Historically, the Tourism and Culture department has been referred event sponsorship and fee wavier requests.  The current process does not allow for the administration to properly analyze and capture the information required to make a sound fiscal decision, which would determine the legitimacy and worth of tax payer dollars sponsoring events. The administration would like to strengthen our sponsorship application process in order to ensure that funds are given to worthy candidates and to ensure that accountability and fiscal responsibility are exercised at all times.

In Sec. 12-7(a) of Chapter 12 (Arts, Culture and Entertainment) of the City Code, the process currently states that any request for City Sponsorship of an event of $25,000 or more shall only be considered through the City Commission's annual budget process. 

All other requests for City sponsorship, pursuant to 12-7(b) shall require "(I) an advisory recommendation of the Finance and Citywide Projects Committee; and (ii) by a five-sevenths (5/7th) vote, of the City Commission," and 12-7(c) states that 'in considering approval of a Sponsorship for an event, "the City Commission may consider:

(I) whether the event organizer has exercised good-faith diligent efforts to apply for grant funding that may be available from the City's Visitor and Convention Authority ("VCA" or Cultural Arts Council ("CAC");
(ii) the Event organizer's history and performance in delivering quality Events,
(iii) any benefits being directly provided to the general public with respect to the Event, such as free or discounted tickets to persons residing in the City of Miami Beach, seniors, veterans, or member of disadvantaged groups;
(iv) whether the event is accessible to the general public (either as a ticketed event or otherwise); (v) the demonstrable economic impacts associated with the Event;
(vi) the demonstrable media commitments secured by the Event organizer for the Event; or
(vii) the efforts undertaken by the Event organizer to mitigate any quality of life impacts associated with the Event, including noise, littering, traffic or parking impacts associated with an Event."

In FY 18/19 the City of Miami Beach issued sponsorships and fee waivers in the amount of $1,954,128.52. The Tourism and Culture department believes that the City of Miami Beach's Sponsorship Request Process should have a clear mandate that all applications should serve one of the following purposes:

1) To serve as an investment in our Resort Tax collection practices, by supporting experiences that can verify an increase in tourism with hotel room blocks (contracts) or confirmed tourist attendance (ex: ticket sales).

2) To serve as a marketing / branding initiative by supporting experiences that place Miami Beach on the international stage via partnership and media / PR exposure.

3) To serve as a way to engage residents by providing unique and engaging experiences that increase their quality of life.

4) To serve to strengthen our cultural tourism initiatives.

In order to achieve the above, the Tourism and Culture Department would like to further elaborate on our existing guidelines, by implementing the following considerations:

1) Update Sponsorship Definition
2) Mayor and Commission Discretionary Fund totaling $200,000.
3) Sponsorship Score Card
4) Sponsorship Term Limits
5) Sponsorship Step Down
6) Sponsorship Financial Limit

1) Sponsorship Definition:
A sponsorship will be considered as any cash payment to an applicant via this process, but will also now include Fee Waivers, as well as rental waivers for use of City of Miami Beach properties (Miami Beach Convention Center, Fillmore Miami Beach or the Colony Theater).  We recommend that these requests be done prior to events taking place and to not accept requests made retroactively. 

2) Mayor and Commission Discretionary Fund:
In an attempt to allow the Mayor and Commission more flexibility to sponsor the experiences they feel are important to our community, the administration recommends implementing a discretionary fund for each of the Mayor and Commissioners, which will allow them to support any event requesting cash sponsorships or fee waivers between $0 and $25,000.00 dollars.

Event producers would be able to interact directly with the Office of the Mayor and Commission in order to secure this support, which would alleviate significant time and resources that the administration spends on agenda items and sponsorship requests of less than $25,000.00.

The administration recommends allocations as per the below:
- Mayor - $50,000.00 fund
- Commissioners - $25,000 fund x 6 Commissioners
- Total - $200,000.00 budgeted sponsorship dollars and fee waivers for smaller, community-based events.

Once these funds were exhausted, applicants would need to go through the CAC or the VCA to receive additional support for sponsorships under $25,000.00 as the administration will no longer consider sponsorships, or in-kind donations of less than $25,000.00 as these amounts should be covered by the Cultural Arts Council (CAC) and the Visitor and Convention Authority (VCA).

This discretionary funds would allow the Mayor and Commission to give out multiple sponsorships in smaller allotments to deserving organizations and producers, without taking up significant Commission, FCWPC, Administration, City Attorney and Clerk’s Office time preparing agenda items, agreements, etc., for minimal sponsorship amounts.

To outline the time savings, on average, a sponsorship item of less than $25,000.00 takes appx 8-12 hours of Tourism and Culture administration time to execute:

Researching initial agenda item - 3-5 hours (calls, emails, company research)
Preparing Commission Agenda Item - 60 minutes (writing, revising)
Preparing / Presenting Committee Agenda Item - 2-3 hours
Preparing / Presenting Final Commission Item - 30-60 minutes (if no revisions required from Committee)
Execution of Item - 2-3 hours (calls with entity to inform of Commission decisions, writing contract / agreements, revisions, execution of contract).

Total: 8 – 12 hours per item

The above discretionary funds would allow the Mayor and Commission to sponsor worthy community initiatives in a much more timely manner.

3) Sponsorship Score Card:
For all sponsorships $25,000 or greater (cash, fee waivers for permits or rental of the MBCC), applicants would need to submit their proposals between May and July for the following fiscal year.

This sponsorship score card outlines the initiatives of the City of Miami Beach as it pertains to event sponsorship via our Sponsorship Mandate and will score applications accordingly to ensure they meet the guidelines of funding.

In order to qualify for funding via the City of Miami Beach Sponsorship Ordinance, you must meet the following criteria:

1) Have applied to the CAC or VCA for funding. If funding was denied, then the applicant would qualify for a CMB Sponsorship with proof of denial, however, if funding was received via the VCA or CAC, the applicant would not be considered for a cash sponsorship, but WOULD be eligible for fee waivers.

2) All applicants for a City of Miami Beach sponsorship in excess of $25,000 would need to identify a 1 to 1 financial match in a value equal to or greater than the amount being requested (this includes fee waivers). 
a) If the applicant is not able to clearly identify a 1 to 1 match, via signed contracts or a Letter of Intent with a sponsor(s) or other donation, the administration would recommend that this is not an event the City should be sponsoring, or that the applicant has not done the legwork required to produce a successful event.
b) The 1 to 1 match cannot come from the CAC, VCA, or other City of Miami Beach department (as these are all the same funding sources).

3) The applicant must submit their request in writing to the Tourism and Culture department who can properly research and to ensure that all agenda items have been vetted and approved by the administration in a clear and accountable manner.

As part of this written request, the applicant should clearly outline their request, with dollar amounts. No cash sponsorship from the City of Miami Beach can be spent on event infrastructure such as staging, barricades or security. Cash sponsorships must be spent on items that will enhance attendee experience (entertainment / programming, art installations, rides, etc.).

Example Sponsorship Request:
Cash Sponsorship - $50,000

     $25,000 – Main Stage Performer
     $15,000 – Site Performers (acrobats)
     $10,000 – Art Installation
Fee Waivers - $48,000 based on permitting departments estimates

Total Sponsorship Request - $98,000

Once the above has been submitted and approved, the administration will score the applicant with the "City of Miami Beach Sponsorship Score Card" and request supporting documents. Should an applicant not be able to fulfill any of the above requirements, the Tourism and Culture Department would notify the applicant that their application is incomplete and no further processing can take place. Should an application remain incomplete, it would be considered null and void and no further action would be taken.

Score Card:
Successful applicants will be adjudicated against the attached "City of Miami Beach Sponsorship Score Card" based on the following criteria (further explanation of each criteria can be found in attachment "Score Card Explanations").

- Proof of 501(c)3 status

- Length of Event (incentive to get producers to shorten load in / load out times)

- History of Event

- Hotel Room Blocks

- Attendance (Local, National, International)

- Resident Discount

- Community Benefits (Education, Small Business, Seniors, Veterans)

- Marketing / PR Exposure

- Utilization of Multiple CMB Venues

- Name / Brand Exposure

The administration recommends that no sponsorships be pursued from applications who score less than 65% of this score card, as it would be seen as the funds not going to worthy experiences as per the City of Miami Beach Sponsorship Mandate. Applicants would be notified of their score, and would be given the chance to increase their score for each of the line items above to become more in line with the CMB sponsorship initiatives (more hotels, international marketing campaign, etc.).

Based on the score received from the Sponsorship Score Card, applicants would receive that percentage of their Sponsorship request:

Example: As per the example above, an approved applicant is requesting the following:
a. Cash Sponsorship - $50,000
b. Fee Waivers - $48,000
Total request - $98,000.00

After completing the sponsorship score card, the applicant received a 72% rating. The applicant could then not receive more than 72% of their ask ($98,000.00 x 72% = $70,560.00).

4) Sponsorship Term Limit
No sponsorship agreement can exceed a five-year term and in order to be eligible for a five (5) year term, the event must have been produced within Miami Beach for at least three (3) years prior to the application. All sponsorship contracts, no matter the term or dollar amount must include verbiage that requires an audit of post event data as per the Sponsorship Score Card, before the next year’s funding can be approved.

If a sponsorship is for a multi-year agreement, the applicant must prove, via audited statements, that all targets and goals were hit. If not, the administration reserves the right to re-evaluate the score, and reduce the sponsorship or cancel the agreement.

5) Sponsorship Step Down
All cash sponsorships must have a step down over the course of their duration equal to the number of years agreed to. Example: a $25,000 sponsorship over 5 years would have the following step down:
Year 1 - $25,000
Year 2 - $20,000
Year 3 - $15,000
Year 4 - $10,000
Year 5 - $5,000
Applicants who have been producing their events for a minimum of five (5) years within Miami Beach and who maintain a minimum sponsorship score card of 90% every year via verified documents, can be considered to continue their funding without the required step down. These will be on a case by case basis.

6) Sponsorship Financial Limit
In FY 18/19, the City of Miami Beach has sponsored events (cash sponsorships and permit fee waivers) in the amount of $1,503.000.00, in addition to fee and permit fee waivers in the amount of $451,128.52. This has resulted in a total of $1,954,128.52 in sponsorships and waived fees for FY 18/19.  Note: this does not include $680,500.00 in City Wide Sponsorships and Grants that are administered through other departments (MDPL Grant, Boys and Girls Club, etc.)

The administration recommends that a sponsorship limit of $1,500,000.00 be set and that the administration not be allowed to sponsor or waive fees in excess of $1,500,000.00 without Commission approval.

The administration believes that the above methods will increase accountability and financial responsibility, while also allowing applicants to see how they can increase their funding by aligning their events to the overall objectives of the City of Miami Beach.  This process is expected to have the following outcome:

1) Resort Tax Collection:
a. Proper use of sponsorship funds will increase Resort Tax Collection by ensuring we are supporting events that will bring tourists to our city, and fill hotel rooms.
b. Economic Impact on local businesses and cultural institutions through increased tourism will also be recognized.

2) Miami Beach Brand Equity:
a. Supporting High Quality events with international marketing reach, will only increase the way in which the world sees Miami Beach, and will help increase tourism year-round.

3) Resident Quality of Life:
a. Supporting experiences that our residents want to attend.
b. Supporting experiences that put tourists in hotel rooms, which will help to calm traffic and parking issues, as attendees will be able to explore our city on foot rather than by driving.