By: Diane Benjamin Note to Jamie Mathy: Future Councils are not bound by actions of past Councils. The Tari Renner “ramp” pension funding plan means zero if it can’t be afforded. Tari knew he wouldn’t be around to find at least $10 million more a year in the future. Renner already locked the Council into […]
By: Diane Benjamin Faulty planning forced the citizens of Bloomington to pay for a Fire Station that has NEVER been used. Tom Hamilton thought Mitsubishi would bring another 10-12000 people to the southwest side of town. He guessed wrong and wasted millions of dollars! From Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_planning The most notable critique of economic planning came from […]
By: Diane Benjamin The Planning Commission delayed sending the new zoning ordinance to the Council over concerns in historic districts. What you need to see are the minutes from their last meeting. They aren’t listed separately on the City website, but they are included in the packet for yesterday’s meeting. http://www.cityblm.org/Home/ShowDocument?id=20520 PDF page […]
By: Diane Benjamin Ever since Tari was first elected, a never-ending supply of Master Plans covering everything in Bloomington has been produced at great expense. In order to get Council support they were sold as “advisory”. They never were meant to be advisory, they are considered law. The hard-core leftist on the current Council frequently […]
By: Diane Benjamin 8 of the 9 aldermen heard an hour and a half recap of the proposed zoning changes last night. David Sage was absent, of course with no explanation. Most people don’t need to listen to 1 1/2 hours, it got much more interesting when the alderman got to ask questions. To hear […]
By: Diane Benjamin Bloomington wouldn’t have a Bike Master Plan without Bike Blono. Bloomington wouldn’t have a Complete Streets plan without Bike Blono. Bike Blono had private meetings for months with Public Works to make lanes on Washington happen. (as stated by Michael Gorman of Bike Blono) Bikes have always been allowed on the roads, […]
By: Diane Benjamin Bloomington recently announced they won an award for excellence in comprehensive planning: http://www.cityblm.org/index.aspx?page=18&recordid=3855&returnURL=%2findex.aspx The award was for Bring It On Bloomington It doesn’t matter that Bring It On Bloomignton was a flop! https://blnnews.com/2014/09/19/bring-it-on-bloomington-flops/ The McLean County Regional Planning Commission wanted 7,660 people to complete the survey. They got 1,160. It was declared […]
by: Diane Benjamin Of course nobody in Bloomington City government is going to tell you that. The goal was to get 7,660 people to complete the survey. They only got 1,160. 15% of what they wanted. It will be declared a success, Mayor Renner will say how he works with data and 1,160 is plenty. […]
By Diane Benjamin Vasudha Pinnamaraju, Executive Director of the McLean County Regional Planning Commission, made a presentation to the City Council last Monday. The Council is updating their Comprehensive Plan. The presentation was on existing conditions in the City of Bloomington. Some of the data used was from 2010, I doubt it is still valid, […]
by: Diane Benjamin This morning’s appearance by Mayor Renner on Cities 92.9 had at least 3 problems. Tari claims to be transparent, which would be wonderful. Unfortunately he gets in the way of transparency. Per Tari: 1) This years budget was discussed for 9 months. really? In open Council? NO! 2) Cuts and Taxes were […]
