Your views - Fiscal responsibility needed

To the editor,

I am writing this letter, not because I am opposed to the idea of an Aquatic Center, but because I am concerned that we are "diving into" this proposal without being fiscally responsible about it. I am very concerned that the City of Fort Scott is promoting the passage of this measure, without knowing the answers to some very important questions. I attended the Aquatic Center question and answer session held at the Buck Run Community Center on 05-10-07 and was not satisfied with the answers to many of the questions.

The major areas of concern are with the projected Revenues and Expenses and the inability of Larkin Aquatics to be able to provide "real world" "apples to apples" examples to back these numbers up. I am concerned about the projected revenues, and in particular with the outdoor facility. The current revenues of our pool are $17,512.00 (according to the link on the City of Fort Scott Web site). The projections of the new outdoor portion of the proposed facility are $187,589.00 (over a ten-fold increase). I personally asked Aqua Vision Committee member Dave Martin about how they explained this massive increase in revenues at the session, and he explained that projected increased patronage was the basis of those numbers. While I do agree that a $6.5 million facility would see some increased patronage, I am not confident that we are going to see an increase that would result in a ten-fold increase in revenues. Moreover, I am concerned that even if this type of increase in patronage is possible, the projected capacity limits of the center would prove this increase impossible.

With respect to expenses, I personally asked a Larkin Aquatics employee if he could provide an example of a facility, similar to the one proposed, so that the projected utilities costs could be compared. He was unable to provide such example.

Instead, he advised that they were basing the projections on their experience with many other facilities they have been involved in. I would certainly hope that if they have done that many facilities, they could provide a better example than lumping every project together to obtain their data. If Larkin is not able to provide such examples, maybe another firm should have been considered to do the study. If there are "real world, apples-to-apples" answers to these questions, I am hopeful that the city, Larkin Aquatics, and/or the committee could provide them to the public prior to the June 5th special election, so that the voters can make an informed decision about this measure.

Shawn Daugherty Fort Scott