The City of Nanaimo is looking for information about the dissolution of the Downtown Nanaimo Business Improvement Association with the chief financial officer claiming there’s been no accounting of what happened.
“I don’t want people to get this thinking that the city is investigating DNBIA,” said Victor Mema, chief financial officer. “You would have expected that the process to dissolve, the city would have been provided some sort of accounting of this is what’s left and this is how we’re going to dispose of it. That part hasn’t happened.
“We will just reach out to what’s left of DNBIA to understand how that worked out and that’s it.”
Members of the Downtown Nanaimo Business Improvement Association dismantled the non-profit during a special general meeting in March. It came after the city pulled back its matching grant to the organization and instead set up a funding pot for any individual or organization to apply for to hold downtown events.
The association has argued it had no input into council’s decision and there was discomfort in collecting levies without the city contribution. City staff is a “little bit frustrated,” according to Mema, who said the city had asked the association to tell it what it would mean if the city were to reduce its funding, the group gave scenarios and none of them contemplated dissolution. The issue that the city took away funding and the DNBIA couldn’t operate, “it was a surprise to us,” he said.
Members heard what happened to assets of the association at the March meeting. It has $20,000 left over. An event kit, for example, went to the Child Development Centre and the community stage to Vancouver Island University, although the board said the assets are still available to association members. A tent has since been given to the Old City Quarter Association.
In a letter to the News Bulletin, Eric McLean, president of the Old City Quarter Association, said his organization has written to the city asking for the money left in cash reserves be protected and instead perhaps used to fund downtown events cancelled by the DNBIA.
“More pressing is the need for a full accounting of the finances of the DNBIA upon its dissolution, and this is now overdue,” he said.
Mema told council the city will look into what happened, what should have happened and if any next steps need to be taken. He said it’s about information, adding the city is hearing from former members who claim something went wrong, so the citizens of Nanaimo, who had been paying 50 per cent of funding, want to know, he said.