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March 29, 2005 Here is a recent letter to the editor published in the Commercial Appeal. MARCH 20, 2006 From the letters to the editor: Traffic circle isn't an RDC project It seems to have become the trend to assert erroneous information about the Riverfront Development Corporation. A case in point is a recent TV news report about the Mud Island traffic circle. The traffic circle is not an RDC project. It is a project deemed necessary by the City of Memphis to help alleviate an impending traffic problem on Mud Island. The City asked the RDC to oversee construction of the project to help save time and money. The RDC has done both. Second, the RDC has saved the City of Memphis more than $2 million in the past five years. It is not a drain on City funds. It saves the City money by operating and maintaining the riverfront for the same money the City was spending in 1999. Without the RDC, costs to provide basic maintenance of the riverfront parks would explode. RDC also operates Mud Island River Park for the same amount the City did in 1999 -- and eliminated admission fees. Rick C. Masson Chairman, Riverfront Development Corporation Memphis Shown below is the recent Form 990, Return of Organization Exempt From Income Tax, that the Riverfront Development Corporation filed. Look on line 19, page 1 and you will see that the RDC added $2.5 million to their net assets for the year. Also note on page 7 that one of the employees is Dorchelle Spence, wife of Robert Spence, and she makes $90020 plus $13142 in benefits. Her title is RDC Communications Director. Robert Spence is a close associate of Mayor Herenton and has made huge legal fees from the City. Also note on page 17 that Benny Lenderman III made $183,907 plus $17923 in benefits. Enough said in answer to Mr. Masson excep that it looks like the the $2 million he claims the City saved went right into the saving account of RDC. Click here to see what the RDC bank is doing with your tax money. Click here to go to the RDC page and learn what other boondoogles the RDC has cooked up with your tax money.  January 3, 2006 Buried at the end of today's City Council agenda is an admission by the City Council that they made a huge mistake on May 21, 2002 when they approved unanimously the master plan to remake the riverfront. The resolution which is shown below reads "RESOLUTION supporting the removal of the Land Bridge component from the Memphis Riverfront Master Plan originally endorsed on May 21, 2002, as recommended by the Riverfront Development Corporation." It is interesting that the vote in favor of the hugely expensive and stupid plan was unanimous (11-0) and Tom Marshall and Myron Lowery were absent from the City Council meeting in 2002. Ricky Peete, who voted for it, is presenting the request today to kill it. He is a member of the RDC board. Lowery is the chairman of the CIP budget committee of which Marshall is a member. Both are responsible for the huge CIP budget and have refused to get rid of a lot of unneeded but expensive projects such as the light rail and the beale street landing projects. If they really want to cut the CIP budget and improve the City's financial situation, they should move to kill the current $28 million dollar beale street landiing project which is proceeding and is completely unneeded. Click here to see the Agenda item for January 3, 2006 which kills a project on which millions have already been spent in planning and are now wasted.  December 15, 2005 BEALE STREET LANDING PROJECT-WHY ARE WE SPENDING $28 MILLION OF OUR TAX DOLLARS? W. C. Fields would feel right at home as a member of the current City Council or as financial director of the Herenton Administration. In the classic movie, the Bank Dick, Fields asks a customer if “He ever went boondoggling”. (The definition of boondoggling is engaging in worthless activities). The Beale Street Landing Project ($28 million projected cost) ,which is proceeding, fits this definition perfectly. This is one of the dumbest things that the Herenton Administration and the current City Council have done and that is going some with this current City Government. If you go to the website of the Riverfront Development Corporation Click here to go to the Riverfront Development website and read about the Beale Street Landing Project. you can read about it in their own words. They say “Approximately 50 stops are made by three major vessels each year, not including local excursion boats and special annual or one-time visits.” But when we checked the website of the Delta Queen Line they only show 26 stops during the 2006 season. The line has had financial problems in the past and recently emerged from bankruptcy. They presently use the ramp just south of the tram to mud island (just below the amphitheater as shown in the picture above) and this works quite well. Taxies, busses, supply trucks and passengers seem to do quite well at that location. As far as we know there has never been a threat from Delta Queen Lines to stop visiting Memphis if this new landing is not built. Why then are we spending $28 million dollars on this boondoggle? $19 million of this is general obligation bonds which Memphis cannot afford with our falling bond rating and general financial situation. This is a question that needs to be answered now. (Shown in another picture below are the contractors beginning to spend our tax money at the foot of Beale Street). We need to stop this project. Where is W. C. when we need him to guard the City Bank?  October 5, 2005 Recently we sent an open records request to the Riverfront Development Corporation which is shown in a pdf file below. We received an answer also as shown below. In that answer Mr. Lendermon claims that RDC is not subject to the Tennessee Public Records Act, this in spite of the fact that on their website under financial highlights, they show a City Grant of $250,000 and receive City Money for Park Operations of $1,311,463. Also they show Contract Revenue of $3,557,996 which is undefined as to source. Sure sounds like taxpayer money to us. However, Mr. Lendermon graciously offered to sell us some information at 40 to 50 cents per page which we accepted. The RDC plans for our riverfront can be seen on their very nice website. Click here to see what RDC has planned for your riverfront. The history here is that the RDC had meetings on proposals and the overwhelming sentiment of the public is that the excessive taxpayer cost of public money (General Obligation Bonds) and the loss of public property does not justify the proposed projects. The City Council has approved the RDC plan and the Capital Improvement Budget from 2006 to 2010 has $52 million dollars scheduled, $39 million of which is financed by City of Memphis General Obligation Bonds. And furthermore, just this morning the Commecial Appeal said that the RDC is moving ahead on the $27 million riverboat landing at Beale Street (if the city council OKs $500,000 next week for dredging). No mention, of course, of operating costs vs. revenue or the bound-to-be-extraordinary maintenance costs of the sophisticated dock designs for river fluctuations. This is another example of an out of control Herenton Administration and a City Council that has a majority that goes along with these financially unsound schemes. Click here to see our open records request to the Riverfront Development Corporation. Click here to see RDC's answer to our open records request. Click here to see RDC financial highlights. Click here to see the CIP budget for the City of Memphis for the Riverfront. October 10, 2005 We have obtained copies of agreements, contracts and other data between the City of Memphis and Riverfront Development Corporation (RDC). We have attached them in two pdf files for the public's review. This information gives a clear picture of the millions of dollars spent by the City of Memphis for planning for a project that is not needed or wanted by the tax paying public but which provides a nice income for RDC employees and the prospect of future development projects for downtown developers using public money for a large share of the cost. The picture of the relationship between the City and RDC is there to see. Some guidance and overviews are necessary in looking at these documents. The first file is City Contract #N17090 which is a Master Development Agreement dated January 29, 2004. The reason given by the City for the contract is that the Riverfront is under utilized and blighted and that it requires sound re-planning and redevelopment under a plan that will eliminate blight and decay and will accomplish the modernization and general improvement of the City of Memphis downtown area. The City will pay the bulk of development with some money coming from the State and Federal sources. The City also will pay the cost of management by RDC. Concerning this, the most recent information from the RDC website shows that for the year ended June 2004, out of $4.19 million in operating expenses, salaries, wages and benefits cost $2.2 million or 52.7%. Sources of revenue were $3.5 million in contract revenue, $250,000 from City grants and $1.3 million to take care of various City parks. $1.1 million was spent on Capital projects. The rest of the paperwork is interesting. It goes back to the year 2000. Pages 1-4 is the restated charter of the RDC. Pages 5-8 are two ordinances (4751 and 4763) to modify the jurisdiction of the Memphis Park Commission over certain parks and other facilities and to create a new Division of Park Services, thereby killing the old effective well run Park Commission. Pages 9-12 is a management agreement as amended for RDC to manage Mud Island River Park and other various parks. Pages 13-20 is a list of various properties of the City and County giving information as to location, size and annual rental and other data. Pages 21-23 is a management agreement dated June 29, 2001. The City agreed to Pay RDC $2.9 million dollars the first year as a management fee and starting July 15, 2006, that annual fee would reduce as shown. Pages 24-28 is a master plan agreement where the City agreed to pay RDC $761,000 for a master plan. Page 29 is a RDC routine maintenance schedule for various parks. Pages 30-31 are bid and contract agenda sheets from the General Services Division of the City. Pages 32-34 are contract amendments and extensions for contract N16404 for $3.9 million from the CIP project GA-055 for Land Bridge Planning and Design. Pages 35-39 is a Planning Agreement date January 23, 2003 for $3.27 million dollars for Engineering-Architecture. Pages 40-41 is an agreement between the State of Tennessee and the City of Memphis for a $7 million dollar appropriation for Riverfront Development. Attachment A (page 41) shows what it is for and that the estimated project cost is $15 million dollars. We do not know if this was ever received by the City of Memphis. Page 42 is a bid and contract sheet for RDC for $125,000 dollars. Pages 43-46 is a RDC agreement for Urban Land Institute Advisory Services for $3.08 million dollars. Pages 47-49 is a resolution from the City Council for $1.8 million dollars, most in G. O. Bonds for improvements. Pages 50-51 are bid and contract sheets for $1.8 million and $3.92 million dollars. Page 52 is an inter-office memo from Jerry Collins, Director of the Public Works Division, to Keith McGee, CAO saying that the $3 million is entirely for the design contract for Beale Street Landing and that the actual project is estimated to cost $20-25 million. Pages 53-55 is an agreement for pedestrian park improvements for $1.8 million. Click here to see the agreement that the City of Memphis made with the Riverfront Development Corporation. Click here to see what the City has spent and the Riverfront Development Corporation has cost you so far. October 18, 2005 At last reality has begun to dawn on the Riverfront Development Corporation and they have temporarily killed the expensive, unwanted land bridge. Whether the current City Council will back this decision is unknown at this time as they continue to insist on their expensive, unneeded capital improvement projects. Memphiswatchdog.org has just obtained all the inside information on the riverfront Development Corporation and we publish it below for the general taxpaying public to study. Here are the important points. • As of June 30, 2005, RDC had a net worth of about $1 million • During the year ended June 30, 2005 RDC received a little over $6 million from the City. • RDC (really the City of Memphis) lost a little over $2 million in the last year on the parks, mainly Mud Island. • In July 2001, RDC signed a contract with the City of Memphis giving them management of all City of Memphis riverfront property paying them over $10 million to date. • Benny Lendermon, the President of RDC makes a salary of $172,050 per year plus a bonus of $25,000. Also he and other employees get vacations, sick leave, health insurance, life insurance, short and long term disability insurance, and a retirement plan, all as shown on the attached information. • Bounds & Gillespie, Architects, received a three month contract in 2004 for a Beale Street Landing design contract for $3,137,266.00. • Hnedak Bobo Groups, Inc have a monthy Beale Street Landing Management contract of $34,000/month since 11/27/01. that is nearly $2 million to date. The public needs to consider that the City debt has nearly tripled in the last ten years to over $1 billion. We do not need to spend money on these kinds of projects until we get our finances under control in the City and the County. Click here to see the audited financial statement of the Riverfront Development Corporation. Click here to see the salaries and benefits of the RDC employees. Click here to see the projects and associated contracts of the RDC. June 24, 2005 The US Supreme Court yesterday ruled on a case from New London, Conn that it was OK to use eminent domain for private purposes as long as it would increase tax revenues. This decision could have an effect on the plans of the Riverfront Development Corporation to spend millions in public money for their riverfront plans. The Friends for our Riverfront group will certainly oppose any such efforts. The opinion of most taxpayers in Memphis is that the Riverfront Development Corporation plans benefit mainly the downtown interests and that any development should be 100% private money if it is such a good idea. Take a look at what has already been spent and what the future plans are for using our tax money. Click here to see part of the future scheduled capital improvement budget expenditures on this riverfront development boondoogle. Click here to see the past and current approved spending of your tax money on the riverfront development plan. There is a lot of misunderstanding and misinformation about what is going on at the Riverfront Development Corporation and what the cost will be if their plans are implemented. We know that Mayor Herenton created RDC in 1997 to implement his grand plan for the river in contradiction to the wishes of the founders of Memphis. We know he plans to spend a lot of public money on this plan in the form of bonds as is shown in the download above from the 2006 Capitol Improvement Budget. We have shown also a link to the website of friendsforourriverfront.org which gives a good outline of the RDC plans and the cost to taxpayers. Our opinion is the same as it was for the FedEx Arena. If it is such a good deal, why do you need public money. Let it stand on its own merits. You decide based on the facts. click here for friends for our riverfront website. Click here to go to the Memphis Riverfront Corp website. | FIRE AND POLICE NEWS | PARK SERVICES | CITY ATTORNEY'S OFFICE | PUBLIC WORKS | ENGINEERING DIVISION | FINANCE DIVISION | SALARY & BENEFITS | APPOINTED CITY EMPLOYEES | MEMPHIS SCHOOL SYSTEM | RIVERFRONT DEVELOPMENT CORP | INDUSTRIAL DEVELOPMENT BOARD | HOUSING AND COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT | MEMPHIS SHELBY COUNTY AIRPORT AUTHORITY | | Return Home | 2009 NEWS | MEMPHIS CITY GOVERNMENT NEWS | MEMPHIS CITY COUNCIL NEWS | MLG&W NEWS | SHELBY COUNTY GOVERNMENT | CONTACT US | |
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