Finances look positive in Heritage Park audit
Auditor reports a huge turnaround over previous years
Results of the independent audit, conducted earlier this year, were presented during the park foundation's board meeting but were not released to the press.
However, Bob Lake of Lake & Associates, which conducted the audit, said he has seen a huge turnaround in the park's financial statements — documents he was nervous about seeing in years past.
"As an audit, obviously for us, the statements this year are fast improving over the statements last year," he said. "Issuing an audit this year is certainly a much easier case."
In February 2006, the park received a one-time grant of $2 million from the state Legislature to keep it afloat after mounting debt had nearly forced the park to close its doors. The foundation that runs the park was then revamped.
This year, the park is seeing 298 percent more guests than last year and has been operating in the black since November.
Heritage Park drew criticism in March when its board recommended leasing 12 acres at the east corner of the park to the University of Utah's research park. The lease would have brought in $400,000 a year in much-needed revenue for the park.
The park already receives $700,000 or $800,000 in annual state funding and got $50,000 this year from the county's Zoo, Arts and Parks (ZAP) fund.
Eric Jergensen and Jill Remington-Love, members of the Salt Lake City Council, have recently toured the park, said Matt Dahl, the park's executive director.
The living history site needs $400,000 for capital projects. Ideas to generate those dollars have been to use transient-room tax dollars, city or county open space funds or money from either entity's ongoing budgets, he said.
"Whatever we don't get from the city (or county), we'll go to the Legislature," said the park's foundation board chairman Ellis Ivory. Ivory is also chairman of the Deseret Morning News board of directors.
Ivory said the foundation could meet with legislative leadership and ask for an increase in the park's annual state appropriation. Utah Jazz owner Larry Miller, who earlier this year criticized the land lease, has been lobbying the Legislature on the park's behalf, Ivory said.
The Legislature is starting its own audit of the park, done at the prompting of Rep. Ralph Becker, D-Salt Lake, who is a Salt Lake City mayoral candidate. It will be presented during the 2008 legislative session. Becker told the Deseret Morning News in May that he'd like to see a plan that keeps the park financially stable for a long period of time.
E-mail: astowell@desnews.com
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