WDDI makes cutbacks

Waynesboro Downtown Development Inc., has announced a reduction in staff hours and salaries due to lower event revenues and budget projections.

In a Tuesday afternoon media release, WDDI announced that its board of directors voted to temporarily reduce staff to working four days a week, with a corresponding 20 percent salary cut.

However, Executive Director Kimberly Watters and Events Coordinator Rick Moyer have decided to continue to work full-time with the 20 percent salary decrease.

“Now is not the time for a decrease in effort,” Watters said in the release. “We are both committed to our mission and are willing to tighten our personal belts to help ensure the work of this organization continues.”

The office will continue to stay open five days a week.

“This wasn’t an easy decision,” said Eileen O’Rourke, who chairs WDDI’s promotions committee and is on the board of directors. “But the reality is that the economy has

negatively affected our events revenues and budget projections. We need the support of the community to provide vital revitalization services for the downtown.”

O’Rourke said the board reviewed its revenues and projections at its meeting Monday following its annual Taste of the Town fundraiser and determined the need for budget cuts. She expected the total amount raised at the event to be available today, but said it wasn’t as much as in past years.

“I think there are some people that just didn’t have it in their budget to pay for tickets this year,” O’Rourke said.

While the Taste of the Town event received in-kind sponsorships to help defray the costs of putting on the event, O’Rourke said it received less in cash sponsorships.

WDDI received $65,000 in city money in fiscal year 2009, about the same amount it received in fiscal years 2007 and 2008. In fiscal year 2006, it received $25,610.

WDDI, according to its Form 990 filing — required by the Internal Revenue Service for 501(c)(3) non-profit organizations – raised just over $20,000 from its events in fiscal year 2007, the last year its filing was available online.

O’Rourke said budget reviews would continue on a weekly to monthly basis, and that it would be “going gangbusters” on its Friends of WDDI campaign, in which businesses, for a requested minimum $25 donation, can buy stickers to display in shop windows showing their support for the organization and for downtown revitalization.

An anonymous donor has pledged an initial $2,000 grant to get the campaign underway.

“We are still committed to our mission of downtown growth and development, but we recognize the clear and pressing need to respond as an organization to the changing economic conditions,” O’Rourke said. “Like everyone else, we’re working hard and tightening our belts.”

Besides developing and launching the Virginia Fly Fishing Festival, and by supporting the creation of a downtown farmers’ market, it produces six other downtown events.

“We’re going to fight very hard to make sure this organization gets better and continues – and survives,” O’Rourke said.