By: Diane Benjamin The City of Bloomington likes to pretend they are transparent. They even have a transparency portal on their website: http://www.cityblm.org/government/transparency One of the items listed is: As I’ve written before, the BCPA documents are mostly non-existent unless I FOIA them. https://blnnews.com/2019/02/14/it-a-secret-bcpa-creativity-center/ These are the event reports currently on the City website, there […]
By: Diane Benjamin The Bloomington City Code has a section on ethics for employees, it is patterned after the State Ethics Act: http://www.cityblm.org/government/codes-ordinances/city-code Excerpt: To find out what activities are prohibited, see the State Ethics law: http://www.ilga.gov/legislation/ilcs/ilcs5.asp?ActID=2529&ChapterID=2 This is the definition of Prohibited Political Activities from that link: There is more, but that’s enough […]
By: Diane Benjamin Part 1 See Part 2 here: https://blnnews.com/2018/08/30/part-2-nikita-richards/ See Part 3 here: https://blnnews.com/2018/08/30/part-3-nikita-richards/ This was the job Nikita used to have, maybe still does: Nikita’s LinkedIn page shows NDR and Running for McLean County Clerk, but doesn’t mention she works for the City of Bloomington: There is a description of what NDR Communications does […]
By: Diane Benjamin Earlier this month the City of Bloomington claimed the Public Works party was financed with employee money from vending machine profits: https://blnnews.com/2018/06/04/party-at-public-works/ I FOIA’d the City vending machine contracts, of course my FOIA was extended. Yesterday I received two contracts dated in 2004. This one is for vending machine products other than […]
Note: The search firm used by Bloomington, GovHR, also found David Hales for Joliet. They neglected to tell the Joliet Council about the pending Coliseum prosecutions that happened under Hales’ watch. What are they not telling Bloomington about the two candidates they presented? _____________________________________________________________________ A quick review: Citizens were given the opportunity to meet the […]
By: Diane Benjamin Bills and Payroll for 5/29/2018 http://www.cityblm.org/Home/ShowDocument?id=17800 See page 86-93. All the NEGATIVE numbers mean they spent more than was budgeted for that area. It’s illegal to spend what isn’t budgeted without Council approval. If I have time I may investigate further. Note: Remember all Tari’s free lunches he claimed were for City business? […]
By: Diane Benjamin Tari Renner was on WJBC this morning with Scott Laughlin. Scott asked Tari about pension funding. Tari had to mention the pension funding award he accepted several years ago. Pension funding was neglected for many years so Bloomington could do fun stuff like the BCPA and the Coliseum. When Tari was elected […]
