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Monday, March 18, 2024
March 18, 2024

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TrackTown USA crunched for cash ahead of 2016 U.S. Olympic Track & Field Trials

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The Eugene, Ore., nonprofit group organizing the 2016 U.S. Olympic Track & Field Trials set for Eugene next month is short on money to run the event and is passing the hat around, looking for donations.

Most recently, the private group TrackTown USA this week asked for — and got — a $75,000 pledge from the city of Springfield.

TrackTown said its cash on hand doesn’t add up to the total cost of putting on the 10-day event that starts July 1 at Hayward Field.

TrackTown declined to disclose the size of the budget gap or release specifics about its fundraising and spending plan for the event.

Reached Thursday, TrackTown USA President Vin Lananna referred questions about the nonprofit’s financial situation to TrackTown USA CEO Michael Reilly.

“It’s definitely not cause for concern,” Reilly said. “We’ve got a small gap.”

Reilly declined to go into details about the shortfall, saying he was confident ticket and vendor sales would make up for it.

The operating budget for the Trials is in the $10 million vicinity, he said.

Lananna, too, said TrackTown could close the shortfall.

“I can tell you that at the last two (Olympic) Trials (in Eugene) there was a budget gap,” Lananna said. “But we always get there. I have reasonable confidence, I wouldn’t say full confidence, but I have reasonable confidence we’re going to get there.”

TrackTown and its forerunner hosted the 2008 and 2012 U.S. Olympic Track & Field Trials at Hayward. Like this year, the group drew revenue from ticket sales, private sponsors and vendors, and secured money from local, state and federal government agencies to host the event, seen as a major image boost and economic boon for the region.

The cash shortage was revealed this week, when Lananna and Travel Lane County President and CEO Kari Westlund pitched the Springfield City Council for a $75,000 subsidy to cover some event costs.

“The event budget is facing a serious deficit,” Westlund told the council, “and continued production of this event to the high standards set in 2008 and 2012 is imperative in my opinion.”

The council approved the payment, using hotel tax revenue.

“In 2008,” Lananna told the council, “we were fortunate to be able to receive funds from the federal government to help us with many things, in particular security. This year, in 2016, that is not the case.”

TrackTown has sought for months to round up money to pay for the July event.

The Oregon Legislature earlier this year rejected a TrackTown request for $3 million in state money to cover security costs at the Eugene Trials as well as at the Indoor World Championships that TrackTown put on in Portland in March.

Government money and private-sector sponsorships are crucial for track and field events because ticket sales produce only a small portion of needed revenue.

TrackTown’s balance sheet took a big dip in 2014, the most recent year for which the nonprofit has submitted financial reports to the Internal Revenue Service, and the same year it hosted the World Junior Track & Field Championships and the Run TrackTown High Performance meet in Eugene.

TrackTown reported $1.9 million in assets at the end of 2014, down from $3.1 million at the end of 2013. Nearly all its assets were in cash, savings and investments.

TrackTown in 2014 received $4.7 million in event revenue, donations, grants and government money, but spent $3.9 million on track and field event expenses, $1.4 million in TrackTown personnel costs and about $600,000 in advertising, travel and support costs, totaling $5.9 million in expenses. The bulk of TrackTown’s personnel expenses were to pay Lananna, Reilly and project director Sam Lapray. The pay and benefits of the three totalled $647,000.

A TrackTown security committee has discussed how to trim costs while maintaining adequate security at the Trials, Westlund said. Tracktown has cut back on advertising, she said.

Although the event is held at Hayward, financial support won’t come from the University of Oregon.

“The university has no plans to provide cash support to TrackTown,” UO spokesman Tobin Klinger said in an email Thursday. “We have been working in partnership to ensure the overall success of the Olympic Trials and have negotiated service agreements that are acceptable to both the university and TrackTown. We anticipate that any costs to the university, such as non-reimbursed staff time, will be minimal.”

Westlund said she didn’t know the size of the budget gap for the Trials.

Such events need subsidies, she said. “We will never earn enough to break even, through tickets, percentages on food and the kind of ways you earn revenue. It’s never going to cover it to be able to deliver an event of this caliber,” she said.

Yet officials estimate the economic impacts are big for the region. Travel Lane County estimates $32 million to $37 million in direct spending by attendees during the 10-day event, and additional spending at local restaurants and other businesses.

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Those benefits justify the taxpayer-supported contributions, Westlund said.

Eugene contributed a total of $200,000 to the upcoming July event and to last year’s NCAA Outdoor Track & Field Championship, Eugene spokeswoman Jan Bohman said.

Lane County spokesman Jason Davis said the county has committed a total of $590,000 to TrackTown between 2013 and 2020, from hotel tax and video lottery revenue.

“If we want to host the Olympic Trials here, and want to deliver an event to the country at the level we have been, it’s going to take a little bit of (public) support, a lot of sponsorship support, earned revenue, all of those things to build a budget out,” Westlund said.

http://registerguard.com/rg/news/local/34506210-75/tracktown-usa-crunched-for-cash-ahead-of-2016-u.s.-olympic-track–field-trials.csp

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