By: Diane Benjamin
Not only illegal, it’s breaks the City PCard policy. AND – more than one City employee (which Tari is) broke the policy.
Note the date – May 12th. From documents obtained by FOIA, this purchase was on the PCard held by Beth Oakley, Executive Assistant to somebody.
She violated State law and City policy by charging a personal item to a City PCard. Of course, she did it at somebody’s direction – she didn’t decide on her own that Margot Ehrlich needed a ticket. I wonder who told her a ticket was needed for his girlfriend.
Don’t forget somebody in accounting put this illegal charge on the list for payment.
Don’t forget the Council approved payment without asking a single question!
Don’t forget I had to file a FOIA for this Bills and Payroll because it wasn’t posted 3 hours before the meeting took place. That has NEVER happened in the more than 5 years I’ve been reading them.
Margot did pay the City for the ticket price and half the agent fee – but not until May 26th. The City didn’t receive it until June 2nd, 7 days later.
But wait!
Was Margot on this tour? If yes, where is the payment for it?
Was she transported to the airport and back? If yes, where is the payment for it?
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I hear the local media called the City to see if Margot had paid for the flight. As usual, the local media didn’t investigate any farther. Maybe this will prove media is a threat to your freedom and liberty NOT watchdogs of the truth.
There is much more to investigate about this trip and the Sister Cities program. This is far from the last story! A lot of the information I FOIA’d I haven’t received, there is even more to FOIA now.
By the way, Chris Koos paid his own way and turned in an expense report. I’m not sure how he turned it in before he got home – but look at what account it was paid from:
Payment was approved at last Monday’s meeting. http://www.normal.org/ArchiveCenter/ViewFile/Item/2689
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So if the plane ticket was purchased by the City, it was done under tax exemption, so shouldn’t Marge pay taxes on the ticket and all things?
I rarely fly, can somebody who does look at their last purchase?
FYI Beth Oakley is Tari’s assistant.
Renner will blame anyone to deflect this. His apparent attitude of entitlement–not only for himself but for personal relationships–is appalling. This violation is against State law and municipal policy and should be investigated and prosecuted by legal authorities regardless of the amount of money. Actions have consequences. He should have learned or been taught that as a child.
They should be in jail and anyone involved in the process of approving this charge on the card.
Something I have found, and I travel a LOT, including internationally, is often times, until you know how to do it better (and these people don’t and won’t ever) the airfare is sometimes the cheapest part of the trip – especially to places where everything is sky high (Norway and Sweden come to mind) Japan is middle of the road and people like Tarry can manage on about 180.00 per day, (average people can get by for about 80ish) I said CAN manage, I have a feeling his expenses are usually higher than even the average well off “tourist” – Oh wait – Tarry and his g/f likely had the city of Asahikawa footing their feed, lodging, transport and entertainment – or did I miss an invoice for their feed, lodging, transport while in Japan, and entertainment? Bottom line is, these pleasure jaunts for Tarry and company are total wastes of tax payer money. Including these “mayors conferences” and the like – You have a city to run Tarry, you wanted to be mayor (why, I will never know it was certainly not to help the peasants) His Buddy Chris of course has his own problems – wonder when those cars are going to start rolling off the lines at Rivian, since they never have in any other city they have scammed – a simple Google search could have told you that Rivian is as shady as a country Grandma’s back yard and they have scammed people for years – but oh no I’m sure you paid a team of “experts” to check them out for you… – sorry for the rambling, but the both of them are simply disgusting and people keep electing them.
My question is: will the Bloomington City Council be establishing a system where all citizens in the area can use a city purchase card to purchase travel and then pay it back weeks later? Until I can see proof that Ms. Ehrlich had sufficient funds in this/any bank account at the time the ticket was purchased, I would have a hard time believing this wasn’t an interest-free loan to Ehrlich, ultimately at the Mayor’s request to process the charge.
People point out that her ticket and the mayor’s ticket were purchased separately from the group. I hear crickets chirping because they cannot explain that away. People also do a great job pointing out that there are other expenses, paid for by the city, that she benefited from.
One last item. Nothing in the mayor’s propaganda piece about his “citizenship award” mentioned trade as a reason for spending all this money on the Sister City relationship. I have no problem having a Sister City and having an exchange with them; however, use private funds to do so or only do so after roads and other infrastructure are improved.
Why does Renner have an assistant? Does he really need one? The mayors position is supposed to be PART TIME. We have a City Manager who is supposed to be running the city on a day to day basis ( lord please see to it he gets a job elsewhere soon) , so why is Tari working so many hours? Why are we feeding his face, the Aldermans faces, and his cronies faces for the past four and one- half years? Surely he and they can afford there own food and booze. He should be working less and saving us money. Renner is a legend in his own mind. He’s a pompous jackass with an entitlement mentality. A police investigation is warranted. The City Council should limit his hours. Limit him to be advisory to the City Manager. Until we change our form of government and eliminate.the City Managers job and replace that position with a full time Mayor, then this bozos wings need to be clipped.
If we had a council that didn’t worship him they might!
Exactly, the entire thing is sewed up now as it is.
Oh and I have NEVER approved of feeding these people, especially when it’s places like Anju, or other high price places – they can go to Subway for the $6.00 foot long or the DQ 5 Buck Lunch if that’s gonna be the way it is. Best plan – STOP paying for their feed – Now HOW could we ever make that happen, when as has been pointed out, the council does as Tarry wants and says and Tarry wants the taxpayers to feed him.