2012 City Revenues from Corn Fest Parking

Author: yinn

Sep 11

According to the City of DeKalb, the total in parking fees collected for Corn Fest 2012 is $16,174.

That’s a lot less than the nearly $26,700 collected in 2011 and a sad fraction of the original estimate of $54,000.

And remember, if they worked the same deal as last year, 20% of the total goes to whichever charitable organization helped the city with this task.

Sales tax revenue information from this year’s Corn Fest will be available by the last week in September. Last year the sales tax take was about $4200.

Wonder what the FAA would say.

Bonus: Corn Fest Liquor License after the jump. Read the rest of this entry

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Corn Fest Has a Liquor License. Guess Where the Bar Is?

Author: yinn

Aug 24

DeKalb Corn Fest, Inc. now has its own liquor license, and its own special permit to serve liquor at Corn Fest in the great outdoors. My companion and I saw them about 5:30 p.m.

We had to request to see these documents, because they weren’t posted anywhere: not at the gate to the beer garden, not in the regular serving area nor the VIP area. A nice staff person had to go looking in an office in the hangar used by VIP. All told it took about 10 minutes to get a peek at them, even though Corn Fest was already serving.

The name of the licensed establishment is “Corn Fest” and the address is 1586 Barber Greene Road, which, as I’ve commented and Tweeted before, is the address of the Daily Chronicle.

The Knights of Columbus ran the beer garden for Corn Fest until this year. KC has, you know, an actual bar.

On Monday I’ll submit a Freedom of Information Act for these documents so you don’t have to depend upon my memory for details.

Stay tuned.

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Looking for Corn Fest Financial Postings?

Author: yinn

Aug 23

We’re doing a brisk business today in searches for Corn Fest postings, particularly financial reports. Hitting the Corn Fest tag will present them in a pleasing reverse chronology for you. Enjoy!

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City Revenues from Corn Fest 2011

Author: yinn

Aug 8

We need for DeKalb to collect, at minimum, about $30,000 in Corn Fest annual revenues on behalf of DeKalb Taylor Municipal Airport (DTMA) because that’s what city administrators told the FAA it would do.

They also said they’d put these revenues, consisting of sales taxes and parking fees, directly into the airport fund instead of dumping them into the General Fund and making transfers. They have not yet made this change, so I requested the numbers through the Freedom of Information Act.

Make the jump to see how well we’ve done. Read the rest of this entry

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Corn Fest Financials Through 2010

Author: yinn

Jul 18

ear of cornDeKalb Corn Fest was lucky to have funds in reserve when it moved from the downtown to DeKalb Taylor Municipal Airport in 2008.

YearRevenuesExpensesGain/LossGrants
Given		Ending
Fund
Balance
2004129,016153,600-24,584?25,805
2005174,734140,83933,895?59,700
2006183,392163,69819,69425,20079,394
2007167,509156,17411,3353,00090,699
2008160,999178,519-17,5204,00073,179
2009183,662184,376-1,01430072,165
2010155,804171,748-15,944None56,221

Except for the “Lady Antebellum boost” in 2009, revenues have been trending downward. Revenues are no longer itemized on the tax forms, so we don’t know which categories have gotten hit.

The expense story is not so mysterious: expenses jumped with the move to the airport because site costs rose from $20,000 to $38,000.

It will be interesting to get last year’s numbers to see what effect, if any, the new parking fees had on the bottom line. You will recall that the City of DeKalb, not Corn Fest, benefits from the parking fees; nevertheless they could still affect attendance and spending.

Source: Foundation Center 990 Finder

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Corn Fest Financials

Author: yinn

Aug 30

YearRevenuesExpensesGrantsGain/LossAssets
2004129,016153,600?-24,58425,805
2005174,734140,839?33,89559,700
2006183,392163,69825,20019,69479,394
2007167,509156,1743,00011,33590,699
2008160,999178,5194,000-17,52073,179
2009183,662184,376300-1,01472,165

2004-5: No grants were allocated as such for these years but there were expenses listed as “contributions,” of $2,500 and $3,064, respectively.

2006: Yowza.

2007: There was rain and flooding.

2008: This was Corn Fest’s first year at the airport.

2009: Lady Antebellum probably saved their hash.

Source: Grant Space Tools

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More on Corn Fest & Parking Fees

Author: yinn

Jul 16

Here’s a piece of an e-mail from an FAA official to the City of DeKalb about FAA requirements for holding Corn Fest at the airport, which DeKalb County Online got hold of in May:

Of particular importance is the amount of money received by the airport from the event. This MUST be some form of Fair Market Value revenue received from the event and put into the airport operations fund. Failure to do so could put the airport in noncompliance with its Grant Assurances. IDA/FAA may request proof of payment to ensure compliance. I would also add that a token sum of something like $500/day or $1,000/day for what appears to be a pretty big event is not considered Fair Market Value.

In early June, the FAA official recapped an agreement made during a meeting with the City of DeKalb:

- There will be a charge for parking for the event. A daily and/or weekend charge/fee was mentioned. Based on historical attendance figures, this could lead to revenue to the airport ranging between $30k to $50K. Also, you mentioned in the previous years’ events that the sales tax collected at the event went back into the airport budget. These two sources of income (if close to the estimated amount) would, in my opinion, be considered Fair Market Value for a 3-day event.

Then the Chronicle editorial said this*: Read the rest of this entry

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Chronicle Misses the Mark with Corn Fest Parking Fees

Author: yinn

Jul 14

In “Our View: Corn Fest fee to park is fair,” the Chronicle today makes the case for users of Corn Fest to help pay for it.

The city provides, among other things, a location for the festival and police and emergency personnel in case something goes wrong. The emergency personnel are paid out of their departments’ budgets, which tough financial times have stretched as far as they will go.

The question: Who should pay for those costs? The people who attend the festival or every taxpayer in the city, whether they attend or not?

Of course it would be fair, if it were happening the way they say. But it’s not.

Readers of DeKalb County Online and this blog already know that the $5 parking fee will not go toward providing first responders at the festival. FAA approval of the event is contingent upon the city’s collecting fair market value for Corn Fest’s use of the airport, in this case $30,000 – $50,000, to go straight into the Airport Fund. It cannot be used for other city operations. We are back to Square One on covering these costs.

The above information comes from e-mails provided by the city, at least one of which was supposedly prompted by a Chronicle inquiry. It is baffling that the newspaper somehow failed to get the memo.

Besides getting the basic facts wrong, the Chronicle’s stance fails to take into account how this might affect Corn Fest itself. Read the rest of this entry

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Council in the Twilight Zone

Author: yinn

Jul 13

Better late than never? Here are a few comments on the City of DeKalb meetings Monday night.

Group Therapy

When I switched on the Committee of the Whole meeting (admittedly not right at the beginning) there was an immediate feeling of disorientation. The mayor was complaining about a constituent taking up too much of his time. It came across as a group therapy situation, specifically some sort of assertiveness training session for our unhappy figurehead.

Within this context, Alderman Gallagher named a civicly-participating resident. If the result is a slander suit, I guess I’m a witness!

Corn Fest

Next for discussion was charging parking fees for Corn Fest. Here’s what the agenda says:

2) CONSIDERATION OF CORNFEST PARKING FEES.
The City of DeKalb has negotiated with the Big Brothers / Big Sisters of DeKalb to enter into an agreement to provide labor for the collection of funds at the CornFest summer festival at the DeKalb Taylor Municipal Airport. Per the direction of City Council, staff has been investigating ways to recoup some of the costs expended for the support of the CornFest event.

LAST year it was about recouping staff overtime for security and cleanup. THIS year, it’s about not getting into trouble with the FAA. Read the rest of this entry

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Declining Attendance at the Taste / Corn Fest

Author: Kay Shelton

Jul 9

I am not surprised that after high-profile news reports of mobs of thugs attacking people in downtown Chicago in broad daylight that the attendance at the Taste dropped. But, attendance was down in previous years as well. No matter what anyone says, unless there is a popular band at Corn Fest, its attendance dropped, too. Sun Times columnist Neil Steinberg wrote some hilarious yet probably good suggestions (if anyone had the guts to use them) on how to improve attendance at the Taste, most of which could be applied to Corn Fest:

http://www.suntimes.com/news/steinberg/6406989-452/city-doesnt-need-a-genius-to-fix-taste.html

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