By: Dine Benjamin
Normal Trustee Kathleen Lorenz compiled a form email she sent to numerous residents who asked why she changed her vote. Yes folks, she was convinced the Town’s credit rating is more important than not fleecing residents for more money. She still spews the AAA credit rating from the much smaller Fitch Ratings while ignoring Moodys who has Normal at AA1. Kathleen even has an example of how much a drop in credit rating will cost if the Town borrows $10,000,000.
Earth to Kathleen: The citizens don’t want the Town borrowing more money!
The Town debt is already ridiculous, principal isn’t even being paid yet on numerous bonds, just interest. (More on that later today). I wonder if the plan is to borrow $10,000,000 for the underpass?
Below is her form letter, read it carefully. Since Chris Koos announced the re-vote was to fix an error, it’s obvious who got to her. The “emphasis” is mine.
Sent: Thursday, December 12, 2019, 3:30 PM
To: REDACTED
Subject: Response
?Hello REDACTED
Let me start my response by setting forth three things:
* On Council, I am and will always be committed to being the best steward of the Town’s resources.
* Sometimes in life, we do need to change our opinion on something when presented with new information.
* My change in decision was done with a great amount of thought and careful consideration of that new information.
I would very much like to make it clear that the Town reduced the 2019 levy by $600,000, based on the motion made by me during the November meeting. That is $600,000 to taxpayers, and a reduction to citizens’ property tax rate from 1.47 (2018) to 1.46 (2019).
When an amendment was proposed that would reduce the levy even further-by $96K-it initially appeared to be extra savings. Had I realized that cutting that $96K had the potential of hurting our bond rating, and the loss of a potential communication director – the latter being the issue most discussed at the meeting – I saw the initial decision for what it truly was: penny wise and pound foolish. I was glad of the opportunity to fix it at last week’s council meeting.
The impact on the Town’s AAA bond rating is a complicated matter – one that this issue gave me greater clarity and understanding. It has many moving and perhaps even subjective parts, on the part of rating agencies’ opinions of an entity’s risk. Suffice to say, that given the amount of debt load that we have – currently about $88M – we have to be extremely thoughtful of our bond rating. Falling to a AA rating would cost the Town over $500,000 in additional interest on one $10M bond, and never mind about any future savings that we’ve been able to achieve with our AAA rating through refinancing our current debt.
Nothing about any of vote is simple, especially ones on taxes. I’m reminded of a point in the poignant eulogy given by Senator Alan Simpson at President George H.W. Bush’s funeral, where he recalled one of Bush’s sayings: “when the really tough choices come, it’s the country, not me. It’s not about Democrats or Republicans, it’s for our country that I fought for.” I’m far from comparison to such a national figure of our country’s history like President George H.W. Bush, but the theme strikes a chord for me: it’s about the Town, not left or right, R’s or D’s, but for the well-being and future of our community – and for that I rest well at night.
Thank you for your interest and inquiry.
Kathleen Lorenz
Normal Town Councilmember
cell 309-531-1884
Where I come from this is where you get your hip boots out because the BS is so deep. Of course they want to borrow 10 million dollars. That 13 million dollar grant money for the bike underpass is burning a hole in Mayor Koos’s pocket. Using a credit rating to justify a tax increase is REALLY reaching for a justification. Sorry Kathleen, no one here is dumb enough to buy this lame excuse for you caving to Mayor Koos and his band of fools.
“On Council, I am and will always be committed to being the best steward of the Town’s resources” ….and you say this with a straight face expecting the taxpayers of the Town of Normal to believe you? Kathleen you are part of the problem. Start caring about the people who elected you and you represent because you are doing great harm to them and the Town of Normal by rubber stamping the Koos Cabal of fiscal insanity.
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Yup. We need to spend more money so that we can take out another loan. Brilliant thinking by the so-called leadership of Normal.
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She got one thing right in here otherwise flaming bag of poo. When presented with new information one may have a change of opinion. It is my hope that voters when shown new information that shows the real Lorenz will change their vote to someone else. Unfortunately it won’t be for 3 years I believe till we get the chance to remove this fool. In the meantime to see her letter in action go to https://mondomedia.com/games/play/74/Flaming_Bag_of_Poo
for a laugh.
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Don’t do the math on this one. It does not add up. It seems not hiring another person to be a propaganda/PR person if it’s not in the budget. The math gets a little circular here. The reason the PR person is needed is because the budget is messed up. I could go around again but I think we get it. They will try to convince us that the hole isn’t that deep and we have a very tall ladder. Neither of which is true.
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THIS says a LOT about “uptown” IF it was such a great place to come live, visit, and spend money, as mr koos and his lemmings would like US to believe, then they would NO need a PR person or whatever you call it.
This is the SAME kind of BS that gave the Labor Party in G.B. their SOUND butt kicking in the election..
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“This is the SAME kind of BS that gave the Labor (sic) Party in G.B. their SOUND butt kicking in the election..”
Yep….Great Britain dogged hard core Communism–at least for now. REJOICE!
Bloomington-Normal & Illinois, aren’t so lucky. Koos, Tari, Crabill and Crazy Jenn–Marxists, all.
And some polls show leads for Bernie or Liz.
You know what that means. Prepare yourself. Be ready for the worst.
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Neither have a chance. Expect a Trump landslide, the people aren’t that stupid.
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The new information that Kathy has been presented with is that she’s no longer up for reelection in the next go round. These people care more about the bond rating than they do our debt load.
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I’m not convinced Kathleen thinks for herself. Someone or someones drove this change. Maybe she was worried she wouldn’t be invited to the Chamber black-tie ball.
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I think she promised someone a job with the communication manager position, then struck a deal with Koos to pass a tax increase and he’ll hire her hand picked candidate for the job in return.
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Lorenz is correct it is not about D’s and R’s in town. It is also not about the taxpaying citizens. It is and has been for sometime about the local Elitist Clique. The clique includes but is not limited to local pols, organized labor leadership, the Chamber, the EDC, ISU, IWU, government department heads, secondary school administration’s, State Farm leadership, Country Companies leadership and healthcare leadership and Uptown and downtown supporters. They all see themselves as the movers, shakers and trend setters that are all-knowing and all-seeing. They are quite pleased with themselves, love photo ops, talk a good game and avoid real work whenever necessary. It’s all about what this circle wants and no one else.
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I don’t think she changed her vote because of her credit rating worry. Her mentor Chris Koos asked her to turncoat on taxpayers. She happily obliged..
He is a cult leader to her. She repeatedly says how much she respects his vision. She will do anything he says. When she votes out of line it is only with his blessing. They always ensure enough others will vote correctly so his agenda gets passed anyway.
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