News

By Jane Smith

    The Downtown Development Authority board members will discuss how to search for a new executive director at their Sept. 14 meeting.
    The Delray Beach board voted 4-3 to not renew Marjorie Ferrer’s contract as executive director at a specially called meeting on Aug. 13. If the vote had not been taken by Aug. 17, her contract would have renewed automatically on Oct. 1.
    She wanted another year to oversee the organization and was planning to retire in 2016, said new Board Chairman Mark Denkler. He was one of the three who voted for Ferrer staying one more year. The other two were Seabron Smith and Albert Richwagen.
    Just three days prior, the board was deadlocked on that vote taken after Smith left the meeting. Bonnie Beer sided with Denkler and Richwagen.
    At the Aug. 11 City Commission meeting, the DDA executive team did not fare well. Ferrer, executive director since 1993, and Associate Director Laura Simon gave a presentation on how the DDA helps attract people to downtown stores and restaurants while creating an attractive place to work and visit. But they did not mention the organization’s budget as the mayor had requested.
    Mayor Cary Glickstein took issue with that omission.
    “Last year you showed up without any budget,” he said. “This year your presentation made no mention of your budget and you are a taxing authority.”
    He pointed out the DDA spends 40 percent of its revenues on general and administrative expenses, which includes salaries, benefits and office space. He considers that percentage “bloated.”
    He also reviewed the minutes of the board meetings and found them “devoid of any critical analysis towards its executive team, which represents close to 40 percent of its budget. It’s as if the executive team is running the board, not the board leading the staff.”  
    Ferrer said the DDA salaries are 30 percent of the budget, lower than the Delray Beach Marketing Cooperative’s 36 or 37 percent.
    “It’s not a taxing authority, part of that is lost in this conversation,” the mayor said. “I’m not going to belabor it, but I made my point.”
    Few board members were left when more than three hours later the city commissioners discussed the results of the DDA survey. Most respondents gave positive views to the DDA.
    Vice Mayor Shelly Petrolia, who requested the survey of DDA property owners and renters, said she noticed a split in the responses between those who were very satisfied with the DDA and those who were less satisfied or didn’t respond. She also said parking was mentioned as the main area where property owners want to see the DDA spend its money.  
    During the next budget year, the DDA will be involved in a pilot program for employee parking at the South County Courthouse garage.  
    At the DDA meeting on Aug. 10, board member Ryan Boylston raised the succession issue because Simon said she had a job offer. When Simon was hired in 2010, she was told that Ferrer would be retiring in three years, Simon said.
“We can’t keep floating along,” Boylston said. “We have to notify Marjorie that we won’t be renewing her contract in October. We have to do that 45 days before that date.”
    Because of the tied vote, the board members scheduled a special meeting for Aug. 13 after asking new board attorney Max Lohman about how much notice they had to give. He said 24 hours.
    Denkler agreed to talk with Ferrer and Simon prior to the vote.
    At the Aug. 13 meeting, some board members took issue with the mayor’s comments about the staff being in charge and not the board.  The six members who were on the board last year agreed that the commission presentation did not address the financials as the mayor had asked. Lohman reminded them that they had “segued from the agenda item.”
    Board members and Ferrer each will bring their own ideas for the transition to the Sept. 14 meeting. They may send those ideas via email to the organization’s administrative assistant, who will forward them to Denkler, but Lohman warned them against emailing each other. That would be violating the Sunshine Law.
    After the vote to not renew Ferrer’s contract, Denkler said, “We have some soul-searching to do on what is best for our organization.”