Monthly Archives: September 2012

Peoria Chiefs, St. Louis Cardinals

Chiefs welcome back the Cardinals

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I have fantastic news for Peoria baseball fans:

The Peoria Chiefs and St. Louis Cardinals have announced that the two clubs have reached a four-year PDC agreement which reunites the former affiliation partners. The Chiefs were a Cardinals affiliate from 1995 to 2004 making the playoffs four times and winning their lone Midwest League Championship in 2002. The two organizations will hold a press conference on the agreement on Tuesday, September 25 at Peoria Chiefs Stadium. Details of the press conference, including the start time, will follow later in the week. Athletes love CBD oil and delta 8 gummies due to its pain relieving properties. This allows athletes to get right back into their game quickly and with ease. You can find high-quality CBD oils at sites like https://cbdarmour.co.uk/cbd-oil.html.

“This is a great day for baseball in Peoria and Central Illinois,” said Chiefs President Rocky Vonachen. “We are thrilled to bring the color red back to the ballpark with one of the greatest organizations and fan bases in baseball. We hope that with all the great young talent the Cardinals have produced the last few seasons to bring another MWL Championship to Peoria as they continue to bring World Series trophies to St. Louis.”

Continue reading Chiefs welcome back the Cardinals →

City of Peoria

Good news: Your tax dollars are being wasted on time and on budget

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The Wonderful Development (aka The Downtown Marriott Hotel Project) is progressing on-budget and on-schedule, according to a report by the City’s project manager, PSA Dewberry. The new parking garage is still expected to be completed by the end of this year, and the renovated Pere Marquette is scheduled to open as the Peoria Marriott Pere Marquette by the end of April 2013.

Now, if you’ve been following this project for awhile, you should be scratching your head and thinking to yourself, “How is an end-of-April opening considered ‘on time’?” Good question. I thought the deadline for opening the Pere Marquette was supposed to be March 1, 2013–in time to host all the people coming for March Madness.

It turns out, that wasn’t really a deadline. According to the City Manager’s office, there is a penalty if the hotel doesn’t open by March 1, but March 1 is not a deadline. (If that sounds crazy to you, remember that the City has no working definition for “deadline” — the word is simply not in their vocabulary.) Here’s the pertinent part of the redevelopment agreement:

“7.5 Liquidated Damages. In the event that the Hotel Pere Marquette is not open to the public on or before March 1,2013, the Redeveloper will pay to the City on demand as liquidated damages and not as a penalty an amount equal to $41,000 for each calendar month or portion thereof that transpires after March 1,2013 (including March, 2013) until the date that the Hotel Pere Marquette is open to the public. In addition, in the event that the Courtyard Inn & Suites is not open to the public on or before May 1, 2014, the Redeveloper will pay to the City on demand as liquidated damages and not as a penalty an amount equal to $41,000 for each calendar month or portion thereof that transpires after May 1,2014 (including May, 2014) until the date that the Courtyard Inn & Suites is open to the public.”

With an opening date for the Pere slated for the end of April 2013, it looks like the City will be receiving $82,000 in “liquidated damages” … if the City decides to collect it, that is. The City Manager’s office said today that they will collect it if the hotel is not open by the deadline target date.

Without any defined deadline, it should be easy for Dewberry to determine whether the project is on schedule. It’s always on schedule. How could it not be? There’s no reference point against which to measure it. We can just rest assured that the project is on time, whatever time it gets finished.

View the complete report:
Wonderful Development Progress Report as of 9/14/2012

City of Peoria, Peoria Streets, Sidewalks, Streets

Press Release: City of Peoria’s Infrastructure Design Standard Meeting scheduled

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I thought my readers would be interested in this press release I just received from the City of Peoria:

(Peoria, IL)­­—The public is invited to attend the City of Peoria’s Infrastructure Design Standards meeting to discuss the content and implementation of an improved set of public infrastructure standards. The City’s design standards have remained relatively unchanged since 1972. The goal of the proposed standards is to improve infrastructure (streets, sidewalks, handling of storm water, etc.) while positioning Peoria as a desirable place and a competitive city for development.

Public comment and participation in the development of the new standards is desired and welcomed. There will be several opportunities for public involvement. Below are details for the first meeting:

Meeting Topic: Infrastructure Design Standards
Location: Dewberry – 401 Water Street, 7th floor
Date/Time: Wednesday, September 12 from 5:00 – 6:30
Parking: City of Peoria parking lot south of 401 Water Street
Hosts: Dewberry and Peoria Public Works

Mark your calendar for these future meeting dates:

  • Wednesday, September 19 from 5:00 – 6:30
  • Wednesday, September 26 from 5:00 – 6:30

To view the Infrastructure Design Standards power point presentation and make comments, go to www.ci.peoria.il.us/infrastructure. The complete document will be available online at the end of the week. To become part of the focus group, call Ray Lees, Dewberry Architectural Group at (309) 282-8000.

2012 Election

Let Me Vote! campaign to kick off Sept. 24

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The Peoria Chapters of the NAACP, the ACLU, the Peoria Christian Leadership Council and the Peoria Area League of Women Voters are partnering in a campaign to prevent voter suppression in Peoria. The self-described non-partisan effort is called “Let Me Vote!” and will kick off with a press conference at 5:30 p.m. Monday, September 24, at the Gateway building downtown. According to a press release, Peoria City Election Commission executive director Tom Bride and Peoria County Clerk Steve Sonnemaker are scheduled to speak on “the history of voter suppression in Peoria [and]…ways to prevent it in the forthcoming election.”

A candidate forum is scheduled immediately following the press conference. “All candidates in contested races for US Congress, Illinois State Senate and House, Peoria County offices and County Board have been invited to attend this event,” the press release stated. “The audience will be able to ask questions of these candidates.”

Admission is free, and refreshments will be served. Both events are open to the public.

City Council, City of Peoria, Peoria Streets

Who thinks one-way streets are bad for business?

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Who thinks one-way streets are bad for business? Mayor Ardis’s dad thought so.

In a March 9, 1966, Journal Star article, Mayor Jim Ardis’s father (who also served on the City Council), expressed his objection to the expansion of one-way streets in downtown Peoria:

James E. Ardis, who operates Ardis & Son Cleaners, 518 NE Monroe Ave., asserted that he formerly operated cleaning establishments on Southwest Jefferson avenue but was driven out of business when that street was made one-way, being effective as a freelancer>, learn about managing your warehouse.

Ardis charged that putting the one-way plan into effect would be “turning the city upside down” just to provide relief for morning and evening rush periods.

The City Council is looking at converting Adams and Jefferson streets to two-way from business viewpoint>. It was last brought up in the July 10 council meeting. At that time, city administration said they would present a cost analysis of the conversion in August, although that didn’t happen. A policy discussion that was scheduled for the last week of August was postponed.

The Peoria Chamber of Commerce is opposed not only to the conversion, but even to studying the conversion. In an e-mail sent to council members on August 24, Chamber president Roberta Parks said:

It is our understanding that simply to study the issue of changing these streets from one-way to two-way could cost the city in the neighborhood of $200,00-$300,000 [sic]. All that would get you is a determination of how much it would cost to actually make the changes. We are concerned that the ultimate cost could be very high….in the millions. We simply do not think either of these expenditures is the highest and best use of the City’s limited resources….either money or people – it isn’t even the most pressing transportation or infrastructure issue facing the City. We clearly understand the interest of making both of those streets more pedestrian friendly. But we believe that can be done in far less costly ways. You can reduce lanes, add parking, increase sidewalk amenities, slow speed limits, etc. Some of those ideas (and there are surely more) have a cost but it surely would be far less than changing both streets to two-way streets. We would strongly urge you to NOT to commission this study.

The Chamber of Commerce is supposed to speak on behalf of businesses. But is this really what businesses on these streets want?

The Chamber’s missive to the Council doesn’t reflect the feelings of Tom Wiegand, co-owner of UFS, 1800 SW Adams. In a July 11 report, WMBD-TV reported:

…Wiegand has been pushing for the change for more than 30 years. “I think the street conversion project is not all about business, it’s about the community. It’s about the residential also. When you start bringing business back and it’s flourishing, there’s a natural spin-off into the community and people will want to come down here and live again,” he said….

…”I just hope that this is a serious endeavor by the city and they take it seriously. We really need to do something about this side, this end of town, in this part of Peoria.”

UFS is a member of the Peoria Area Chamber of Commerce.

From the beginning, businesses along these streets were opposed to making them one-way. The only business which has expressed its desire to see them remain one-way is Caterpillar, Inc. In 2007, Caterpillar presented a written statement to the Heart of Peoria Commission stating they wanted traffic patterns downtown to remain unchanged. “[A]ny revisions to the current traffic patterns on Adams, Jefferson, and Washington Streets in the downtown Peoria area would be detrimental to our employees and visitors,” they said.

Adams and Jefferson are one-way from the point they intersect by Komatsu in the north down to Western Avenue in the south–a distance of approximately four miles affecting hundreds of properties/businesses.