Municipalities that use the South Shore Convention and Visitors Authority’s video billboards for events may need to pay for the privilege from now on.

The CVA in its 2025 budget has established a fee schedule for using the billboards, its chief financial officer, Nicole Wolverton, said during a budget presentation to the CVA’s Board of Directors Thursday morning. The CVA sometimes allows municipalities to borrow the billboards for specific events; because they take significant manpower to set up and need a CVA employee onsite to run them, there needs to be a cost associated with their use, she said.

Municipalities that partner with the CVA will pay $500 for the billboards’ use and non-partners will pay $1,000, Wolverton said, though COO Nikki Lopez added that the door would be open for “in-kind” trades, such as donating a billboard’s use for a top sponsorship.

With a quorum of 13 board members present, the CVA voted unanimously to approve its 2025 budget of $6,614,250, which included an increase of $15,000 over last year’s budget, Wolverton said. The budget includes a 4% employee cost-of-living increase, simplifies several line items and moves some expenditures into different funds, she said.

“We’ve got revenues up and expenses flat. The treasurer likes that,” CVA Treasurer Matt Maloney said after the presentation.

“The chairman likes that,” said Chairman Andy Qunell. “That’s pretty good in this environment.”

The Lake County Council, which once again approves the CVA budget after S.B. 37 took effect in July, will vote on it at its November 12 meeting. The council took no action on the CVA’s budget at its October 16 meeting because the CVA has until December 20 to submit its budget to the council; the CVA Board had to approve the budget before council submission; and the CVA budget doesn’t affect the Council’s budget that it approved for itself at that meeting.

In other business, one of the CVA’s 2024 R.O.S.E winners and one of its 2024 R.I.S.E winners have been nominated for Hoosier Hospitality awards, Chief Marketing Officer Heather Becerra told the board. Their names will be announced during a ceremony at 2 p.m. EST on October 29 in Indianapolis.

Michelle L. Quinn is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.