The Starkville Parks Advisory Board is unlikely to deliver its report of recommendations for the citywide system, members confirmed Thursday, after numerous issues prevented the group from meeting in June.
When aldermen approved a summer takeover of the park system in February, the board also established a seven-person, ad-hoc committee and tasked it with assessing the organization’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats.
City minutes show the report was due by the end of June, but advisory board member Sumner Davis said the group is now aiming to deliver recommendations in early August.
The group has tentatively identified 1 p.m. Thursday as its next meeting. SPAB meetings are held at the Sportsplex.
Aldermen do not have to perform housekeeping and move the report’s due date if they’re willing to let the requirements of the previous order slide, Mayor Parker Wiseman said.
“I don’t think there’s any concern that they’re not staying on task. It’s not uncommon for a special committee charged with delivering a report like this to run behind,” he said.
Numerous issues have either prevented or limited meetings this year. SPAB was forced to cancel a May meeting after the city failed to properly notice it according to the Open Meetings Act, and only three members could attend the make-up gathering because of conflicting schedules.
“It can be hard to get seven people with seven different lives in harmony like this. We’ve had a lot of unforeseen problems, too, like the Cappe’s (Steakhouse) fire,” Davis said in reference to board member Eric Hallberg, who is tied to the restaurant.
The group is expected to discuss park issues as a whole Thursday as members prepare to finalize the report. The final document itself is not expected to delve deep into fixes for the system, Davis said, as aldermen are solely responsible for the direction of the city department.
“The key thing (the board of aldermen has) to figure out is what they want our parks system to be? They control the finances, so they’re the ones that have to make the tough decisions,” he said. “It’s hard to make decisions regarding finances and long-term planning when they’re spending money. We’re really not in a position to make specific recommendations because of that.”
Financial woes were the driving force behind the city’s decision to assume control of the park system. Last September, Starkville Park Commission fell $60,000 short of its yearly budget and could not meet payroll, retirement and bill payments without a bailout.
Shortfalls in revenue and an ever-growing electricity bill have continued to hamstring the department’s budget.
In May, Wiseman announced an aggressive repayment plan to bring Parks’ out of arrears with Starkville Electric Department.
At the time, documents showed the system still owed SED $59,000 in previous back payments and about $63,000 for the current fiscal year.
To end the current fiscal year with a zero balance, Wiseman proposed lump $40,000-$45,000 monthly payments through September. The city, he said, would reduce those payments to $28,000-$30,000 in September.
The plan should clear the outstanding balance as late as next summer, he said in May.
Advisory board members identified fiscal responsibility, along with communication and accountability, as the department’s primary shortcomings and said it also suffers from a lack of planning, vision, leadership and networking.
The positives, board members said, include strong participation levels with its nonsporting programs, the department’s ability to utilize 2 percent food and beverage tax receipts for capital improvements, resources available from the city and Mississippi State University, physical space and potential county revenue streams.
Board members and the group’s city liaison, Ward 4 Alderman Jason Walker, identified a possible strategy to increase its own revenues and provide additional sales tax receipts for the city: hosting additional sports tournaments.
“(Hosting) a tournament every other week throughout the season could generate a substantial amount of revenue for the city, and that’s probably a more-obtainable, short-term goal than (recruiting large-scale industrial developments),” Walker said in May. “We have a lot more control of that happening than an industry coming.”
Having a department head focused on budgetary and marketing matters, hiring a proven maintenance guru, aggressively competing for tournaments and solving internal communication issues could put Parks at a level where it could even generate enough revenue to hire a tournament manager that specifically recruits events, members said.
Carl Smith covers Starkville and Oktibbeha County for The Dispatch. Follow him on Twitter @StarkDispatch
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