According to Minutes of the November 25, 2013 Adjourned Meeting of the Mt. Lebanon Commission, the Commission allocated $750,000 in municipal funds for the turf project, including $637,400 by action at the November 25, 2013 meeting. The remaining $112,600 will be considered in a separate motion at a future Commission meeting. In this month's issue of our municipal mtl Magazine, there is a three page article about field fundraising. The Public Information Office writes that the field sports organizations are to raise an additional $250,000 or 25% of the project. Volunteers are to contact Dave Franklin at his office, dfranklin@eckertseamans.com according to the municipal magazine article. But look who is doing the heavy lifting raising non-municipal funds.
As revealed in my January 24, 2014 Right To Know, the Sports Advisory Board (SAB) or field sports associations, isn't doing the lion's share of raising non-municipal funds. It is the Municipality! Gateway, our municipal engineer has donated $4,000 in 2013, with promises of more in 2014. Gateway is also doing the engineering on the project and any traffic studies required; however, a major portion of the dollars required will have to come elsewhere. What I discovered is a sweetheart deal with...drum roll please...Dick's Sporting Goods. Orchestrating what should be something entirely by the private sector are Mt. Lebanon Commissioners, the Director of Recreation, MTLSD Athletic Director, and the Municipal Engineer creating the pathway for the SAB and the Turf Project Task Force (TPTF).
Keep in mind that the RTK information requested was from November 1, 2013 to January 24, 2014.
Steve Silverman, elected but not yet sworn in as Commissioner, started communicating with Tony Lombardo, V.P. of Dick's Sporting Goods (DSG) on December 5, 2013. Steve indicates, "I am hopeful Dick's will help Mt. Lebanon with our new Turf Field."
On December 11, 2013, Steve followed up with Tony and brought Commissioner John Bendel, and Director of Recreation David Donnellan into the conversation. Steve suggested that Tony meets with the three of them.
A question arises as to what Dick's might do for the turf project and how Dick's would benefit is addressed in the December 19, 2013 email from David Donnellan to several SAB members, including Municipal Engineer Dan Deiseroth of Gateway, and MTLSD Athletic Director John Grogan. Click here --->THIS IS A VERY SIGNIFICANT EMAIL. <----- Is the School District aware of Grogan's involvement with this partnership? Does it conflict with Policy KGD Partnerships and Sponsorships? Why is Mr. Grogan involved with any fundraising project of this magnitude while MTLSD is trying to raise $6 million?
The December 20, 2013 emails indicated that Chip Dalesandro, representing Football, didn't like the deal. Donnellan thanked Silverman for reassuring Chip that no such commitment had been made. [Yet.] Silverman, using his mtlebanon.org address, is now aware and involved.
Donnellan copies Commissioner John Bendel on his December 19, 2013 message about Dick's, so Bendel is involved.
Mr. Lombardo indicated on December 20, 2013 his looking forward "to helping in any way.." and a meeting with his V.P. of Community Marketing on January 6, 2014 in a reply to a Donnellan message of December 19, 2013.
The holidays slowed things down for a while until we find that another Dick's executive, Jim Famularo is contacted by Commissioner Silverman, and cc's Bendel and Donnellan about a meeting scheduled for January 30th when all will be present.
January 17th and 18th emails describe meetings and the very revealing Tim White message of January 18 at 9:48 AM sent to John Bendel, which states that "While they (Dick's) can stroke a check for a huge position on this, my understanding was they wanted some type of access to our constituency (defined as sports groups grant them access to email lists) and they want a contract for blanket procurement for sports products" found here. The "blanket procurement for sports products is still on after all. Bendel and Silverman are parties to this as well.
So here we have it. The Municipality is doing the major "private fundraising" and a Municipal part time employee, Katherine Heart, doing fundraising for the "private" funding as well, as I revealed in Big enough for its own post UPDATED. Why isn't the Municipality working toward raising its balance of $112,600?
This stinks. It has been kept entirely out of the public knowledge.
Meanwhile, this appeared in Pittsburgh Business Times on March 7, 2014. Dick's Sporting Goods launches campaign to fund youth sports "Every year we’re seeing more and more cutbacks in sports,” said Gruden in a prepared statement. “Budgets are being decreased, coaches are being eliminated, and fewer players are going out for youth sports. We have to do something about it!”