By: Diane Benjamin
Everybody knows the streets aren’t being fixed. Bloomington can’t even find money in the budget (that has skyrocketed under Tari Renner) to invest in infrastructure. https://blnnews.com/2018/03/26/nice-pantagraph/
They will happily raise your taxes though to pay for a couple of roads.
Yesterday we learned there was a “disconnect” ordering tickets for the One Voice trip to Washington DC, so taxpayers got fleeced again: https://blnnews.com/2018/04/03/remember-the-one-voice-air-fare/
There are still no minutes are posted on the City website for 2018: http://www.cityblm.org/government/city-council/meetings-agendas/city-council-documentation/-parent-146/-folder-1624
Bloomington hasn’t entered their TIF reports for 4/30/17 on the Comptroller’s website yet: https://tinyurl.com/Bloomington-TIF
This list could be much longer – but they do have time for a “Welcoming Ordinance”!
The essential services government must perform are not a priority. What you expect of your government isn’t what you are getting. Tari’s “Culture Change” is clamping down on citizens and local businesses for CONTROL. “Right Fit” means he is so much smarter than you, so he gets to decide what businesses are allowed in Bloomington.
The Council finally told Tari he doesn’t do economic development, but they haven’t said the North Main St property needs to be sold now.
Meanwhile, your money is sitting there while your taxes are raised because Tari wants to control instead of allowing the private sector to flourish.
Kroger put off building on East College. Tari’s love affair with Green Top Grocery is crumbling. State Farm and the YMCA are leaving downtown. I had a comment on my site about a guy who was tortured by the City while rehabbing a building downtown. He will never do another one.
Bloomington needs to take a hard turn to economic freedom before it’s too late. At the rate of destruction it might already be. The Council already increased garbage rates and cut service. If they can’t find money in the budget for roads without raising taxes again, they all need to be replaced.
I give them a brief time to get their heads spun in a better direction than up their arse ,, and if things keep on keeping dumber and unaccountable , i’ll be packing and moving to a better state that has some common sense , knows what a budget is and how to work and exist in a healthy environment , and plans things based on facts not aspirations . what idiot keeps betting on a dead horse while also putting obstacles on the track .
They will find money to buy SF building and Grand Cafe, mark my words.
Tari and the Council can’t resist the opportunity to interfere and impose their will on the private marketplace. They’re so good at developing, why just look at Green Top Grocery or Downtown Bloomington. Huff condos, the museum (er, gift shop), or the so-called cultural district. Well, maybe Commerce Bank is coming back to the Downtown or the Front and Center building will be brought up to code. I’m sure Trish and her department will save the day! Tari’s press mill, I mean the Pantagraph, is relocating to be more Downtown (read: smaller space). Beware the Greeks bearing gifts. If the City is given the SF building, it should refuse the deal.
I’m still upset looking at that budget graph you posted last week, where our budget has skyrocketed since Renner was elected….
The Council’s #1 priority for the past five years has been “economic development.” The ED department and Renner believe economic development to be giving tax dollars away. That is why the budget has skyrocketed. Sales tax rebates, property tax abatement and TIF districts. In one year, $3M to purchase land downtown—the structural deficit (budget gap) was $3M. Fees were raised by $3M during the past 2 months.
Beware, the downtown State Farm building will become their “gift” to the city.
It is a convergence of several different things. What is happening to bloomington is no different than what has happened to thousands of smaller towns across America where the town’s main employer (usually a factory) shuts down and decimated the town. Our community thought it was immune to these types of market forces but it turns out we are not immune. Couple this with the fact that our leaders spent like there was no tomorrow, and now tomorrow is here.
There is also the self reinforcing cycle where an ever increasing number of groups and business ya e convinced government to give them money in exchange for votes. Bloomington does not have the money to do that yet continues to pretend it does.
Our leaders are also obsessed with quality of life items. It does not matter how many amenities your community has if there are no good paying jobs (see Decatur for an example). The only economic security in the 21st century is being in a place with a diverse set of employers. Bloomington doesn’t have that.
It’s the OLD watch the LEFT hand so you won’t SEE what the right hand is doing trick. YES! They want a median on fairway, and a round about and 30 mph on Hershey and HIGHER garbage fees, and brick streets and a welcoming ILLEGALS to OUR TOWN and new library and more of the same and higher and wider and DEEPER..
YET they IGNORE the BASIC issues, sewer, garbage, streets, BUSINESS, etc. By the time they get done they won’t have a pygidium left to pull their head out of…
All the supervisors in public works have brand new 4 wheel drive trucks that they drive home. Also FOIA how much they are spending on there so called beautification around the city yards. We have two machines for pot holes they can barely keep running
I need more details!
Maybe your link is broke, but the minutes are there:
http://www.cityblm.org/government/city-council/meetings-agendas/city-council-documentation/-parent-146/-folder-1610
Those are motions and votes. It’s a waste of time to do Minutes separately, but they do anyway. The minutes are what is missing.