From Midlands Tribune
http://www.midlandtribune.ie/articles/news/44932
A little more detail here.
Croke Park To Intervene As Major Financial Crisis Looms For Offaly GAA Board
Thursday, 19 February 2015
CROKE Park has stepped in as a major financial crisis has emerged for the Offaly GAA County Board.
Rumours that the finances of the board were not in a good position have floated around in recent weeks and these were confirmed at the February meeting of the Offaly GAA County Board last week when it emerged that Croke Park have been asked to come to the county's rescue with a new loan.
Officers admitted that the county is experiencing serious cash flow problems at the moment but the problem is way deeper than that with a lengthy list of creditors owed thousands of euros.
It was revealed that players have only been paid recently for vouchers for football boots that were supposed to be paid last year.
It is understood that over €200,000 is owed by the board - while the Offaly GAA income and expenditure account showed a profit of €38,045 last year, the balance sheet showed that creditors were owed a massive €455,602.
Paying the loans for the redevelopment of O'Connor Park is also proving to be a major burden for the board. Last year, O'Connor Park showed an operating deficit of €99,405.
It was announced last week that Offaly GAA's O'Connor Park loan with Ulster Bank is being transferred to central headquarters at Croke Park while intensive negotiations have also taken part with members of the National Finance Committee in an effort to solve the current financial crisis.
A meeting between board officers and all club chairpersons, secretaries and treasurers will take place in the coming weeks where details of a package and the repayments schedule from Croke Park will be announced to them before being formally put to a full County Board meeting on March 10th.
It also emerged that the crisis may affect the board's plans to develop a new training facility at Kilcormac though chairman, Padraig Boland is very hopeful that this will still proceed as planned.
Treasurer Jimmy Hogan told delegates that cash flow is currently causing the board a major problem with all county teams now in training, a lot of invoices coming in and no revenue from club championships or other sources.
Mr Hogan stated that the Offaly GAA Finance Committee have held a number of meetings to address the problem and have submitted proposals to the National Finance Committee.
He declined to reveal figures but told Clara delegate Brian Gavin that the situation was 'very bad'.
Mr Padraig Boland revealed that the Finance Committee, chaired by James Murphy of Rhode, have been meeting almost every day on the issue. He stated that their list of creditors has increased substantially in the last twelve months while the board is now introducing a new financial management package and procedures.
'Quite an amount of money is owed to creditors,' he revealed. 'Some belong to the current period. Others are more historical, over a two to three year period. We were sufficiently concerned to raise it with the National Finance Committee. We need goodwill with creditors. The cash flow is not any worse than any other year.'
The National Finance Committee will be coming back to Offaly with their proposals before their term ends on February 27/28, Mr Boland declared.
'It is a chance to make hay out of a crisis and get all our affairs in order,' Mr Boland said.
He told Brian Gavin that O'Connor Park has been a big factor in the board's financial plight. He stressed that O'Connor Park had to be developed as Offaly had to play two 'home' championship matches away in consecutive years but that it was putting them under pressure.
In a meeting with John Brown of Leinster Council, it emerged that the repayments on O'Connor Park were the difference between Offaly and the finances of comparably sized neighbouring counties. Apart from that, Offaly compared very favourably with them, Mr Boland told delegates.
He stated that part of their financial problem was that a 'business decision' was taken in recent years to prioritise repayments on O'Connor Park over paying money owed to creditors.
He hoped that O'Connor Park could generate more revenue and avenues such as concerts, naming rights and other ventures are under consideration.
The board are now putting procedures in place where all creditors will be paid over a 30/60 day period.
Mr Boland is hopeful that the new €1.5 million county training grounds will proceed as planned in Kilcormac. He stated that they were in an awkward position as they were seeking support to pay creditors on one hand and support to develop a training ground on the other.
He promised that clubs would not be asked to finance the Kilcormac training ground but he said that they have put a strong case to Croke Park about funding for the facility.
He agreed with St Brigid's delegate Laz Molloy that smaller counties like Offaly are being left behind by the bigger counties. He said there is growing concern in Croke Park about this and staff are trying to solve it. 'Behind the scenes, there is a row about how this is done,' he said, adding that he was stunned recently when he heard that every club in Dublin pays €22,500 for a full time coach and this is matched by the Dublin County Board. He said a club like Kilmacud Crokes is bigger than Offaly.
'The playing pitch is not level. The GAA is a strange organisation. Sometimes they can't do something because everyone else will want the same but they try and help in different ways. Our case has to be fought and we will fight it,' Mr Boland commented.
Stressing that no one was being critical of anyone who has served the board in the past, he concluded by saying: 'O'Connor Park needs to be more self sustaining. It has the potential to do it. We need to be more focussed on that. We have been run like a voluntary organisation. We need to be more professional. We are not casting aspersions on anyone who has been here before. The people who were here before did very well to keep the ball in the air while playing into a gale force wind but we are where we are and my job as chairman is to lead us out of it. We will get out of it but we need help from Croke Park.'