By: Diane Benjamin
The Town of Normal is well known for making their own rules. Some developers are charged sewer tap-on fees, some aren’t. If you are Stan Nord and they “forgot” to charge the owner at the time the sewer connection was made, you get charged. Being 4 owners ago when they “forgot” is immaterial. Of course nobody at the Town was fired for incompetence.
The financial relationship with the Children’s Discovery Museum and the Foundation is murky at best. Whatever CDM wants they get, even if the agreement looks like the Foundation should be footing the bill. Citizens have no idea how much CDM costs them, they should.
I could go on and on about Normal “bending” the rules whenever they want, but this one is blatant.
From the Town code: https://normal.org/DocumentCenter/View/7695/Chapter-01—Elections?bidId=
The Oath of Office is spelling out, is it too difficult to copy and paste? It says support “the Ordinances of the Town of Normal” right in it!
That is not the Oath of Office prescribed in Illinois law, so the elected and appointed officials take that oath instead. The State oath doesn’t say anything about “the Ordinances”, just the Constitutions of the United States and Illinois. Obviously somebody wrote “ordinances” into Town Code and the Town ignores it.
This is not a new problem. This part of the Town Code has been ignored for a LONG time. I asked Brian Day, Town attorney, why they aren’t using the oath in the code. No surprise, he didn’t respond.
Citizens of Normal know if they break Town code, like temporarily parking on your grass because you are moving, the authorities will be all over you. Code applies to control you, it doesn’t apply to the Town. If the Code section showing the required OATH doesn’t apply, what other parts of the Code is the Town pretending don’t exist?
Below is a file of past oaths, another “no surprise” is that many of the required signed oaths could not be located. Illinois law requires keeping a signed copy, since Normal can’t find some, does that mean the “profession staff” is incompetent or the oaths were never taken? See the first and last paragraph. Koos appointments are required to take the oath too, very few appointment oaths are included.
Obtained by FOIA:
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Rules for thee but not for me.
The “professional staff” can’t even get the basics right. Now I know where people fired for incompetence in the business world go for their next job.
Can I cherry pick which parts of the code I want to ignore or is that perk reserved just for Queen Pam? The level of arrogance Normal keeps showing is disgusting.
This is not ignorance. This is arrogance. Normal Town Council , staff and Favorite Friends – n – Family can do whatever they want. Regular citizens however are treated like gum on the bottom of their shoe.
Obama’s “jewel of the midwest.”
How is this NOT wrong? Koos keeps saying we are a Home Rule municipality which allows us to make our own rules. This our rule and we aren’t following it?
Ridiculous how low these jerks will go.
Bloomington had to redo theirs a couple years ago.