The next community forum for District 150 is Thursday, October 4. However, rather than being held at Von Steuben, it was announced at the last meeting that the Oct. 4 meeting will be at Kingman Primary School instead, 3129 N.E. Madison.
All posts by C. J. Summers
District numbers don’t add up
Each District 150 public forum begins the same way — with a PowerPoint presentation from the administration. One of the slides that is flashed up is titled “Enrollment to House,” and it shows these numbers:
| Item | By the Numbers |
|---|---|
| Kingman, Irving & Glen Oak 2008 Enrollment | 1164 |
| Capacity Remaining at Other WHS Attendance Area Schools |
670 |
| Planned Building Enrollment | 650 |
| “Choice” Enrollment | Unlimited |
One person at the Irving School meeting asked how you could replace three schools — total enrollment of 1164 — with one school that would only be able to house 650. She understood the school district’s vision of having magnet, or “choice,” schools. But she wondered why anyone wouldn’t want to send their kids to a brand new school closest to their neighborhood. Answer from School Board President David Gorenz: he couldn’t answer at this time because the board is still studying how it will all work.
In other words, the school board has leapt before looking again.
The whole thing doesn’t make any sense. They’re building a brand new, state-of-the-art school that can only hold half the population of the three it’s replacing and calling it progress. They say that the children on the East Bluff and North Valley deserve a new school, yet they’re simultaneously banking on half of those children opting out of it — i.e., “choosing” to go to another district school. If not enough kids opt out, I assume the district would have to make them go somewhere else, perhaps taking enrollment on a first-come, first-served basis.
The end result is that not only will kids be losing their neighborhood schools, they may be losing their new replacement school, too. Five to six hundred children will be bused to other “old” school buildings around in the city. This is a lose-lose for everyone except the small set of students who will (a) get the new school building in their neighborhood, and (b) be lucky enough to attend it.
And there’s another problem: can Health/Life Safety bonds for Irving, Kingman, and Glen Oak (1) be combined to build only one replacement school, and (2) can that replacement school be smaller than than the three schools it’s replacing? It would be worth a call to the Illinois State Board of Education to find out. Of course, if it turns out they can’t be used for that, I suppose the district would just get its funding elsewhere, like the Public Building Commission.
Policy session planned for tomorrow night
Tomorrow night, October 2, the Peoria City Council will have a special meeting to discuss the use of Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) funds for projects such as ornamental street lights in the Orchard District. Since it’s during the regular council meting time, I wonder if it will be broadcast on WCBU and/or Insight channel 22. Anyone know?
Here’s the official agenda:
SPECIAL CITY COUNCIL AGENDA
POLICY/WORKSHOP SESSION
CITY HALL, COUNCIL CHAMBERS
6:15 P.M.ROLL CALL
INVOCATION AND PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE
PETITIONS, REMONSTRANCES & COMMUNICATIONSPOLICY SESSION
ITEM NO. 1 Communication from the City Manager and Director of Public Works Regarding a POLICY SESSION Pertaining to SPECIAL ASSESSMENT GUIDELINES Regarding ORNAMENTAL STREET LIGHTING and the USE of CDBG FUNDS with These Projects.EXECUTIVE SESSION
ADJOURNMENT
78-84
Not a very impressive performance by the World Series Champion St. Louis Cardinals. Hampered by poor pitching and many injuries, they couldn’t even muster a winning season in 2007. But, on a positive note, they did end the season with a five-game winning streak, including a sweep of the Pirates.
But the Cardinals are still the best baseball team with the best fans in all of baseball, and I’m sure they’ll be back in the post-season in 2008. They always bounce back. And they’ll be ready to get World Series victory #11 next year at this time.
Looking forward to Spring Training 2008. For now, it’s on to football season.
“Protecting the taxpayers’ interests”
Little new was discussed at last night’s community forum on where to locate District 150’s planned new school(s). But I had to chuckle when district treasurer Guy Cahill explained why the existing buildings couldn’t be fixed up. He said that the buildings had been evaluated and determined to cost more to repair than to replace (although I believe those estimates are suspect), so the Illinois State Board of Education will not allow tax money to be spent fixing up the buildings in order to protect the taxpayers’ interests.
Of course, the reason the buildings are in disrepair is because of the poor maintenance the school district has done. That didn’t protect the taxpayers’ insterests.
The district spent $877,500 on properties on Prospect Road that it can’t use, doesn’t need, and won’t sell off — with taxpayer money. That didn’t protect the taxpayers’ insterests.
Senate Bill 2477 was recently passed by the state at District 150’s behest and will allow the school board to raise taxes for new school construction without a referendum via the Public Building Commission. That — by definition — doesn’t protect the taxpayers’ interests.
But now, we’re supposed to believe that consolidating three older neighborhood schools into a big, new, consolidated school is in the taxpayers’ interests — that it will be better “both financially and educationally,” according to school board president David Gorenz. From listening to the community forums, it doesn’t sound like the community believes it.
Open Thread Thursday
My week has been really busy, and I haven’t had much time to blog. But feel free to comment on whatever is on your mind in the meantime.
Also, don’t forget that tonight at Irving School there’s another public meeting on where District 150 should build their replacement school(s).
Pick a plan, any plan
The city council on Tuesday tacitly approved Craig Hullinger’s request to pursue his plan to put townhouses and a street between the Riverplex and Spring Street near the river. (Councilman Sandberg voted against having Hullinger spend his time on that project because he would like to see other projects that we’ve already started come to fruition before efforts are divided to work on other projects. Councilman Spain countered that, if we wait until all the current projects are implemented, we won’t be coming up with any new ideas for a long time; he used the warehouse district as an example of a project that may take seven years or more to complete.)
I got a chance to talk to Hullinger yesterday before the council meeting, and one of the interesting things I learned (though I had heard of this anecdotally before) was how various city documents are not coordinated. Case in point: this area bordered by the train tracks and river, Spring Street and the Riverplex.
- If you look at the Zoning Map for Peoria (updated 2005), you’ll see that this area is zoned R-3 (single-family residential) from Spring to Wayne, and C-2 (large-scale commercial) from Wayne to the interstate.
- If you look at the Comprehensive Plan’s Future Land Use Map (adopted 2001), it has the area from the interstate all the way to Morton Street (this area includes the Riverplex) designated as park land. From Morton to Spring, it’s designated as a mix of commercial and high-density residential.
- If you look at the Heart of Peoria Plan (adopted “in principle” in 2002), it recommends the city “pursue development of a whitewater race course, utilizing available land to the north of the current recreational and fitness complex.” That would stretch from the Riverplex parking lot almost to Evans Street.
All of this leads me to conclude that the city needs someone somewhere to coordinate the many and various plans the city has adopted. I’m sure this isn’t the only part of town where plans conflict with each other. Who makes sure they’re in harmony? Which plan has precedence? Or are they all equal?
The city is currently in the middle of writing a new comprehensive plan. Hopefully these conflicts will be resolved during that process.
4 a.m. liquor license proposals flawed
I’m not inherently opposed to expanding the 4 a.m. liquor license area, which is on the council’s agenda for tonight. But the two proposals on the table — one from the liquor commission and one from the police department — have flaws.
The proposal from the liquor commission is a transparent attempt to grant 4 a.m. liquor licenses to two bars that cater to African American patrons. The reason is because black patrons perceive they are being excluded from current 4 a.m. bars by those bars’ dress codes. To me, if there is discrimination taking place, then the city should deal with that issue head-on, rather than try to resolve it through de facto segregated liquor licenses.
The proposal from the police department almost makes sense, except that it excludes the area bordered by Kumpf, Adams, Oak, and the river for no apparent reason. If you’re going to extend the area and make it easier to patrol, why not make the area contiguous? Is it to exclude certain bars that are located within the excluded area? The other flaw is that, if the whole point of extending the liquor license area is to include two African American bars, and those bars are not included in the police department’s proposal, what is accomplished? Nothing.
I recommend rejection of both proposals. The 4 a.m. area should be left as is for now. And I further recommend a full investigation into whether there is racial discrimination occurring at current bars with 4 a.m. licenses. If so, those bars should have their licenses revoked.
Townhouses on riverfront deserve consideration
At first glance, putting urban townhouses along the riverfront between the Riverplex and Spring Street seems like a crazy idea. But is it so crazy that it just might work?
I stopped by the Economic Development department and took a look at their proposal for this stretch of land. It would only displace about 100 feet of park land, which they plan to replace — yes replace — by using sediment dredged from the river to extend the shoreline. Thus, no park land would actually be lost. It would cause minimal disruption to the park, requiring only that the sand volleyball courts and Constitution Garden be relocated a short distance away and that a small portion of the bike path be rerouted. The city owns the land, one of the few parks not owned by the Peoria Park District.
The townhouses and home listings would face outward toward the park and the river, and a new road would be built (it could just be an extension of Water Street, or it could be given a new name like Riverfront Drive) between the Riverplex parking lot and Spring Street. The city itself wouldn’t build the townhouses or the road, but would put out bids to developers instead. The idea is to get private dollars reinvested downtown.
The development would not be merely residential. It would be mixed use. So the ground level of the complexes would include a retail component which could include things like a deli, restaurant, grocery store, etc.
There would be an added bonus to this development, too. It could help the city with its combined sewer overflow problem. The combined sewer intercept runs underneath the park. If the city were to put in a larger intercept pipe or additional pipe storage, it would have to dig up some of that land at the city’s sole expense. But if a private developer were building a new neighborhood there, the excavation costs could be shared to the city’s and developer’s mutual benefit.
Reaction to the idea on the Journal Star and Peoria Pundit sites has been negative because of two things: Taft Homes and PMP Fermentation. So that was one of my first questions when I visited the Economic Development Department.
The city has been in contact with the Peoria Housing Authority, and the PHA is planning to replace Taft Homes with River-West-style housing in the future. They may be able to move up implementation of that project to roughly coincide with the building of townhouses along the riverfront. As far as crime is concerned, the argument is that having up to 200 new residential homes will make the area safer because it will provide more “eyes on the street” in that part of town. It will combat the culture of “I didn’t see nothin'” that is prevalent among lower-income residents.
PMP Fermentation is owned by Fuso Chemical Co. of Osaka, Japan, and within the past year they’ve shut down half of their physical plant. They closed two buildings and laid off 16 workers in September 2006 because “the company can buy its chemical products cheaper from China rather than produce them in Peoria,” according to Journal Star archives. This has mitigated the impact PMP has on the livability of the area.
Furthermore, there’s a bit of inconsistency in arguing against townhouses here, but in favor of park land. If crime and industry are so terrible down there, one would think no one would want to play volleyball, ride bikes, walk around Constitution Garden, etc., in that area of town. Yet people do. Wouldn’t townhouses further improve the area? And couldn’t it be the start of more renewed investment on the near north side?
I think the idea has some merit and should be given fair consideration. I’m looking forward to Director Craig Hullinger’s presentation to the City Council this evening. I’m sure he’ll get plenty of tough questions about the location and its challenges.
Open Thread Monday
What’s on your mind? Leave a piece of it here.