Affiliate Review Committee reviewing taxpayer-funded entities in Carmel

CARMEL, Ind. – The City of Carmel is working towards greater transparency to show where taxpayers’ money is spent.

The city created a new Affiliate Review Committee to understand the spending behind taxpayer-funded entities and question if those dollars would be better spent elsewhere.

“It’s uncomfortable, but it’s important work on behalf of the taxpayer, and so we take that really seriously,” said Mayor Sue Finkam.

At the March meeting, an outside legal consultant created a report on the All Things Carmel store operations and its supporting organization, Promote Carmel, Inc. 

The city closed the gift shop in August. They said the store cost taxpayers upwards of $1.2 million.

“We found some challenges in maybe how the store was run, how documents were kept,” said Finkam.

For the group’s second meeting, they took a look at Carmel Chriskindlmarkt, Inc., the nonprofit that runs the annual holiday event.

After reviewing more than 500 pages from CCI,  their findings show that since 2017, the city has invested more than $8 million into the nonprofit and hasn’t received one cent in return.

Additionally, for the first time, the city said the event did not hit their revenue numbers.

“They had lost money this last year and then invested heavily in six full-time positions that they hadn’t invested in before, that created a negative balance for them,” said Finkam.

A previous leader of CCI released a statement, frustrated that they weren’t consulted during the review.

“The bulk of what was presented appeared to be designed to create an incomplete and slanted narrative,” said former board chair Sue McDermott. “No legitimate review of an organization’s governance and operations can be performed without interviewing the entity’s management and key stakeholders.”

McDermott added that they are disappointed the findings didn’t mention the financial return to the city from the event. 

“While the expense associated with the City’s allocation of labor cost to CCI was highlighted, the positive economic and cultural impact, the positive nationwide marketing impact and the community value associated with the market was not,” McDermott added.

The mayor changed the nonprofit’s leadership and is working to resolve the loss.

“Carmel Christkindlmarkt, Inc. will continue to cooperate fully with the City of Carmel to foster a sustainable partnership built on a foundation of transparency,” said President and CEO Maria Adele Rosenfeld. “It remains our goal to offer an authentic, magical holiday experience that elevates the City of Carmel regionally, nationally and internationally. We look forward to stewarding this invaluable community asset for generations to come.” 

“I’m super excited that we were able to get $284,000 paid back for the first time ever,” said Finkam.

Following all of the reviews, the board plans to give further recommendations on how the organizations can improve their spending habits.

The mayor said there are several other community development corporations the committee intends to look into.