09/03/2025
THE DGI/MATHENY MONEY MACHINE: The numbers don't lie
Downtown Greensboro Inc. (DGI), the nonprofit created to manage the city’s Municipal Service District, has become a million-dollar middleman... a buffer between taxpayers and accountability.
Now, as State Bureau of Investigation agents dig into the dealings of DGI CEO and sitting council member Zack Matheny, Greensboro faces an uncomfortable reckoning with a basic question: What exactly are taxpayers getting for their million-dollar annual investment in DGI?
We already know what Matheny and his board of enablers appear to be benefiting from. But what about the rest of us? Let’s take a look.
THE RECEIPTS: WHERE OUR MONEY REALLY GOES
DGI's 2023 IRS Form 990 reveals that it receives $1,661,339 in BID tax as well as a portion of Greensboro's sales tax allocation.
Of that, a staggering $1,007,196 went not to downtown improvements, but to sustaining the organization itself.
The filing shows:
• $224,055 in compensation for Zack Matheny (a roughly $40,000 increase from the previous year)
• $78,766 in compensation for CFO Joy Ross
• $312,395 in other salaries including Undercurrent co-owner and DGI VP Rob Overman and former Mayor Keith Holiday
• $39,159 for a pension plan
• $45,039 in payroll taxes
• $40,631 in employee benefits
• $90,850 in occupancy costs
• $81,270 in "other" expenses
• $39,749 in information technology
• Tens of thousands more in administrative overhead
Put bluntly… Of the roughly $1.6 million in Business Improvement District and sales tax revenues collected from Greensboro taxpayers, more than $1 million is consumed by payroll, benefits, and overhead.
What began as a tax intended to fund extra police bike patrols, cleaner sidewalks, graffiti removal, and beautification has instead been siphoned into sustaining what appears to be a gluttonous bureaucracy.
The very dollars meant to make downtown safer and more vibrant now sustain a "cronied" organization that appears more focused on itself than on the community it claims to serve.
And that’s only part of the story.
Beyond the special levy on downtown property owners, DGI also taps into additional streams of city funding:
• Sales tax allocation: ~$260,000 annually
• Ambassador Program Services: $195,000
• Ambassador Public Service: $100,000
• Fun Fourth Festival: $32,000
• Festival of Lights: $33,500
• Holiday Parade: $11,000
Total annual taxpayer investment in downtown operations through DGI: Over $2 million
Most of this money bypasses real improvements, landing instead in overhead and questionable expenses, all with little oversight, as Matheny's extravagant spending clearly demonstrates.
MATHENY'S LAVISH SPENDING WHILE GREENSBORO STRUGGLES
The administrative costs are just the beginning.
Community watchdog and former Yes Weekly editor Jeff Sykes recently wrote to council members Sharon Hightower and Hugh Holston after activists unearthed five years of DGI ledger records from city audits (2019–2024).
His findings are damning: "I find it unbelievable that taxpayer monies have been used in this fashion. There are dozens and dozens of questionable line-item spending records at bars, restaurants, and entertainment venues... It remains morally offensive to me that Greensboro persists with areas of concentrated poverty clusters, substandard housing and lack of transportation resources while one man, one group, one entity spends thousands and thousands of taxpayer dollars for food, alcohol and entertainment just a few short blocks away."
The ledgers tell the story:
• Nearly $2,000 in bar and restaurant charges in Baltimore over two days
• $1,800 for hotel and restaurant bills in Palm Beach, Florida
• Multiple restaurants in Wyoming
• Multiple $300–$500 charges at the Greensboro Country Club
• One $1,200 charge at B. Christopher's
• $390 for Wicked tickets, paired with $397 at Machete and $25 parking at Tanger Center … all on the same day
• Frequent tabs at bars and breweries that don't serve food
• Random luxury hotel stays in Asheville
• $638 in dues to the Greensboro Sports Council, a circular flow of taxpayer dollars
These are documented ledger entries which clearly illustrate a pattern of indulgence on the taxpayer’s dime at the very moment Greensboro grapples with record homelessness, entrenched food deserts, and severe affordable housing shortages.
THE MATHENY PROBLEM: WHEN LAWS ARE IGNORED
The ongoing SBI investigation underscores the fundamental flaw in Greensboro's DGI arrangement.
Matheny resigned from city council in 2015 citing a conflict of interest as he negotiated to become DGI's CEO, yet later returned to the council while maintaining his DGI position… a blatant conflict of interest that raises serious governance concerns.
But the problems run deeper than one person's ethical lapses, this appears to be a systemic mismanagement enabled by ineffective board oversight and tolerated by city leadership.
North Carolina law requires special districts to be subject to public records laws, yet DGI, which manages the special district routinely refuses to provide basic information to taxpayers, including meeting minutes and detailed financial records.
The city's own contract explicitly states that elected officials cannot benefit financially from city contracts, yet Matheny continues to draw a $224,000+ salary from an organization funded by city revenues while sitting on the council that oversees that funding.
And where is DGI's board during this taxpayer-funded spending spree?
Well they are failing in their fiduciary duties.
The very people appointed to provide accountability are approving luxury spending, ignoring legal requirements, and enabling a system where public money flows freely to bars, country clubs, and entertainment venues while downtown property owners, the supposed beneficiaries, get little more than expensive administrative overhead.
This appears to be a deliberate system designed to insulate spending from scrutiny.
DGI's board knows the law requires transparency, actually, Stu Nichols, the current board chair is an attorney…
They know elected officials can't financially benefit from city contracts.
They know taxpayers have a right to see how their money is spent.
Yet they continue to approve budgets, sign off on expenses, and maintain the fiction that they're serving the public interest while presiding over what amounts to unaccountable taxpayer spending.
Meanwhile, a sitting council member is also the CEO of DGI, a taxpayer-funded nonprofit.
The conflicts of interest are staggering, yet apparently no one in city leadership sees a problem.
THE PATH FORWARD: REAL ACCOUNTABILITY
This raises an obvious question: Why are we paying DGI over $1.6 million annually to do what the city could do directly, especially when the existing Economic Development Department is far from overwhelmed and the Chamber of Commerce handles much of the business development work?
As Mayor Nancy Vaughan likes to remind us about what “happens in other cities”...in some other cities, downtown revitalization is managed through their economic development departments without creating expensive middleman organizations.
Greensboro should follow their lead by:
Dissolving DGI and transferring its functions directly to city government.
Downtown economic development, marketing, and business assistance programs can be managed more efficiently and transparently within existing city departments.
Eliminating administrative redundancy.
The $1+ million DGI spends on itself annually could fund substantial improvements to downtown infrastructure, business incentives, or provide tax relief to residents.
Restoring accountability.
City-managed programs are subject to public records laws, budget oversight by elected officials, and direct accountability to voters… no more luxury spending hidden from public view.
Ending conflicts of interest.
Come on! No elected official should simultaneously sit on the dais while making decisions about their own organization's funding.
THE BOTTOM LINE: A SYSTEM DESIGNED TO WASTE OUR MONEY
What we're witnessing is a system designed to extract maximum taxpayer dollars while providing minimum accountability.
DGI has devolved into a machine that seems to exists primarily to sustain itself and enrich its leadership, while downtown property owners, the people supposedly being served, get stuck with the bill and little to show for it.
Downtown Greensboro deserves investment and attention but not through an expensive, unaccountable intermediary that spends most of its budget on administrative overhead, ignores public records laws, and appears to operate as a personal expense account for lavish entertainment.
It's time to eliminate this costly middleman and manage downtown development the way most successful cities do… through transparent, accountable government departments that answer directly to the taxpayers who fund them.
The question is whether our city leaders have the courage to make the change that fiscal responsibility, basic accountability, and respect for taxpayers demand.
Sadly, there's little reason to believe this council will rise to the occasion.
In my view, Vaughan, Abuzuaiter, Hoffmann, Thurm, Wells, Holston and the other seat fillers on the dais, seem more focused with protecting their colleague than confronting hard truths.
Voters would do well to remember that as early voting starts tomorrow.
Worth noting that while Zimmerman seems to have overstayed his eligibility as a board member, and while not highlighted on the DGI site, he remains part of the DGI executive committee as supported by a recent email from Matheny to his executive board members.
