Following “Just the Facts”, “Howard Roark” and “Reality Check” has made me curious enough to dig a bit on my own. On the PWC Arts Council website I was appalled to find the name “Dominion Symphony” listed among our own arts groups! Isn’t this the Fairfax County orchestra headed by Councilman Mark Wolfe’s pal Chris Hite? If so, why are they allowed to advertise on a PWC website? It’s clear that Wolfe diverts PWC funds to this Annadale orchestra, but do they now intend to go after PWC funds directly? Do our County Board of Supervisors have any control in this matter whatsoever, or is it all up to the “Arts Liaison” Kathy Bentz and friends to decide how things will go around here? Presumably she oversees and approves the website?

Tell you what: Let’s just shut the whole thing down and start over. We clearly need music and the arts, both for our children and for ourselves, but we don’t need these shenanigans. I’d go without, rather than remain on constant watch over our County luminaries.

All that money into one project. We can’t even give our Teachers a decent pay raise or salary.
The teachers are suppose to work miracles with the kids, but the parents forget they need to help them at home. The Teachers can’t do it all.

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You don’t need to worry about the PWC educators, thanks to Obama and the federal stimulus. The PWC educators received an additional 25M dollars for this school year 2009-2010. That was enough to stop any layoffs of PWC educators (YES, there were the normal “de-staffs” resulting from changing school populations and changing BOE priorities). But, and this is important, all educators received a COLA, i.e. raise of approximately 3%, thanks to the eagle dropping stimulus dollars on PWC educators (union link?). OH, there is an additional 25M dollars of federal stimulus appropriated for the next school year too! Nice of the feds to make this contribution to our educators. But, who is going to pay that higher salary baseline, when the federal money dries up?

And what is it that Mark is supposed to explain? The facts are already in the public 990s. It seems that there is some very unfair “baiting” going on, with the clear suggestion that he is guilty becase he hasn’t explained himself. For shame! Given the way he has been attacked here, anyone so attacked would be a fool to say anthing.

My conclusion, until I hear more, is that this is a witch hunt to get Mark by people who don’t like him.

Words like “funneled money” suggest improper conduct, while “paid” money does not. Cute choice of words.

President Erkel lied, the economy died!

We deserve better.

Miller caused fits on the council about that vote. He put up a valiant effort putting other members of the council on the defensive, especially Parrish and Hayes. As I remember they were the biggest two proponents of the project on the council at the time. I also remember mayor Waldron seemed to agree with Miller by the way he spoke, but he didnt have at vote (he only broke tie votes).

I’ve spent a lot of time researching this situation because I want the arts to survive in our community for our benefit and for the benefit of our children without the influence of self-dealing and conflicts of interest corrupting the process. If problems such as we are suffering from now persist, the arts will vanish in our community and our kids will have nothing but the rubbish on television and other mass media. That’s not what I want.

Go to http://nccsdataweb.urban.org/PubApps/showVals.php?ft=bmf&ein=541964442 as you read this so you can see Chris Hite’s tax filings (form 990) for yourself. Wolfe and Hite seem to have no hesitation to lie to the citizens and elected officials of PWC and Manassas but I think they are scared of the IRS, and assume we’re not smart enough to look at those filings.

Hite was the executive director (a salaried position) of the Prince William Symphony Orchestra (PWSO) at least in years 1999 and 2000. During that time he used PWSO funds (taxpayer supported) to register a competing orchestra at his home address in Annandale with himself as president and his wife as secretary/treasurer. At that time they called the organization “Little River Symphony.” During this time also, Mark Holcomb was president of the PWSO board.

By no later than 2004 Hite and his Annandale group became Wolfe’s ballet orchestra, even though Wolfe continued to say publicly that he used the PWSO. See the tax filings at the above link for documentation of this. Also, the PWSO “musicians committee” controlled by people associated with Hite’s group, including Hite’s wife, had a nice thing going where they hired each other without even holding competitive auditions for slots. Hite and Wolfe essentially controlled both Manassas Ballet and the PWSO.

In 2007 the PWSO board hired a new executive director, Dr. David Montgomery, who tried to clean up this mess, including using a truly competitive audition process to improve the quality of the performances. The response from Hite and his people was swift and vengeful as they concocted a public smear campaign against Montgomery in late 2007. This move included a phony mass resignation of musicians from the PWSO. In fact, only eleven people who had actually signed on to play with the PWSO that year refused to honor their contracts, and they were all associated with Hite’s Little River Symphony. The remaining “resignations” were friends of Hite and the Little River Symphony who had no contracts or agreements with the PWSO.

During that smear campaign, Wolfe announced that he would no longer use the PWSO (he wasn’t using them anyway). Hite announced the creation of a new symphony that he called the “Dominion Symphony Orchestra,” which was where all of the musicians who left the PWSO would go. In fact, all he did was in early 2008 change the name on the corporate registration from “Little River Symphony” to “Dominion Symphony Orchestra.” See the letter from the Virginia Corporation Commission in Hite’s 2007 990 at the link above.

Mark Holcomb, the president of the PWSO at the time Hite created the Little River Symphony (aka Dominion Symphony Orchestra) in 1999 and 2000, recently became a member of Hite’s board. He is a very close associate of Kathy Bentz, the arts liaison who controls the PWC arts grants panel. They decide how to spend County arts funds, including Wolfe’s $55k. Bentz has had Holcomb on that panel since it was created three years ago.

Wolfe continues to lie publicly about his relationship with Hite’s Little River Symphony/Dominion Symphony Orchestra. He advertises even today ( http://www.manassasdance.org/09-10_Season.html ) that the “Manassas Ballet Theater Orchestra” plays at his performances. Hite’s 990s (tax filings linked above) prove otherwise. There is no such organization. Let Wolfe produce a corporate registration or tax filing in the name, “Manassas Ballet Theater Orchestra.” I’m not holding by breath waiting for that. Wolfe understands the PR problems associated with sending local tax dollars elsewhere (especially to his friends who live elsewhere) and has created this veil to attempt to conceal what he and Hite do.

These shenanigans by Wolfe, Hite, Bentz and Holcomb are going to destroy the arts community in Manassas and Prince William County. Their activities need to be shut down immediately. In fact, I think the City of Manassas and Prince William County should be in court Monday morning seeking an order to freeze all of the Manassas Ballet’s assets until a complete audit and investigation can be done.

As for COF’s comment and several others, I agree. I do not think in these economic times, we should be funding new arts projects. The city got rid of it Recreation and Parks Department and has scaled back many of the amenities that made the city popular to live in. There is the chance of more layoffs in the upcoming budget, so why are we funding these programs?

As to the county, where do you begin? The economic realities facing the Supervisors this year are tough. I don’t know how they will be able to balance thier budget without another round of cuts.

The local governing bodies, now more than ever have to extremely careful to justify how they spend our tax dollars. If there is the NEED to fund a program, fine, just be ready and willing to explain why!

Austin Haynes

Please note, I use my real name. I am always happy to have a meaningful conversation with anyone on our local issues. I appreciate the above comments as they were presented in such a fashion. If you feel that you wish to talk to me direct, Greg has my cell phone number and he has my permission to give it out.

All that money into one project. We can’t even give our Teachers a decent pay raise or salary.
The teachers are suppose to work miracles with the kids, but the parents forget they need to help them at home. The Teachers can’t do it all.
Then we have other Services that go with a cost of living and or pay raise and we expect them to be the top notch preformers.

Lets do away with all tax money going for these un-necessary undertakings, audit every penny that goes out and audit all the committees. We are spending way above our means and it needs to stop.

It would be sad if something was going on that shouldn’t be. But I think an audit should be done if only to show everyone that everything is above board.

I happen to agree with you. The ballet and symphony, while nice, are not necessary. These people are running a business and getting paid to do so. Let them figure out how to make their business work without taxpayers help.

Also if Mark is getting funds from the government and he and Bass are both board members of the dance school and I’m not sure if Parrish is still on that board, isn’t that a conflict of interest, seeing as how all of them are on city council? A government body that decides how to spend our tax money? Did any of them disclose that they were on the “ballet” board when an allocation was made to councilman Wolfes business?

Now in all fairness Bass may not have been on city council when funds were given out to Wolfe.