Some cash-strapped communities go commercial

By Kathleen Burge, Globe Staff, 11/12/2003

In Holden, a library volunteer enters cyberspace to hawk books to bidders on eBay. In Barnstable, officials are wooed with a potential $1 million deal to rename their airport after a company, while Andover leaders ponder bottling and selling their award-winning municipal water.

In Beverly and Braintree, they post ads on school buses. And in Princeton, the town's municipal light department is hoping for a free bucket truck, plastered with corporate logos.

Mark Hughes -- the chief executive of Buzzmarketing who persuaded Halfway, Ore., to change its name to Half.com in 2000 -- said cities and towns struggling through tough financial times are looking for money wherever they can.

"I think municipalities are open to new and different things more and more these days," said Hughes, who also proposed that the Barnstable Municipal Airport become the first in the country to sell its "naming rights" to a corporation eager to advertise. "There's a lot of receptivity."

But not everyone is as enthusiastic. Gary Ruskin, executive director of the nonprofit Commercial Alert, warns that the trend toward partnerships between municipalities and corporations can lead only to trouble.

"Will you hang a 100-foot Coke bottle over a school?" Ruskin asked. "Will the mayor wear patches for city sponsors on his suit jacket? Once you accept the notion that your city is for sale, there's no logical place for it to end."

Hughes and Ruskin agree, though, that tight budgets have made communities more amenable to novel ways of raising money. In Massachusetts, state aid to cities and towns, not including education, has plunged more than $500 million over the past two fiscal years, according to the Massachusetts Municipal Association. More and more communities are voting to override the state's limit on property tax increases under Proposition 2 1/2.

In communities forced to lay off workers and charge residents new fees, officials are looking for fresh ways to earn money. Some are finding help beyond their borders, often in corporate coffers.

Geoffrey Beckwith, executive director of the municipal association, said the selling of the suburbs is a sign of desperation. "There aren't any magic solutions," he said.

These days, the fund-raising machine of the Gale Free Library, an elegant granite building bequeathed to the town of Holden in 1888, runs day and night on eBay, the online auction site. In 1999, when Judy Haran took over the annual book sale run by the Friends of the Gale Free Library, she discovered that she could raise more money selling the books via an online auction.

Haran and her volunteers have shipped books as far as Russia and New Zealand. One of their all-time bestsellers was a 50-year-old guide to hunting and fishing in Alaska, snapped up for $200. "There's a certain thrill to this, because often you don't really know what it's worth," Haran said. "It's sort of like winning the lottery, I guess." In January, Hughes of Buzzmarketing had an idea for town and airport officials in Barnstable: Follow the lead of football stadiums and basketball courts by selling naming rights -- the Ocean Spray Cranberries Airport, for instance -- and earn as much as $1 million. But airport officials were cool to the idea.Barnstable's response hasn't dampened Hughes's enthusiasm for selling naming rights. The people of Half.com, Ore., got $100,000, plus loads of publicity, for changing their name to match an Internet shopping site now run by eBay. The possibilities are endless, Hughes said. "Buzzards Bay is a really awful name," he said. "It could be Barnes & Noble Bay. Why not?"

Andover officials are considering a list of money-making ideas, including the bottling and selling of the municipal water, which has won awards for its taste.

Some towns are not eager to see any more commercialism in daily life. Cohasset selectmen rejected selling the naming rights to three new fields at the town's $450,000 baseball and softball complex, though they did allow sponsors to post their names on the scoreboards. The trend toward selling the naming rights of public places worries those, like Ruskin, who fear that corporations already wield too much power over public affairs.

Still, the lure of corporate money tempts many a cash-strapped town, even when it comes to controversial items like cellphone towers. Cities and towns are discovering they can lease space for antennas. Starting next year, Weymouth will receive $24,000 a year for allowing an antenna to transmit signals from the cupola of its historic Town Hall.

The new face of community fund-raising can be seen in the ads for Curves gyms posted on the yellow sides of Beverly school buses. In September, the city became the state's first to raise money for education by accepting poster-sized ads on school buses. Last month, Braintree school officials followed suit, selling ads to businesses on the sides of school buses: $2,000 for a six-month run.

Kathleen Burge can be reached at kburge@globe.com.

© Copyright 2003 Globe Newspaper Company.