Despite debt, the fun goes on at Yellow Duck

The owner said he expects to proceed with an ambitious park expansion plan.
By CYNTHIA VINARSKY
VINDICATOR BUSINESS WRITER
CANFIELD -- The owner of Yellow Duck Park says the 29-year-old recreation center will continue operating, even though a tax dispute with Ohio has forced him to file for bankruptcy protection.
Leonard McGarvey filed petitions under Chapter 13 of the federal bankruptcy law, which allows an individual with regular income to keep property and pay off debts over time, usually three to five years.
McGarvey is the sole proprietor of the park on state Route 46 best known for its swimming lake and its drive-through holiday light shows.
He said he is up-to-date on payroll, vendors serving the 40-acre private park have been paid, and he plans to pay his past-due Ohio taxes as well.
"He's never refused to pay, but the state has said: Pay it now or we'll shut you down," explained Andrew Suhar, the attorney handling McGarvey's Chapter 13 case.
"He wants to pay it and he is paying it, but he needs more time. It's sort of ironic on the state's part, because if he shut down, the state would get zero."
Records listing McGarvey's assets and debts haven't been filed yet in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Youngstown, but Suhar said there are few creditors.
"There's not a lot of debts he dealing with," the attorney said. "It was just this one aggressive creditor that forced him to do this."
Looking ahead
The park owner would not divulge sales figures, but he said his business is viable, and he's making plans for an ambitious expansion project. Excavation has already begun on the first phase, a 20,000-square-foot family activity pool scheduled for completion sometime this summer.
Improvement plans also include an 800-foot "lazy river" attraction for wading and floating, a white sand beach, a go-cart track and a bumper boat pond.
McGarvey said the park's 1,000 member families paid reduced dues and initiation fees this year because the facility is under construction. He plans to raise the one-time initiation fee from $100 to about $300 when the project is complete. Yearly dues, now $200, will increase to $300 or more, he said.
McGarvey said he has met with officials at the Mahoning Valley Economic Development Corp. to try to line up financing for the project. Donald French, MVEDC director, would only confirm that his staff has talked to the park owner.
The park employs seven year-round employees and typically adds up to 68 seasonal employees in the summer. The owner believes his employee roster will grow to 30 year-round and more than 200 seasonal when the expansion work is finished.
Additions
McGarvey said he bought the Yellow Duck property in 1975 and operated it as a private swimming club. He added a water slide in 1985 and built a second, larger slide in 1989, the same year he started offering a drive-through Christmas light display.
Over time, the park added a spring light display and a Halloween light display, he said, and the combined exhibits now include 5 million lights. Park staff members are always working on new and larger displays, and McGarvey expects to double the number of lights in use by Christmas 2005.
"It became apparent to me that a one-season operation couldn't survive. That's why I developed the drive-through entertainment idea," he said.
McGarvey listed eight other private local swimming lakes that have closed over the past few years. "One of the major reasons I'm not on that list of eight is that I diversified with the holiday light shows," he said.
The park has had financial troubles before, however. Yellow Duck Park also filed a Chapter 11 bankruptcy case in 1994.
vinarsky@vindy.com