Outside the Box!

Take some time out and let your imagination run wild!


Have an interesting long weekend!

True Confessions?

Back on January 21, 2009, the Journal and Topics published an article titled, Frimark Sets 'Shopping List'. In that article we learn that of the $27million total costs on Mayor Howard's shopping list, Mayor Howard's plan to make good on his first mayoral campaign promise, to bring his vision of a "flood-free Park Ridge" to reality, is to seek, all in, $7million for infrastructure improvements that may help mitigate some of the sewer problems that contribute to flooding in Park Ridge. Not all of that $7million is dedicated solely to flood relief efforts -- it includes alley paving and $1million in repairs to existing sewers in danger of collapse, as well as "$100,000 to put a watertight coating on the Riverside Drive floodwall."

The rest of Mayor Howard's shopping list, $20million, is dedicated to the purpose of building a new police station -- the police station that 7th ward Alderman Wsooooolman's referendum, the referendum being supported by Mayor Howard, assures us won't cost taxpayers a nickel more than $16.5million, not including debt payments on the borrowed money.

The article concludes by telling us "Frimark plans to send the list to Illinois State Senators Dick Durbin and Roland Burris as well as U.S. Representative Jan Schakowsky." Yeah, that should work.

We haven't seen a shopping list from Mayor Howard's mayoral campaign opponent, 1st ward Alderman Dave. But we are looking forward to his ideas on how to spend our dwindling taxpayer dollars -- and we were pleased to read a discussion of Alderman Dave's support for limiting the level of City debt in the Pub-dog's post today.

Finally, PRU readers, the Crew would like to hear what's on your municipal shopping list?

Go ahead, "genius", take another bite at the apple. :-P All in fun.

Bottled COW Recap!

Busy day for the PRU Crew! We appreciate those of you who have waited patiently for a COW recap!

Our sources have provided notes and we will be double checking things, but in the meantime here's another installment from our PRU cub reporter, Naomi de Plume!

From the desk of Naomi de Plume:

Oh Lord. Anyone who attended the Committee of the Whole meeting last night is already starting to put together their survival kit.

The City's finances are spinning out of control, and the mayor and City Manager Hock are sitting there like twin Neros watching Rome burn while Finance Director Diane Lembesis mumbles about how everything will be great...in 20 years!

It bordered on the the ridiculous. No, it went well beyond the border. Hock issued a memo stating that the Uptown TIF Fund (a/k/a Black Hole) is soaking up an increasing amount of money from the City's General Fund, but the General Fund can't afford to kick in any more. But Hock said not to worry, everything will be fine based on projections.

Alderman Schmidt correctly recognized that Hock was starting to sound like the happily-departed Tim Schuenke who left the City in an awful mess, mostly because the Council spent freely based on his own rosy, but throughly unrealistic, projections.

This is not good. It's bad. Really bad. Better get your batteries and bottled water.

Another PRU Pot Luck!

1. -- Another COW cattle call!


The City Council has another committee of the whole (COW) meeting scheduled for this evening. On the agenda (.pdf) are a few intriguing items such as discussion of May 2008 - January 2009 Financial Results, debt limitation, formation of an O'Hare Commission, granting additional taxi licenses, and an appeals process for denials of text amendments by the Planning and Zoning board.


The PRU Crew would like to have seen some supporting documents in relation to the council's discussion of financial results, but alas, there aren't any listed for public review on the City's website. And we aren't willing to count City Manager Jim Hock's memo (.pdf) to the council as a supporting document.


It will be interesting to see if this cabal of self-professed Republicans actually act like traditional Republicans and grant additional taxi licenses to American Taxi, ensuring business competition and expanded service options for consumers in Park Ridge. Last time the subject came up (see pg. 4 of the .pdf file), Mayor Howard was just a lowly Aldermoron on February 1, 2005 and was in his first mayoral campaign for Mayor. At that time the pro-business candidate didn't seem to think expanding the business base and competition in Park Ridge was a good idea, at least where taxi service was concerned. And then two days later, Mrs. Patricia Carpenter, wife of Lee Carpenter the then-owner of Park Ridge Taxi, made sure to express her...agreement.



Finally, we can hardly wait to hear the genius justifications for why the risk of politicizing the Planning and Zoning process is a good and necessary public policy change.



2. -- Sir Walter fails to rally!


As we discussed last week in our post Rules Are Made To Be Broken, challenges to several Park Board candidate hopefuls had been filed. One of those hopeful candidates was Mr. Walter Mizialko.


Sources tell us that after Mr. Mizialko failed to appear at not one but two hearings on the matter, the Election Board has finally seen fit to remove Mr. Mizialko from the April 2009 ballot.


The challenge against the candidacy of Mr. Brandt will continue with an appeal of the Election Board's decision to the Circuit Court of Cook County.



3. -- Give the Pub-dogs another bone!


A most excellent piece -- Put Up Or Shut Up, Mr. Ryan! The PRU Crew enjoyed it!

TGIF!

From: mixx.com - Michiko280 - sleeping_puppies


Three Dog Night MP3 from Free MP3 Downloads

Have a great weekend!

Rules Are Made To Be Broken!

From: dangerspot.co.uk -- children's books

Today another editorial in the Herald-Advocate, The undoing of democracy for April elections, provides more evidence that our local press isn't quite what we may have hoped for.

The editorial writer describes "the dash to ensure election by eliminating opponents, finding any possible reason to have them removed from the ballot. Get enough candidates removed and the yard signs, buttons and candidate forums become a mere formality instead of a way a candidate has to prove their qualifications to voters," and laments "the extent to which the electoral boards go along with such shenanigans, or in some cases where the law allows such a meltdown of the democratic process."

In order to follow that line of thinking, one must assume that challenges to a candidate's paperwork are not a part of the democratic process -- that somehow holding candidates accountable for abiding by the arguably tedious election rules isn't an integral part of the democratic process.

The PRU Crew believes that such challenges are an integral part of the process, even when the challenges to a candidate's paperwork seem tedious or like nit-picking. It strikes us as short-sighted to say "democracy pays a price" because a potential candidate is "thrown off the ballot due to using the wrong clip to fasten their petitions together or not having them bound at all...When a candidate is challenged for an honest mistake, such as claiming to be an independent in a nonpartisan election in which everybody is theoretically running independently, the result is a disservice to the voting public." The PRU Crew would ask, if a candidate can't manage the little tedious stuff isn't the democratic process served by eliminating the potential candidate from consideration for the big stuff, like actually being elected?

Further along in the editorial, readers are told, "The law does not allow the secretaries who accept petitions at these local boards to give any direction to candidates, even on something as simple as the proper way to fasten petitions together." Well, if fastening petitions together is so simple, then why shouldn't a potential candidate be expected to accomplish that task all on their own, and then be held accountable to the simple fastening rule when they don't?

Reading between the lines of the editorial has lead the PRU Crew to believe the Herald-Advocate editorial writer had Park Board hopeful Meredith Wisniewski in mind when writing this editorial. In a February 11, 2009 article, it was reported that "Meredith is new to the process and followed the (election) handbook," said her father, Brad Wisniewski, who represented his daughter at the hearing. "We didn't find anything in there that said anything about binding" and "Wisniewski, a recent college graduate who grew up playing softball in the park district, said she asked the park district secretary about how her papers needed to be filed, but the secretary told her she could not help." And we see that young Ms. Wisniewski is still traveling the up-slope on the learning curve.

Has democracy paid a price for the loss of this particular candidate from the April 2009 ballot? Probably not, because the democratic process is a continuum of activity, not merely a moment in time. Ms. Wisniewski can move forward, tedious lesson learned, and try again at a future date. The PRU Crew deeply hopes that she does, as we are always excited about young people who not only take an interest in the democratic process, but actually step up to the plate and take a swing at public service.

As for the other two candidates removed from the April ballot, Nicholas Giordano and Peter Wachowski -- they are described in the 2-11-09 Herald-Advocate article as "attorneys with firms based in Park Ridge...removed from the ballot after both admitted they had not filed the required Statement of Economic Interest with the Cook County Clerk. Both stated they had overlooked this requirement."

Attorneys who "overlooked this requirement" for filing Statements of Economic Interest? Adios and good riddance.

Benedict Alderman Ryan, Illustrated Again!

For your reading pleasure, we've copied and posted 5th Ward Benedict Alderman Ryan's latest communication to constituents.

We feel strongly that if Benedict Alderman Ryan believes 1st Ward Alderman Dave Schmidt has done something illegal then Benedict Alderman Ryan should file a complaint with the proper authorities. Enforcement of the law is one of the responsibilities of elected officials.



As for the rest of Benedict Alderman Ryan's letter -- we'll leave it to PRU readers to comment.