WARNING SIGNS APPARENT AT CIVIC CENTER

The warning signs were there for the Cape Girardeau Civic Center long before the Area Wide United Way pulled the plug on funding.

Over the past year, six Civic Center board members have resigned, largely because of concerns about how the not-for-profit organization has been managed by Ed Slaughter, Civic Center board president. Four of the board members, including Circuit Judge John Grimm and treasurer Drew Laudie have resigned since June.

The United Way board of directors put the Civic Center on probation in December 1993.

The United Way board continually asked Slaughter for complete financial records and information about the center's programs.

On May 23, a frustrated United Way board canceled its funding of the Civic Center.

Harry Rediger, United Way board member, said they didn't act sooner because they knew the United Way was the center's only certain source of funding.

United Way officials said the Center will have to maintain adequate financial records for at least several months and implement more programs for youth before it will be considered for any future funding.

The center is dependent almost totally on a $35,000 allocation from United Way. The center received $17,500 in two payments this year before the United Way board shut off funding.

Former Civic Center board members say the center has floundered in recent years under the leadership of Slaughter and Fred Pennington. Pennington helped manage the center on a part-time salary.

The former board members say Slaughter and Pennington have operated on a haphazard, seat-of-their-pants basis.

Those who resigned from the board say the center at 232 Broadway suffered from sloppy record keeping at best and financial mismanagement at worst.

Checks bounced and bills went unpaid, they said. In recent months, the center has operated few programs.

They also claim there was no financial accountability. Board members asked for, but never received, a complete accounting of Civic Center finances.

Money often was spent without board approval. "None of us have seen any invoices or bills," said George Dordoni, who shares one voting seat on the Civic Center board with his wife, Iris.

The Civic Center bought a $2,800 sound system last September and has yet to make a single payment on it.

George Dordoni said the sound system was purchased by Slaughter and Pennington without board approval.

Slaughter said he has no knowledge of such a transaction. The bill was sent to a Civic Center post office box.

"Fred gets most of the stuff out of the post office box," Slaughter said.

Slaughter said only he and Pennington have keys to the box.

Pennington said the sound system hasn't been used much.

Former board members and the center's former full-time director, Calvin Bird, believe the Civic Center can't survive under the current leadership.

Bird said both Slaughter and Pennington should step aside.

Slaughter and Pennington said they are being made the fall guys for an operation that has suffered from a lack of funding.

"Nothing hanky panky is going on with the finances," said Pennington.

They and their critics agree that the Civic Center has suffered from not having a full-time director since Bird resigned in July 1994.

Slaughter and Pennington said the center can't afford a full-time director.

But George Dordoni and Bird believe the center could afford a full-time director if it didn't spend its money unwisely on off-again, on-again renovation projects and paying money to Pennington and board member Marvin McBride.

Pennington gets paid $240 a month. McBride has received payments, totaling about $100 a month, to cover various expenses he incurred in helping to run the center.

Dordoni calculated the center is spending more than $2,400 a month on operations. That includes $600 in utilities and a $616 mortgage payment.

"Even with the high mortgage payments and the utility payments, there should be enough left over to hire a director and do some programs," Dordoni said.

But Slaughter and Pennington disagree. "We simply didn't have enough money coming in to hire a full-time director," said Slaughter.

The center at one time operated on a budget of abut $60,000, Slaughter said. But that was before the Cape Girardeau senior center moved out of the building in 1993.

The senior center had been paying rent to the Civic Center and paying a part of the utility costs.

With the departure of the senior center, the Civic Center had to depend almost entirely on the United Way for its funding, Slaughter said.

Bird served as center director from the fall of 1987 to July 1994.

"When I started working at the Civic Center I was making $14,600 a year," he recalled.

When he resigned in 1994, he was making $18,000.

But Bird said he wasn't paid for his last two months on the job. Slaughter contends otherwise.

As director, Bird never had the authority to write a single check. Slaughter said that was so the director couldn't misuse the funds.

Bird said Slaughter did what he wanted without consulting the director or the board.

Bird said the Civic Center has become little more than a glorified gym where children can play basketball.

"Basketball is not a program," he said.

But Pennington said disadvantaged youngsters served by the center wouldn't even step foot inside the building without basketball.

"Basketball is the drawing card," he said.

Some former board members and Bird believe the center needs to offer academic programs such as tutoring.

Sheldon Tyler served on the board during part of last year. He said he resigned because nothing was being done to obtain grants to fund youth programs.

Tyler started the Rainbow Village program at the Civic Center two years ago. This year, the summer program for children, which focuses on everything from personal hygiene to citizenship, was moved to the Salvation Army.