The Bay Area Reporter - Friday, May 7, 1999
Jim Provenzano

But even some sponsors have come under fire for their role in what many call the largest AIDS fundraiser ever. One critic claims contractors reap hefty profits from their participation.

This week, the Bay Area Reporter focuses on some of the companies working with Pallotta TeamWorks, the for-profit company that produces the official Tanqueray AIDS Rides. (Not unlike their elusive mascot "Mister Jenkins," representatives from major sponsor Tanqueray gin have not been found by press time, but will hopefully be included in upcoming articles.)

Boston-New York rider Todd Davis's website describes the 1995 Ride's finale as "well orchestrated to tug at the heartstrings," with an almost choreographed line of rainbow-colored riders in Tanqueray-emblazoned jerseys given precedence over riders who had actually arrived earlier. It provided an eye-catching photo op, Davis acknowledged, "But at the same time, we had just ridden 65 miles in a downpour and all I wanted was a bath."

That bath may have been provided in one of the lumbering trailers furnished by OK's Cascade, of Monroe, Washington, which, according to one former Pallotta employee, collects "huge sums" for their services.

"They provide meals and showers," said John Haley, who worked on the 1996 Chicago-Twin Cites AIDS Ride and the Boston-New York 1997 AIDS Ride. "They've done it on every event" and were contracted and paid as "one of the biggest expenses. Every night the accountant would go over that day's fee. He wrote them checks for $45,000 to $50,000 a day."

"The lunches alone û bag lunches û are put together by the company," Haley told the B.A.R. "You're talking about a chicken salad sandwich, a bit of pasta salad and a Clif Bar, all budgeted at $12.50 each."

Haley contends that these contracts are a form of sweetheart deal set up by Pallotta TeamWorks founder Dan Pallotta.

"If Pallotta's not on the board," he said, "he's certainly a shareholder."

To find out, the B.A.R. called Wade MacIntire of OK's Cascade, the company Pallotta TeamWorks hires exclusively to construct the "tent cities" around the country.

B.A.R.: You provide the mobile units for AIDS Rides. How many are there?

Wade MacIntire: We have a number of units. We're a logistic support company. It's what we do. We have mobile kitchens and mobile showers. For the California AIDS Ride, I think we use three of our mobile kitchens. We have four or five showers that we utilize on that Ride, as well as a whole host of equipment, as well as a very large staff. We probably employ 40-50 people on the Ride to deliver the services and prepare the meals. We do all of the AIDS Rides and a lot of events for promoters.

What other events?

We prepare the meals. We're a mobile caterer. The equipment's only part of what we do. We also have mobile laundries. We can basically create a city in the middle of nowhere.

So like film shoots, other events?

We do lots of bicycle rides. The government hires us for emergency response events, like Hurricane Andrew. We're a rapid response mobile support company. We're fairly unique in that we're certainly one of the biggest, because we have a lot of equipment and a lot of staff.

Are the AIDS Rides you do only with Pallotta TeamWorks?

We've done stuff with lots of other agencies.

So, what are your rates?

What are my rates?

Yes. How much does it cost to produce one AIDS Ride?

I'm not even going to begin to get into that. That information is entirely confidential.

Well, with people raising millions of dollars, some of them have asked me to ask you where the money's going.

It's not our position to deal with that. What we get are countless responses from people saying how grateful they are for what we do, but you know, if you want to know about costs, you'll have to talk to Pallotta.

Some AIDS groups have shown increasingly smaller net proceeds in several cities. Do you reduce your costs for a nonprofit or a smaller group, more than you would for any other group?

There's so many nonprofit groups. If we donated all of them, we'd be broke and we wouldn't be around or be able to do any of them, and if we weren't around, they wouldn't be able to do the AIDS Rides. My point is, we give them a very fair value. It takes a lot of expensive resources to do what we do. We obviously make a reasonable profit on it, or we wouldn't be doing it. They're very intense events to do, but we're not getting rich doing AIDS Rides, let me tell you.

In recent years, newspapers in five cities have reported that AIDS Rides have had disappointing proceeds because of increased costs. Directors of several AIDS organizations have said these costs are far too great. Do you?

We've been doing the Rides for a number of years. We've held our costs steady. We're employed by the Pallotta organization, and if we weren't there to do the Rides, nothing would be raised for the charity. When they get concerned about it enough and they don't want to do the Rides, well, I guess that's the case but I'm not going to discuss what the rates are or our relationship with our clients.

Two cities have already organized their own rides. With 80 percent of the money not going to those it's supposed to benefit, they seemed a little upset.

If they're upset, I guess the Rides will drop off, but at this point we work on them. That's up to them to deal with all those issues. Many, many millions of dollars go to the organizations that are supposed to receive it. They wouldn't get a dime of it if Pallotta wasn't in the act, or companies like his.

Don't you think that's a bit single-minded?

Look, I'm not gonna discuss this with you. I've told you what we do: our equipment is very expensive. You can't do the kind of thing we do without it, and if you're sort of insinuating that we must be cuttin' a fat hog, believe me, we're not, and I don't need to defend that with you, or anybody else.

Is Dan Pallotta a shareholder in your company?

It's a confidential relationship and I'm sure you understand that.

Stock and bars, energy gel

120,000. That's the number of "food items" donated by sponsor Clif Bar, including Clif Bars and Clif Shot, described as "an energy gel" that squirts out like the contents of a toothpaste tube.

Berkeley-based Clif Bar, Inc. is a corporate sponsor of the AIDS Rides for the second year. Dean Mayer, marketing director for Clif Bar, said that his company is "involved in the most intense way. All employees have been offered the opportunity to ride at company expense. That includes people who have never been on a Ride."

Clif Bar is a growth industry all its own. Recently the company office was profiled in the Chronicle for its work-play environment, where employees are encouraged to "get motivated" by using an indoor climbing wall.

With such a hearty work environment, AIDS Ride participation fits in with their healthy image. "The company has an on-site gym and trainers," Mayer said. "They can take classes. If employees don't have a bike, we get them one. We'll front the money for them at no interest."

Clif Bar held an AIDS Ride kick-off party in February, as well as a rummage and bake sale. "Everybody's doing what they can to raise money."

Mayer said that 75 percent of Clif Bar employees will be riding throughout the country. "The others will be volunteering, working at a booth at different stations. Essentially if they're not riding, they're volunteering."

Clif Bar co-founders Gary Erickson and Lisa Thomas are also riding in the California Ride, he said, along with about a dozen employees. In a company of 80 people, Mayer claimed a six-figure allotment of paid services to support riders. "If you go, your flight, your hotel, your time away is paid for by Clif Bar."

Riders who raise greater amounts of money enjoy the privilege of riding as "Team Clif Bar," complete with name brand logos and priorities at photo opportunities.

At the mention of funding problems, Mayer bristles, and shifts the subject. "AIDS is an important issue for us. As the world begins to forget about AIDS, we don't see that. We know that it's still important. We want to maintain public awareness."

When asked to comment on the exorbitant costs of recent other Rides, Mayer said, "It would be nice if all the money went to AIDS, but you can't run a fundraising effort without having some overhead. I can't make a judgment about the amount that used or spent. You're bringing in new people and millions of dollars that wouldn't be there."

He claimed that of the gross totals of $100 million raised, approximately 57 percent will go to AIDS service groups. "Much of that $60 million wouldn't have gone to them without the AIDS Rides."

San Francisco AIDS Foundation (SFAF) financial summaries confirm this. According to a brochure produced by the foundation, costs for the California AIDS Ride 5 were only 37.6 percent. Rides in previous years have dropped from 46.6 percent in 1994 to slightly less than 40 percent on subsequent rides.

And even if these figures remain high by comparison to less elaborate fundraisers, for Mayer, it's a cost worth paying.

"They need someone to motivate them," he said. "They need to feel strong enough about the cause. A lot of people wouldn't do it anyway. Which would the people want, $60 million or nothing?"

Friendly skies

American Airlines is a corporate sponsor of the AIDS Rides, but has no direct flights from Los Angeles to San Francisco for returning Bay Area riders, some of whom have been unpleasantly surprised when travel agents directed them to United Airlines instead.

Despite the highly publicized boycott of United, based on the company's ongoing litigation against San Francisco's equal benefits ordinance, travel agents contracting with Pallotta TeamWorks have booked gay riders on United flights. (A notable exception is Cornish Travel in West Hollywood, which instead refers riders to Southwest Airlines.)

The United controversy is one issue that disturbed AIDS Rider Paul Remagen. "I can't believe AIDS Ride is using United as a carrier," he told the B.A.R. from his East Bay home in Lafayette.

The self-described "asymptomatic long-term survivor of HIV" is an avid cyclist and "borderline extreme skier." His lover, Roy M. Coe, wrote the book A Sense of Pride: The Story of Gay Games II '86, before dying of AIDS in 1994.

Remagen acknowledges the controversies of the AIDS Ride finances, but will ride anyway. He's also been asked to be a media spokesman for the Ride. Despite this, he's open about his misgivings. "I've raised questions," he noted, "and they haven't been answered.

"Some people have not donated because of feelings about the [San Francisco] AIDS Foundation. They are not in agreement about how it spends its money."

Remagen's concern stems from his living outside San Francisco, and issues that are not the fault of Pallotta's company, but how the cash is dispersed.

His agency, the Contra Costa County AIDS Task Force, which became the AIDS Project Contra Costa, annually got around $70,000 from early AIDS Walks (a separate event not produced by Pallotta TeamWorks). When SFAF took over the AIDS Walk, Remagen said it dropped to around $20,000.

"The money that people from other counties raise doesn't come back to our county," such as AIDS Project Contra Costa. That group recently collapsed under financial problems, he said.

So why is he riding? "I'm a long-term survivor, 18 years with HIV. I'm still alive and capable. I wanted to experience it for myself."

Remagen puts in about 130 miles a week in training. The former physical education teacher, raised in Florida and Los Angeles, has lived in the Bay Area for 17 years and has an informed perspective on "the Pallotta scandal," and is "not happy about it at all," not the usual viewpoint of an ardent AIDS Ride supporter.

"They need to be held accountable," he said. "The focus needs to be there. People think a lot of the money is going to AIDS funding when in reality, it's not."

No matter where it goes, Remagen has raised $4,400. "I thought I'd have difficulty in the past. Having to raise $2,500 made it elitist. For people with AIDS, that's a lot of money."

Yet, he hasn't had problems raising it. Although he doesn't consider himself rich, living in a wealthy suburb has helped.

Remagen believes that the AIDS Rides can be restored to a sense of accountability, "if enough pressure is brought to bear," he said. "If Pallotta doesn't organize it any more, it could return to what it used to be. I hope so."

Next week: Wheels of Fortune, Part Four: Former and current employees of Pallotta TeamWorks, and maybe Mister Jenkins.
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