2 directors added to Cedar Fair board
6/9/2010SANDUSKY - Two executives in the hospitality field and from the same metropolitan area as a major shareholder have been named as new board members of Cedar Fair LP.
The additions, which were announced yesterday, of Eric Affeldt and John M. Scott III, stem from an agreement between the Sandusky amusement park company and Q Funding III LP and Q4 Funding LP, Fort Worth, mutual funds that, combined, own 18 percent of Cedar Fair's stock.
The announcement was made the day after Cedar Fair's annual shareholders meeting, at which investors expressed anger and frustration over the suspended dividend, executive pay, and other matters.
Mr. Affeldt is president and chief executive officer of ClubCorp Inc., a Dallas firm that sells memberships in golf courses and resorts it owns and operates, and had been a principal at private equity firm KSL Capital Partners, which purchased ClubCorp in 2006.
Mr. Scott is the president and chief executive officer of Rosewood Hotels & Resorts, a Dallas luxury hotel company, and had been an executive at private equity real estate fund Maritz, Wolff & Co.
Both of their terms began Monday and will expire in 2013.
The board additions are the second major change Q Funding has made on Cedar Fair. Q Funding insisted on having more input into the operations of the company.
The two parties reached a deal in which the new members were to be nominated by a consultant but then approved by Q Funding and Cedar Fair officials.
Earlier, it publicly opposed Cedar Fair's proposed takeover by Apollo Global Management this year.
Before shareholders were to vote, and approval was largely in doubt, the $2.4 billion deal was withdrawn in April.
Cedar Fair's board has nine members, but by next year's an-nual shareholders meeting, two board members whose terms expire will no longer be directors, and the board again will be reduced to seven members.
Cedar Fair, which owns Cedar Point and 16 other amusement and water parks nationwide and in Canada, is trying to restructure its $1.6 billion debt, the terms of which have prevented it since late last year of paying a dividend.
Q Funding officials have asked Cedar Fair to quickly restore a dividend.