Conneaut Lake can't be sold for tax money while under court supervision

Posted | Contributed by Jeff

Don’t expect to find Conneaut Lake Park on the list of properties to be sold at an annual Crawford County Tax Claim Bureau sale, despite the fact no real estate taxes have been paid for 10 years and now are more than $400,000 in arrears. As long as the 115-year-old amusement park is under court supervision, it can’t be sold for unpaid property taxes.

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Conneaut Lake

Ok...this is going to be really confusing.......

If the park isnt making enough money to pay the taxes and they are getting further in debt, the "public owns" the park, the park doesnt qualify for tax abatement, but yet the public which owns the park can sell their own park to pay off the debt it owes to the public? How can Conneaut Lake Park get a win in that situation? How can the public get a win in that situation? It sounds to me to be a lose-lose proposition.

Dont get me wrong...I love Conneaut Lake. I want to see them succeed. If I had enough money to donate to the park, I would. There is just no way out of the downward spiral unless someone or some entity will donate enough money to wipe the debt away and give the park some wiggle room to get new rides, etc.

EDIT - spelling*** This post was edited by beast7369 2/15/2007 10:17:30 AM ***

Unfortunately, the only new ride for Conneaut will be called "Circle the Drain."

I wish they would just get it over with. This slow death is sad to watch.

What I want to know is...

What is Conneaut Lake's financial condition *EXCLUSIVE OF the tax debt*.

Only if you separate out the back taxes can you figure out if the place is really making money or not. My suspicion is that Conneaut Lake is making enough money to operate, but not enough to pay its taxes. Which would explain why it has managed to survive this long.

--Dave Althoff, Jr.

^last I read, the hotel restaurant and lounge lost $198,000 of the $230,000 they were in the red. (i don't believe taxes were even part of the loss equation.

Cue Gonch...

If they know the property can't be put up for tax sale, there's no sense of urgency to have to pay the back taxes. There are better places for them to put their money.

On the other hand, say the County Tax Claim Bureau somehow does put the property up for tax sale, do you think anyone is just going to walk in and write a check for $400,000 and assume responsibility for future tax bills? So they own a business that apparently isn't making any money, or worse, they own "land" that is occupied by a park that's not making any money. Just because a property goes up for tax sale, doesn't mean someone's going to buy it.

Also the township seems to keep placing additional restrictions on what can be done on the site, so that's going to scare away potential buyers. The local and county governments might be dreaming of someone to hand them a s***load of money, but realistically, I doubt it's going to happen.

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