$30,000 for Taking it to Street

Understand City has committed $30,000 to promote private music events hosted by Murphy's Landing.
Taxpayers dollars being spent to benefit one for profit business.
How is this justified?

Ok Mr. Adkins, enough is enough.

Given the fact that the city practice of taxpayer dollar usage is to buy downtown properties, try to sell them.....fail to sell them and eventually give them away for a fraction of the purchase price, coupled with developmental loans to people like Robinette and Grau just to see them back out of the agreed upon contract for final development in exchange for a city money give-away.......and now, if this information by Middletown29 is accurate, the city is using taxpayer money to foot the bill for pay for private sector entertainment for their pals at Murphy's Landing? If Murphy's Landing wants to bolster their business by using entertainment as a draw, let them finance the idea, not the taxpayers. The public sector city needs to stop financing the private sector business operations.

That is quite enough focus and concentration on your downtown dream sir. There are many in this town who pay taxes that do not want their money going to the black hole known as your downtown area. It has been a huge waste of money so far, yielding an end result that is not even close to the money outlay. C'mon city leaders. Please stop the money spending on the downtown and start dispersing it elsewhere. Contrary to popular belief, the downtown is not the save all/end all to being the remedy for solving the city's problems. The money distribution in this city is not even close to being efficient nor directed in the right manner as to real priorities needed. Why is this happening Mr. Adkins?

Not sure where money comes from. Even if it is CVB? can they spend tax dollars to promote an event that profits a single downtown business?
If funds are from CVB and Moorman is involved wouldn't that be some kind of conflict? How do you find out who is involved with CVB?

Does it matter if City Council approves if they provide funds and appoint board?
Are they permitted to advertise for a for profit business activity?
Does anyone review CVB expenditures?

Middletown29 wrote: Does it matter if City Council approves if they provide funds and appoint board? Are they permitted to advertise for a for profit business activity? Does anyone review CVB expenditures?

I know that both Moormans worked very hard on this project last year, and have worked very hard for the former downtown area. I attended a few of these events and also found the crowd lacking on most evenings. Murphys, Canal House and at the Square seem to be the financial beneficiaries. The wine shop should also get a kick this year. Nothing else is ever open. The coffee shop and other daytime businesses seem to suffer from traffic being blocked off by early afternoon. Maybe once a weekend or every other weekend?

Hello,

The City Manager gave an update on the CVB at last night's meeting.  

Middletown29 wrote: Understand City has committed $30,000 to promote private music events hosted by Murphy's Landing. Taxpayers dollars being spent to benefit one for profit business. How is this justified?

Years ago, before they filled in Sunset Pool, the city claimed they did not have the approximate $30,000 funds to keep the pool operation afloat each year and they could not find a private source to keep it running.

Now, we read where they are prepared to lend a similar amount for music entertainment to benefit some downtown businesses.

Now that we know this, one could conclude that the pool was doomed at the time because the pool just happened to be out of the realm of interest, IE......the downtown.

One could also conclude that there is now a distinct possibility that the money will come for the music event BECAUSE THE EFFORT WILL BENEFIT THEIR DOWNTOWN. Would the city release money to benefit any other part of the city? Evidence points to a doubtful answer.

If this is factual, we can also see yet another effort to use taxpayer money for their downtown dreams and another example of them refusing to ask the taxpayer if they want their money spent on this downtown dream. They have no right to take everyone's money and spend it on the few who support the downtown, especially since they are bound and determined to ignore the other 90% of this city as to money allocation. I don't care how much embellished fluff the Journal puts on all the glitter stories coming out of downtown, the effort is only for the appeasement of a small percentage of this community and the downtown is not this grandiose venture they pretend it to be. They are simply not in tune with reality down there. I would imagine most of us could care less about what they want and don't want our money spent in this fashion.

VietVet wrote: Middletown29 wrote: Understand City has committed $30,000 to promote private music events hosted by Murphy's Landing. Taxpayers dollars being spent to benefit one for profit business. How is this justified? Years ago, before they filled in Sunset Pool, the city claimed they did not have the approximate $30,000 funds to keep the pool operation afloat each year and they could not find a private source to keep it running. Now, we read where they are prepared to lend a similar amount for music entertainment to benefit some downtown businesses. Now that we know this, one could conclude that the pool was doomed at the time because the pool just happened to be out of the realm of interest, IE......the downtown. One could also conclude that there is now a distinct possibility that the money will come for the music event BECAUSE THE EFFORT WILL BENEFIT THEIR DOWNTOWN. Would the city release money to benefit any other part of the city? Evidence points to a doubtful answer. If this is factual, we can also see yet another effort to use taxpayer money for their downtown dreams and another example of them refusing to ask the taxpayer if they want their money spent on this downtown dream. They have no right to take everyone's money and spend it on the few who support the downtown, especially since they are bound and determined to ignore the other 90% of this city as to money allocation. I don't care how much embellished fluff the Journal puts on all the glitter stories coming out of downtown, the effort is only for the appeasement of a small percentage of this community and the downtown is not this grandiose venture they pretend it to be. They are simply not in tune with reality down there. I would imagine most of us could care less about what they want and don't want our money spent in this fashion.

Our maze of bureaucracy in Middletown is increasingly under Adkins' control. Could the reason behind the sudden, complete change of CVB members be due to some disagreement with Doug's wishes? Will the new members be more compliant because he hand picked them? Doug uses the several boards under his control or influence to front HIS objections or HIS ideas.   For instance, none of the boards actually have any authority to make decisions for against any issues before the council, only council should be doing that! But didn,t Adkins say in the council meeting that the Historical Society would have to approve of the O'Reilly business before it would be considered? And/but is that location even part of a historical district?

Oh, Spider
You ain't seen nothing yet.
Downtown Middletown Inc. was established so Middletown could become a member of the Ohio Main Street Program which is part of  the National Trust for Historic Preservation.
That now means that the Middletown Historical Society has power over every property in the downtown area from the river to the tracks.

Thank you for the correction..yes it should be the Middletown Historic Commission. 
Can't wait to see their demands for the upgrades on the Hope House.
Power is a wonderful thing when you can use other peoples money...