Florida Keys News - Key West Citizen
Friday, March 12, 2010
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City mulls events fee rule
May crack down on donations, paperwork
BY MANDY MILES Citizen Staff
mmiles@keysnews.com

Key West city officials may strengthen a law that requires commercial organizers of special events to donate at least 25 percent of their net proceeds to a local nonprofit organization.

The proposed change in city rules states that any group that does not file timely financial statements and summaries of its donation may be prohibited from holding future events.

The donation, a minimum of $1,000, applies to all for-profit special events that "cause the closing of a city street or other public right-of-way," but nonprofits are exempt.

"Obviously, if a nonprofit is holding the event, they don't have to donate money to another group," City Manager Jim Scholl said.

A problem with one event's organizers prompted the proposed rule change, but Assistant City Manager Mark Finigan said he did not know which event it was. Scholl did not return The Citizen's calls seeking that information.

Among the many events that must pay the fee are Goombay, PrideFest, Lobsterfest, Fight Night, Children's Day and the Florida Keys Seafood Festival, Finigan said.

The City Commission will consider the proposal at its regular meeting Tuesday evening.

Detention center

Commissioner Jimmy Weekley on Tuesday will propose urging the state to continue funding the Monroe Regional Juvenile Detention Center on Stock Island. Florida Department of Juvenile Justice officials have included it on a list of facilities that could be closed due to "under-utilization."

The closure would require juvenile offenders from the Florida Keys to be held in detention centers in Miami, isolated from family members and legal representatives, and subjected to harder criminals.

"The proposed reductions in funds will counteract the success realized in Monroe County since 1999 as a direct result of the united commitment and efforts of both Monroe County and Department of Juvenile Justice toward strengthening our families and protecting our youth," the proposed resolution states.

The City Commission will meet at 6 p.m. at Old City Hall, 510 Greene St. For more information and an agenda, go online to keywestcity.

mbolen@keysnews.com

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Don't forget the African American Heritage Festival every June.

Submitted on Fri, 03/12/2010 - 11:13am by *.*
They close down a main thoroughfare, Whitehead Street, usually for a day, even two, with rap music blasting into the night. Traffic becomes a nightmare, the neighbors are at their witts end with the trash and noise, and we all wonder how much the city gets for doing this to us all.

Where are the republicans and tea party people??

Submitted on Fri, 03/12/2010 - 10:11am by Ed
Come one folks. Talk about giving up your freedom! The city is going to tell a private business what to do with their profits!!! Talk about socialism! What is next? Make every business in town give money to a health care fund to be sure people can get medicine. This is an outrage! If you want to get back some money for closing a city street, you charge a flat amount and get out of the way.

Socialism!

Submitted on Fri, 03/12/2010 - 12:29pm by Observer
I can't tell if this comment is sarcasm or genuine outrage. The other comments here about 'gaming' the system are right on and it has apparently been a common practice for a long time. The ordinance specified 25% of gross and that's what it should be.

This isn't socialism by any stretch, it's putting a price on the interruption of normal life in the City and for the inconvenience inflicted on its residents by these regular pseudo-festivals.

That it directs the money so raised to worthy non-profit organizations is just icing on the cake.

It was both outrage and

Submitted on Fri, 03/12/2010 - 2:24pm by Ed
It was both outrage and sarcasm. I think the city has no right at all to mandate giving any percent of profits to charity. That is up to the private individual taking the risk and putting on the events. If the city wants to charge a fee to recoup money, that is fine. You do not take a percentage of profits. This is Government gone mad.

Fine. Let them pay the max for the venue, then. The city can

Submitted on Fri, 03/12/2010 - 8:33pm by *.*
charge whatever is necessary for a private entity to use the public streets and property of the city and to inconvenience the citizenry. So....fine. No percentage points. Charge them $25,000 to close a single block on a single street and all is good.

Sounds fine with me. I

Submitted on Sun, 03/14/2010 - 4:30pm by Ed
Sounds fine with me. I think 25k is high and would likely not allow too many private events anymore, but if that is what the city wants to do, so be it. Something closer to 10k likely covers the cost, but the city would have to determine this.

At issue is that there are those who feel a percentage is some

Submitted on Sun, 03/14/2010 - 7:26pm by *.*
sort of communism. That's crap.

I think it's fair to take a percentage but hey, you can't stop fraud in their accounting for these questionable activities. So...instead of a percentage, let's just come up with a price-y flat rate. If they want to take our streets, stop our ingress and egress, and impose their noise and trash on our neighborhoods, then they should pay the max to the city and the citizens they have inconvenienced. OR they could hold their 'event' on private property and not make the lives of the citizens more difficult. Bottom line: Is it cheaper for them to use the property of the city and the people, or is it cheaper for them to use private property? Either way, they pay.

Accounting problem with "Net Profit"

Submitted on Fri, 03/12/2010 - 9:32am by Ralph
Creative accounting can assure that many events never see a NET PROFIT. Promotional costs eat up the net, but promote the business and have residual benefit. Bars, for example, have been known to take out full page ads to promote a "fest du jour." Non-profits should receive a percentage of GROSS SALES. There is no way to tell whether an event nets a profit without a detailed analysis of figures which are easily manipulated, but Gross sales are easy to estimate. A bar will get at least 150 glasses of beer out of the common keg. Multiply the number of barrels served by 150 and the price per glass. Voila. Now write the check to the organization. It's not rocket science.

Problem with one....

Submitted on Fri, 03/12/2010 - 9:12am by Concerned
OK...we want to know who the one was....

The problem was ...

Submitted on Fri, 03/12/2010 - 12:20pm by Observer
... brought into the light by a James St. resident who 'outed' the St. Patrick's day event run annually by Finnegan's Wake at a City Commission meeting about a month ago, when the permit for street closing was heard.

But apparently they aren't the only ones who've been shorting the non-profits, although no City official at the meeting had answers about what the level of compliance has been. It seems another instance where the City doesn't really know whether or not its rules are being followed and if revenues and expenses are being accounted for effectively. Shades of the Monroe County School District!

It's time for an audit and, if it can be shown that anyone didn't pay the correct amount over the last three years, no more permits until all arrears are paid.

What about Fantasy Fest and the Fee??

Submitted on Fri, 03/12/2010 - 2:27am by Merit
Fantasy Fest is a FOR PROFIT event. MarketSource runs the event in order to make money. AIDS Help does have the chance to use the events to generate revenue and donations, but the overall company... MarketSource... makes money off this event... Is this Fee going to be charged? Could another non-profit get some of the "25%" fee from the profit-making portion of Fantasy Fest.

So, what happened to Market Share?

Submitted on Fri, 03/12/2010 - 11:09am by *.*
They ran the event for years. I agree with other posters that it makes more sense to estimate the gross and go from that. Cook a few books and the 'net' goes away.

Market Share

Submitted on Fri, 03/12/2010 - 2:13pm by dolphin girl
Market Share is hired to promote Fantasy Fest and they do a remarkable job. Fantasy Fest is a non-profit event.

Market Share keeps a TON of

Submitted on Sun, 03/14/2010 - 4:32pm by Ed
Market Share keeps a TON of the money. Just because FF is partially a fund raiser, does not mean all the money goes to charity. This event has outlived it usefulness and the city needs to start enforcing some laws down here against the freaks that come for this "charity" event.

A difference of opinion

Submitted on Sat, 03/13/2010 - 12:52pm by Merit
In my opinion, Fantasy Fest and Market Share have done more damage to the Keys, along with the Bubba Corruption.

I AGREE 100%!!!

Submitted on Sun, 03/14/2010 - 4:31pm by Ed
I AGREE 100%!!!

Damage?

Submitted on Mon, 03/15/2010 - 11:37am by dolphin girl
How can bringing tourist and money be damaging? That is the slowest time of year. We should look forward to making money at that time of year.

Theres damage !

Submitted on Thu, 03/18/2010 - 2:55pm by tavernierjim
Those of us that live in the upperkeys have to put up w/tourist doing 60 mph in over loaded cars when its FF time. And on the way home many are still drunk or hungover behind the wheel. As a 49 year local I have never,ever went to FF and will never go. Being around unruley ,nasty drunks is not my day of fun!put that in your pipe and smoke it!
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