nothin Tourney, Parades Stiff City On Overtime | New Haven Independent

Tourney, Parades Stiff City On Overtime

Mendel Haston Photo

Long stretch: Tennis hasn’t paid police OT bill for 15 years.

Brian Slattery Photo

St. Patrick’s Day Parade: Owes more than 320K.

Three major annual city events owe a combined almost $700,000 for police services provided over the last four years. Alders want organizers to pay up.

But first the city might have to overhaul a system that allows past due bills to fall through the cracks.

Alders learned Tuesday night from Deputy Chief Administrator Officer (CAO) Maggie Targrove that the city lacks an adequate process for recouping the money that it is owed from event organizers and has no centralized billing system for that purpose.

Targrove made the report at a workshop at City Hall of the Board of Alders Public Safety Committee. 

Chief Administrator’s Office

Police overtime costs for the Freddy Fixer, St. Patrick’s Day parade and the tennis tournament.

Multiple departments have a piece of the permitting process but no one department is responsible for collecting the money that organizers must pay beyond permit fees to cover the costs of overtime associated with their event, she said. And if organizers fail to pay, the city absorbs the costs.

The current process is really convoluted,” Targrove said.

Public Safety Committee Chair Antunes: Organizers should pay their bills.

Quinnipiac Meadows Alder Gerald Antunes, chair of the Public Safety Committee, said he requested the workshop after discovering that the city has hosted several events during fiscal 2017 – 2018, providing nearly $700,000 in services, but has collected only about 12 percent in reimbursements.

He said that can no longer fly in a city that just raised its taxes by 11 percent and is still facing a $14 million deficit for the fiscal year just completed, in part because overtime costs in the police and fire departments continue to bust the budget. The city faces an estimated $30 million long-term structural deficit moving forward, and is looking for ways to cut it.

Center-Court Deadbeats

Mendel Haston Photo

Ukrainian Elina Svitolina at the tennis tourney.

Alders were particularly dismayed to learn that three major annual events — the Freddy Fixer Parade, the St. Patrick’s Day Parade and the Connecticut Open tennis tournament — owe the city $693,941 just for police overtime for the last four years. Combined, two of the three events have reimbursed the city only $78,237. The Connecticut Open hasn’t paid anything at all.

The city doubled its contribution to the tournament in the last fiscal year from $100,000 to $200,000. The new budget provides the tournament’s standard $100,000 contribution from the city.

But the tournament hasn’t paid anything in the way of a reimbursement in the last four years for police overtime, according to the CAO’s office. In fact, the tournament has not paid anything for the last 15 years since an agreement between the city and the tournament about those costs expired in 2003. The tournament hasn’t paid anything toward city overtime costs even when the city offered organizers a discount.

Based on the expiration of the Sponsorship Agreement [from 1999] and [the] City’s current financial situation that has placed severe constraints on Police and Fire overtime budgets, I’m writing to inform you that we are not able to continue to cover the cost of Police and Fire extra duty coverage for the tournament,” then-Acting CAO Jennifer Pugh wrote in an Aug. 24, 2004 letter to tournament Director Anne Worcester. Because this is late notice for the current year, the City is willing in 2004 to split the costs of extra duty police and fire coverage with Pilot Pen on a 50%/50% basis. However, you should plan to budget for 100 percent of these costs for the 2005 tournament.”

Markeshia Ricks Photo

Targrove and Carter: City doesn’t have a track record of collecting.

Current CAO Mike Carter wrote a similar letter to Worcester last October noting that overtime costs for the weeklong event have continued to rise above $78,000 a year, the bulk of which is about $52,903 in police overtime. He offered a steep 80 percent discount, which would have reduced the bill to about $15,615.

You should plan to budget 100 percent of these overtime costs for the August 2018 tournament,” Carter further wrote in the letter. But the tournament didn’t pay and is currently in the hole with the city for $180,945. The 2018 tournament starts Aug. 18.

Worcester was not at Tuesday’s meeting, neither were the organizers for the Freddy Fixer and the St. Patrick’s Day parades. She could not be reached Tuesday night.

Wingate: Uncomfortable with 50 percent deposit.

Some of the ideas that arose during the workshop included requiring organizers to put down a deposit as part of the permitting process, though at least one committee member, Beaver Hills Alder Brian Wingate, had some heartburn over the suggestion that it be 50 percent of the estimated overtime costs. Hill Alder David Reyes suggested that if not 50 percent, at least 25 percent might be a good number. It doesn’t solve, however, the problem of recouping the remaining 75 percent, he pointed out.

Hargrove noted that the city needs to work out its definition of what constitutes a city” event, and what that means in the way of providing and being reimbursed for services. She advocated for a central electronic permitting system that would be easier for people to navigate. There was discussion of possibly denying future permits until organizers paid their outstanding balances, which gave CAO Carter some pause.

Carter suggested that, at least for the three biggest events, New Haven receives positive economic benefit. An analysis of that benefit should be conducted before policies that could effectively prevent the events from happening are put in place, he argued.

Carter said a better strategy for the city might be to create a special events overtime line item in particular department budgets so they can plan ahead. Right now, overtime for special events comes out of the overall overtime budget for each department.

Rebecca Bombero, city parks director, said she has been able to plan for overtime in her budget for annual events like Rock to Rock, Hoop It Up, the Easter egg hunt, and the holiday tree lighting. She said it gets trickier for events that come up every once and a while, or in the middle of the year.

Upon the suggestion of Alder Reyes, the committee agreed to create a formal working group to delve further into the problem and come up with recommendations before the events in question circle back again.

We don’t want any of these events to stop, but these organizers have to understand that there is an expense to this,” Antunes said. The days of getting so much for free are gone by the wayside. We can’t afford it anymore.”

Click here to read other stories about the city’s structural deficit.

Hey, Buddy, Can You Spare $30 Million?
Mayor Open To Idea Of Fewer Top Cops
City Ends Policy As It Begins To Pay Off

Tags:

Sign up for our morning newsletter

Don't want to miss a single Independent article? Sign up for our daily email newsletter! Click here for more info.


Post a Comment

Commenting has closed for this entry

Comments

Avatar for WereUthere?

Avatar for 1644

Avatar for PanicNewHaven

Avatar for cttaxpayer

Avatar for Chowdha

Avatar for One City Dump

Avatar for Seth Poole

Avatar for hartman

Avatar for 1644

Avatar for Statestreeter

Avatar for 1644

Avatar for Wowinnewhaven

Avatar for Bill Saunders

Avatar for EarlyBird

Avatar for JCFremont

Avatar for FedUp

Avatar for Clarification

Avatar for observer1

Avatar for JCFremont

Avatar for omgreally1977

Avatar for Bill Saunders

Avatar for OverTheRiverThruTheHood