(Arnolds Park)– The Iowa Great Lakes Maritime Museum Board of Directors Friday adopted a budget for the upcoming year.
It has revenue of 2.53 million dollars with expenses of 2.486 million, resulting in a projected income of 107-thousand dollars.
Jim Frost, Executive Director of the Iowa Great Lakes Maritime Museum, says the operations, which include the amusement park, Maritime Museum and Queen Two will lose an estimated 10-thousand dollars by the end of this year. He says the new budget includes enhanced concert revenue and belt tightening.
Frost added he feels comfortable with the budget. He says they’ll be looking at various aspects of operations, including the park, museum, Queen Two excursions and green space activities, looking at ways to promote each on its own merits, as well as making each of them fiscally viable.
Budget and Finance Committee Chair, Bob Schneider of Okoboji, Fundraising and Long Range Planning Committee Chair Al Maser of Spirit Lake and Frost will meet with representatives of a group of local banks this week to discuss reorganizing the park’s debt and request a 500-thousand dollar loan to allow the park to open this coming May.
Maser says the meeting with bankers is going to be critical. He says the organization’s goal has to be how to get out of debt and to “somehow come up with funding that will preclude having to continually use the land as collateral.”
