Grand Prix of Boston

http://www.bostonherald.com/news/columnists/joe_battenfeld/2016/08/battenfeld_raising_a_caution_flag

Now the feds expand their probe into the Grand Prix. I have no idea where that will lead, but this Casey guy who was running the event, he is just a complete joke. He's now asserting that his cancellation of the race was a bluff to try to get the course changed to avoid flood zones. Trying for a course change would be an entirely reasonable idea in response to that flood zone problem that cropped up - might not have worked so late, but it was worth a try. But bluffing a cancellation, without even clueing in the national IndyCar organization that he was going to do so, that is comically stupid. If true. With this guy, maybe he was not in fact bluffing when he cancelled, maybe he's just making shit up as he goes along and he thinks he can position the mayor to look like he overreacted to a bluff? Who the hell knows at this point?

Also, in news from Colorado, he lost a $1M lawsuit in part because he never showed up to defend himself. The plaintiff is now filing in Essex County court to enforce collection, and Casey is asserting that he expects to have it dismissed. The Herald did not clarify what exactly he meant by "it" but I think he meant the Essex County filing to force payment on the CO award (rather than the base CO case itself). If it's true that he never showed up to defend himself in CO court, he won't likely be getting collection enforcement suits dismissed anywhere.

So given Casey's complete lack of credibility, his assertions about the City strong-arming him are obviously suspect - might be yet more bullshit he's throwing against the wall to see if it sticks. But the news about a lawsuit in CO increases my astonishment that the City - and Commonwealth and the national IndyCar organization too - ever allowed this guy to get past the conceptualization stage with this race. Is it really the case that NO ONE at all did any due diligence? Really? The more news we get on this guy, the more he seems like someone who should never have gotten past about the second or third phone call before getting the brush off.

I think the local papers should dig in deeper on how much backing Casey got from the national IndyCar organization. I don't recall seeing much about that when this was all getting proposed. And there have been a bunch of proposed IndyCar races that have fallen through, not just Boston's. So maybe much of the absurdity here lies with that national organization, but I can't tell.
 
Promoters pay a flat sanctioning fee to IndyCar and, in return, get some promotional support and planning support while retaining all on site revenues from tickets, concessions, etc. IndyCar had been trying to get into the New England market for some time, so there may have been some prior pitching involved to get an investor/promoter on board, but ultimately they are looking for race venues, not Ponzi scheme opportunities. Remember, the goal is to have successful, long standing events, as that's what pays dividends for the series in the long term. Yes, many, many other street circuit races have fallen through, and I think ultimately the series will move away from them in the future.

To that end, for 2017 IndyCar has instituted a Request for Qualification process to determine new races. The responses need to include budgeting, local governmental assurances, and race/event promotion experience, among other things: http://www.sportsbusinessdaily.com/.../20/Leagues-and-Governing-Bodies/IndyCar.aspx
 
Thanks, Arenacale, I hadn't seen that article. It gets generally towards the answer I was looking for, but is really more about avoiding such problems in the future. And I certainly agree with you that they aren't in this business to stumble into this sort of mess.

But the article does say they previously did due diligence, however informally, in a process that was more "relationship-based." That still leaves me wondering about just what that entailed between IndyCar national and Casey and the City of Boston. Whether informal or not, what level of d.d. did IndyCar put into Casey, and what (if anything) did they convey to the City of Boston? Were they providing a thumbs up, or a caveat emptor sort of stance? What did the City of Boston do, independent of and in addition to, whatever IndyCar did?
 
So, to put a bow on this, I ended up going to the Watkins Glen race that ultimately replaced the GPoB (and will for the next 2 years as well!). While I'm still heartbroken that the Boston race is never going to happen, I was completely impressed with the Glen and will most likely make plans to be back there next year. The access was phenomenal, much like Lime Rock you can walk most of the track to see the different action spots. They also wisely went with a GA ticket that gave everyone access to the paddock, so there was more to do and see than you really had time for.

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Granted, my views were also skewed by the fact that I won a hot lap ride in a pace car and the opportunity to wave the green flag for the first session of qualifying! From the starters stand, the cars are way more intense, and from inside the car, the track is way more intense! The amount of elevation change is downright deceiving on TV, you think it's pretty flat, but then you experience it...

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They estimated about 30,000 attendees on Sunday, which is pretty damn good considering they had less than 4 months to promote the race and sell tickets, and, again, it's been renewed through 2018 so it looks like this should be a success going forward.

Meanwhile, wish I could have gotten my hands on one of those show cars they auctioned! I heard that Watkins Glen actually bought one of them.

If you like looking at pictures of cars as much as you like looking at pictures of buildings, I have a Flickr gallery: https://flic.kr/s/aHskHWd7Ga
 
Yikes, more details on Casey and the Boston Grand Prix:

http://www.wcvb.com/article/boston-grand-prix-free-spending-detailed/8501129

- - - -

"So where did all the money go? Records show the company spent nearly $20,000 on luxury boxes at the Boston Garden
for a Bruins game and a Bruce Springsteen concert, as well as money for junkets to Indy races in California and Florida."

" 'I wasn't paid that much money,' Casey told 5 Investigates back in June, but under oath before the bankruptcy trustees’
attorney, he said he paid himself more than $608,166 and claimed he is still owed another $377,834."

Casey also testified he regularly paid his own personal bills out of company bank accounts,including $8,200 dollars for his
personal home mortgage and a legal bill paid on his behalf to a lawyer in Utah.

Boston Grand Prix also paid for Casey’s Porsche, which he is still driving, $6,000 for two business suits and $2,500 for
a Boston College Club membership.

The company even paid off a debt for one of Casey's other businesses, Laser Leasing, which had nothing to do with the race.

- - -
 
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F-Line to Dudley said:
How did the city miss so many screamingly obvious red flags with these hucksters? Scarily incompetent vetting right there.
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I don't believe any vetting was done at all.

From the channel 5 article:
And that brings us to Casey's accounting, the sum total of which was just one seven-page spreadsheet, obtained by 5 Investigates, with none of the transactions dated.

That led to these questions from the bankruptcy trustee's attorney.
Attorney: "There were no other books and records that Boston Grand Prix kept for the company?"

Casey: "No."
Click to expand...

At that level of “accounting”, it wasn’t possible for the City to have done any vetting; there was not a sufficient basis of financial information upon which to perform standard due diligence. For an endeavor of this kind, the City ought to have been demanding proper financial statements audited by an independent audit firm of some well-known standing. A seven-page unaudited spreadsheet ought not to have gotten this joker past the door of even the most cursory vetting. It should have been a short "get the fuck outta here" conversation.

Later in the article, in a part about what access Casey’s lobbyists / consultants had to the Walsh administration:

"Boston Grand Prix failed. It didn’t happen,” Walsh said. “So I don't know what kind of access it is.”

The mayor said the only lack of transparency was with John Casey himself.

“I give no one special treatment, and I certainly wasn't going to give consultants to BGP special treatment,” he said.

The mayor also said he is glad details are coming out on how Boston Grand Prix was operated.
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Sweet Jesus, Walsh better be thanking whatever deity he believes in that the Grand Prix fell apart at the stage it did. Most folks aren't paying attention, he can dismiss it all under the "no harm, no foul" approach, and get away with that.

This was a pure Ponzi scheme. Imagine if Casey had managed to hold it together just long enough to get the staging all set up, the race crews in town, the point of no return well and truly crossed, and THEN his house of cards had collapsed? Walsh would have had a nightmare on his hands. I hope to hell he has learned from this.
 
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