Letter to Streator Schools....
Monday, September 08, 2014
Letters to the editor: Concerts for a Cause comes up short and school gets nothing? - LaSalle News Tribune - LaSalle, IL
Letters to the editor: Concerts for a Cause comes up short and school gets nothing? - LaSalle News Tribune - LaSalle, IL
Letter to Streator Schools....
Letter to Streator Schools....
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26 comments:
EVIDENTLY MS NOONAN HAS ALREADY GOTTEN THE APPROVAL FOR NEXT YEARS CONCERT. THIS LETTER TO ME MAKES ME BELIEVE SHE CAN HAVE WHATEVER SHE WANTS. HARL AND ALDERMAN WAKE UP! DID I READ THIS LETTER WRONG OR MIS-INTERPERATE IT? UNBELIEVABLE!
Hopefully this will encourage our city council to put a stop to these so called "Concerts for a Cause" as this is (I believe) the 3rd concert that generated no money for the "Cause".
She only mentioned the gate. No mention was made of residual sales in booze and food.
She is outright lying. The Alan Jackson concert produced no money and the concert that the Peru Little League volunteers worked for got no money. I bet the Streator school people that worked this concert are laughing at the thought of ever doing that again. noonan gets free labor and the school gets nothing. At least she should donate a night's pizza proceeds like she did for little league. Or she should take the money from her personal account and give them a donation. What a scam!
something tells me that plenty of money was made on booze and food.
Is it true a draft beer was $7, and a fishbowl drink was $12? 3,000 people there. Each person had a beer that's $2,100.00. How about 5 beers? That's $10,500.00.
That will be the Last Concert for a Cause. Just a prediction.
I think Cops for Cancer is a better event myself.
Now folks it is gut check time. Do you want to leave Kristy out there hanging, finally putting in the paper what everyone else has been afraid to stand up and say. There have been so many links posted where you can voice your complaints, draw attention to this craziness, stop the charity BS.
Or you can whine on a blog. I have done my filing. Do the same. They may retaliate against one or two, but not dozens. There are dozens of real newspapers, real reporters around the midwest. Blow some smoke up their butts!
Did any of those "volunteers" ever call the dept of labor to inquire about being paid an hourly rate since they were working for a "for profit" entity? Even if noonan had a separate not for profit entity for the ticket sale portion (lol), did the volunteers serve alcohol /food under the for profit side of the entity? Just curious. Once a complaint is filed, an investigation must follow to show no wrong doing occurred.
The letter was well written by Merry Noonan. She shared facts and her regret about the show. It was a business venture that didn't meet expectations. Sometimes the gamble wins and sometimes the gamble fails. The group didn't lose money, the promoter did. Will this play into the decision to resume concerts next year? There is nothing scheduled to discuss.
A few made a big deal out of a small town concert at the local airport. I think it was unfortunate that the concert was not more attended. You had a good thing going in your small town, credit a few naysayers with making it out to be problem. They will move on to the next topic to try their hand at some more sense of relevance.
10:32 You must be one of those with the FBI, Attorney General, Department of LABOR, EPA and the local union shops on speed dial. Maybe the owner should pull a about face and sue those open forms and people like you for slander?
Did you know that protection of slander is only admissible with fact based statements? And anybody can file a civil suit.
10:32 AM You bet the volunteers served alcohol/food for the profit side of the concert. There should be an investigation.
11:23 PM, what filing did you do?
12:05 - I am actually happy the concert failed. I am happy because the government should never have been involved in an endeavor like this. I am happy because maybe our local leaders will see their folly. This was pure cronyism bordering on malfeasance. GOVERMENT SHOULD NOT BE INVOLVED IN ENTERTAINMENT!
1:20 Does you statement include municipal band concerts, library books, swimming pools, baseball diamonds? I am grateful people like you are not elected to office.
1:54 - Yes, absolutely. None of that should be funded with tax dollars. We are entering a new age. If we want things like that, people need to get together and raise the funds to support them directly - not passively through back door deals and legislation. Oh, I know the progressives will come out of the woodwork and say these are all "good for the community" and "its for the children" and other such hogwash. But the fact of the matter is - the government has reached the limit on how much money they take from us. We need to draw a line in the sand and say NO MORE!
And believe me when I say there are more and more people getting fed up. Until now, they could not enter local politics do to having to work a full time job. Well - these people entering the age that they can start getting heavily involved. The Internet has also made is possible to see exactly how we are being defrauded by our local politicians.
I agree with you 1:20. 1:50, evidently you are not smart enough to understand 1:20's blog. Please re-read it. Then use your brain and put two and two together.
2:47 Your the same person that will complain because there is nothing to do in our community and why the City won't fund the yearbook project. And cry because our kids are leaving our towns to get better jobs and more recreational opportunities. And berate teachers because they make more than minimum wage. Please keep your ideas in your garage with that cold beer. Everybody understands that you need all aspects to build a better community. Yes, I agree that more people are getting fed up with---you and other caveman.
4:12 - Government is not responsible for keeping us entertained. That is the job of the private sector.
I want free movie tickets. Oh... I forgot, Peru is trying to run the movie theaters out of town.
Very interesting article about this in the Ottawa Web Times. Includes responses from the school and the responses they got from contacting some of the bands. Makes for some very interesting reading!
HomeNewsLocal
Streator school will receive nothing from benefit
Posted: Tuesday, September 9, 2014 11:50 pm
Derek Barichello, derekb@mywebtimes.com, 815-431-4073 | 0 comments
After being chosen as the beneficiary of a local charity rock concert, Centennial School in Streator learned recently it will not receive any money, after it provided 50 volunteers for the August event.
Proceeds from the Rock Star Energy Drink Uproar Festival, the latest event in the Concerts for a Cause series hosted by Lou's LaGrotto in Peru, were supposed to help Centennial purchase new technology.
At least, that was the plan.
The series has raised hundreds of thousands of dollars since 2005, according to past reports from its organizers. Merry Noonan, concert promoter and restaurant co-owner, had no comment Tuesday when she was contacted by The Times. She said she will release a statement at a later date.
Centennial staff learned in May they had been chosen as a beneficiary of the charitable series and would receive profits from the concert in exchange for help.
Centennial Principal Anne McDonnell was told that "everyone had received money" that participated in it, but following the concert, the school was sent a letter stating Concerts for a Cause had nothing to donate this time around.
"We had to provide 50 volunteers to help that day of the concert and the night before to set up," McDonnell wrote in an email response to The Times. "Some of our jobs started at 7:30 a.m. and ended well past midnight. They included set up and tear down of equipment, cooking and serving food and beverages, checking IDs, driving the musicians and crew around town in our cars, driving the chefs around to purchase meals for the crew, cleaning up garbage after the concert, and one volunteer did laundry for a band."
The situation has raised questions, concerns and emotions in the community, according to McDonnell, who says Centennial staff still is struggling with how to handle it.
"Our staff had a range of emotions with this news, but mostly we were devastated for our students," the principal said. "Some staff could not let that be the end and wrote letters and or contacted the bands to share our story. Several responses were received, which all included the same message: They had no idea that this situation had occurred, and they were looking into it."
The Aug. 16 show at Illinois Valley Regional Airport in Peru featured more than 10 hard-rock bands, including Godsmack, Seether, Buckcherry, Pop Evil, Escape the Fate, Redlight King, Three Years Hollow, Sons of Recovery and Suicide Girls.
Noonan has told Centennial staff that it could reapply, but as of now, there hasn't been a decision made in that regard, McDonnell said.
This is a pretty clever scheme if nothing else. Please correct me if I'm wrong, because I'm about to make some unverified assumptions, but it sounds like the "charity" portion receives any gains from ticket sales only. So, all of the major expenses (which should have been negotiated ahead of time, i.e. cost for the entertainers, security, etc) need to be covered by ticket sales, and any ticket sales in excess of those expenses is then earmarked for the school donation. Going into the concert, there should have been a pretty clear "break-even" figure for ticket sales. I would guess this was not shared with the school for fear of volunteers backing out because their labor would not bear fruit, so to speak.
It's my understanding that a separate, for-profit entity was then selling food and booze, and the proceeds from those sales were not included in the "pot" that was intended to contribute to the school donation. So, in effect, the charitable portion of the event was stuck with all the overhead while only receiving a portion of the revenue stream. It would be interesting to see the break-down of ticket dollars and food/drink dollars. Additionally, if the volunteers were involved with food and/or booze sales, then something is seriously amiss. Having not gone, I don't know if that's the case or not, but I would guess that if there is any possible recourse, it would be found there.
Please correct any inaccuracies in the above. This is a pretty interesting issue, and I'm anxious to see how it shakes out. It's extremely unfortunate that the school didn't receive any funds, but perhaps this will be an eye-opener for any hybrid charitable/for-profit schemes in the future.
Lois, this letter should have its own heading. Also, the news tribune should also print this letter. WLPO SHOULD ALSO SHARE THIS LETTER. Noonan had no comment. Wonder if there is a script writer that will be contacted? The city should be completely embarrassed. Again, this makes the city look really bad being as they were involved. And for this alone, the city should never have been involved with these concerts.
Since this concert took place on August 16 and the notification of "no money" to the school several weeks later, I must believe that our elected officials knew that there would be no donation.
With that in mind, instead of Mayor Harl whining about his hurt feelings in the "payroll fraud", he should have been offering a personal apology to the residents and asking for a council discussion on the city policy of assisting in a private business venture to make money for that company at our Municipal Airport. This last meeting on Monday August 8 provided the perfect opportunity to do exactly that.
And of course that did not happen. Time for some Honesty in Peru and a little bit of transparency would be appreciated.
I bet $3,300 was a hit.
About as much a hit as going fishing and catching a cottonmouth snake!
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