By: Diane Benjamin
The City of Peoria is facing a $31 million deficit because of COVID-19: https://week.com/2020/04/14/peoria-city-council-facing-31-million-hole-cuts-likely-on-the-way/
Normal is missing close to half of their population because of college closures. What is their deficit? (crickets)
http://normal.org/ArchiveCenter/ViewFile/Item/3608
Since bills were not included in the last packet, there are two lists in this one.
Previously Normal paid the Cornbelters $25,000 for a sponsorship. I don’t see any other REBATES. Did taxpayers ever demand this? Keep in mind the Democrat candidate for County Auditor thought you needed the stadium – Rob Fazzini. Normal played along.
Will Normal ever admit this was a mistake? (just to get a building built with a still empty 1st floor)
Lots of advertising for a closed theater, you can buy tickets to view on line though:
https://www.normaltheater.com/
Looking for more “free” money
Was ISU not available? Wesleyan? Ecology Action Center? Ameren? CornBelt Energy? (FOIA filed)
Either the payment is listed twice or this is an additional payment: PDF page 39 & 45
Library paid a consultant $187.50 per hour plus expenses
Is staff at the closed library, Discovery Museum, etc still getting paid?
Agenda:
Normal already uses this system, the documentation claims they eliminated two positions when it was implemented in 2014: PDF page 60
PDF page 66
Perfect example of why increasing the minimum wage is meaningless. Somebody has to pay, that would be YOU. All those people with more money in their pocket have to notice the cost of everything just went up.
Finally, this one:
PDF page 81:
For an explanation you have to go back to the March 2nd meeting – PDF page 154.
https://normal.org/ArchiveCenter/ViewFile/Item/3566
This is a program that helps people who can’t afford a house buy one. (Deju va)
Lots to unpack here. The bottom line is that Koos, Reece, and the Town will never admit that the government was wrong. Let’s face it, nothing and no one is perfect, yet this group acts as if everything they do is/was correct. When something turns out to be a demonstrable failure, they either double down by forking over more and more taxpayer money or create a strawman argument to assign blame elsewhere. Uptown is perhaps the largest and most obvious example of a bad government idea executed even worse than imagined. Yet, there’s Koos wanting to knock down buildings, expand Uptown, and hand out taxpayer money to his loyal subjects. Let’s add a multi-million dollar sports complex while we’re at it. The Town of Normal is like a Hollywood production company, they build these elaborate sets, but in real life, no one really lives or works there.
Sports complex is DEAD! 😍
I hope so, but with this crowd, you never know.