By: Diane Benjamin Links to the 4 previous stories: https://blnnews.com/2020/07/08/the-saga-of-mondays-normal-meeting-continues/ Inside information: Rumor (98% confirmed) is Normal was furious with Bloomington when they offered to lease or sell part of Prairie Vista golf course to Fire Juniors for a new soccer field. Prairie Vista already has adequate infrastructure, the new location in Normal doesn’t. Bloomington […]
By: Diane Benjamin On June 22 the Town of Normal held a special meeting just to approve submitting a grant request to the State of Illinois for funds to fix West College: http://normal.org/ArchiveCenter/ViewFile/Item/3668 This plan also included extending the trail, the cost estimate just for the trail wasn’t listed – just the total: If other […]
By: Diane Benjamin THREE of your representatives, a full one third, failed to attend this meeting. Mathy, Mwilambwe, and Bray were absent. Of course the ones that did attend acted like it was perfectly normal. Only a few items of note: A guy from Millennium Soccer spoke during Public Comment. (22:50) I was not aware […]
By: Diane Benjamin I filed a FOIA request with the FAA pertaining to the soccer fields on January 31, 2018. I received it today by mail. It’s not that big, no word on why it had to be mailed. So, why does soccer need to leave the airport property? See this 1994 letter written by […]
Normal wants a study for between $40,000 and $60,000 to see if a sports complex makes sense. Seriously? ____________________ By: Diane Benjamin The local soccer people held a press conference in August 2013 to demand taxpayer funding for their complex. It was complete with cute little kids in their soccer uniforms. The group handed out […]
By: Diane Benjamin I find it hilarious Normal must offer early retirement to employees because Bloomington broke the MetroZone agreement costing them $1.2 million. The total budget is $107,133,177. (Tiny percentage of the total!) I wonder if the Soccer Complex is now dead? $1,400,000 was spent on yet another underpass study! Normal should be […]
By: Diane Benjamin The local soccer people have known since at least 2013 they have to leave the airport soccer fields. Has anybody bothered to ask the FAA why the kids could still play on the fields for 5 years after they demanded they vacate because it’s too dangerous? Your government at work protecting the […]
By: Diane Benjamin Prairie City Soccer League is losing it’s soccer complex on the airport property at the end of next year. They had a lot of time to raise money for their own new complex. They claimed in a proposal from 2013 to have over 3000 kids participating. Keep in mind the Pony League […]
by: Diane Benjamin You probably don’t realize that you fund the Bloomington Center for the Performing Arts whether you ever go there or not. A 1/4% Sales Tax was levied in 2002 to pay for it. The tax does not have an expiration date. Below is a recap of the money generated by this tax: […]
by: Diane Benjamin Obviously when around 20% of voters actually vote in local elections, what City government does to you isn’t a priority. This is what happens in Bloomington when you don’t care who represents you: An estimated $139,000,000 needs to be spent on sewers in the next 20 years It will cost an estimated […]
