Town rankles youth league with financial information request

Owen Babe Ruth League cries foul over proposed MOU changes

Fred McCormick
The Valley Echo
March 14, 2023

A proposal by the Black Mountain Recreation & Parks Department that would require the Owen Babe Ruth League to allow monthly access of its financial records to town staff was voted down, March 13, by the town council. Photo by Fred McCormick

A proposed addition to the memorandum of understanding between the Town of Black Mountain and a local youth sports organization led to pushback and a lengthy discussion, March 13, as the town council convened for its regular monthly meeting. 

The revised agreement, which outlines terms that allow the Charles D. Owen Babe Ruth League to use the baseball and softball fields at Veterans Park, would grant the town monthly access to the nonprofit organization’s bank statements. The proposal, presented by Recreation Director Josh Henderson and opposed by Owen Babe Ruth representative Frank Cappelli, failed to pass, following a lengthy discussion and a 3-2 vote by town council. 

An MOU between the parties was in place when Henderson stepped into his current position in 2018, he told the board while introducing the agenda item.

“At that time, the Babe Ruth organization was operating under a 2016 MOU,” he said, referring to a copy of the document. “The highlighted portion listed financial support from the Town of Black Mountain, and as you can see we were pledging monetary support in the sum of $5,000 for their program. By accepting this, they were opening themselves up to a review of their financial records.”

The annual funding and financial reporting requirements, which were previously included in a single line item, were removed in 2020, when a policy change by the town required the organization to apply for money each year through a grant application process, Henderson continued. 

The recreation director cited the town’s in-kind contributions to the youth league as the impetus for revising the MOU to allow his department access to monthly bank statements. 

Cappelli, who contends the organization signed its current MOU last September, characterized the revision as an unnecessary burden on a volunteer-led nonprofit that is already facing challenges.

“If you look at the MOUs the town has with other organizations that use the town’s facilities, they don’t require full access to their finances,” he said in a public comment before the document was presented to the town council. “We know we have a situation we’re currently dealing with, and you guys are all aware of it. We’ve come to you to tell you about it, and it’s being investigated. We did the right thing, and let everyone know about it.”

Requiring monthly access to its financial records, which the organization now makes available to the public in its monthly board meetings, singles the league out, he continued. 

“It wasn’t requested that you add this to football or pickleball, or any other MOU this year,” Cappelli said. “This was proposed to us before our current issues came to light, and we were never given a reason why this needs to be put in there. At the end of the day, financial disclosure has always been tied to funding in the past.”

The league, he added in an email to the town council hours before the meeting, is willing to provide that information to the town, but maintains the obligation, if added to the revised MOU, should be accompanied by automatic annual funding, as it was prior to 2019. 

“If you allocate funding to us this week for the current fiscal (year), we will add this new language to our MOU and sign it today,” he wrote in the email to board members. 

While the town no longer guarantees annual financial support for Owen Babe Ruth, it provided nearly $25,000 in services last year through the use of its baseball facilities, according to Henderson, who pointed out the town also allocates $9,000 annually for field maintenance and $2,000 for field-related materials, although Cappelli contends the league was only able to use three of the four in Veterans Park last fall. 

Mayor Mike Sobol told Henderson the maintenance of the fields would be a town expense regardless of the league. 

“If there was not a Babe Ruth organization, I’m assuming our town would go ahead and provide this, and we certainly couldn’t do it for $9,000,” he said. “And, the fee schedule would be the same. I mean, if we operated a league, we’d still have fields we have to maintain.”

Sobol added he would like to see the town figure out how to provide the league with additional funding. 

“Isn’t that the grant application process, which they have available to them?” Councilmember Pam King replied. “At this time, they chose not to apply.”

The league does intend to apply for a 2023 grant through the town, which opened the application period this month, Cappelli said in an interview after the meeting. An email correspondence between Henderson and Cappelli, dated Jan. 6, indicates the organization asked about the grant process and expressed its intention to apply before the deadline. In a response from the town, the league was told an application would be sent in March, but Cappelli asserted the information has yet to be received. 

Council member Bill Christy asked Henderson if the town regularly charges other nonprofit organizations to utilize its facilities. 

“No other groups of this size come to us, but we have had people who would like to do an ultimate Frisbee tournament or a baseball camp out there, and then we look at where they fall on the fee schedule and charge them,” the director responded.

In a follow-up question, Christy inquired about the process by which the town would review the organization’s financial records. 

“Would looking at their bank statements tell us anything?” he asked. “If somebody were taking money and not putting it in the bank, how would we know? We’re not auditing what they’re doing, or if they’re making incorrect charges. That’s not the scope of this.”

Past bank statements from the organization, according to Henderson, revealed “glaring” issues. 

“From a staff’s perspective, we just wanted to put something in place,” Town Manager Josh Harrold told the town council. “If you would like to put something different in place, or even remove this, we just felt like we needed something extra in there to make sure we’re protected.”

The league’s claim the document presented to the Babe Ruth organization in January differed slightly from the one brought before town council was a concern for council member Doug Hay. 

“That gives me pause that, as Frank said, we didn’t give them the opportunity to share their concerns,” he said. “Like we’re forcing them into an agreement their board hasn’t had a chance to review.”

Henderson replied that the MOU presented to the board was sent to the Owen league on Jan. 11, but Cappelli later said the organization reviewed a slightly different version on Jan. 9, and did not receive the version recommended to the board. 

The approval process of the document felt “messy,” Councilmember Alice Berry said. 

“They feel like they didn’t get to respond, and I hear that the email was sent, but they didn’t follow up,” she said. “It doesn’t feel right to move forward.”

Hay was not opposed to the revisions, as presented to the board, but said he would vote against it. 

“It feels like the negotiation should be between the parks department and Babe Ruth, and I know communication has not been great,” he said. “I would hope this will start some discussion, because they are an organization we give a lot of in-kind donations to, and I think that communication, both ways, is critical.”

A motion by Christy to include text inviting the Owen Babe Ruth League to apply for grant funding passed, 5-0, before King moved to adopt the MOU. Hay, Berry and Christy voted against the proposed revisions.