By: Diane Benjamin The Bloomington City Council only has ONE employee: David Hales. He gets huge raises around this time of year. Tonight the Council is discussing “personnel” in Executive Session. Since Hales is in charge of making all other personnel decisions, will the Council hand Hales another raise? Last year Hales was paid $229,615.36 […]
By: Diane Benjamin Bloomington paid $245,000 for the Sugar Creek Packing property, plus $6,000 for a study checking for hazardous waste. Monday the Council will approve tearing the buildings down. It’s only another $244,722.50. The City will have a half a million invested with nothing to show but dirt. Remember, they couldn’t obtain a certificate […]
Remember the December incident when one of the speakers at a Diversity Project meeting had a concealed carry gun? Remember the Pantagraph story? http://www.pantagraph.com/news/state-gun-signs-must-comply-to-be-enforceable/article_d5a4fe35-683c-532a-a50b-79d060b4fce1.html John Boch, the person in question and the Executive Director of Guns Save Lives, wrote the Pantagraph a letter. He never received a response from them. I met John this week […]
By: Diane Benjamin Bloomington City Council – Monday night: Landlords beware. You will be paying more. People living in your apartments aren’t capable of: Asking you to fix problems Moving to a better maintained apartment if you won’t Withholding rent until you fix problems Making repairs themselves and deducting the cost from rent Reporting you […]
By: Diane Benjamin Is David Hales hiring even more staff, or did somebody leave? They prefer a Master’s Degree in “Controlling the population”. See this link: http://www.cityblm.org/index.aspx?recordid=426&page=22 Expect the new hire to NOT be local. The International City Managers Association is probably forwarding candidates right now. Huge moving expenses will follow.
By: Diane Benjamin Bill and Payroll for approval at Monday’s meeting are now on-line: http://www.cityblm.org/index.aspx?page=242&parent=9535 I don’t have time today to look at everything, but residents should be happy to know your City shipped another huge amount to Springfield for their contract lawyer! Redistribution of your wealth to Springfield!
By: Diane Benjamin I sent the County a Freedom of Information request for all the Statements of Economic Interests Matt Sorensen was required to file. Here’s a link to what they sent: Sorensen Stmts of Econ Interest Besides all the side businesses listed, his addresses are interesting. Matt and his wife used to live at […]
Don’t sit back and complain about our failing education system. Do something about it: http://www.district87.org/pages/Bloomington_School_District_87 BLOOMINGTON PUBLIC SCHOOLS DISTRICT 87 ________________________________________________________________________ The Bloomington Public School District 87 Board of Education will be filling a vacancy created by the resignation of Mr. John Dirks effective December 29, 2015. Persons interested in the position should send a […]
By: Diane Benjamin Today a lawsuit was filed against the Edgar County Watchdogs, the former chairperson of the College of DuPage, and Adam Andrzejewski of For the Good of Illinois. The suit was filed by a member of the COD’s fundraising foundation who just happened to get no-bid contracts from COD, some marked as architectural […]
Quote from Special Agent Patrick Bohrer, assistant section chief Public Corruption/Civil Rights program at FBI Headquarters. “We depend greatly on assistance from the public. So let me end by saying, if anyone out there has any information about potential wrongdoing by a public official, please submit a tip online or contact your local FBI field […]
By: Diane Benjamin I planned to do this story yesterday, but then the Matt Sorensen story sidetracked me all day. My readers are GREAT at giving me tips – this was one of them. The Pantagraph read is on my site, it still took them an hour to do a story. Yesterday, the paper devoted […]
By: Diane Benjamin h/t Illinois Leaks/Edgar County Watchdogs http://edgarcountywatchdogs.com/2016/01/mcclean-county-board-chairman-indicted-in-federal-court-for-theft-wire-fraud-totaling-over-890000/ You can see the entire 14 page indictment here or on the Edgar County Watchdogs site above: Indictment-Sorensen
h/t Illinois leaks/Edgar County Watchdogs http://edgarcountywatchdogs.com/2016/01/mcclean-county-board-chairman-indicted-in-federal-court-for-theft-wire-fraud-totaling-over-890000/ The Press Release contains MANY details left out of the Reuters story.
Additional stories: http://blnnews.com/2016/01/07/sorensen-more-info/ http://blnnews.com/2016/01/06/county-board-a-chance-to-change/ http://blnnews.com/2016/01/05/sorensen-grand-jury-indictment/ http://blnnews.com/2016/01/05/more-on-sorensen-court-press-release/ By: Diane Benjamin Maybe if the local press did investigative reporting we would know. Why did the press not care when Matt Sorensen left State Farm under less than amicable circumstances. What does it take for State Farm to fire a high-ranking employee, let alone the McLean County […]
By: Diane Benjamin If your bank charged you an almost 100% penalty for paying late, what would government do? Payday loans have capped interest rates to protect borrowers. Not so much for government A family I know bought a vehicle out of town in September. A few weeks ago they got a Sales Tax bill […]
By: Diane Benjamin Enough people have voted in the first poll of GOP Presidential candidates to show you the results. These were people from an email list of conservative voters. Click on the picture to make it bigger. If you are planning to vote in the GOP primary in March, you can now vote. If […]
By: Diane Benjamin On Thursday, January 7th, I will be speaking at the Guns Save Lives meeting in Peoria. If you want more information, click here: http://www.gunssavelife.com/?ai1ec_event=gsl-peoria-meeting&instance_id=7294 ____________________________________ Back in November, I wrote about participating in The Diversity Project with Colleen Reynolds from WJBC: http://blnnews.com/2015/11/02/hope-for-the-future/ The guy who runs the program, Jeff Schwartz – former […]
Two refugees arrested on terror charges – in different States! http://www.cnn.com/2016/01/07/us/terror-charges-refugees/ Got it yet Steve? By: Diane Benjamin Today Steve Vogel proved that Democrats do not have the ability to govern or keep the country safe. Most of us already knew that, but Vogel was nice enough to put it in writing for all to […]
For the next week the poll is only for people I’ve had on an email list of conservatives for many years – hence the password. After a week I will open it up to all my readers. I will report the findings from both polls. Thanks, Diane
