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http://posttrib.suntimes.com/news/lake/28421317-418/funding-feud-heats-up-over-festival-of-the-lakes.html

Funding feud heats up over Festival of the Lakes

By Carrie Napoleon Post-Tribune correspondent July 1, 2014 10:22PM

Updated: July 2, 2014 2:02AM


Hammond Mayor Tom McDermott Jr. on Tuesday ended a 12-day truce with the South Shore Convention and Visitors Authority board and its president with a return to Facebook and a refusal to accept a $40,000 sponsorship approved by the board for the city’s Festival of the Lakes in July.

The $40,000 figure was a compromise by board members between the $30,000 budgeted by the SSCVA for the event and the $50,000 McDermott requested June 19 when he appeared before the board to apologize for attacks in the press and on social media concerning the move of the South Shore Air Show from the Lake Michigan shoreline in Gary to Fair Oaks Farms in Newton County.

At a special meeting Monday, the authority board debated for an hour how much to commit to the Hammond festival and whether McDermott’s apology was just a ploy for additional funding. Typically, the SSCVA commits $20,000 to the festival. In 2013, it gave $30,000.

The board members bristled at the $50,000 donation, and a motion to sponsor the Festival of the Lakes for $30,000 failed. Then a motion to sponsor the event for $40,000 was approved.

On Tuesday, McDermott posted an email from the authority’s president and chief executive, Speros Batistatos, to the members of the SSCVA board that informed them that McDermott had declined the $40,000 sponsorship.

“I share your collective sense of bewilderment and disappointment at the Mayor’s decision to spurn this board’s offer of $40,000. In my conversation with the Mayor, and as I have explained to each of you personally, I repeatedly asked the Mayor to reconsider this decision,” Batistatos wrote in the email.

McDermott also posted Tuesday to Facebook the terms of the truce between the SSCVA and Hammond, saying the SSCVA agreed to contribute $50,000 to Festival of the Lakes in exchange for Hammond officials remaining silent on the controversy over the authority moving the air show to Newton County and “spending $380,000 of Lake County taxpayer money outside of Lake County.” The mayor also agreed to stay out of any debate in the General Assembly concerning county council approval of the SSCVA budget.

McDermott on his Facebook page asks residents to advise him of how to respond now that the authority board did not approve a $50,000 contribution to the festival.

“Speros calls to say he can only get $40K of Hammond’s promise of $50K, a 20% reduction in the amount agreed upon. Of course, he still expects Hammond to remain silent on budget approval and his decision to move the air show,” McDermott wrote.

In the letter to his board, Batistatos said that in “my more than 25 years in public service I have never ... seen an elected official ask his Facebook followers to make policy decisions. ... I think this whole situation is amazingly distasteful and embarrassing.”

Sponsorship dollars for the Festival of the Lakes are due Thursday. The SSCVA has called an emergency session at 9 a.m. Wednesday to discuss its options, but indicated that no action will be taken.

McDermott could not be reached Tuesday for comment.

The SSCVA referred calls for comment to board chairman Vic DeMeyer, who said the SSCVA has nothing further to add at this time.

McDermott has noon deadline for SSCVA money

By Carrie Napoleon Post-Tribune correspondent July 2, 2014 10:44PM
Hammond Mayor Tom McDermott/Sun-Times Medifile photo

Hammond Mayor Tom McDermott/Sun-Times Media file photo

Updated: July 3, 2014 2:01AM


HAMMOND — The South Shore Convention and Visitors Authority board members say the offer to sponsor Festival of the Lakes for $40,000 is still on the table if the city can provide the authority information on what is included in the sponsorship package by Thursday’s deadline.

Vic DeMeyer, chairman of the South Shore Convention and Visitors Authority board, said board members in an emergency executive session Wednesday decided after a long and spirited discussion to leave Monday’s offer of a $40,000 sponsorship on the table despite the apparent rejection of that offer by Hammond Mayor Tom McDermott Jr.

“The board is unanimously in favor of supporting this event. Nothing has changed,” DeMeyer said.

DeMeyer said the SSCVA’s attorney is forwarding a letter to McDermott today seeking to confirm the mayor has rejected the sponsorship offer.

“We are waiting for the mayor’s response. We certainly hope he takes us up on it,” he said.

McDermott said he is upset Speros Batistatos, SSCVA president and CEO, was unable to deliver what the men agreed upon behind closed doors.

“I don’t know the status of the offer,” McDermott said Wednesday. “The terms of that deal weren’t honored… I shook hands with the man. What am I supposed to do if Speros can’t honor the terms?”

He had not yet received correspondence from the SSCVA’s attorney on the status of the sponsorship and said he was unaware of what the agency was offering in light of the broken pact.

“Is this a $40,000 sponsorship with strings attached or just plain sponsoring?” McDermott said.

He said he would gladly take a $40,000 sponsorship and offer the SSCVA all that would come with the sponsorship at that level if it is not contingent on the terms of the truce that he said is no longer valid.

“If they are going to require Mayor McDermott to not be able to speak his free mind, to lobby legislators in the General Assembly; if I take it and they expect me to shut up not tell you how I feel, I can’t do that,” McDermott said. “If they are able to throw around money to shut up public officials, I don’t appreciate that.”

The board convened in emergency executive session to discuss the apparent breakdown Tuesday of the deal brokered by DeMeyer and Batistatos in June with McDermott.

In exchange for increased financial support to Festival of the Lakes, McDermott apologized to the SSCVA board and agreed to stop disparaging its members and Batistatos in the press and social media over the move of the South Shore Air Show from the Lake Michigan shoreline in Gary to Fair Oaks Farms in Newton County. McDermott had also agreed to hold his tongue on state legislation seeking to bring the SSCVA’s budget under county council scrutiny.

McDermott returned to social media Tuesday after the SSCVA board Monday failed to approve $50,000 in sponsorship for the Hammond festival, instead opting to sponsor at $40,000. He laid blame for the breakdown of truce at the feet of Batistatos.

Even Jesse Jackson can take note of his tricks.