Was the Development Authority able to legally manage a tennis center and amphitheater according to state law from 1993 to 2003?

Was the Development Authority able to legally borrow funds for operating expenses for the tennis center according to state law?

Were the loans obtained in a legal, public and non-conflicted manner?

Those are the questions you are most likely not going to hear from the Peachtree City mayor and Council at Wednesday’s special meeting about the Development Authority’s loss of reputation caused by actual violations of state law to the tune of almost $1 million. Wednesday’s meeting is about sweeping unlawful activity under the rug at the city’s expense.

There is an interesting history connected to the city’s tennis center. From the beginning there was not a great deal of support from the taxpayers as a whole for building a tennis center in the first place. In surveys conducted by the city’s recreation department, the tennis center and future expansion thereof always landed on the lower half of the wish list. However, certain powers-that-be wanted a tennis center built.

The city had traditionally given the decision-making capacity to the voters, rightfully so, on big recreation projects. Well, how do you build a tennis center if you do not have mass public support, funds in the budget or the passage of a voter referendum for the project?

Even with a development deal with Peachtree City Development Corporation (PCDC) providing a land donation and $500,000 from impact fees from the new Planterra Ridge subdivision, funding was to always be a major problem for the tennis facility.

Unfortunately, the answer was to sneak it around the public through a channel that was mostly out of public view – the Development Authority of Peachtree City. Unfortunately again, state law did not allow development authorities to engage in such activities.

Plans were drawn and the overzealous expectations from an elite tennis crowd unwilling to compromise on the project lead to the first withdrawal from a local bank for $350,000.

It just so happened that the chairman of the Development Authority was also an executive with the bank. Official correspondence and minutes from Development Authority meetings around 1993 and shortly thereafter showed a general belief that the tennis center would essentially pay for itself and cover the $350,000 debt.

Expansion of the tennis facility continued over the years. With each expansion came the promise that the sport venue would “break-even” or better. Those promises were a very thin veneer that hid a deeply mismanaged entity which was living large on the narcotic of continual, non-collateralized and non-public loans to pay for the annual operating expenses.

City finance officials, independent auditors and the Georgia Bureau of Investigation all stated that the accounting for the operations was a complete shambles.

The tennis center also received large sums from hotel/motel taxes and tennis membership fees, so why did they need these under the table loans and how were they being used?

Sadly, there is no clear documentation showing where the loans went. They did not have any capital building expenses out of the $1.5 million debt except for the initial $350,000. Eventually, the vice chairman of the Development Authority resigned and listed the presence of numerous problems of a serious nature.

In order to explain the mounting numbers, a propaganda campaign had begun to fool the public into thinking that the massive debt was a result of capital expenses needed to construct the various phases of the tennis facility.

In reality, city records show that the funding to build the expansions was — and is currently being — paid out of the city’s general fund.

In 2001, the City Council, the same one that signed the project over to the Development Authority in 1993, proposed to pay off the immense operating expense indebtedness of the authority via a voter bond referendum on the November 2001 ballot.

As November approached, the assumption of the Development Authority’s indebtedness had been withdrawn as a referendum ballot item, and the public was never given a reason. It was around this point that outsiders began asking to review the records and the legality of situation was being questioned.

There was an entire slate of recreation projects that did make it on that November 2001 ballot and the voters denied all of them. The irony was that the tennis center would have probably met the same fate had it gone through a proper and legal channel almost a decade prior.

Exposing the illegal activity has had some positive consequences. The local bank made some significant changes. The tennis center is now run on a budget and has full financial and legal accountability. The new members of the Development Authority have behaved in a manner consistent with the laws of the state.

Unfortunately, earlier this year the City Council voted to remove the mandatory requirement for a member of the council to hold a seat on the Tourism Association which now operates the facilities. The mandatory seat insured that the officials elected by the voters could insure things were legal and proper.

The City Council chose the route of less accountability and opened the door to more misfortune in the future.

The City Council should not participate in any measures designed to manipulate tax dollars in such a way as to pay off the illegal acts of an autonomous governmental entity such as the Development Authority.

Regrettably, the current City Council is proceeding to engage in some sneaky tactics designed to circumvent the public, again, in order to reward the illegal actions of the past authority.

In the spirit of open and honest government, the City Council should place the issue of the illegal indebtedness before the voters in the form of a referendum. They should have the courage to allow the people to decide the fate of issuing bonds related to the authority’s misdeeds. This should have been the course of action in 1993, and it needs to be the path we follow today.

Our city can stand on a righteous and lawful foundation if the leadership takes us in that direction.

Steve Brown
Peachtree City, Ga.

Brown is the former mayor of Peachtree City.