CRANBERRY TWP — The Butler County Tourism and Convention Bureau had a better year in 2015 financially than in 2014.

That change is attributed to the Bantam Jeep Heritage Festival, which made a lot of money this year, according to the 2014-2015 audit.

Joseph Myers of JP Myers & Associates, which did an audit, talked about the findings at the bureau board meeting Thursday.

In 2014, the bureau had a loss of $122,000 and in 2015 it made $280,000, of which $255,000 came from the Jeep festival, according to Myers.

“That is a significant piece of your operating budget that you cannot discount,” he said. “From an operations standpoint, the Jeep festival provides a significant amount of revenue to you.”

The festival revenue was $414,000 in 2014 with expenses of $263,000, he said.

This year the festival’s revenues raised to $630,000 with expenses of $375,000,

“It is a big deal and I understand that is going to change in the future,” he said of the festival and its finances.

“As finance guy, as an auditor and as an accountant that money has to be replaced somehow to continue the good work you are doing in Butler.”

In August the bureau board approved handing over control of the festival to the Jeep Festival Committee. The bureau’s board was to meet with the solicitor to finalize a contract that will give the committee the ability to plan the annual event.

It has always been the intention of the bureau to build the event and then pass it over within five years to another entity.

Before next year Myers said he would want to know how the bureau is going to replace that, its budget and its plans.

“We just need to look into the future a little bit to know we are going to be around,” Myers said.

Jack Cohen, president of the bureau, said the bureau has planned for the time when it would no longer be responsible for the festival.

“We are prepared to work on the monies that we budgeted, so we are going to be fine. Because we did have a good plan, we are in good shape to move forward.”

Myers said the total assets for the organization were $559,000 in 2014 and $871,000 this year.

Cash also increased by $292,000.

“All in all, 2015 was a pretty good year. Way to come back from a bad 2014,” Myers said.

The Jeep committee is reviewing the contract for the festival, Cohen said.

Cohen said he could not give specifics on the contract because it is still under negotiation.