Monthly Archives: January 2009

City of Peoria

Midtown Plaza Cub Foods closing in March

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The following info just hit my mailbox while I was home for lunch:

Mr. Curt Craig from Cub Foods in Minneapolis [said] they are closing the Midtown Plaza Cub Food Store. […] This will happen the first part of March, with the last employees leaving mid-March.

You remember Midtown Plaza. The City paid $5.5 million to clear the land (including knocking down old ladies’ houses on Dechman) required to make way for this project and made the area a TIF district after rejecting their own consultant’s report that said this was a bad deal for the City. They listened to the developer’s consultants instead.

The city’s consultant (Development Strategies, Inc.) predicted, according to a Journal Star editorial on 3/9/1999, that Cub Foods “would draw 90 percent of its customers from other city grocery stores.” Joseph’s consultants (Melaniphy & Associates, Inc.; Deloitte & Touche) predicted “43 percent of revenues would come from customers living outside the city” and that Cub Foods “would draw customers from a 10-mile radius.”

The city’s consultant was right. After Cub Foods opened, Thompson’s/Sullivan’s and John Bee both closed. With the loss of Cub Foods, where are East Bluff residents supposed to go for groceries now?

Also, will the city get a refund on that TIF money from the developer?

Museum Block

Questioning museum attendance projections

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Reading over the Peoria Riverfront Museum information on the County’s website, I found page 211 especially fascinating. There, in black and white, is a “Museum Benchmark Matrix” comparing various museums around the country, their square footage, metropolitan statistical area (MSA) population, annual attendance figures, and other information.

Here is a simplified chart of all the museums that listed their annual attendance figures (I’ve added Peoria’s proposed museum to the end of the list):

Museum Location MSA Pop. Gross SF Annual Attendance
Science Station Cedar Rapids, IA 252,784 20,000 27,000
Science Spectrum Lubbock, TX 267,211 85,000 185,000
Putnam Museum Davenport, IA 376,160 115,000 190,000
Sci-Port Discovery Center Shreveport, LA 387,583 92,000 200,000
Gulf Coast Exploreum Mobile, AL 404,406 55,000 220,000
Exploration Place Wichita, KS 596,452 100,000 180,000
Louisville Science Center Louisville, KY 1,233,735 129,000 315,000
Kalamazoo Valley Museum Kalamazoo, MI 323,264 60,000 125,000
Peoria Riverfront Museum Peoria, IL 371,206 81,000 240,000 (est.)

Notice anything unusual or surprising? That’s right. The projected attendance for Peoria’s museum block is more than every other museum in the matrix, except for Louisville’s, where the MSA is over 1.2 million people.

In case you’re wondering where I got the 240,000 figure for attendance, here’s the scoop: the museum folks are estimating 360,000 visitors per year for the whole block. But they split that up this way: 1/3 of those people will attend Caterpillar Experience only, 1/3 will attend the Peoria Riverfront Museum only, and 1/3 will attend both. That means that only 2/3 of the 360,000 estimated visitors to “the block” will go to the Peoria Riverfront Museum (360,000 x 2/3 = 240,000).

It’s tricky trying to figure out their numbers, as you can see, because they often treat the whole block as a single project in their campaign literature. But it’s really two projects; and if you want to compare apples with apples regarding the museum, you must first split the projects apart.

So let’s see if Peoria’s numbers hold up to some mathematical scrutiny. Let’s look at market penetration. We’ll take the average attendance and divide it by the MSA population for each of the museums listed in the matrix:

Museum Att./Pop.
Science Station 10.7%
Science Spectrum 69.2%
Putnam Museum 50.5%
Sci-Port Discovery Center 51.6%
Gulf Coast Exploreum 54.4%
Exploration Place 30.2%
Louisville Science Center 25.5%
Kalamazoo Valley Museum 38.7%
Average 41.35%
Peoria Riverfront Museum 64.7%

As you can see, the projections for Peoria’s museum are well above the average of other museums in the matrix. If Peoria were to get the 41.35% average penetration, it would come out to about 153,494 visitors per year.

Now, I’m going to guess that the argument will be that these are old numbers — possibly as old as 2004 — and that the museum’s projected attendance figures are for 2011, which is the date they hope to open the museum. So, let’s assume that 153,494 is a 2004 figure, and that attendance would increase at a rate of 3% per year. Over seven years (2004-2011), that would bump up the attendance to 188,788 visitors — still far below the 240,000 figure being projected. To get to 240,000, you’d have to assume that attendance would grow by almost 7% each year. It’s also worth noting that museum officials have been projecting “200,000 to 250,000 visitors a year” since 2003 (“Report touts museum impact,” Peoria Journal Star, 4/8/2003).

Granted, my methods are not nearly as scientific as the “common sense” methods employed by others, but I think a case could be made that the museum’s attendance estimates are wildly optimistic.

Museum Block

Bob Manning takes on his critics

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Bob Manning dared to criticize the proposed museum project last month when the council was asked to amend the museum’s redevelopment agreement for the third time. Since then, he’s been pummeled in the Forum section of the Journal Star by the likes of Jim Maloof and Jim Baldwin. Manning wrote his own letter to the editor, mostly responding to Baldwin’s letter, but shooting back at his critics in general with this paragraph:

Let this be a warning to anyone who considers running for the Peoria City Council. If you disagree with the agenda of the “self-anointed” leaders in this community, they will come after you with personal attacks. They will not debate the issues on substance. Rather, you will be criticized for standing in the way of “progress” (read “their pet projects”).

After writing this blog for three and a half years, I can understand Bob’s frustration. No matter how much you try to speak to the issues, it seems that there’s always someone on the other side of the argument that takes your comments personally, and responds with a personal attack on your character. I guess if you can’t win the argument on substance, then the argument of last resort is the ad hominem attack.

When those attacks happen as publicly and with as much vitriol as the recent forum letters from community “leaders” against Mr. Manning, they backfire. After Maloof’s letter was published, there was not one comment in the Journal Star’s comments section in favor of Mr. Maloof’s point of view. Ditto with Mr. Baldwin’s letter. Instead, there has been an outpouring of support for Manning, including letters to the editor defending him, and thanking him for speaking out.

If this museum project is as wonderful as its boosters say it is, it should be able to stand up to scrutiny on its own merits. If it can’t, then no amount of personal attacks are going to save it.

Crime

Stupid criminal of the month

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This made me laugh:

Jermaine D. Mitchell, 21, of 4417 W. Rockwell Drive called police about 9:40 p.m. to report he had been robbed at gunpoint in Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Park, located in the 200 block of South MacArthur Highway.

Mitchell told officers the robbers stole his money, $48, and the nearly 40 grams of marijuana he just bought, police reports stated.

…Police also arrested Mitchell on a charge of possessing more than 30 grams of marijuana for admitting to having the drug.

Note: If someone steals your illegal drugs, don’t call the police.

2009 Campaign

Fifth district contest down to two

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Doug Crew has pulled out of the fifth district council race, canceling the need for a primary there. That leaves Dan Irving and Gloria Cassel-Fitzgerald, both of whom ran two years ago for at-large council seats.

In the at-large race, the top five vote-getters each won a seat on the council. Irving came in sixth. Cassel-Fitzgerald came in ninth. Taking a look at the precinct results, Irving got more votes than Cassel-Fitzgerald in every precinct in the fifth district. Of course, past performance is no guarantee of future results, but this is a good sign for Dan. (Full disclosure: I supported Dan Irving in the 2007 at-large election.)

Something else that would help Irving is if he can pull in the same endorsements he picked up two years ago, which included Ray LaHood, Jim Ardis, and Patrick Nichting.

Museum Block, Peoria County, Taxes

County committee approves museum tax referendum

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From the Peoria County website:

The Peoria County Finance/Legislative Committee passed a resolution late this afternoon that would place a referendum on the April ballot asking voters to raise the sales tax rate 1/4 of one percent to help fund public facilities. The County Board must approve the resolution before the referendum can be added to the April ballot. The Board must make its decision by January 30; a special board meeting will be called to allow the full board to vote on the resolution. The date of that meeting has not yet been set.

Should the County Board pass the resolution, the voters will ultimately decide whether to support the sales tax increase. The referendum would include a sunset date, set 20 years from the effective date of the tax increase. If the referendum is on the April ballot and the voters support the sales tax increase, money raised from the increase will be used to help fund construction of the Peoria Riverfront Museum.

Interested persons may click here for more information on the museum funding. From the information library, please select MuseumPolicyConsideration-REPORT.pdf or MuseumPolicyConsideration-REPORTandATTACHMENTS.pdf.

State of Illinois

House committee: Impeach Blagojevich (UPDATED)

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UPDATE: The full house voted 114-1 on Friday morning to impeach Rod Blagojevich. The Senate will hold the trial.

The House Committee on Impeachment unanimously recommended that Rod Blagojevich be impeached. Their recommendation now moves to the full House, where lawmakers are expected to vote tomorrow. If it passes (or should I say, when it passes), the Senate will then hold an impeachment trial.

Here’s the Committee’s report. Here’s the summary:

In sum, the Committee heard a great volume of evidence relating to the Governor’s abuse of power. The Committee received a criminal complaint and affidavit whose weight comes primarily from the Governor’s own words, when he was unaware that the government was listening. Those recordings captured the Governor overseeing and directing plans to negotiate a personal benefit for his appointment of a u.S. Senator; conditioning the provision of State financial assistance to the Tribune Company on the firing of members of the Chicago Tribune editorial board; and engaging in a number of instances of tying official actions to campaign contributions. The Committee saw further evidence of the Governor linking campaign contributions to official actions with the sworn federal court testimony of Ali Ata and Joseph Cari, testimony which helped lead to the conviction of one of the Governor’s top fundraisers, Antoin Rezko. The Committee heard evidence that the Governor defied JCAR and expanded a health care plan without legal authority or a funding source. And the Committee heard a number of abuses exposed by Auditor General Holland in his audits of the flu vaccine program, the I-SaveRx program, and the efficiency initiative.

In response to all of this evidence, the Governor chose to remain silent and absent from the proceedings. His counsel offered a Transition Report from the President-Elect’s attorney on the subject of the Senate seat and a videotape of a press conference by Congressman Jesse Jackson, Jr. Beyond that, the Governor’s counsel named four individuals that, he predicted, would testify that they were not approached by anyone from the Governor’s staff for any wrongful purpose related to the Senate seat and, in one case, related to the Tribune Company issue. It is fair to note, however, that at the time the Governor’s counsel made the proffer of the four witnesses (December 23, 2008), the U.S. Attorney had already requested that the Committee refrain from inquiring into the subject matters of the Senate seat and the Tribune Company (December 22,2008). The Governor’s counsel knew, at the time he made the request, that it would not be granted.

In sum, the Committee has heard a great deal of evidence relating to various instances where the Governor’s inappropriate actions constitute abuse of power. The Governor’s counsel, in response, has provided the Committee only a small amount of information that does not even address the majority of the claims raised in this proceeding.

My favorite part is where he paid someone who didn’t know sign language to be an interpreter for the deaf.

Education, Nation/World, Peoria Public Schools

Michelle Rhee: Blueprint for urban schools?

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I heard a story on NPR the other day about the chancellor of the Washington (D.C.) public schools, Michelle Rhee. She has a plan for improving the struggling urban school district:

She has proposed a new contract for the union that would undermine tenure, the teachers union holy of holies. The carrot is money. By tapping Mayor Fenty and private philanthropists, she is hoping to make D.C. teachers the best-paid in the country. Current teachers would actually have a choice. If they are willing to go on “probation” for a year—giving up their job security—and can successfully prove their talent, they can earn more than $100,000 a year and as much as $130,000, a huge salary for a teacher, after five years. If not, they still get a generous 28 percent raise over five years and keep their tenure. (All new teachers must sign up for the first option and go on probation for four years.) Rhee predicts that about half the teachers will choose to take their chances on accountability for higher pay, and that within five years the rest will follow, giving up tenure for the shot at merit pay hikes.

Of course, the goal of this is not only to reward successful teachers, but to get rid of “incompetent teachers,” as Rhee puts it elsewhere. The teachers union says, “You can’t fire your way into a successful school system.” Rhee counters that tenure does nothing to improve student achievement and only makes it harder to terminate poor teachers, which is bad for the children. The union questions Rhee’s ability to judge who is or is not a good or competent teacher. And back and forth it goes.

Rhee has a bargaining chip: charter schools.

About a third of D.C. parents now opt to send their kids to charter schools, which are public schools—but where the teachers are non-union. The union has lost more than a thousand of its more than 5,000 teaching slots during the past decade. Rhee, it appears to many, is not interested in protecting turf. If she can open more charter schools that are better than the regular city schools, she seems willing to let the old system wither away.

In either event, if Rhee gets her way, many are saying that it will have a ripple effect through the nation, with many other urban school districts trying to follow in Rhee’s footsteps.

District 150 is starting to look into charter schools, and on an unrelated note they’re looking for creative ways to save money. For the new math and science academy, they’re even looking to partner with Bradley University; such an arrangement “could help the university develop and train better teachers, as well as provide a better educational opportunity within District 150.” No word yet on what relationship charter school teachers would have to the union.

So, should District 150 follow Rhee’s plan for improving urban schools? Or, to put it another way, should Peoria’s public schools make tenure-busting and/or union-busting part of their strategy?

The Peoria Chronicle

Resolution

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I’ve been on the precipice of giving up blogging completely, but in the end I’ve resolved to greatly reduce, but not eliminate, my little hobby. That will no doubt be a disappointment to some and wonderful news to others.

In the past, I’ve tried for the most part to put up at least one post every day — to be a daily blog, as it were. I’m no longer going to pursue that. Instead, I’ll write only when I have the time and the desire to say something, and let the blog lie dormant otherwise. This means I won’t be posting press releases or “breaking news” or that type of thing anymore.

I hope you’ll continue to stop by and see what I have to say, even if my posts are more infrequent. I very much enjoy reading the discussions that take place here in the comments section, and I hope you do as well.