Town Seeks Holiday Event Help

BERLIN — During a larger discussion this week on the timing of special events in the town, it came to light Berlin’s annual Memorial Day celebration at the monument along Main Street is in danger of going away due largely to the health issues of the event’s primary organizer and largest supporter.

At Monday’s Mayor and Council meeting, Police Chief Arnold Downing discussed with Berlin’s elected officials the need for more advance notice with special events. Downing used a new three-day special event at remodeled Henry Park on Memorial Day weekend as an example.

“I’d like to ask the Mayor and Council to consider a 45-day notice for special events,” he said. “The month of May is event-laden and we have four more to go this month and we’re almost halfway through. Short notice, especially with a new event, creates problems.”

Downing said the police department often has to juggle manpower and hours to ensure the town’s many special events are safely covered. He said the town’s aggressive special events calendar puts many other departments in the same situation.

“A two-week window is not always enough time to plan,” he said. “I’m not only speaking for our benefit, but all of the other departments, especially with first-time events.”

Out of that discussion was borne a concern about the traditional Memorial Day ceremony at the monument on the corner of Main and West Streets. For years, Berlin long-time resident Sonny Adkins has organized the event, but health issues have kept him from planning it for the most part this year. Downing said the town is looking for somebody to step up and fill the void.

“The Memorial Day event needs a leader,” he said. “Several people including myself have been asked to take it over and have had to turn it down for a variety of reasons. We really just need somebody to step up and sign the paperwork. I’ll fill it out for them.”

Mayor Gee Williams said Adkins had volunteered to plan and organize the Memorial Day ceremony for years and called on the town’s spirit of volunteerism to maintain the treasured event.

“Volunteers aren’t paid, but they are some of the most valuable people in this town,” he said. “This is a classic example of that. Mr. Adkins has done a wonderful job with this for so long and now we need some help with it. … This is an event I feel really close to and I’ll do whatever I can to keep it going without a break,” he said. “We just need somebody to step up to the plate.”

State Visitor Totals Spiked 26% Since 2007

OCEAN CITY – The Maryland Office of Tourism Development sat down with Ocean City tourism representatives this week to present an update of the state’s tourism current process and plans moving into the future.

Maryland Office of Tourism Development (OTD) Director Margot Amelia began by explaining OTD serves as the state’s official travel marketing agency, promoting Maryland’s attractions, accommodations and services to increase visitor spending in the state. It additionally provides residents and out-of-state visitors with information and services to ensure a positive trip experience and positions Maryland as a competitive destination.

The Maryland Tourism Development Board (MTDB) has oversight of the Maryland Tourism Development Fund, which is a separate fund dedicated to tourism marketing that includes $2.5 million in mandated grants to 25 destination marketing organizations. The board can generate revenue and accept federal monies, and review legislation, fees and taxes to assess the impact on the economic viability of the tourism industry.

The MTDB participated in five-year strategic planning process, reviews and approves the Office of Tourism’s marketing and development plan and cooperate with other organizations that aids in the development and promotion of tourism.

The five-year strategic plan, 2010-2015, process began in September of 2008 with the final document being approved in November 2009. It includes dramatic changes in economic climate and tourism budgets that have impacted some strategies and tactics, but the plan has been an excellent road map for success during challenging times. The board revisits the plan annually with the same facilitator.

The strategic plan’s vision by 2015 is Maryland’s tourism industry, and the efforts of the OTD, shall be recognized as a vital economic engine for the State of Maryland, generating revenues, sustaining jobs, improving the State’s image and leveraging investments in Maryland’s tourism assets. OTD will pursue its mission- increasing tourism expenditures- with a focus on accountability and results.

In 2011, Maryland welcomed 34.4 million visitors, which is a 6.8 percent increase from 32.3 million visits in 2010. Visitation to Maryland has increased 26.3 percent since 2007 with an additional 7.2 million visitors outperforming the 8.1 percent growth of the United States. Market share has increased 16.9 percent since 2007 so far outperforming regional and national trends.

Leisure travel in Maryland is on the upswing while the state saw growth in all segments, business and leisure as well as both day trips and overnight stays. Leisure travel grew 8 percent in 2011, 30 percent since 2007. Overnight stays grew 8 percent in 2011, 27 percent since 2007.

In 2011, Maryland reached record breaking revenue of $14.3 billion economic impact, and visitor spending surpassed the State’s pre-recession high.

Maryland’s tourism supports 131,000 direct jobs with a payroll of $4 billion. Tourism is the 10th largest private sector employer in Maryland. One out of 17 jobs in Maryland is a tourism job.

The $14.3 billion in visitor spending generated $2 billion in State and local taxes. Without the revenue generated by visitors, Maryland households would have paid $920 more in taxes in 2011.

Maryland’s tourism business continues to grow significant revenue. In FY12, the Comptroller reported $377.5 million in sales tax revenues attributable to tourism for the Tourism Promotion Act, which is an increase of 5 percent from FY11, after adjusting for the increase on the sales of alcohol. An additional $18 million in tourism tax revenue was collected in FY12, qualifying the MTDB for an additional $3.573 million in FY14.

“Very critical, and one of the first things we did when I came on board was both quantitative and qualitative research,” Amelia said. “We did an image awareness study to determine what consumers thought of Maryland and its competitors, and to determine what motivates consumers…and we did qualitative research on focus groups to allow consumer insight and direction for our advertising, our publications and our web design.”

OTC refocused marketing efforts on key feeder markets and communicated with those markets year-round. The focus is on the top three markets of D.C., Baltimore and Philadelphia, which make up 55 percent of Maryland travelers.

The MTDB commissioned an effectiveness study on 2011 advertising that reported only incremental business was generated by ads, not travel planned prior to viewing the advertising. Advertising generated $182 million in visitor spending from 211,000 trips that supported more than 1,800 new tourism jobs. Every $1 spent on OTD ads generated $220 in incremental visits spending, $31 in State and local taxes and $6 in State sales tax revenue.

“So while we were doing all that new research, all the branding work we still had to do all the core promotional work and outreach efforts,” Amelia said. “We are out there all the time doing travel trade sales, international marketing, public relations…it’s all about content development, and you need to continuously update your content on the web, social media and publications. Also, social and digital media and marketing, and we do a lot of product development.”

OTD has an alliance with Washington D.C. and Virginia, and while they compete aggressively against each other, they still work together, which has resulted in a successful Maryland investment in promotion to Western Europe and emerging markets of Brazil and China where every $1 put in is matched $8 in FY12.

“And we have returned to the consumer market in Canada through a lot of Discover America programs,” Amelia said. “Canada is a great market for Ocean City.”

OTDs future strategies for success recognize the State must go beyond the strategic regional promotional efforts, and it is necessary to target larger, and more distant metropolitan areas, such as New York City.

“We have done a great job with our strategic regional promotional efforts but in order to grow we really need to be talking to that big market up in New York…another area we will see significant efforts is in the international market,” Amelia said.

Berlin Planning Head Resigns After Ultimatum

BERLIN — Berlin Planning Director Chuck Ward resigned Tuesday morning after being told he had a choice to make — step down or he would be terminated.

“I resigned. My letter of resignation is on file in Town Hall,” Ward said in a statement Thursday.

While Ward refused to go into detail over what transpired that led to him stepping down, Mayor Gee Williams was specific in an interview this week. He outlined the council’s reasons for seeking Ward’s resignation on Wednesday.

At the Mayor and Council meeting on Monday, concerned merchants converged on town hall to protest what they believed was a pending crackdown on sidewalk clutter, such as sandwich-style signs and tables and chairs. At an April Historic District Commission meeting, the topic of sidewalk accessibility was broached, and Ward was asked to evaluate the code and issue suggestions. The mere possibility of a crackdown on these items sparked concerns throughout the business community, and the Mayor and Council decided at Monday’s meeting to work toward amending the existing code and clarify exactly what is allowed and what is not.

The morning after the meeting, on Tuesday, Administrator Tony Carson met briefly with Ward to inform him the Mayor and Council was asking for his immediate resignation or he would be fired. Ward chose to resign.

“This was not the result of any one action, but this latest brouhaha over the sidewalk issues was an example where both the Planning Commission and Historic District Commission in the eyes of the Mayor and Council were not well served and being properly advised on this particular issue, and it’s one of many such instances over the last few years,” Williams said. “Quite frankly, while Chuck had many fine attributes, his lack of communicating with the town administrator and the Mayor and Council and giving an opportunity to address or get information back to these commissions on these issues was basically not well serving them or the community at large.”

The mayor said it was disheartening to learn of the pending sidewalk recommendations from the local media, rather than the head of the town’s planning department.

“Any information I found out about this was in the local newspapers and this issue led to the highest number of phone calls on any one issue since I have been mayor,” he said. “It was either related to the sidewalk signs or the rumor that the tables and chairs outside were going to be completely outlawed. All of this could have been avoided by simply having the zoning director have basic conversations with the town administrator and gathering information from the town attorney. Our primary concern is making sure any objects meet current pedestrian accessibility standards. It’s ironic that this issue in Berlin, which has one of the best records of any small town in this state of becoming ADA compliant.”

Williams believes all of the current controversy could have been avoided had Ward appropriately addressed the HDC members’ concerns on the spot at last month’s meeting.

“There was lots of information that should have been shared with the Historic District Commission because they had every right to ask questions with accessibility, and I have no problem with that. A responsible response by the staff person assigned to the commission should have happened,” Williams said. “This was just one incident. If it was just one, this wouldn’t have happened. This was not personal in any way.”

Williams said he hopes to have the planning director position filled prior to Carson leaving the city at the end of June for a post in Ohio.

County Remains Uncertain How To Initiate School Safety Officers

SNOW HILL — County officials this week agreed to keep funding in the proposed fiscal year 2014 budget for school safety, but it remains uncertain just what the finished product will look like.

In the wake of the school shooting tragedy in Connecticut last December, local law enforcement and the Worcester County Board of Education formed a school security committee that produced several recommendations for safety improvements to help ensure a similar incident does not occur here. Out of those meetings came three basic recommendations, including a plan to hire 13 new full-time Worcester County sheriff’s deputies, essentially one for each of the county’s 13 public schools.

The proposal comes with an estimated price tag of $1.6 million in the first year alone and at least $1 million in each year thereafter. A second proposal would include hiring 13 part-time sheriff’s deputies to man the county’s public schools throughout the school day and that proposal would cost an estimated $604,000.

The third proposal would include using municipal police officers from the three towns in the county in which public schools are located along with two new full-time sheriff’s deputies to cover schools in the county at-large including, for example, Ocean City Elementary and the Worcester County Technical High School.

Under that plan, the officers would only man the schools during arrival and dismissal times and the schools would be on lockdown during regular school hours. That proposal would be the least expensive of the three on the table and would cost an estimated $350,000.

During budget deliberations on Tuesday, the County Commissioners weighed each of the proposals, although they did not reach a final decision. After considerable debate, the commissioners decided to leave in the budget the $604,000 for the second option for the time being, although that is not an indication that plan is the favored one.

County Administrator Gerry Mason said he had identified a grant that would provide 75 percent of the cost of hiring and outfitting new sheriff’s deputies, but that the funding would only apply to the hiring of full-time deputies. According to Mason, the deadline for applying for the grant is set for May 22, however.

Regardless of the final plan chosen, the commissioners said funding should be included to improve the lock-down capabilities of the schools.

“The biggest concern I’ve heard is about the lack of protection from inside,” said Commissioner Merrill Lockfaw. “The kids I’ve talked to are more concerned about the threat coming from the inside, not the outside.”

After considerable debate, the commissioners decided to hold the $604,000 already listed in the budget and adjust the figure when the final plan is decided upon.

Local Raids Lead To $1.4M, Corruption Charges; Terrorist Connection Probed

BERLIN — Two local business owners have been indicted for enterprise corruption and money laundering, among other charges, for their roles in smuggling millions of dollars’ worth of illegal untaxed cigarettes.

Approximately $1.4 million in large black bags and 20,000 cartons of cigarettes were recovered Wednesday from the West Ocean City home and other properties belonging to Basel Ramadan 42, who is being called the “ring-leader” and “boss of the enterprise” in a vast cigarette smuggling conspiracy. His younger brother, Samir Ramadan, 40, was referred to as the “enterprise treasurer” in a press release from the New York Attorney General’s Office.

At a press conference yesterday, New York Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman and New York Police Commissioner Raymond W. Kelly announced the indictments of 16 members of a criminal ring that brought approximately one million cartons of untaxed cigarettes from Virginia to the New York City area.

Law enforcements suspects the proceeds of this illegal operation could be ending up in the hands of terrorist groups, but at this point it’s not a certainty.

“The association of some of the suspects in this case to the Ari Halbestram’s killer, the Blind Sheik and a top Hamas official concerns us,” said Kelly. “While it hasn’t been established yet where the illicit proceeds ended up, we’re concerned because similar schemes have been used in the past to help fund terrorist organizations like Hamas and Hezbollah.”

On Wednesday morning, Homeland Security officials and New York authorities stormed a condominium above the Subway on Sunset Drive and Coastal Highway and were seen confiscating items and seemed to be working a crime scene. In West Ocean City, in the Oyster Harbor community, a similar scene played out with the two brothers arrested. Personal property was seized and vehicles were stripped during searches.

Witnesses in the Oyster Harbor community reported to The Dispatch 15 police vehicles from Maryland, New York and New Jersey surrounded the home at 12648 Whisper Trace and two suspects were reportedly handcuffed and seen face down on the lawn. Additionally, at one point, a suburban rolled into the community and six armed agents ran into the house. Four flatbed trucks were also spotted on site and towed all of the vehicles at the home.

The Ramadan family is the owner of several local businesses, including area convenience stores, the Village Market shopping center in Ocean City and the Subway on Sunset Drive where the raid took place (but not other Subways in Ocean City, Berlin and Ocean Pines).

Both Basel and Samir Ramadan were being held yesterday in Worcester County on the charge of fugitive from justice — New York.

Questions to the federal Homeland Security office have not been answered as of deadline.

At yesterday’s press conference, authorities outlined the long-term investigation and specifically discussed the Ramadan brothers.

“This joint investigation by the Attorney General’s Organized Crime Task Force and the New York City Police Department, and with the assistance of Homeland Security Investigations, uncovered the trafficking ring and its connections to Brooklyn, Queens, Staten Island, the Bronx, Albany, Schenectady and multiple other states, including Maryland, Delaware, Virginia and New Jersey.

Through the use of electronic surveillance, physical surveillance and the review and analysis of financial records in conjunction with other investigative tools, the Attorney General’s investigation revealed that the head of the enterprise, Basel Ramadan, and his brother, Samir Ramadan, obtained cigarettes from a wholesaler, Cooper Booth Wholesale, Inc., in Virginia and stored them in a public storage facility in Delaware,” the Attorney General press release said. “Several times a week, co-conspirator Adel Abuzahrieh, of Brooklyn, drove with tens of thousands of dollars in cash from New York to Delaware where he gave the Ramadans the cash in exchange for cigarettes. Beyond the $55 million in purchases to cigarettes, the Ramadans have generated more than $10 million in profits from their illegal activities.”

Once the distributors were given the cigarettes, totaling approximately 20,000 cartons per week, they were provided to resellers, who then sold the untaxed smokes to Arab markets and grocery stores in the New York area. In total, the estimated sales tax revenue lost to New York State was estimated at more than $80 million.

“The Ramadan brothers furthered the criminal enterprise by depositing more than $55 million from their untaxed cigarette sales into small local financial institutions in and around Ocean City, Md., and used that money to purchase additional cigarettes for illegal sale,” the press release states.

Basel Ramadan and Samir Ramadan, along with 14 other New York and New Jersey residents, face anywhere from eight to 25 years in prison.

Although the brothers’ exact business ownership in the Ocean City is murky at best, due to another Ramadan family also being local proprietors, tax records confirm Basel Ramadan, through BSM Ocean City Properties LLC and Phoenix Property Investment LLC, owns several units in the Village Market shopping center on 18th Street and Philadelphia Avenue. The brothers own the Subway on Sunset Drive and the condominiums above it that served as their main office, but sources confirm they do not own the Subways on 12th Street, 3rd Street, inside the Walmart, Ocean Pines as well as Berlin.

Special Holiday Weekend Event Set For Berlin

BERLIN — The newly remodeled basketball courts at Henry Park will get a baptism by fire of sorts with the first annual Berlin Day in the Park, a three-day event over Memorial Day weekend that will include basketball tournaments and other festivities after the Mayor and Council approved the event this week.

Last fall, an ambitious program was undertaken to rehabilitate the dilapidated basketball courts and other amenities at Henry Park in Berlin along the east side of Route 113. That project is now nearing completion and the town has been seeking a signature event with which to christen the new facilities. The Mayor and Council got the event they were looking for this week with the approval of the first-ever Berlin Day in the Park event set for Memorial Day weekend.

Event organizer Terran Wright told the Council on Monday the three-day event would include a youth basketball tournament and an adult tournament for players in grade 10 and up, along with a free festival for kids and adults of all ages in conjunction with the Sonrise Church. In addition to the basketball tournaments, the Berlin Day in the Park event will include food and music, inflatable amusements for kids, horseshoes and several other events geared to all of the residents in the community.

“We were aiming for something for kids to look forward to and we came up with an idea for the basketball tournament,” said Wright. “That idea led to several others and we decided to try to make it a weekend-long event over Memorial Day. The long-term goal is to make this an annual event every Memorial Day.”

Wright said the event will afford kids in the community with wholesome activities and provide other entertainment for people of all ages in the community.

“I’ve been coaching youth football for a number of years and I’ve seen a lot of the problems with kids,” he said. “It’s nothing that can’t be fixed.”

Berlin officials embraced the idea for the Berlin Day in the Park and approved the three-day event.

“I think it’s wonderful,” said Councilwoman Lisa Hall. “He’s done a lot of work on this and it sounds like a wonderful event.”

Deputy Town Administrator Mary Bohlen said Berlin was looking for a special event to celebrate the renovation of Henry Park and Wright’s basketball tournaments and associated events fit the bill.

“We were hoping for somebody to step up and execute a basketball tournament to celebrate the opening of Henry Park,” she said.

Half Of Public Safety Building Lot To Become Paid Parking

OCEAN CITY – Half of the Public Safety Building parking lot on 65th Street will become paid parking for Ocean City visitors and residents starting this summer.

Along with the Mayor and City Council’s decision to implement paid parking on 146th Street from Coastal Highway to the beach, 49th Street from Coastal Highway to the beach, 131st Street from Coastal Highway to Sinepuxent Ave. and on the west side of Philadelphia Avenue from South 1st to North Division streets, the city is also planning to begin charging for parking in a portion of the municipal lot at the Public Safety Building on 65th Street. All moves are designed to increase revenue and help close a budget gap in the FY14 Financial Operating Plan.

City Engineer Terry McGean updated the Mayor and City Council on the plan to initiate paid parking in the eastern half of the Public Safety Building parking lot, while the other half closest to the building itself will be dedicated to public safety and district court employees and visitors. The parking lot is currently divided into two halves with a drive aisle running north/south.

Paid parking will only be enforced during “off hours”, which are 5 p.m. to 7 a.m. Monday through Friday, and all day on Saturday, Sunday and on holidays.

The west half of the lot will be posted as “Parking for Public Safety Building and District Court Employees and Visitors Only” and those spaces will striped with yellow paint. Employees will be issued a parking pass and enforcement will performed by the police department.

The paid parking half of the lot includes 101 parking spaces, excluding the spaces used by the MVA Mobile Office. Staff has estimates $20,000 in additional revenue per year from the lot, which is already included in the balanced FY14 proposed budget.

“It is a good idea and something we need to move forward with … make sure we sign it and let people know it’s available for beach parking as well on Saturday and Sunday,” Council President Lloyd Martin said.

Paid parking in Ocean City is currently in affect now on the weekends and will become enforced daily starting the Friday before Memorial Day weekend.

OC Eyes Tourism Dashboard To Track Key Figures

OCEAN CITY – The Town of Ocean City is on its way to creating a new tourism dashboard that will collect a variety of data to use as a metric in determining tourism productivity.

Ocean City tourism officials have been discussing how to come up with a more reliable way in measuring the amount of tourism passing through Ocean City, besides relying on Demoflush figures, which are estimations on the population in Ocean City based on wastewater flow from Ocean City provided by the Ocean City Wastewater Division and calculated by the OC Tourism Department.

At that time, the discussion concluded with several options left to be further explored, such as the State of Maryland’s tourism metric, looking into local resources to conduct a study, such as the Business, Economic and Community Outreach Network (BEACON) at Salisbury University, or hiring an independent entity to conduct a study.

Andy Malis of MGH, the town’s advertising agency, had suggested contacting Nobi in coming up with a way to measure Ocean City’s tourism. Nobi is a group of scientists that specialize in using complex mathematical modeling techniques and applied statistics in the form of experimental design to help clients achieve their objectives, but hiring the independent entity was a costly option.

During a commission meeting in April, Commission Chair/Councilwoman Mary Knight recommended the development of a subcommittee to analyze already available tourism data.

“The next step is developing a subcommittee to explore this a little bit further,” Tourism Director Donna Abbott said at that time. “There are a whole bunch of different things we could put on a dashboard like trash collection, bus revenue, parking lot revenue and all those different things we have that we can put into a report to have a better picture of what’s going on.”

At this week’s Tourism Commission meeting, Maryland Office of Tourism Development Director Margot Amelia shared the state’s monthly reports and the metrics used.

The Maryland Tourism Monitor is a monthly recap of Maryland’s travel and tourism trends monitored by the Amelia’s office. The monitor tracks the offices’ website visitation, the number of newsletter subscribers, social media traffic, requests for travel information, the number of welcome center visitors, kiosk usage, hotel occupancy reported by Smith Travel Research, Inc., airport arrivals, Amtrak train system ridership leisure and hospitality employment and tourism taxes.

“I know you guys have some really great metrics that you can look for because at the end of the day visitors are important but what’s really important is revenue,” Amelia said. “We can all do a really great job in guiding a lot of daytrippers into Ocean City to use the restrooms and generate some Demoflush but what we are interested in hearing is your hotel revenue is up and amusement and admissions tax is up and restaurant tax is up because that is how we can really tell if tourism is up.”

Since the last time the commission met, a tourism metric subcommittee had been formed and met.

“We made great progress in coming up with some metrics that we already have, and that we will hopefully be able to start with sometime this summer,” Knight said.

Abbott said like the Maryland Tourism Monitor, Ocean City has a lot of the same data available. It is just the matter of collecting the information and organizing it, such as bus ridership, Inlet parking revenue, solid waste collection, Demoflush and Smith Travel Report hotel occupancy.

County Might Take Over Ocean City Election

OCEAN CITY – City officials are getting rid of Ocean City’s outdated voting booths so voters can have one-stop voting on Election Day.

According to City Clerk Kelly Allmond, during the 2013 budget hearings the council requested a review of the municipal election process.

The Ocean City Municipal and Presidential Elections were held concurrently at the Roland E. Powell Convention Center on Nov. 6, 2012.  The two elections were held in separate rooms of the building. There were 3,064 voters for the municipal election and 3,144 voters for the presidential election. The total cost for the election was $9,060.

“At the end of the day, voters expressed one common concern about the municipal election — long lines,” Allmond said. “I attribute the delays to high voter turnout coupled with one disabled voting machine.”

Allmond furthered Ocean City’s voting system has become outdated as the Shoupe machines are now obsolete. The last vendor on the East Coast stopped servicing the machines in 2010, and the Mayor and City Council will be faced with added costs of replacing or renting additional voting equipment. The latest quote on leasing eight electronic poll books is $9,900 plus programming fees.

Allmond estimated $20,000 to conduct another separate municipal election, or a one-time cost of up to $15,000 to program the county system to incorporate the municipal election.

When City Solicitor Guy Ayres first looked into the idea of adding the local municipal election to the county’s program almost a year ago, the Worcester County Board of Elections advised him it could not be done without the State of Maryland’s Board of Elections approval.

For Ocean City’s election to be held by the county as part of the general election, legislation must be passed by the General Assembly.

“I have gone through the state election code and quite frankly I don’t agree with this,” Ayres said. “There is nothing in the state election code that requires them to do anything to add a municipal election date, in fact to the best of my knowledge they do it for Cumberland.”

Ayres suggested for Mayor Rick Meehan to write a letter to Senator Jim Mathias pointing out the issue with the state board and ask the senator to have the attorney general’s office to look at it.

Councilman Joe Mitrecic made a motion to move forward with having Ocean City’s municipal elections handled by the county and have the mayor write a letter to Mathias. The council vote was unanimous.