By: Diane Benjamin In case you forgot, the Summit was originally by invitation only from a Trustee or Mayor. After outrage, citizens were allowed to attend but their concerns were kept separate. This is a link to the report Lyle Sumek was paid to produce after the meeting, I hear it was rewritten many times […]
By: Diane Benjamin With virtually nothing on the agenda Normal might be back to a short meeting. I don’t expect that trend to continue unless they are completely out of money and just not telling anyone. Monday would be a great time for off-agenda Public Comment – lots of them! Koos has the time to […]
By: Diane Benjamin Background: If you’ve ever watched a Normal Town Council meeting you know Chris Koos, Pam Reece, and most of the Council don’t appreciate Stan Nord representing citizens. The formerly 10 minute meetings with your elected officials never questioning anything are over. The emails below reveal how City Manager Pam Reece feels. She […]
By: Diane Benjamin Part 1: https://blnnews.com/2020/05/01/rivian-back-for-property-tax-abatement/ Part 2: https://blnnews.com/2020/05/03/normal-monday-5-4-2020/ Part 3: https://blnnews.com/2020/05/03/normal-part-3-5-4-2020/ Payments that aren’t supposed to be discussed (per Chris Koos) start on PDF page 9: https://normal.org/ArchiveCenter/ViewFile/Item/3621 This is the second meeting in a row where the Town has refunded money. At the last meeting over $12,000 was refunded including what appears to be […]
By: Diane Benjamin Is Normal pretending to listen to citizens? January 16th – Budget Review Work Session at 9:00. The Citizen Summit was held on December 5th. The Council held a Work Session the next day. Lyle Sumek was hired to facilitate both. He has had plenty of time to compile a priorities list based […]
By: Diane Benjamin For the second time in recent months Normal was incapable of live streaming with good audio. The posted video still has the same problem, luckily it was fixed almost 13 minutes into the meeting. About every 20 seconds the prior audio was replayed over the first. In another 20 seconds a third […]
By: Diane Benjamin All emails received by FOIA. This comment appeared in a December 4th article – Mayor Koos: https://www.pantagraph.com/news/local/govt-and-politics/in-step-or-out-of-line-normal-council-wants-to/article_deebde5c-33be-5c08-bd94-828984d434bf.html The Mayor was talking about the Citizens Summitt. He wanted only “invitees” to participate. Stan Nord invited the Town from his Facebook page. Koos and Pam Reece were annoyed at the December 2nd council meeting: […]
By: Diane Benjamin When government schedules ‘off” night meetings, most people never know about them until it’s too late to attend. These two you need to know about in advance. The first meeting is December 2nd. This is a joint meeting of the Bloomington and Normal Councils to discuss a sports complex. It will take place […]
By: Diane Benjamin The Bloomington Council holds Committee of the Whole meetings to discuss items in public. In Normal they meet during the day for many hours at a time so the public doesn’t attend. The meeting with Lyle Sumek wasn’t even held in the Council Chambers. All of the pics below are from the […]
By: Diane Benjamin Below is another page from the workbook compiled by Lyle Sumek for the Normal Town Council: Start with: Integrity The Normal Town Council can’t come up with 4 votes to force changes to the illegal public comment policy? That’s integrity? How about the years of 5-10 minute meetings that used to happen […]
By: Diane Benjamin During the recent 2 day Normal Council meeting with Lyle Sumek they used a workbook. I FOIA’d this year’s and last years. So far I haven’t made it past page 12 of the current one. (It’s 334 pages long!) Section 1 Normal – A Championship Team (Lyle’s name, not mine) This section […]
By: Diane Benjamin PDF page 50: https://normal.org/ArchiveCenter/ViewFile/Item/3446 Normal under this Council is not capable of living within their means. I bet you didn’t know about this two day meeting of the council with Lyle Sumek: Sumek is the guy really running Normal. I bet this meeting isn’t going as well as last year’s! Celebrate they […]
By: Diane Benjamin Tonight’s meeting is delayed because at 7:00 there is a tree lighting ceremony on the circle. THIS HAS BEEN CANCELLED DUE TO THE WEATHER. The meeting is still at 7:30. http://normal.org/ArchiveCenter/ViewFile/Item/3436 A few choice payments tonight: This is the Florida guy who tells Normal how to operate: Who else contributes and what […]
By: Diane Benjamin Pam Reece can’t understand why Stan Nord is questioning the actions of past Councils. If Pam can’t understand why Stan was elected, she had an opportunity handed to her: Stan has raised questions about a number of issues. Some of them included Town owned properties being leased for much less than market […]
By: Diane Benjamin Normal has hired a guy name Lyle Sumek many times to tell them how to do their jobs. Since his office is in Florida, they are probably paying his travel expenses too: http://lylesumek.com/ I wonder why his office is in Florida? Lower taxes? Are the people you elected incapable of governing? Is […]
