Did The Obama Campaign Event Last March Deplete the Alerus’s “Concert Fund?”
I want to start off by saying that this is speculation. On the other hand when the Alerus Commission and City Leaders aren’t giving us the complete picture you have to wonder why. When the Grand Forks Herald shows NO interest in telling the public what’s really going on at the Alerus you have to try to figure things out on your own.
(Incidentally Say Anything’s Grand Forks readership has doubled since I started this series. How’s the Herald doing?)
The biggest reason why operating losses at the Alerus skyrocketed this year was because of losses in the “concert fund.” Of course that’s a fraud cooked up to cover up losses they incur from concerts.
The “concert fund” started with a balance of $250,000 it ended with a negative balance of $469,107.67. That’s a loss of $719,000. (Curiously the Ad the Alerus Commission ran claimed they only lost $631,000. I guess it’s hard to keep track when you run two sets of books.)
Now the Alerus Commission did give some information regarding SOME of those losses. In the Feb 26th Herald they said they lost $262,000 on the Neil Diamond concert in October. They also said that they paid out $125,000 to a promoter for a debt from 2003? Finally they said they lost some money on some of the other smaller concerts.
In the Adventure of Silver Blaze, Sherlock Holmes solved a case not because of evidence that was there, but because of evidence that was missing. So why is the Alerus manager so forthcoming about how much they lost on Neil Diamond. Not only did he give exact figures on what they took in and what it cost the Alerus, he also blamed the shortfall on the nationwide economy.
Why make such a big deal out of the Neil Diamond concert which accounted for only a third of your losses? Is it because they spent the money on an event that wasn’t a concert?
That got me to thinking. What was the biggest event at the Alerus this last year? Well obviously it was the state Democrat convention when Barrack Obama and Hillary Clinton came to court North Dakota’s primary vote. Consider that you have a group managing the Alerus that shouldn’t be managing a fireworks stand. Consider that the people overseeing the Alerus have so much Fargo envy they would do anything to get one up on our neighbors to the south. Consider that these politicians are notorious for sticking their bills onto cities that host their events (Does Obama still owe millions to the city of Chicago for the election night party?)
It’s very easy to believe that that bunch let the spending get over their head and lost a BUNCH of money hosting a political event. Of course that would be far from acceptable which would explain why they tried to cover it up. It would explain why we are getting incomplete information. It would explain why we didn’t hear about these losses UNTIL I broke the story.
The citizens of Grand Forks deserve to see audited financial statements of where our money is going. We need to be demanding to see this information.
I had another thought that started with pondering about the money the Alerus paid to the concert promoter for an event in 2003. Now the Alerus staff (and commission) would have to have authority to manage the Alerus businesses interests. That is they can incur expenses to running the center and pay for them. Part of their business involves risks so I can understand how they might book a concert and lose some money on it. That’s what the concert fund was for.
On the other hand they have NO authority whatsoever to expend city funds. So how did they run a deficit in the concert fund. They must have gotten a transfer from a city fund. But when the city employees transfer money to an Alerus account that’s an expenditure that can only be authorized by the city council.
The city council and mayor have been saying they had no idea that this money was transferred.
Isn’t it a crime to spend unauthorized city money? It must be. Why is no one getting fired? Why isn’t the States Attorney looking into this? If Sandy Blunt can be convicted of a felony charge for some creative perks that went to his employees at WSI why is this overlooked?
And that brings me back to the $125,000 paid back to the concert promoter for a dispute from 2003. I don’t think there is any expectation that Alerus operations were going to pay for that expense. They had to know it was going to come out of a city owned fund. So that also was the Alerus Commission expending City money apparently without the City Council approving it. How can that be legal?
The time for secrecy at the Alerus is over. This is a city owned property and we have every right to get a complete and honest financial picture of what’s going on.
