Opinion: Privatizing Playland Update: DeJaVu All Over Again

READ MARK LUNGARIELLO’S ARTICLE IN LO-HUD HERE

This is like Sustainable Playland deja vu all over again. Extensions, requests for more time, stalling, no plan submitted, no surety that the company has the money, delays, delays, delays, questions, questions, questions. Let’s be done with this six years long fool’s errand of Astorino’s to privatize management of Playland. It’s been tried in the past and was proven a monumental failure. The “hedge fund backing” is questionable at this point because Nick Singer LEFT the hedge fund he founded with his former partner (Standard General) back in the summer of 2013. The actual company that will be coming in to run the park as “Standard Amusements” is in reality called “United Parks”. All United Parks is is one person named Jack Falfas. Touted by Singer as “the best in the business”, the reality is that Jack Falfas hasn’t worked in the Amusement Park industry in well over five years. He lost his last job with Cedar Fair -a company he’d WORKED AT (but never owned) for thirty five years – back in 2010. He apparently left in disgrace after a long career with them ended in an angry dispute with upper management during a phone call, sued to get his job back and lost. No one else in the industry has snatched him up since then. So when I hear he’s “the best in the business” or that he has a “bankable resume” I have to ask, “Oh really?”

After breaking ties with Cedar Fair and apparently not finding work for any other Amusement Park Industry companies, in early 2014 Falfas formed “United Parks”. All research shows that other than Mr. Falfas, there isn’t much of a viable company. Good luck locating any management team information. They only have one other Park in their portfolio...”Hydro Adventures” - a water park out in Missouri that they just bought and started running in 2014 (their very first park as a new company!). Falfas’ fledgling company has only two seasons of running that under its belt. This September, when they were SUPPOSED to be at Playland ‘shadowing’ the staff to observe and learn about the breakdown of the Park and all the classic rides etc, and when they should have been finalizing their plan for Playland to submit to the County and the Public for review before their Oct. 31st deadline to sign, they were instead down in Daytona, FL securing the purchase of another small water park called “Daytona Lagoon”. Look it all up, it’s all there. Interestingly enough, all the United Parks press releases announcing the purchase of Daytona Lagoon tout PLAYLAND as already being an entity that United Parks MANAGES. They haven’t so much as managed a paper bag into a garbage can at Playland yet (the “co-management” period has been a joke to date, they were never involved in any day to day supervision, running or even “shadowing” at Playland this past summer while the Park was busy churning out over $10 million in gross attendance revenue with no help from Standard Amusements). Yet they are using their management of Playland as a selling point to secure other new deals. Kosher? You be the judge.

As for United Parks, their web site clearly states that *their* financial backing comes from Nick Singer’s new financial project (is it a hedge fund?) called “Purchase Capital” - ALSO only just formed in early 2014. Who and what exactly Purchase Capital is remains a mystery…but the question now looms: what happened to the financial backing of the deep pocketed Standard General hedge fund we thought was financing this $25 million back when Singer first got involved in the Playland RFP and was still with Standard General? These guys have no proven track record running any company that owns or operates amusement parks. They don’t have any proven track record running any kind of company AT ALL. None. If you think you’re getting some established amusement park industry fixture that has any sort of significant management team, experience, portfolio or “in house” operations of any kind, you’d better think again. THAT would be hiring Cedar Fair to manage Playland . We didn’t get Cedar Fair and their vast resources, years of experience, extensive successful portfolio and solid management team, we got a former employee of theirs and that’s it. And Falfas is an employee whom they do not want back.

Singer has absolutely no background in the industry at all, and Falfas’ success throughout his career has been due largely in part to the fact that he worked previously for a huge, multi-national company that owned many amusement parks such as Knotts Berry Farm in CA, and Cedar Point in Sandusky, Ohio (where Falfas is coming to us from after his unceremonious “uncoupling” with the company he’d spent his whole career at). Working for Cedar Fair, Falfas had an extensive network of financial, staffing and managerial resources that were the safety net to his success of working as a manager within a large company. He was NEVER the guy in charge of the whole operation. There is nothing in his portfolio to point to that indicates to us that he can handle the quagmire that is Playland all on his own without that big company’s resources and staff backing him up.

It’s also highly questionable at this point as to whether or not any of Standard’s “investors” (or are they Purchase Capital/United Parks investors now? That’s all become quite murky at this point) want to touch Playland with a ten foot pole given the extraordinary amount of money needed to restore the park thanks to decades of deferred maintenance down there, the worst of which has endured under Rob Astorino’s watch for the last six years. Their $25 million (if they even actually have it) won’t even cover HALF of what needs to be done at Playland. It’s the COUNTY’S responsibility as owner and landlord of the property to take care of the infrastructure issues and capital improvements projects. And that will never change, no matter who comes in to run the place for us. This deal was never going to relieve the County Taxpayers of the “financial burden” of Playland. Of COURSE we should and must pay for this, Playland is an incredibly valuable asset and you take care of your assets, but why would we do that and then hand a restored and profitable park over to a bunch of anonymous private hedge fund investors to reap 92.5% of the profits while the County Taxpayers have footed at least 2/3 of the bill to make the repairs? WHY would we do this? To salvage Rob Astorino’s ego?

The County needs to abandon the idea of privatizing management of the Park. Instead they should be looking at starting a ten year long restoration project that seeks out corporate sponsorships and private philanthropic donations to restore this beloved historic landmark and bring it into the 21st century in time to mark its 100th birthday in 2028 . A targeted and well executed fund raising drive by a foundation set up for the purpose could offset in large part - if not completely - all the capital improvements projects that need to be done and the Taxpayers wouldn’t have to bond it all out. We’d get a restored Park, and we’d get to keep ALL the revenue ourselves and out of this committee we could re-assemble a re-vamped 21st Century version of the Playland Commission to be re-instated at some point down the line. Too much time has been wasted over the last six years since Astorino came into office with this nonsensical idea that he has never been able to bring to fruition. In the meantime not a penny has been put into Playland while the County has bonded out tens of millions of dollars for repairs and upgrades and upkeep for other County Parks (KENISICO anyone?). And through it all, dear old Playland continues to deteriorate and yet somehow over the last two summers has still managed - without a penny of care going into her, and with 50% of her food and games stands closed and shuttered - to raise her attendance and revenue numbers drastically over the all time low she hit when Astorino was chanting his “nobody goes to Playland anymore” mantra at every turn from 2010 to 2013.

Playland can and will outlive Rob Astorino’s reign of terror. She’s already made it through a lot of tough times since 1928 and she’s still quite alive and kicking. And during those years she has put A LOT of money in the County coffers - A LOT. When does she get any of it back to help take care of her? If we had all the money right now that Playland has generated IN PROFIT over the years socked away in a bank account earmarked just for that Park, we could pay for all of these fixes and then some. It’s time for the County to step up to the plate and RE-COMMIT to this Park that has pulled in so much money in revenue for the County and brought so much joy to so many people and families over the last 88 years. Give Playland back some of the money she’s made for us over the last nine decades so she can be taken proper care of. We don’t need to “re-invent” Playland, we need to RE-INVEST in Playland and RESTORE Playland.

Standard Amusement’s request for an extension at this stage of the game, after all the time they’ve had to evaluate the property and develop a plan, is just a clear indication that they are not ready to go, and not up to the task. It’s time for them to quietly fade away and for us to get on with the job of caring for the Park the way this Park deserves to be cared for. $10 million in revenue and counting over just three months this summer - well over the Park’s operating budget for the season - almost 600K patrons just over the summer months and Playland’s such a “failure” that we need private management to rescue it? You can’t be serious.

Standard Amusements clearly did not do their due diligence on Playland’s condition or County operations before trying to broker this deal, and the County has clearly fallen short of doing their due diligence of “Standard Amusements”.

End this now before we get Taxpayers into a 15 year long fleecing contract.