By: Diane Benjamin The Youth on a Mission kids were allowed to speak out of order last night because they had to get home and study for finals. This was a Koos edict, the Council didn’t vote. “Friends” are allowed perks while citizens wanting to speak off agenda have to wait until the end of […]
By: Diane Benjamin In a representative government elected officials represent the people, not the organization they are elected to. Pam Reece wants meetings fixed in advance which is why 2 on 1 meetings are held. It’s embarrassing for her to actually have Trustees do what they were elected to do – represent the people paying […]
By: Diane Benjamin 1) Two meetings ago Kathleen Lorenz suddenly started voting against the “professional staff” and even started asking questions about bills. She was part of the gang when meetings were less than 1/2 hour long because nothing was questioned. She didn’t like my headline however: https://blnnews.com/2022/03/22/kathleen-lorenz-is-running-for-re-election/ In case it’s too hard to read, […]
By: Diane Benjamin Even though items on the Omnibus Agenda are rarely questioned by anyone other than Stan Nord, Kathleen Lorenz pulled 3 items last night. The reasons she gave didn’t make a lot of sense, it appears she now wants the public to know she isn’t a rubber-stamper. The meeting lasted slightly over an […]
By: Diane Benjamin Normal Town Council meetings are supposed to fixed in advance. Trustees know they are expected to vote YES on everything, after all staff is PROFESSIONAL. Representing taxpayers is shunned, staff is always right. Kathleen Lorenz and Scott Preston actually chose to act conservative last night. I wonder if both are afraid of […]
By: Diane Benjamin Water rates go up 2% every year without a Council vote. That isn’t enough money for the Town however. 1:08:15 – Chris Koos tells Stan Nord to quit bringing up past Council actions. This story is for you Mr. Mayor because past Council actions are why the Town wants to increase water […]
By: Diane Benjamin Appearances are very important in Normal. That’s why Koos frequently refers to the “professional staff” and claims his actions are required under Roberts Rules of Order. Appearances must have been very important for Pam Reece when Kathleen Lorenz asked about this expense: Note: the check was made out to Chemberly Cummings: Note […]
By: Diane Benjamin The speech below was right after Pam Reece declared there isn’t a problem with tap-on fees. She of course had to take on Stan, she called it “his thing” even though he’s wrong. She obviously didn’t read the annexation agreement for the Kerrick Road property that called for $300 an acre, the […]
I missed more Chemberly food spending: By: Diane Benjamin Chemberly’s participants in her “Youth on Mission”: She claimed earlier that she only had 8 kids, maybe some of the masked wonders are her paid assistants. What she is really doing is training activists. Chemberly doesn’t understand we are a Republic, not a Democracy. We elect […]
By: Diane Benjamin The Town of Normal is getting almost $11 million in American Rescue Funds over 2 years. Remember this slide from the Town of Normal Work Session on spending the windfall? https://blnnews.com/2021/12/07/normals-work-session-lack-of-transparency/ See the $3.5 million for the Savannah Green neighborhood. I have a map of that area below, but first you need […]
By: Diane Benjamin Stan Nord quit attending 2 on 1 meetings with Pam Reece and staff because they aren’t held to get his opinion. They are held to tell the Council what the plans are and get their official head nods. Funny how CITIZENS paying the bills aren’t privy to the same information. The 2 […]
By: Diane Benjamin Local property values are rising which means your property taxes will be going up based on the new value of your home. Units of government claiming they are keeping the rate the same as last year want you to believe they aren’t raising your taxes. When you bill comes in the mail […]
By: Diane Benjamin Kathleen Lorenz and Scott Preston claim to be Republicans. This story proves they are fakes. First a quick review of what Enterprise Funds are. Local government decided years ago people need to pay for what they use. Hence, Enterprise funds were created to specifically tax you based on usage. Water is one […]
By: Diane Benjamin How to tell when a Normal Town Council meeting will go bad: Stan Nord is attacked in the first 14 minutes. Of course Nord has a problem with sewer tap on fees, some developers get charged the big bucks and some get by with paying nothing. He didn’t say it, but he […]
By: Diane Benjamin 1) Bids for repairs and painting of the Camelback Bridge were rejected because the cost was significantly over budget. Keep in mind, the Town isn’t re-bidding their share of building the underpass since costs have changed. Does that explain why money is being stockpiled? 2) The only item Kathleen Lorenz voted against […]
By: Diane Benjamin Thursday the Planning Commission will hear from citizens about One Normal Plaza. This Commission is made up of unelected citizens that are appointed by Chris Koos. See who is on the Board here: https://normal.org/401/Planning-Commission Also note: NO email addresses or phone numbers are on this site for citizens to contact them! They […]
By: Diane Benjamin The biggest reason people refuse to call themselves Republican is because the Republic Party is the do-nothing party when they have the reins of power. DC Republicans voted dozens of times to end Obamacare when their votes were meaningless. When they actually were able to end this healthcare disaster and replace it […]
By: Diane Benjamin The video below is Stan Nord making comments at the end of Monday’s meeting. He is followed by Kathleen Lorenz who is distraught about the tone of this meeting. In other words: Shut up Stan. Animosity on the Council is caused by Lorenz’s lecturing Stan while the rest of the Council snickers. […]
By: Diane Benjamin Anyone who ever watched Bewitched will remember Gladys. She was Samantha and Darrin’s noisy neighbor who thought it was her duty to report the odd happenings she witnessed peering out her window. Normal has Kathleen Lorenz. Unlike Gladys who couldn’t convince her husband witches lived next door, Kathleen has no problem convincing […]
By: Diane Benjamin WGLT did another hit piece on Stan Nord, but as usual they MISSED the story and left out details: https://www.wglt.org/post/normal-council-member-stan-nord-alleges-discrimination-independent-lawyer-disagrees First, just like the lawyer Normal hired to conduct the assault on Joes Stationhouse Pizza, the results were completely predictable. Second, WGLT claims they obtained a copy of the 7 page page […]
Only 5 of the candidates on the ballot bothered to show up. Those not attending were: Kevin McCarthy, Chemberly Cummings, Donna Toney, and AJ Zimmerman. If the GOP saved the video I don’t see it anywhere. If you want to know who the elites don’t want to see elected: These 3 with Marc Tiritilli as […]
By: Diane Benjamin Last night during Trustee comments at the end of the meeting Chris Koos claimed Council agreed to limit each to 5 minutes. Evidently that was done in secret. I doubt Stan Nord got 5 minutes because he was constantly interrupted. Nord showed a map of where Normal plans to run water lines […]
By: Diane Benjamin There are great teachers, I’m not sure Karyn Smith qualifies. I watched part of the budget discussion last night that was continued from last week. Smith decided to inform viewers about bonds. She claimed paying interest for decades is what they are designed to do. The principal will be paid at the […]
By: Diane Benjamin Government’s job is first to preserve and protect freedom for future generations. How is that one working for you? Next, government should only be doing what citizens can’t do for themselves: police, fire, water, sewer and roads. Maybe citizens need to start building their own roads and charge a toll to use […]
By: Diane Benjamin Of course Stan Nord knows taxpayers got fleeced to rent the second floor of 1 Uptown Circle only to fill a hole in Uptown. The Council that approved paying $35000-$36000 a month simply did as they were told. Chris Koos wanted the hole gone and obviously the private sector wasn’t going to […]
By: Diane Benjamin At Tuesday’s Normal Town Council meeting Kathleen Lorenz asked why the Intergovernmental Agreement with Connect Transit says both Bloomington and Normal are required to review the CT budget yearly. They never do, but it is in the agreement. Kathleen: Maybe because CT loses $1 MILLION a month and local taxes were raised […]
By: Diane Benjamin After every Council meeting Stan Nord does a video on Facebook to explain what happened. Of course the Town hates the videos because they don’t control what he says. He mentioned the 11/5 indoor dining meeting from this story in his December 21st video: https://blnnews.com/2020/12/30/normal-you-cant-eat-inside-but-we-can/ Obviously the gang met in person and […]
By: Diane Benjamin Part 1: https://blnnews.com/2020/12/29/normal-vengeance-part-1/ This snip is from the minutes of the September 8. 2020 minutes: https://normal.org/ArchiveCenter/ViewFile/Item/3759 Obviously Lorenz and McCarthy missed the graphic in Part 1 stating Normal’s priority is to run Water to Rivian. The minutes go on to state this $5,000,000 project would promote economic development, there is no mention […]
By: Diane Benjamin Follow-up to this story: https://blnnews.com/2020/12/10/lorenz-how-about-not-believing-everything-you-are-told/ The Town of Normal finally provided the information I requested by FOIA. At the December 7th meeting Lorenz went on a long rant about rumors. It was aimed at a Facebook post by Marc Tiritilli concerning the quality of the water some residents have endured for a […]
By: Diane Benjamin Problem identified: Kathleen’s facts are right, Stan Nord’s aren’t. Did Kathleen read this story? Her facts were WAY OFF! https://blnnews.com/2020/12/10/lorenz-how-about-not-believing-everything-you-are-told/ Kathy didn’t do any better in an interview with Cities 92.9. She was there to counter an interview Stan Nord did previously. You can listen to it here: https://www.cities929.com/david-paul-blumenshine/ The first topic […]
By: Diane Benjamin Many of the locally elected aldermen and trustees are inflicted with the same disease. They believe everything they are told instead of looking at facts for themselves. They weren’t elected to represent government staff, they should be representing the people. There were two glaring examples during the Town of Normal meeting last […]
By: Diane Benjamin Of course we know the local elections are not non-partisan. Koos and Renner don’t hide the fact they are Democrats. Carrillo and Crabill don’t hide they are socialists. Scott Preston is involved with the local GOP party. The association list goes on and on. When elected, ideology isn’t suddenly thrown out the […]
By: Diane Benjamin Normal managed to have an almost 2 1/2 hour meeting. Much of it was spent trying to straighten out YOUR thoughts about the Town government. Kathleen Lorenz reiterated again payments can not be discussed because they were already approved in the budget. Pam Reece gave a long diatribe about a payment to […]
By: Diane Benjamin At the last meeting (September 8th) Kevin McCarthy pulled approving the bills from the Omnibus Agenda just so he could state “it is just a report”, everything spent was already approved in the budget. Last night Kathleen Lorenz pulled the same item so she could give the same speech. Who’s turn will […]
By: Diane Benjamin Much of the meeting was spent talking about the 3/31/2020 financial statements and the financial trends report. Neither are on-line yet, so they aren’t worth discussing much here. Many accolades were thrown at staff for doing a good job preparing for the audit. I agree, but isn’t that what they get paid […]
By: Diane Benjamin Normal met for almost 4 hours last night. See the 6:00 pm Work Session story here: https://blnnews.com/2020/09/09/stealing-more-from-you-the-town-of-normal/ I’m going to start with the END of the regular meeting since I might have been one of the few still awake watching it. Chris Koos is attempting to fix his image since he was […]
By: Diane Benjamin If you read the story below you saw Stan Nord was cut off last Monday when he asked questions about taxpayer investment in the private Illinois Arts Station: https://blnnews.com/2020/08/18/normals-painful-meeting/ He was cut off because Pam Reece and company have been negotiating behind the backs of the Council for months. All emails received […]
By: Diane Benjamin Besides Kathleen Lorenz proving she is unfit to serve as an elected official, lots of other things happened too. In case you missed her rant: https://blnnews.com/2020/07/21/i-bet-you-missed-the-premier-of-lorenzs-version-of-shut-up-stan/ I hope Kathleen and the other Council members take the time to read the comments to that story. The people supposedly “served” by the Normal […]
By: Diane Benjamin If you happened to watch the Normal Town Council meeting last night you might have shut it off before they got to Council comments. You missed proof Normal isn’t government For and By The People, it’s for and by the staff. Kathleen Lorenz went on a long diatribe condemning Stan Nord for […]
By: Diane Benjamin 9:00 – Stan pulled the bills for further discussion – particularly paying property taxes. Pam Reece and attorney Brian Day didn’t have good answers for not filing paperwork to make them exempt. 14:45 Koos ends the conversation. Next was the contract with the McLean County Regional Planning Commission. Stan wanted the same […]
