I think a vast majority of Peorians agree with the phrase “essential services first.” The question really is, what services fall under the category of “essential”? Public safety would undoubtedly top the list, and public works wouldn’t be far behind. But if you were going to strip the city’s responsibilities down to the bare essentials, what would they be? Or, alternatively, what are the most non-essential things the city does — what should the city stop doing or cut completely?
28 thoughts on “Reader poll: What are “essential services”?”
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Essential: Police, education, fire, road maintenance including snow removal, libraries, park maintenance, other general infrastructure maintenance/enhancements
Non-essential: Gateway Building, Riverfront Museum, RiverPlex, Kellar Bike Trail, Civic Center Expansion including possible new hotel, further annexation of land
I’ll have to think before I post on this one….it’s easy to be for “police, fire, public works, etc.” but without defining at what levels (and how they will be funded), I’m not sure just listing them does much to further the issue you’re getting at.
Perhaps, I’ll take your alternative approach and list those things that I feel shoulde be deleted from the budget as non-essential.
This is a very difficult, though vitally important question. It is easy to take shots at projects like the Civic Center, but there are benefits to that kind of facility that are not so easy to measure. How many people, for example, would not have moved here and added to the economy if we did not have the CC and other subsidized facilities and programs that arguably add to the quality of life? Certainly rampant crime and substandard schools detract from the attractiveness of Peoria, and those problems are the highest priority. I would agree the Gateway Building was a mistake, as its costs so greatly exceed teh revenue from it and its quality of life contribution seems tenuous at best.
Surely some urban planning experts have addressed this issue. While Peoria shouldn’t blindly follow the experts, that would be a good place to start. I would like the City Council to take CJ’s challenge up and explicitly tackle it. It would give the Council a better context in which to make the important budget and other decisons.
Of course I’ll weigh in with a very simplistic answer that no one will like. :0)
Essential services include police and the courts.
*Everything* else should be left to the market.
Yes, education, fire dept. and roads and especially trash pickup should be privatized.
Those who benefit from services should pay for them and those who don’t, shouldn’t. All of us without exception benefit from police and court protection.
The market will substantiate all of the other things but people have to be willing to pay for them. And there’s no reason that someone who owns a house worth 4-5 times what mine is should have to pay 4-5 times what I pay for fire protection.
Lower taxes and cut all the services and I think you’ll find that there are some that people think are important enough to pay out of their own pocket for (e.g. toll roads) and some that will just go away. If Amtrak had to make a profit it’d be running better by now and I think the same thing about the civic center, etc. If they’re worth money, people will spend money on them.
The definition of “Essential City Services” may always stay the same depending on the size of the city in which city services are applied; ie, Police, Fire, Public Works. However, I think that one essential city service, is the ability to budget responsible fiscal managment of those defined services. In other words, is our City Council essential city service? Maybe stop spending on frivolous studies on where to build, what to build, and how to build. How much did we spend on the attempted buy out of Illinois American Water? Haven’t they brought PHA into our neighborhoods, haven’t they botched many development projects. ??? Something to think about.
Essential services is a term often used, without proper definition. I think there needs to be diffentiation between essential and minimum service. At a minimum government provides some level of protection from fire, gangs, and the like. Government in the U.S. provides schools, garbage collection, sidewalks, libraries, and roads as it sees appropriate.
There are items that do not fall into this area that still should be considered essential. Essential in that without them the area would miss out on opportunities it could have. Opportunities to be better than its size alone warrants. The Civic Center, Zoo, Museum Square, and Children’s Museum projects fall in this area.
We need these items to be a competitive community, and it scares me to think that the so called “essential services” set is so diametrically opposed to the “progressives”.
Some say the money we use on those items above the minimum required could be used to improve things like fire and police protection. The problem is that we already throw a lot of money in those areas. People also need to keep in mind the law of diminishing returns. If we triple the amount we spend on police protection will crime go down- I hope so, but by how much? Also, I doubt it would seriously affect the homicide rate directly. Peoria’s homicide rate is too high, do not confuse what I am about to say with indifference to this plight of our city, but even with nearly 20 homicides last year what is the probablity that an officer will ever be in a position to stop this. With guns the action can be carried out very quickly, and an officer likely would not be able stop this unless we go to a true police state. The way (in my mind) to stop the murders is to stop those who commit the murders in their everyday activity.
Essential services need to be viewed as what is “essential” to move towards our community goals in the future. We need to invest in our community so that it can thrive and be competitive in the future. I do not want Peoria to continue to shrink each census. I do not want us to fall down the population, and thus clout, listings. I truly hope that everyone at least considers a less short term view of what is truly essential to our community.
Samer Wesley Aldroubi wrote:
“Essential services need to be viewed as what is “essential†to move towards our community goals in the future. We need to invest in our community so that it can thrive and be competitive in the future. I do not want Peoria to continue to shrink each census. I do not want us to fall down the population, and thus clout, listings. I truly hope that everyone at least considers a less short term view of what is truly essential to our community.”
Your point is well taken and I agree to some extent. You’re correct about the importance of “definition,” however, the consequence of how essential services and “future investment” has been defined in the past got us the money-losing RiverPlex, the rails-to-trails fiasco (despite the warnings), the TIF/Cub Foods on Knoxville and other things.
My view of future investment for the good of the community involves economic and transportation infrastructure that will make our business parks competitive with those of surrounding communities. Private investment will pick up from there, generating revenue for the city’s coffers. The obvious benefit is the attraction of new, well-paying jobs to the area, whether it be in the beloved bio/med-tech field, but also the logistics or industrial fields (rather than more retail stores, gas stations and restaurants). That will grow the population and help fund essential services as the community grows.
In contrast, we fund “quality-of-life” projects that supposedly will draw into the community better human beings than live here now, spend millions to fund projects that do not pay for themselves and then cut essential services as a consequence.
Basically, “investment for the future” can be wasteful and a detriment to essential services, depending on how it’s defined.
“Those who benefit from services should pay for them and those who don’t, shouldn’t. All of us without exception benefit from police and court protection.”
I think you mean “directly benefit.” There’s a HUGE societal benefit to universal education, and it pays off 20 years down the road with fewer criminals and less poverty. Nothing else — not even massive police presence — comes close in crime reduction. There’s also a general public benefit to public fire protection, as I prefer that my neighbor not just stand there and let her house burn down and set mine on fire because she doesn’t feel like paying for fire protection. (It was actually that kind of behavior in NYC that led to public fire departments, but then we’re talking blocks of tenement slums and massive homelessness — but I suppose the people least likely to pay for private fire protection would be the people most likely to end up homeless and the people living closest together even today.)
There’s even a general public benefit to trash pickup, much as I think THAT one should be privatized. If we decide individually whether or not we’re willing to pay to have trash picked up, we’re shortly going to be living in generalized squalor because an awful lot of people are not going to bother. (And given the state of Peoria code enforcement, I doubt they’d be ticketing people for running private dumps in their backyards and refusing to pay for garbage service.)
Eyebrows, you’re correct, I should have said “direct.”
Regarding fire, in the communities with subscription fire departments what would happen is that the FD would come to any fire, whether a subscriber to the service or not (those who didn’t were a minority–home insurance companies would jack up your rate exponentially if you didn’t subscribe). If you weren’t a subscriber you could pay the actual cost of putting out the fire or they’d just make sure the neighbors houses were safe.
Regarding education–I agree that education is important. That’s one of the reasons why my children will never attend a District 150 school. We hear all this debate about the Glen Oak school, for instance. If kids aren’t learning and they need something–does anyone suggest maybe we fire the teachers and start over? Nope. If the school had to survive off the tuition of parent rather than the money ripped from *every* taxpayer whether they have children or not education would be better.
Would some choose not to be educated? Sure. But if we didn’t pass out welfare checks to people who don’t work you’d find that to be a minority also. It seems to me that people think the role of government is to keep people from doing stupid things (e.g. passing a law requiring carbon-monoxide alarms in homes) rather than the government being there to hold people accountable for *wrong* things. And you’ll never be able to make enough laws to keep people from being stupid and every time you try you take away liberty.
I thank God every day that I’ve been spared from losing my life several times due to my own stupidity but I don’t think the dumb things I’ve done ought to be against the law.
No one’s going to read this if I post any longer, but I have thought through many of the implications of these views–some of them will take more work than others. I haven’t spent too much time on it, though, because I don’t see it changing much in my lifetime. I might see private trash pickup (maybe then the company I hire would actually pick up what *I* want them to rather than what the *city* says they have to) in Peoria but I don’t have my hopes set on any major change. Change takes time. My grandchildren might see some of it.
police
fire
public works (streets, sewers, etc.)
parks
library
education
Museum
New Huge Zoo w/African animals
ballpark
Gateway Building
RiverPlex
Lots of Developer generated TIFs
New garbage cans downtown
There’s my list
To join the chorus – police, fire, public works and safety. Personally, I also support the Civic Center because of the enhanced “quality of life” opportunities it offers.
However, the City of Peoria needs to get out of the commercial real estate development business and leave it to the professionals. Their continued meddling is a disincentive to private development.
Clearly museums, zoos, civic centers and the like are not “essential” because thousands of communities exist without them. People are free to live there if they want, just as they are free to live where those amenities exist. If someone doesn’t approve of government support for such amenities, why not move and pay taxes where they don’t exist? There are dozens of small towns within an easy drive of Peoria that offer only police, fire, public works, etc. Live there, work in Peoria.
Perfect, the powers to be come in, ruin the community by offering things the community can not afford and basic services suffer as a result and “justanobserver” feels, if you don’t like it, move! Yeah, that fixes it. Ok, make me an offer on my house.
Emtronics: Just offering a solution, since things never seem to change and I don’t ever seeing the city council going the essental services route. They are elected, and either the right people don’t run (maybe you should) or don’t have the appeal or cash to get elected. It’s a fact of life. You can agonize over it and wish it were different, you can elect a council majority that will change it, or you can move. IT’S YOUR CHOICE! And I don’t want to buy your house.
In case you haven’t noticed, there are a lot of folks that have taken the advice to “just move”. That hasn’t improved the situation, has it?
It has improved thingsfor them! The only way to improve it for those who live here is to change who’s elected or to convince them to spend our money other ways. Since that’s not being done, you have to conclude that a majority of people are OK with the way things are going, or are too busy or too disinterested to get involved.
Mouse: Ah, oh so true…. and we remain with as many administrators for D150 and the student population is how many thousand less than in 1994?
Police, Fire and Public Works ….
Pay cash up front — the Civic Center is not $55 million it is $130 million with the debt service — is that correct?
So amenities on the public credit card ie bonds (aka debt service) are sinking us into a bottomless pit….
Sell the Gateway Building and sink the extra dollars into increased saturation patrols by the police.
Until the crime or even the perception of crime and well as the quality of education is increased, it is all for naught…. In the information/Internet age, no one is fooled by the build it they will come mentality — people already know what it is like before they arrive….
And the developers are whining about the Form Based Code because it will not mean business as usual….. if nothing changes nothing changes and the end of the developer welfare is akin to having an addict of any type go cold turkey and the withdrawals will most likely be met with kicking and screaming and whining at a frightening pitch….
And justanobserver… IMHO is all about the abundance or scarcity mentality —- any person can embrace either mentality — Peoria suffers from the scarcity mentality — money worship, greed, power and what’s in it for me…..
The GOS issue has sparked hope in the hearts and minds of many people that there is still light at the end of the tunnel which will become brighter as we continue to value each other and what everyone has to bring to the table as important and build collaborative solutions together.
KA: All legitimate points, and the GOS issue is certainly something to point to. But I still believe the Park District has designs to become the all-powerful entity when it comes to the community’s leisure time activities, including providing programming for the whole community school concept. So was it really a victory and something for hope, or was it a calculated retreat by the park district until a more opportune situation pesents itself? So my point continues to be that as long as the people are elected who make the decisions that result in situations that provide amenities over essentials, we will be at the same point. Don’t know if that’s good or bad, but it reminds of the adage that “if you always do what you’ve always done you always get what you always got.”
Justanobserver: True enough — if nothing changes nothing changes —- also, some of these ‘concepts’ are actually talked about in governmental ‘committee’ meetings — I recently came across a document from Dec 1 2004 at the PPD that discussed the community concept regarding programming…. and perhaps that is a mistaken byproduct of the merging of the Park District and the Recreation Department in 1963….
The Pleasure Driveway and Park District of Peoria, organized in 1894, was the first park system formed in Illinois. Seventy years later in 1963, the City of Peoria Playground and Recreation Department merged with the Park District, thus expanding the potential program and facility responsibilities of the Park District.
I feel that the PPD has gotten away from their ‘core’ business of parks and into a quasi-business mode…..on the backs of taxpayers for non-essential services and competing with the private sector.
Just take the PPD budget:
1993 = $13 million
2007 = $49.4 million —- you do the math…….
what are we spending that money on??? It’s OUR TAX DOLLARS!!!!!
and in the meantime the City of Peoria continues to annex hundreds of acres of land and the population remains relatively constant.
The rhetorical question is …. what’s wrong with this picture???
Again, I say our City Council is an essential City Service. Every election of an empty Council Seat, should be carefully examined. We need to take our city back from the PPD, Dist. 150, and the City Council.
KA: Not only do they compete with private enterprise, but also with other not-for-profits who have a superior product to offer but do not have the means to promote it, such as after school programs. Recreation is an important part of such programs, but should not be the foundation for them. Academics, life skills, reading, etc should be a major piece of any after school program. The park district is not qualified to provide after school programs with those components, yet may “squeeze out” others who do not have the same clout or “in” as the prk district.
Observer: with the declining student test scores in District #150, any after school programs offered must support student achievement. This was the early controversy with the 21st Century Grant Program. Under Garrett/Hinton, it was entertainment based. But things changed and all activities were designed to support student achievement. The funding for that program may no longer be available – does anyone know? If the program is still running, someone should be asking Hinton if it has reverted back to entertainment/amusement or does it still have some meat to address student achievement issues? After all, that was a federal tax-dollar funded program.
PC: I am familiar with an agency that provides three after school programs–all academically based–and one of them is in a school. None are funded by the district, with the exception of the in-kind space. They also have an opportunity to go into another school if they can get the funding from outside sources. Not sure about school-sponsored programs, but my impression is that they don’t exist. The results for this angecy are outstanding in terms of grade and behavior improvement and promotion. My concern is if the park district becomes more involved, that will sqeeze out the effective programs. The park district has the funds to offer a lot of stuff, but not in the academic area. Let’s hope student achievement is at the top of the list for any after school programming. As Karrie points out above, the park district has been talking about community programming since at least 2004. IMHO they want to control all aspects of our free time–from the riverfront to summer recreation to schools–whether they are qualified in a given field or not. Just look at the directory of activities in today’s PJS.
PrairieCelt,
The 21st Century grant is still alive and well on a national basis and I’ll bet that with the poverty level at 150 they are still receiving a huge amount of 21st Century dollars.
Speaking of the original waste via entertainment/amusement connected with Hinton’s name I have to wonder why no one has brought up the recent PJS report of how many taxpayer dollars the BOE spent on their entertainment trip calling it “valuable” and all the other excuses recited! While the BOE may rightly defend those expenditures on the basis of their long hours for zero pay I have to question why so many administrators had to go. Even administrators who are set to retire SOON! But, then who are we to question King Hinton and his court jester Cahill since they may be able to create a bidding war between Methodist and the SOSF to recoup the TAXPAYER monies Hinton/Cahill p*ssed away on Prospect! ^oo^~
I should probably answer this from my perspective. I think essential services are public safety (police, fire) and public works (street, sidewalk, sewer, etc., maintenance). That’s it. I don’t think the city should necessarily be limited to those things, but they are the only essential (i.e., “absolutely necessary or vital”) services, and thus, they should be funded first before any other project. Only after these are adequately provided should the city even consider more “progressive” services.