Markowitz claimed it would never cost you a cent.
Is the City going to wait to shut it down until the losses equal construction costs?
Two different management companies have tried, both have failed. Both have had prosecutions for theft, the big ones might be resolved in our lifetime.
The bonds are being paid through higher sales taxes, there is no need to keep the doors open and steal even more money from taxpayers to support this failed endeavor.
The only event reports from VenuWorks since July are very low attended hockey games: http://www.cityblm.org/government/advanced-components/documents/-folder-1612
This council has the chance to start fixing what these people did:
They won’t unless taxpayers demand it.
It would be nice IF this place could just break EVEN. But, HOW LONG are “our leadership” going to continue this facade of making US believe this “monster” will EVER turn a profit? At this point I don’t even think GOOD MANAGEMENT can keep it a float.. DOES anyone on the council have common “business” sense and shut it down, or do SOMETHING with it.
Those event reports posted in the link are very misleading. They only are including variable expenses like event staff, food costs and credit card fess in arriving with event net profit. If you add in the actual utility expense to heat and light the place, not a single event this fall has made a profit! Time to close it down!
My understanding is the ice rink serves some decent recreation / physical education purposes, and should be kept open if it can be reasonably severed from the remainder of the arena.
The arena shutdown needs to be a three-step process: Allow Grossinger a graceful exit from naming rights. Change the name to the Judy Markowitz center, complete with prominent signage. (Signage might be fundable with donations – I know I’d chip in a few bucks to make sure her legacy is properly credited!) Shutter that white elephant. (I’d actually prefer it be called the Markowitz-Renner center, but there’s no way that would be allowed…)
The Ice Center pays to use the ice on the arena side. That would no longer be necessary!