By: Diane Benjamin
A couple of priceless moments:
See 42:38. Chris Koos tells Stan Nord he should ask questions in advance. (Evidently citizens don’t need to know what questions are asked) Nord replies that he has an email from Pam Reece stating she won’t answer his questions unless he gets 3 other people to agree with them.
See 1:45:00. Koos appointments aren’t announced before a Council vote. Trustees think they have no right to question any of them. Remember that when the Planning Commission meets August 4th at 5:00 to hear testimony about sign ordinance changes – every one of those people were hand-picked by Koos. Stan Nord mentions that Koos’ appointment to the Amtrak Board is public knowledge. Koos relents and let’s Kevin McCarthy read who the Council is going to approve.
Just so the wind turbine approval is on the record: Mitsubishi still owns a parcel of land that is currently farmed. The turbine is located too close to that property which means in the future the value of that land could be diminished. The set-back should have been farther from the property line to enable future development on their entire parcel. Normal staff claims they sent notifications to area property owners. Since Mitsubishi has no local presence, the town couldn’t be sure Mitsubishi actually received notice.
The Flock Safety License Plate cameras were passed 6-1. Nord voted again them because the police will be policing themselves. A representative of the ACLU spoke at Public Comment, this was one of their requests: https://www.aclu-il.org/en/alprs
Require an annual independent, public audit that reports any privacy violations (and any appropriate discipline) and evaluates the efficacy of the system.
What Normal passed doesn’t allow any oversight outside of the police department. See 1:13:50. Of course past abuses by an officer wasn’t allowed, neither was the Town’s non-disclosure documents some staff have to sign when they leave the Town’s employment. Who is policing the police? In Normal, nobody.
By Town of Normal standards, this was a relatively calm meeting. Koos and McCarthy must not realize every time they shut down Stan Nord they only draw more attention to what he says.
