Marietta promoter who keeps Nike contract for city-funded team gets bountiful incentives to bring tourneys to Columbus
William Fox’s relationship with the Columbus Parks and Recreation Department runs deeper than the Nike sponsorship the Marietta, Ga., basketball promoter manages for an elite city-funded basketball team that travels the country under the “swoosh” banner.
Fox brings two or more youth basketball tournaments a year to Columbus, where his events are given free use of city facilities and city employees during the tournaments, according to records the Ledger-Enquirer examined under Georgia’s Open Records Act.
In addition to those benefits, Youth Basketball of America-Georgia, an organization of which Fox and his wife, Joyce, are directors, receives a $3,000 bid fee per tournament from the Columbus Sports Council, a city-funded organization that recruits tournaments and sports events to Columbus in an effort to promote tourism.
The city has also paid more than $9,300 since April 2008 in rent to Columbus State University for three YBOA-Georgia tournaments.
While the deals the city and Sports Council makes with groups to bring tournaments and sporting events to Columbus can differ — it is not uncommon for bid fees and deals to be cut with the Georgia High School Association, college conferences and other organizations — it appears the YBOA-Georgia receives more incentives to come to Columbus than a comparable organization. For example, Grand Slam Tournaments, a Columbus promoter that brings baseball and softball tournaments to city facilities, has its rent for using city facilities paid by the Sports Council but gets no cash bid fee and must pay the city workers who staff the tournaments, said Grand Slam owner Ray Thompson.
Grand Slam and YBOA-Georgia both bring mostly state and regional events with teams from Georgia and Alabama to Columbus, though YBOA did bring a national tournament here four years ago.
The city manager’s office and Parks and Recreation employees won’t comment on the details of the arrangement with YBOA-Georgia, citing an ongoing police investigation of the Parks and Recreation Department called by Mayor Jim Wetherington more than a month ago.
William Fox of YBOA-Georgia is also director of basketball operations for East Marietta Basketball Inc., the nonprofit organization that manages the city’s Nike contract.
Columbus City Manager Isaiah Hugley was asked last week about the connection between YBOA-Georgia and East Marietta Basketball Inc.
“You can draw whatever connection you want,” Hugley said.
The Nike contract
Fox has refused to provide the city or the Ledger-Enquirer with a copy of the Nike contract East Marietta Basketball manages for a city-funded team coached by Parks and Recreation Director Tony Adams.
The Ledger-Enquirer requested the information under the Georgia Open Records Act on May 19. The city attorney’s office determined the contract was held by East Marietta, and asked Fox to release it. After Fox refused, saying he did not know the Blazers were a city-funded team, the city attorney’s office referred the matter to the Georgia Attorney General’s Office.
Under the Open Records Act, the Ledger-Enquirer requested information Tuesday from East Marietta Basketball about the Nike deal with the city team. East Marietta Basketball’s attorney, Stacey Jackson, declined to release the information Friday, claiming the nonprofit organization did not fall under the act. The city attorney’s office has taken the position that it does.
The Georgia Blazers under-17 team, which gets uniforms, shoes and funding for travel, has been sponsored by Nike since 2006, according to what Fox told the city attorney’s office. This year, the team, which has 13 players and only one from Columbus, has played in Nike tournaments in Houston, Los Angeles and Hampton, Va.
Fox has declined to speak to the Ledger-Enquirer and has hired Jackson, who also represents four Parks and Recreation employees who are connected to the basketball tournaments YBOA-Georgia holds in Columbus. Recreational program specialist Herman Porter is the tournament director for a number of the events, while recreational services division manager Margaret Brown and program specialist Shelley Stephens are in charge of the tournament gate receipts, according to the information provided by the city manager’s office.
Adams and Porter have refused to conduct interviews with the newspaper, first on orders from the city manager’s office and now at the direction of their attorneys, Don Jackson of Montgomery, Ala., and Stacey Jackson of Columbus.
YBOA-Georgia tournaments
The annual Riverfest Classic, held in Columbus on March 26-28, was a typical YBOA-Georgia tournament. Porter was the tournament director, and the event was listed on the YBOA-Georgia web site as a YBOA-Georgia event.
It drew 98 boys and girls teams in 11 age divisions, according to tournament brackets on the YBOA-Georgia web site. About 18 teams were from Columbus, including 13 Georgia Blazers teams.
The tournament was played in eight different gyms, including city-owned Comer Auditorium, Psalmond Road Super Center, Frank Chester Super Center, Northside Super Center and Shirley Winston Super Center, as well as at Columbus State, Hardaway High School and Veterans Middle School.
The entry fee was $290 per team.
Admission was charged during the three-day event and $3,510 in gate receipts were deposited the day after the tournament into the city’s Parks and Recreation account.
The city did not provide any detailed accounting of tournament finances when requested under the Georgia Open Records Act.
Porter was the tournament’s director, which meant he ensured teams had game schedules, directions to the gyms and that the multi-site tournament ran smoothly, according to information provided by the city manager’s office.
Porter, through the city manager’s office, was asked if he worked the tournaments on city time.
“Mr. Porter has declined to comment on personal matters conducted on his own time,” the city manager’s office responded.
Parks and Recreation Finance Manager Becky Glisson declined to discuss how money from the basketball tournaments is managed.
“I don’t handle anything with basketball and money,” Glisson said. “I don’t know anything about it.”
In addition to teams being charged entry fees, spectators are charged admission — $2-$3 for children and $4-$5 for adults, according to the city manager’s office.
There is no accounting of the gate receipts or breakdown of how much is taken in each day at each tournament site.
Of the four tournaments the Ledger-Enquirer examined, deposits into the city Parks and Recreation account were made on the Monday after the event ended. Brown prepared all of the deposit slips.
Don Jackson, the attorney who represents Adams and Porter, said one shouldn’t assume these tournaments make much money.
“The vast majority of these tournaments are money losers,” Don Jackson said. “When you factor in insurance costs and the cost of officials, you’re not making money on these tournaments.”
Just because there were 98 teams in a tournament and the entry fee was $290 doesn’t mean $28,420 was collected, he said.
“It is not as simple as ‘X’ number of teams equals ‘X’ amount of money,” Don Jackson said. “It is not close to that simple.”
The city has not disclosed details of how the tournament proceeds are split with YBOA-Georgia.
The CSU connection
Though YBOA-Georgia does not pay rent for city-owned gyms, Columbus State University charges for use of its facilities. That rent to CSU is not paid by YBOA-Georgia, but by the city, according to records obtained from CSU.
Since Jay Sparks became Columbus State’s athletic director in April 2008, the university has played host to three YBOA-Georgia tournaments.
In April 2008, the city paid CSU $2,292 for rent, security and clean-up. In June 2009, the city paid $3,364 for rent, security and clean-up. In March, the city paid CSU $3,645 for rent, security, clean-up and medical services. For that March tournament, $3,510 in gate proceeds were deposited into the Parks and Recreation account.
When scheduling YBOA-Georgia events, Sparks said he deals with Adams and Porter, not Fox or the YBOA-Georgia staff. CSU began charging more rent after Sparks became athletic director, which prompted Adams and Porter to ask for a better deal, Sparks said.
“My impression was they would like for me to give it to them rent-free,” Sparks said.
There is a YBOA-Georgia tournament scheduled for Columbus on July 9-11, Sparks said.
“I don’t think it is going to happen,” he said.
Some YBOA-Georgia tournament games have been played at Muscogee County School District gyms. No rent is paid for the facilities because of a memorandum of understanding between the district and the city.
One promoter
Thompson, owner of Columbus-based Grand Slam Sports Tournaments, books four to six youth softball and baseball tournaments into Columbus each year.
His rent for the city facilities — usually the South Commons or Northside Park — is paid by the Sports Council.
“If 50 percent of the teams are from out of town, the Sports Council picks up the tab for rental,” Thompson said.
By his count, Grand Slam brings about 150 out-of-town teams to Columbus each year for the multiple-day tournaments.
Last month, Grand Slam promoted an Amateur Softball Association girls under-16 national qualifier at South Commons. There were about 30 teams, all of them from outside Columbus.
Unlike the basketball tournament, Grand Slam does not get a “bid fee” for bringing the tournament to Columbus. Grand Slam charges admission and team entry fees, which it keeps.
Grand Slam is responsible for paying umpires and Parks and Recreation employees who line fields and help during the tournaments, Thompson said.
Sports Council President Herbert Greene said the Sports Council has an agreement with Parks and Recreation that it can use city facilities 15 times a year to draw events — and tourist dollars — to Columbus. Last year, the Sports Council paid the city about $27,000 for those dates, Greene said.
“We are recruiting sporting events to put people in motel rooms,” Greene said.
And to do that, the Sports Council works closely with Parks and Recreation, which manages most of the facilities used to attract the tournaments and games.
“We are totally dependent on Parks and Recreation,” Greene said.
This story was originally published July 6, 2010 at 12:01 AM with the headline "Marietta promoter who keeps Nike contract for city-funded team gets bountiful incentives to bring tourneys to Columbus."