I received a response from Parks Director Jay Tetzloff, it has been added at the bottom.
By: Diane Benjamin
I’ve been hearing for weeks about mowing not being done in many of the Bloomington Parks. I’ve been cutting the City some slack because of all the rain. Not anymore!
You are paying more in taxes and getting less service.
Yesterday I emailed City Manager Tim Gleason and Parks Director Jay Tetzloff asking what the problem is. No response from either so far.
If a park by you is in poor condition, send me pics: [email protected]
http://www.cityblm.org/government/codes-ordinances/city-code
Rollingbrook Park: h/t a reader – his words:
What’s going on this year? Rollingbrook Park looks awful. Beyond awful.
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If this was privately owned property, the city would have every right to cite you as a nuisance property.
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This is adjacent to the tennis courts.
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Whoever came out and mowed it last week not only had an issue with one of the blades in their mower deck failing to properly cut that section (leaving wonderful stripes of beaten, but uncut grass), but they half-assed mowed. They skipped the corners, and large areas by the trees. Like this one. That is now 24″+ tall.
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They do as they please, because they can, and they tax, fine, overcharge and (selectively) harass US because they can, it’s that simple really. The problem, as well as the question is – HOW can we change it? How can we stop it? I am sorry to say that I don’t have any easy answers.
I received a response from Jay Tetzloff. It has been added to the story.
This is Franklin park 2 days ago. I sent if to the app.
And this is Clinton Blvd Sent from my iPhone
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I don’t see anything, send it to the email address
Does the “MS” after his signature stand for holding a Master of Science” degree? If so, only a total pompous ass would add such a title to a routine business communication. Oops…I forgot…..City of Bloomington big-wig. One of Tari’s “guys”. That explains it.
Really? People do that all of the time. He worked hard for a degree and you’re sitting in front of the computer judging people….but he’s the pompous ass…ha.
It’s common, no matter the occupation field, to include your advanced degree(s) on your email signature. There’s nothing ‘pompous’ about it.
Condelisa Rice has a Doctorate, so does David Petreus, Dick Army and Phil Gramm. And locally, State Representative Tom Bennett. Don’t remember any of them EVER rubbing people’s nose in their degree titles. Different folks with different value systems, I guess.
I rarely put CPA after my name when I was licensed, only when I wanted to prove a numbers point
I don’t think Jay and Parks Dept. deserve the criticism. Everything he said in his response is true. As for lack of employees, the shortage of applicants, for all types of work, seems to have hit a new low. I’m not sure why.
College kids aren’t home for the summer? Where are they advertising the jobs? The paper isn’t going to get applicants.
This is outdoor, somewhat physical labor. That would mean they can’t stare at their phone all day. The job is posted on the city’s website. It pays 11.50/hr, not bad for a summer job…
Maybe they should pay more than $9 an hour. I bet if they paid $20 an hour they have plenty of applicants!
$11.50, good for a temporary job.
Trust me, if they were paying $80 per hour, they would have plenty of applicants. Economics is not rocket science.
(I am NOT saying that I want my tax dollars paying someone $80 per hour. Just observing how life works.)
Remember, this is the same Jay Tetzloff. MS who bent over backwards to defend the kid who murdered the flamingo a few weeks back.
I wonder if the response: “I haven’t been able to mow my grass because I have received a record low number of qualified bids. I am researching why that is though.” would fly with a City code enforcement officer.
Maggie, the kid who hurt the flamingo is in second grade so I doubt he knows the full gravity of his actions and it doesn’t sound like Jay needed to do a tumbling act to get that across. Most people, excluding you apparently, know kids who are that young, do not have the greatest impulse control. You post on this site all the time and each time you sound like a miserable, vindictive person. If unmoved grass gets you this off the chain, maybe it’s time to check yourself into a mental health facility where they can medicate you and keep you from polluting everything you touch with your hyper negativity. Get help Dr. Strangelove!
Why aren’t the flamingos breeding? Losing one wouldn’t be so tragic if they were.
They could have taken the laborers off of the watering crews to mow. I can’t believe I have seen them out watering plants and flowers with all the rain we have had.
I think they bought self-watering containers for downtown.
Where are they advertising for these jobs? I’m wondering if they only want certain people to have these jobs, so they let them go unfilled. I imagine there are a lot of hard-working men who could do this work. Advertise all over the place! Employment agencies, Indeed, Snag a job, the paper.
There was a guy in the parking lot of Schnuck’s in Bloomington asking for money to eat with yesterday evening. Someone go ask him if he needs a job. This must be a popular panhandling parking area I see them a lot sitting next to the Prospect Rd. exit with a sign.
Probably a legitimate reason to be behind. I have about 3 acres, some with walnut trees. I am barely caught up myself with the cleanup from the storms and mowing. I’m looking for sheep to hire. No minimum wage to pay, benefits or union to deal with. So if you know of any sheep looking for work let me know. .
The Schnucks guy, the skinny one anyway, goes and buys lottery tickets every time he gets about 5-10 bucks, sometimes multiple times a day and yes this is known, it’s guys like him that help me not want to give anyone money, at the same time I don’t think Busking is allowed in BloNo, so it’s ok to beg, as long as you don’t entertain or showcase a talent I guess. If you drive around a lot you will know there is a little group that moves around with their signs. I feel true compassion for people who are truly in financial trouble especially if it was caused by no fault of their own, I don’t have a lot of patience with people who simply take advantage of the kindness of others. I used to work quite a bit with the homeless population in a major city and one thing they told me was – Food, is the least of your worries, there’s always somewhere to go get something to eat, and while that was a major city and Bloomington/Normal may not be AS flush with places for homeless to get a meal or some food I have also seen people give food to the “Homeless- Hungry” ones and when they leave their spot the food is left behind, and yes I know this has nothing to do with the parks situation but I kind of wonder what they are looking for in employees if they can’t find any, must be some steep qualifications…
Passing a background check, physical and a drug test are required. That is steep qualifications for some. Sounds like it will be even more difficult next year once recreational marijuana is available.
They need to contract with some of the local mowing companies to bridge the gap, if they can’t hire their own workers.
Good thought, but unions will never allow that….neither will the pro-union council and mayor.
I think both Diane and Jay make good points. Jay’s response seemed genuine and logically justifiable. He wasn’t trying to dodge the questions or deny the City is behind on its mowing. The mowers work like crazy when they’re out there. I’ve seen them in action. It’s not a picnic. Perhaps, there’s a generational shift away from that type of work among the 20 somethings who would have otherwise applied in the past. (Boy do I sound old…haha.) Diane makes an excellent point that the City is hypocritical for enforcing grass height (in the “interest of public safety”) when it commits multiple daily violations of the ordinance itself. Wonder if mowing is another causality of Tari’s prioritization of Downtown and other “cultural” spending…
See the story I just posted
Special training or experience would be needed In order to use the heavy equipment for mowing the parks. A guy was mowing a city-owned property near my home on Monday and the industrial mower got stuck in the mud causing huge ruts. Unfortunately for the residents, especially children who want to play in the parks, they can’t. Outsourcing would be the best solution.
It’s my belief why we are seeing our city parks and the Constitution Trail so out of control with high weeds and grass is that our city is under Looney Leftist leadership and Liberal’s fully believe in the United Nation’s Rewilding of America. They don’t believe in nicely trimmed bushes and grass being cut to look normal but they want this third world country out of control look, they push for the natural mother earth environmental look!
Look at the well-groomed downtown. That is where the manpower and $$ is being spent.