Published: February 20, 2008 09:24 am         

Myers: Canal Place at 'day of reckoning'

CUMBERLAND - The Allegany County legislative delegation sent a letter this week to Delegate Norman Conway, chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, expressing support for a request of $240,000 for the Canal Place Preservation and Development Authority.

But after a committee hearing in Annapolis last month, local lawmakers seemed skeptical whether the authority would receive any money at all without cooperation - i.e. money - from Allegany County and Cumberland government leaders.

Board member Greg Skidmore asked what Michele Crabtree, authority administrative officer, and Howard Buchanan, chairman of the board, took away from the Annapolis hearing. He asked if the authority appeared to have the support of the local delegation.

Crabtree said that the letter to Conway, a copy of which was received Tuesday by Buchanan, was "encouraging."

"My concern is that we need to ... respond to the committee that we have support from the city and county," Crabtree said.

But meetings with local officials for financial assistance have not been fruitful. After meeting with Buchanan and Crabtree early this month, Allegany County Administrator Vance Ishler said the county wasn't ready to help in the form of revenue generated from the hotel/motel tax.

"The county basically said there's no funding available," Ishler said on Tuesday. "They are a separate entity with their own board, they're a state agency."

Ishler said the issue would "be something the commissioners will have to make a decision on" if the authority ever is restructured in any way. Such restructuring is "up to the authority and the state of Maryland."

City Administrator Jeff Repp, a Canal Place board member, said "the only official meeting" between the two entities occurred more than a year ago.

"At that point, since there was no (hotel) project generating any revenue, we thought to give additional revenue would cut into existing funds," Repp said. "With no hotel/motel tax (revenue) coming from that site ... I don't think there's much for the mayor and City Council to meet on."

He said city officials could "entertain a request" for funding assistance "once a project is constructed and is generating revenue."

Delegate LeRoy Myers signed the letter of support addressed to Conway. Myers sits on the Appropriations Committee. Myers and Sen. George Edwards testified before the committee on behalf of the authority and urged continued funding.

For Myers, the direction of Canal Place - it's success or failure - is akin to being on the 98-yard line of the football field, just shy of scoring the winning touchdown.

Canal officials, he said, have "got to have a plan" because "there is nothing available from the state for those last two yards."

"If you look at what they're doing and what should be done and what hasn't been done, we're now at the day of reckoning," Myers said. "It's time the county and city stand up (and agree) on how to finish management of this process."

Contact Kevin Spradlin at kspradlin@times-news.com.