By: Diane Benjamin
http://www.cityblm.org/Home/ShowDocument?id=15932
Now for the meat of tonight’s Bloomington City Council meeting! Finally we have arrived at the tax increases.
Solid Waste – AGAIN! PDF page 130
The Council will get a choice – all of them cost you more:
Ordinance 1: “High Service Level, High Fee Increases”
Ordinance 2: “Medium Service Level, Medium Fee Increases”
Ordinance 3: “Lower Service Level, Low Fee Increases”
$10.59 a month the residents at Lake Bloomington get from private service isn’t one of the choices.
https://blnnews.com/2018/02/25/no-discussion-spending/
Good News:
Here’s the bad news:
Life in Bloomington is going to cost more. Garbage, parking, and licensing businesses – starting at $100. I predict within 5 years that fee will be much higher. It is too easy to raise, local government has proven they are anti-business. Illinois is anti-business, that philosophy is now local. See PDF page 153. Go back one page – employees are still budgeted for a 2% raise.
Page 152 has more bad news. The Arena is going to cost another $425,000, Downtown Signs get $250.000, and the bike trail to Shirley gets $17,000. PDF page 164 shows Revenue decreases expected. Since your liberty will be infringed, the decreases predicted are too low.
More bad news:
The Friends of the BCPA want the City to hire a Development Manager. It looks like they are getting one. The Memorandum of Understanding starts on page 168. The City should just hand them the BCPA and Creativity Center and let them bear the cost.
Even more bad news:
The Council will pass the garbage/recycling ordinance the County and Normal have passed that contains language to mandate recycling.
See page 346 and following. They have a petition labeled “Commitment to vote for candidates who care about climate justice and clean energy”. Below that is: “Petition for an off-campus curb-side recycling option mandate”. Check out NUMEROUS pages of signatures for a list of the local communists.
PDF page 591:
One year moratorium on new video gambling machines
Page 600 shows totals for all the Bloomington machines.
PDF page 155 – streets and sidewalks
Local Motor Fuel Tax is listed at $5,500,000. That has to include another .04 gas tax. It also isn’t close to enough to get the roads up to a POOR rating. Page 163 has more details.
Finally:
A plat for a convenience store at the corner of GE and Hershey road is up for a vote. That’s the empty lot where all the campaign signs accumulate. I hear cries of “Not in my Ward” coming.
This meeting could last until 10:00 pm!
Well, if it’s on Hershey everyone will be going SLOW enough to stop there since it’s NOW 30 mph. Thanks Johnee!!
Local government has failed at running everything it touches. The BCPA, garbage pickup, bike trails, and the arena will continue to worsen. Higher taxes/fees for worse service. Wonder if the Council is aware that people are voting with their feet for reasonable government and lower taxes. Big government dependants (government workers, welfare recipients, crony capitalists) and “townies” will be all that is left. I can’t help but think this is by design. Sad.
Wait. The BCPA Development Manager isn’t a public private partnership? Isn’t the Friends of the BCPA footing some of the cost of this position in the first year…and then paying for all of the cost in outlying years? Why is this public private partnership NOT okay…but the one for the Harmony playground IS okay? At least be consistent. Seriously. Just pave the roads and fill the potholes, okay?
The roads can’t be fixed, pensions are underfunded, and benefits are ridiculous. Let’s hire another employee and make it worse!
@Rich
Read the MOU. The Friends want the City to hire someone (with benefits) to do fundraising while the Friends decide how the $$ is spent and can use the BCPA for free. Public/private is, the City provides the venue and the Friends provide for operations, including a fundraiser.
They want OUR CASH !!
Don’t forget they want to CONTROL your life too.
Mike Madigan will be introducing gun control legislation this week and bringing it up for a vote. “Never let a crisis go to waste” says duel citizen, Rahm Emanuel. The year 2017 will be the last year that I file my taxes in the state of ILLionis, yes this state makes me sick! It is rotten a corrupt to the core.
Curious did the Flamingo’s survive the winter or will they need to buy some new ones?
Holy molli I got off of the interstate the other day and after dodging potholes on west Market the ones on west Locust were worse it seems.
At this rate I think a weekly wheel alignment is due.
Even if they fill them in they will come right back it seems. At this point they might as well gravel the city streets and grade them and be done with it. It’s going to take millions and I mean millions of $$$ just to fix the streets.
I hear the flamingos are in a building with no windows.
Another gas tax increase? I used to buy gas in Bloomington before making trips to Chicago. It was lower priced because of the 6 county Metra transportation tax. Now I buy gas in Dwight. Friday it was $2.17 /gal when Bloomington was $2.49. Of course the city analysis will show no drop in gallons purchased when they raise taxes.