Town of Mammoth Lakes Update

 – Press release from the Town of Mammoth Lakes

Town Manager Marianna Marysheva-Martinez’s Update: May 16, 2013:

To the Town Council, Town staff, media and Mammoth Lakes residents and businesses:

mammothlogo.jpg

Below are highlights of noteworthy items from the past two weeks.

Town Council: During the 5:00pm portion of the meeting, discussion of the Fiscal Year 2013-14 baseline budget continued. The Town is still financially challenged, and this will not improve until new or additional revenues will start flowing in. In addition, it is very important to note that we are significantly under-funding our capital needs, including roads and buildings. Neither the Town nor the private sector have done an adequate job in this area. The physical results will continue to be visible. The solution, from staff’s perspective, is to cut services to invest more in infrastructure, raise dedicated revenues for infrastructure, cut marketing and invest more in infrastructure, or a combination of all these

• A question on the nightly rentals of single family houses also was raised, as a potential future project for staff to research. There are no resources within the Town to undertake this project. (Only three planners are left in CED, and they handle both counter requests and project planning tasks.) If a study is necessary, a consultant would need to be hired. There are currently no funds to pay for such a consultant.

• During my presentation, I mentioned that in addition to a financial crisis that we are barely avoiding, there is now a human crisis. The Town’s staff is simply burned out, overwhelmed by the workload that is the same as it was before the significant staffing cuts, and demoralized as a result. Town’s management will be making a recommendation on how to manage this crisis, during the June 5th Town Council meeting.

• The Town Council approved two significant sets of documents: 1) personnel policies concerning parnternships, gifts & ticket distribution, and recruitment & selection; and 2) an $84,000 contract with Mono County to address the Town’s “emergency” IT needs, including failing email and network servers.

• The Town Council also approved a resolution of intention that started the process to form a Tourism Improvement District. The district would generate nearly $5 million annually for enhanced marketing and tourism promotion, through MLT. The Town will not be receiving funds from the district, and will only collect and remit the assessments to MLT.

Other items:

– Town’s IT services: As stated above, a contract with Mono County has been approved to address the Town’s most immediate IT needs. The contract document has been finalized, and signed by the Town. The Town’s management team had our first planning session (over phone) with the County IT team on May 16. We were told that it may take us 2-3 months to get our email and file connectivity issues addressed. (This is the most expeditious, given the steps involved in the process.) The County and the Town are now proceeding with negotiations of the ongoing IT services contract, and hope to have it in place before July 1, 2013.

• Finance Department staffing challenges: Our Finance Manager will be out on leave for some time. This has created a challenge for the remaining staff, impacting their workload and the timeliness of their deliverables. We are working diligently to get interim help, which we have advertised through numerous channels. (If you know of anyone with city accounting experience, please have them contact me as soon as possible.) In the meantime, the small Finance team is handling the challenge remarkably well, and with their chins up.

–  Trails End Park Opening Ceremony: On May 7, despite the drizzle, we held an opening ceremony of the Trails End Park. A lot of youngsters joined us for this exciting event. Good media coverage followed.

Have a great rest of the week and a wonderful weekend.

Marianna Marysheva-Martinez

 

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Jenn Mately
Jenn Mately
10 years ago

MMM was given a sinking ship, run by a screwball council with way too many personal agendas and political commitments. Tourism and John Urdi is the puppet master and whatever he says, the council and the business owners believe that he will save this town from disaster. The truth of… Read more »

Pawns to Mr. Potter
Pawns to Mr. Potter
10 years ago
Reply to  Jenn Mately

This present council has become so enamoured with itself, and knowing it takes a village to remove them, MMM must have figured it out by now that they are pawns to Mr. Potter (Gregory) and getting a pretty decent salary for a part-time job. This is what happens when one… Read more »

MMM wanted the job
MMM wanted the job
10 years ago
Reply to  Jenn Mately

Jenn – Well it’s clear that MMM wanted the job. So much so, that she crafted the illusion she could help solve the town’s economic problems, which got the existing town manager’s job bounced, and now she’s in the driver’s seat demanding the county help bail the town out and… Read more »

ferdinand lopez
ferdinand lopez
10 years ago

skiing needs to be made affordable,mammoth was at its best as a duct tape or brown bag resort

Catering to those who have money
Catering to those who have money
10 years ago

Those with the dough are choosing to “have-it-all” by trekking to places like Park City where at exclusive Deer Valley Resort snowboarders are prohibited.

Snowboarders
Snowboarders
10 years ago

Having being acquainted with Deer Valley, it is refreshing not to have to deal with snowboarders (who are responsible for many accidents due to the angle of descent on the hill. And pardon the stereotyping, but when I think of snowboarders, I think of scruffy, young people who like to… Read more »

Too many rundown areas
Too many rundown areas
10 years ago

Money is getting tighter and tighter. Revenues are drying up almost everywhere. Mammoth has always catered to the middleclass L.A. folk who don’t mind driving up here to recreate. Unfortunately, with the middleclass rapidly disappearing, that leaves only the mega-wealthy with all the money and they prefer to “have it… Read more »

EasternSierraHomey
EasternSierraHomey
10 years ago

What a sad commentary, you really think bulldozing everything you deem unattractive or not highbrow a solution to the town’s problems. Richie-rich is not the answer! The morons at the town’s government in bed with mountain created the focus on greed and ego, all plans, costs and speculation. Where is… Read more »

Sean
Sean
10 years ago

Yes. Fire up the bulldozers. Main Street is not attractive. Unless you are going for the “Bodie Look” of arrested decay that is.

fire storm
fire storm
10 years ago
Reply to  Sean

a forest fire would save on the cost of a bulldozer.

I’m so over everything Mammoth. Can we pack the whole place up and ship it to L.A.?

Bishop's eyesores
Bishop's eyesores
10 years ago

Bishop should know firsthand how it feels to have a gigantic eyesore on their mainstreet. They’ve gotten so used to the ugly fenced lot (you know the one I’m talking about) for so many years now they aren’t aware (or don’t care) that the richie-riches from L.A. view the area… Read more »

Curious
Curious
10 years ago

What kind of birds don’t fly?

Jailbirds ! Like the city of Bell, some of these crooks belong in the penitentiary.

Tourbillon
Tourbillon
10 years ago
Reply to  Curious

Which “crooks” should be jailed – and have you brought forth your evidence to the D.A.? If not, why not?

Curious
Curious
10 years ago
Reply to  Tourbillon

Tourbillion, The scofflaws that are targeting and fining private property owners for TOT infractions while under reporting their own TOT, sales, employment, state and federal income taxes etc. I did report this to a town council person and received the following written response, “I just sent this to our town… Read more »

Sean
Sean
10 years ago
Reply to  Curious

Oh ya.. That will encourage business in Mammoth. More laws and reporting. Not. Maybe throw in some random water boarding of business owners just to let them know we mean business. Seriously Just raise the sales tax and stop all the red tape mess. Drop everything other than TOT. No… Read more »

Mark
Mark
10 years ago
Reply to  Sean

Reboot? Just pull the plug.

What mess?
What mess?
10 years ago

No mess ferdinand.
MMM was hired to save the day (with or without a new economic development person at a quarter million a year).

ferdinand lopez
ferdinand lopez
10 years ago

what a mess

Tourbillon
Tourbillon
10 years ago

The Council “approved a resolution of intention that started the process to form”. So that’s good I guess. The council approved a resolution. The resolution signals an intention. The intention is to start a process. The process is to “form” something that will, through unexplained alchemy, raise $5M. That’s so… Read more »

Mark
Mark
10 years ago

ammmoth lake?

Marketing will be our Salvation hmm, k. How much did that smerf logo cost again?

Ken Warner
Ken Warner
10 years ago

Right! Cut funding. Cut staff. Cut services. Then agonize about how to repair the damage you (MMM) inflicted on the town. Good for your job security — maybe — and real bad for the community of Mammoth Lakes. And create another funds generating entity to feed even more money to… Read more »