New Management Structure sought for Belleayre

Amid all kinds of rumors in December concerning Belleayre's management, comes this development. If Belleayre were to be managed by a separate authority, it would have to be managed the way that Whiteface and Gore are managed, by ORDA:

New management structure being sought for Belleayre

By Adam Bosch
Times Herald-Record
Published: 2:00 AM - 12/31/10
HIGHMOUNT — A new management structure could insulate Belleayre Mountain from the volatile state budget.

That's according to lawmakers, regional policy groups and ski advocates who've talked about creating an authority to oversee the state-owned ski center.

This comes as some 45 workers are due to be laid off Friday at Belleayre. The layoffs are part of 140 job cuts at the state Department of Environmental Conservation and some 900 across all state agencies.

Belleayre supporters will protest the layoffs Friday at noon, near the entrance to the center.

State Sen. John Bonacic, R-C-Mount Hope, said he will ask incoming Gov. Andrew Cuomo to undo the Belleayre layoffs. If that doesn't work, he'll introduce a bill to create an authority to manage the center.

"This is our fall-back position if we can't reverse what (Gov. David) Paterson has done," Bonacic said, referring to the layoffs. "I think the people at Belleayre and their supporters would want to go to an authority.

Full RecordOnline.com story.

What a bunch of crap. Belle doesn't lose money.

First, I'm all for State cut backs. People need to realize tough times are coming. That means massive reductions in services and large tax increases, Federal, State and local. Yep. I said it.

Vitually all the States are massively in debt. Some are facing default. Local governments are not much better. All government bodies face huge entitlement costs that are skyrocketing and not likely to go away.

The Federal government is so massively in debt it boogles the mind. Only our prestige and the dollar's position as the only world currency is keeping us afloat. That won't last for long.

Furthermore, the price of gas will climb substantially. This hits America very hard as we are more dependent on cars than some other nations. $4-$5+ per gallon is not out of the range of possibilties. This raises the prices of EVERYTHING!, ALL consumer goods, food, clothing, electronics, etc, along with ALL government bodies costs (tax increases) and things like education, daycare, utilities....EVERYTHING.

There is not one expense in your life that will not rise sustantially as gas prices go up. It's insidious. It's an across the board cost increase you cannot avoid, you cannot escape it. Nobody can. When gas goes way up, our economy will take a very hard body blow.

Having said that, Belleayre almost certainly generates a profit. As such it should remain open and generating jobs. The knuckle heads who wanna close it are using cost figures that reflect Belle's profits being pilfered for the State's general fund, graft, etc. But they don't wanna admit that. For PR reasons, they don't wanna leave Belle open while they close other State Parks. As such, they may close Belle even though it makes money. That's stupid!

Any State facility that generates a profit should remain open!  I'm sick of people saying these facilities are money losers, not because I ski, but because it's not true.

Private ski areas have to pay many huge expenses that the State's ski mtns DO NOT HAVE TO PAY, and yet private ski areas make money. The State areas DO NOT pay any Federal or State income tax, no sales tax, no local real estate taxes, no mortgage payment, no improvement costs, no insurance costs. Any single one of these represents huge savings. Combined, that equals large profit. They also get large discounts on their purchases.

How then, can the State's ski areas lose money when they have these huge cost savings and they charge their customers as much as the private areas?

I don't wanna see other State parks closed. But the cold reality is there's no money. We Americans are going to have to accept the fact that big changes are coming like it or not.

YouTube Video from Friday's protest:

Who is this Joe Kelly? Has he been interviewed by HR? I wanna contact some of these people.

We need to keep the things I wrote above in mind. Gore and Whiteface may well be the next targets. The public perceives skiing as a rich man's sport and will call for the State to get out of the sli business when there's no money for schools, police, roads, medicare/medicaid. Never forget.....
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"Private ski areas have to pay many huge expenses that the State's ski mtns DO NOT HAVE TO PAY, and yet private ski areas make money. The State areas DO NOT pay any Federal or State income tax, no sales tax, no local real estate taxes, no mortgage payment, no improvement costs, no insurance costs. Any single one of these represents huge savings. Combined, that equals large profit. They also get large discounts on their purchases.

How then, can the State's ski areas lose money when they have these huge cost savings and they charge their customers as much as the private areas? "
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This is the crux of the debate, and is not what the protesters are focusing on.  This ^^^ is the horn they should be blowing. This is the trump card they should be playing.

It's real simple. These areas make money!!!! Ergo, keep them open to earn money and create jobs.

I'm not for Belle's layoffs, but in being in the IT industry just about every gov't agency I've ever dealt with is a joke. The appointed heads most of the time have no business running the departments. They have 3-4 people to to the same job that 1 in the private sector does. Most of the time the departments are commited to some statewide contract for preferred vendors that rape the shit out of them. We  recently did some work for the state due to someone being able to get the work out to bid. All the bids outside the state contract were a 1/3 of what they were intially going to pay. This was after some work was already done and they realized they paid 80,000 for something that should cost 20,000. We did install for local gov't with them supplying the equipment that was 3 year old technology they purchased 3 yrs prior and was in storage for that time. Then they made the department purchase the exact same equipment to replenish the storage.The shit was outdated when we installed it . What a frigin joke!

NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- Itemize your tax deductions? Itching for a refund? You're going to have to wait.
The IRS said that it needs until mid- to late-February to reprogram its processing systems because Congress acted so late this year cleaning up the tax code. The bill, which includes deductions for state and local sales taxes, college tuition and teacher expenses, wasn't signed into law until Dec. 17.


toss them all out of office and start over

Bravo! Bravo! Outstanding.
Thanks Skimore. Are you refering to NY?

People frequently don't believe it when they are told these things. They refuse to accept that millions, nay billions are wasted/stolen.

Flat out corruption is one of our major problems. Perhaps the lack of money will diminish this. Let's hope.

A year or so ago, NY passed a law that requires it's many agencies/authorities to open their books to outside audits. Prior there was no such requirement.  The NY Thruway Authority has refused to co-operate! Can you imagine? Billions upon billions pass thru their coffers. Now, one must ask themselves.....why would a public Authority refuse to co-operate and follow the disclosure law?

I know that answer. Hope others learn it too.

I believe I recently read that Off Track Betting (OTB) went (or is going) bankrupt.  If NY can't make money taking bets then that explains the mess the state is in.

tom

That's another example of the outright BS that happens here. You are refering to NYC Off Track Betting operations for horse racing, though there's OTBs statewide. Each year, they and the horse race people, NYRA, shake down the taxpayers for millions, sometimes hundreds of millions, or else they'll go " bankrupt ".

Just like the many private ski areas that make money without State aid, there's many examples of private gambling operations who make hundreds of millions each year, yet State gambling and ski areas claim they need taxpayer dollars to stay afloat. It's crap.

Gee, the Indian casinos make friggin mega bucks and there's dozens of private ski mtns in the area turning a good profit, why can't NY State gambling and ski operations survive on their own? They should be/are rolling in the dough.

Those NY gambling ops get hundreds of millions from the State Goverment and they still cry poverty each year. All that money PlUS the huge amount people spend gambling there........

Instead of closing the doors on all these NY OTB's I bet if they let it go to the private  it would have survived.  There would have been people in line to step up and take over one of them. I actually wonder if they lost money. It's hard to believe with a set rake from the monies wagered. More likely the politicians buddies with exorbitant salaries running these places and their hands in the coffer

Snowballs wrote

Who is this Joe Kelly? Has he been interviewed by HR?

Jamesdeluxe's most recent interview with Joe Kelly was back on Oct 1, 2010.

Thanks Harv. I thought his name sounded familiar. I'm gonna contact these people.

Skimore, did the NYC OTB actually close....no bail out?

I whole heartedly agree with your appraisal of the situation but would add a very likely key player - His name is M O B. They're a good reason for common people like myself not to raise to much hell with the situation. Understandably, I try not to ruffle their feathers.

ALBANY - The New York City Off-Track Betting Corp. began shutting down wagering parlors and stopped taking bets over the telephone and Internet last night after a bailout failed in the State Senate.

Lawrence Schwartz, OTB chairman and a top aide to Gov. David A. Paterson, said he expected all operations to cease by midnight. He predicted the closure of harness tracks across the state and possibly no horse racing at Belmont Park next spring without NYC OTB, which took in $840 million in bets last year.

More than 1,000 OTB employees were expected to be out of work.

"We are out of cash," Schwartz said. "We are out of business today because the Senate didn't act."

The bailout needed 32 votes to pass but garnered only 29: all Democrats and two Republicans. There were 21 "no" votes - all Republicans.

Bill passage was made more difficult because six of the 60 senators didn't vote and another four were absent all day.

Minority Leader Dean Skelos (R-Rockville Centre) urged Schwartz to reconsider the shutdown. "Rather than focus on closing down OTB and putting people out of work, Larry Schwartz should keep open negotiations with all parties involved to get a positive result," Skelos said.

Last week, the Assembly narrowly adopted the bailout measure, which frees NYC OTB from making payments to tracks and from certain wage benefits for employees. The telephone and Internet betting operations would be transferred to the tracks and the New York Racing Association.

The Nassau and Suffolk OTBs, along with others, lobbied for similar help, citing financial woes tied to less interest in racing. They backed a bill put forward by Sen. Andrew Lanza (R-Staten Island).

Referring to the Lanza bill, Sen. John Flanagan (R-East Northport) said, "This should be done on the merits or we will be back here again with New York City OTB, Nassau OTB and the others that are having problems."

NYC OTB, which is state-owned, filed for bankruptcy last December. It has lurched from one crisis to another for years, with at least three threatened shutdowns averted at the last minute.

Sen. Kenneth LaValle (R-Port Jefferson) said he couldn't back legislation that aids just NYC OTB. "Suffolk County OTB is in trouble and they are not being represented," he said.

Of Long Island's nine senators, only Craig Johnson of Port Washington and Brian X. Foley of Blue Point, both Democrats, voted "yes." Foley said, "This is about jobs, this does have a statewide impact."

The shutdown of NYC OTB will likely add to this year's $315-million state budget deficit. Schwartz said it would cost "millions of dollars" to shutter the parlors and lay off employees. He also said the state would be responsible for $100 million owed to creditors and $504 million in pension and health benefits for OTB workers.

Wow. What a cluster fudge. Hope they stay closed. All those different OTBs needing large bailouts......

Thanks again Skimore.