Blog reader Robert insists “The City has not contributed taxpayer dollars to the Port in more than 5 or 6 years.” This got me curious since I wanted to know how it could lose nearly $10 million since 2000 and not cost anything.
There is some truth to Robert’s statement because the depreciation at the Port is huge. However total cash flow is negative for the past 5 years. Also realize how little a return this is on a huge, huge investment (ROI)
2007 Net cash $44,436 – Depreciation $1,310,688 – ROI 0.22%
2006 Net cash loss ($30,872) – Depr. $1,324,930 ROi negative (.15%)
2005 Net cash $72,015 – Depr $912,928 ROI 0.49%
2004 Net cash $32,534 – Depr $991,993 ROI 0.24%
2003 Net cash loss ($169,145) – Depr. 938,553 ROI negative (1.17%)
Total net cash loss 2003-2007: ($51,032)
Source: Audited financial statements in the CAFR reports.
Let’s look a little a deeper. The financial statements also show how much was contributed to the Port from other capital assets. It seems that if you don’t count depreciation that you should at least show what came from other capital assets to the Port.
2003-2007: $6,865,758
This means the Port cost city taxpayers in real dollars $51,032 since 2003. Remember this is a $20 million asset. And we spent another $6,865,758 on the Port over the past 5 years.
Total real dollars: $6,916,790.
Looks like somebody is giving Robert the wrong information. Imagine that.