PORT ANGELES — The Port Angeles Downtown Association’s uncertain future will be discussed at the group’s board meeting Monday in the wake of the announcement of Executive Director Barb Frederick’s impending Dec. 19 layoff.
The meeting will be at 6:15 p.m. at the downtown association’s office at 208 N. Laurel St., outgoing board President Bob Lumens said Friday.
“We’re going to talk about what will be required to go on,” Lumens said.
Frederick, the downtown association’s only employee, will be laid off because the organization does not have enough money to pay her approximately $46,000 salary, said Lumens, who announced the move to the group’s approximately 150 members in an email Thursday signed by the board.
Frederick commented on her departure Friday in an email to the Peninsula Daily News that she said would be her only response to her layoff.
“I was not at all surprised by the board’s action, I knew that they would not be able to afford to keep me for much longer,” Frederick said.
“I have no immediate plans but I’m excited at the prospects of what lies ahead,” she added.
“I look forward to finding something with little stress, no politics and not on the front page of the paper.”
Lumens on Friday could not guarantee the continued existence of PADA, which administers the state Main Street program.
“It depends on what everyone wants to do and fundraising and stuff like that,” Lumens said.
The state Main Street program requires participating groups to have an executive director.
Lumens said topics at Monday’s meeting will includes steps the association might take to replace Frederick, who was on a month-to-month contract.
After Dec. 19, the association’s Laurel Street office will be closed indefinitely.
“The board will do its best to make sure the operations of the association run smoothly,” Lumens said in the Thursday email.
New board
The PADA board for 2015 is being elected through a balloting process that ends Tuesday.
The newly elected board will take office Jan. 12. It then will choose officers.
“There won’t be any major decisions until the board is in place,” Lumens said Friday.
PADA funds include money that passes through the city as taxes based on the square footage of downtown businesses that are in the Parking and Business Improvement Area (PBIA).
PADA received its last PBIA funding in July after city officials said the organization had breached its contract with the city by performing poorly in areas such as parking lot maintenance.
City officials’ displeasure surfaced at a City Council meeting Nov. 18.
During a presentation by Frederick on PADA’s third-quarter performance, council members sharply criticized the group over failing to meet the needs of the downtown business community.
Frederick could not explain, for example, why the association was not more aggressively urging businesses to participate in the Main Street program’s business-and-occupation (B&O) tax incentive program.
The council members, Lumens said Friday, “had their own agenda.”
The B&O program allows entrepreneurs to devote a percentage of their B&O taxes to the Main Street program administered by PADA.
The PADA program was eligible for $133,000 in B&O proceeds in 2014 and had pledges of $7,000 with six weeks remaining in the year.
“We got a late start this year,” Frederick told council members.
Lumens said Friday that newspaper accounts that focused on PADA “poisoned the well” for attracting participants to the B&O program.
“Who would give money to an organization all mixed up in an ugly snake pit?” Lumens said.
“I think everyone’s gotten what they wanted in the first place, to see the end of the downtown association.”
At the Nov. 18 meeting, the City Council agreed to give only $5,000 to PADA for downtown Christmas lighting the association had already put up.
PADA is due to give a report on its fourth-quarter performance to the City Council early next year.
PBIA funding
In 2014, the PBIA generated about $62,000 for the downtown association and received $34,000 before funding was suspended.
The city currently is holding $35,000 to $45,000 in PBIA money in reserve that can be used solely for PBIA purposes, city Chief Financial Officer Byron Olson said Friday.
“It’s held in reserve until whenever a final decision is made as to what direction is going to happen with the PADA,” Olson said.
The statewide Main Street program “helps communities develop their own strategies to stimulate long-term economic growth and pride in the heart of the community — downtown,” according to the state-sponsored website http://tinyurl.com/PDN-Mainstreet, which also describes in detail the tax-credit option for businesses.
Sarah Hansen, state Main Street program coordinator, said Friday that cities the size of Port Angeles that participate in the program are required to have full-time executive directors who fulfill certain responsibilities and expectations.
“If a new organization were to come in, they would have to reapply” for participation in the program, Hansen said.
“I know they’ve been struggling for a while and there’s been a lot of conflict.”
The Port Angeles Downtown Association is limited by its status as a federal non-charity 501(c)(6) nonprofit organization rather than a 501(c)(3) charity, Hansen said.
She said that means downtown businesses who participate in the B&O program cannot claim their B&O Main Street contributions as a federal tax deduction.
“They needed to be a (c)(6) because of the PBIA,” Hansen said.
The 501(c)(3) status is “an added incentive that most other organization have that they don’t have,” she said.
“Their funding structure is unique among Main Streets in Washington.”
________
Senior Staff Writer Paul Gottlieb can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 5060, or at pgottlieb@peninsuladailynews.com.
