Starkville Parks Commission leader Dan Moreland is making a last-minute call for additional Fiscal Year 2014-2015 funding after sending a letter to aldermen stating his autonomous city department is forecasted almost $57,000 short for September and operated at an estimated $10,000 monthly loss for at least a portion of the current fiscal year.
Moreland’s documents, sent Wednesday to Starkville aldermen and Mayor Parker Wiseman, outline what John McMurray Jr., a certified public accountant who reviewed SPC’s current money woes, described in a supplemental report as a critical financial situation for the organization.
McMurray’s Sept. 5 letter to Moreland states Parks, as of Aug. 31, had $21,974.76 in its checking account, but September’s “bare necessity bills,” including SPC’s electric bill and Sept. 5 and Sept. 19 payroll and payroll tax would total a combined $78,960.99, leaving Parks $56,986.23 short for the month.
While funds were available to make Sept. 5 payroll and its associated payroll taxes, miscellaneous insurance and garnishes, McMurray’s letter states “the health insurance reimbursement to the city and (the Public Employee’s Retirement System of Mississippi) have not been paid yet.”
“I will pay PERS as soon as there is enough money in the bank,” his letter to Moreland continues.
Moreland’s letter acknowledges SPC is operating approximately $10,000 in the red each month and asks aldermen for an unspecified amount of additional funding.
A summary FY 2014-2015 budget uploaded to the city’s website shows $940,000 — the same amount aldermen gave last year — allocated to SPC’s capital outlay fund, a stream used for operations.
Aldermen will hold the city’s budget hearing Tuesday.
SPC’s financial woes became a 2013 election issue when in April of that year a Watkins, Ward and Stafford audit revealed three fiscal anomalies, including the fact that Moreland issued an unauthorized cashier’s check for $35,000 to help pay the department’s J.L. King Splash Pad construction bill.
Parks also exhausted its improvement budget, an annual allotment of $180,000 funded by the city’s 2 percent food and beverage tax, by late May 2013.
Before voters decided June 2013’s mayoral election between Moreland and Wiseman, another report estimated SPC owed Starkville Electric Department more than $100,000 and forecasted overdue fees and expected usage at $180,000 for the fiscal year.
In his letter, Moreland again blamed the previous administration for SPC’s financial woes, saying the former board cut Parks’ operational budget $5,000 per month in 2010, at the same time expenses increased with the opening of the Sportsplex.
“As a result of the cuts in funding, Parks and Recreation is currently operating with three full-time and part-time employees short (sic),” Moreland said in his letter. “We cannot afford to replace these employees, which decrease (sic) our level of service.
“We are respectfully requesting that funding to the budget of the Starkville Parks and Recreation be restored or increased to a level that will allow us to adequately staff and fund operations,” he continued. “So many of our citizens enjoy these facilities and would benefit from your assistance.”
Moreland made similar allegations last August when the incoming board of aldermen began finalizing the current fiscal year budget. Then, he alluded to a perceived anti-Parks stance taken by Wiseman and former aldermen.
Wiseman engaged his comments head on during last year’s budget sessions, saying the city’s past three years of general contributions remained flat at $844,400 per year. While the operational budget was reduced, the mayor said, other contributions increased, thereby negating the decrease.
SPC receives 40 percent of the city’s 2 percent collections, and those funds are limited to specific expenditures. Payments on electric bills and other similar operational costs are not allowed with those monies.
State lawmakers are likely to take up a renewal for Starkville’s 2 percent food and beverage tax in the next legislative session.
Vice Mayor Roy A. Perkins, who frequently champions Moreland’s and SPC’s contributions to the city, led a successful charge last year to give SPC $96,000, or $8,000 per month, in additional operational funding.
Although Parks is an autonomous organization charged with paying its own bills, Perkins recently indicated he was interested in the city finding a long-term solution to potholes and other infrastructure problems within the Sportsplex’s property.
About five areas on the Sportsplex’ entrance road and parking lot have developed significant potholes, Parks Director Herman Peters told the three-person Starkville Audit and Budget Committee in July, after Mississippi State University began its public transportation system, the SMART Route.
The Sportsplex is one of the city-campus shuttle stops that provides public parking. It services the high-density apartment complexes of Lynn Lane.
In that budget meeting, aldermen acknowledged that portions of the area’s infrastructure itself have not seen significant upgrades or overlays since it was constructed almost 20 years ago.
Carl Smith covers Starkville and Oktibbeha County for The Dispatch. Follow him on Twitter @StarkDispatch
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