All posts by C. J. Summers

I am a fourth-generation Peorian, married with three children.
City Council, City of Peoria

O’Brien Steel expansion: proposed or not proposed?

21 Comments

Neighbors in the near north side and Averyville area are wary of Item No. 3 on tonight’s City Council agenda.

The item itself is fairly innocuous. O’Brien Steel wants the City to vacate the alley behind their Adams St. property. O’Brien owns the property on both sides of the alley. They’ve cleared recently-acquired adjacent property and are leveling the land.

What concerns neighbors is this: “This vacation is the first step in the proposed O’Brien expansion.” Neighbors are asking, “what expansion?”

Despite this council communication stating that there is a “proposed” expansion, when you ask the City for information about that expansion, they say they’ve received no proposal.

Susan Schlupp in the City’s Economic Development Department says her department has not received any expansion plan from O’Brien Steel. Pat Landes, Director of Planning and Growth, said in response to neighborhood inquiries that her department “does not have any application for rezoning, special use, or zoning certificate on file. At a meeting in September, O’Brien representatives said that when a plan was ready and they were ready to file that they would meet with the neighbors.”

Neighbors are wary of such promises. After all, the last redevelopment agreement with O’Brien Steel (June 2000) was made public on a Wednesday and passed by the City Council the following Tuesday. Neighborhood associations asked the City to defer the item to give them time to meet and give input to the plan, but the Council feared a deferral would scuttle the project.

Incidentally, the last redevelopment project promised to “increase the number of local job opportunities from the existing 150 to over 200 when the project is complete.” But in March 2009, the Journal Star reported that “32 of [O’Brien Steel’s] production workers were laid off indefinitely. Company president J.P. O’Brien said the company employs 120, most of whom are production workers.” It would appear that the promised additional jobs either never materialized or were short-lived. In any case, O’Brien now has significantly fewer employees than before their last expansion.

Despite all the protestations from the City that no proposal has been made, a June 22, 2010, statement from Speer Financial selling City of Peoria general obligation bonds had this to say: “[O’Brien Steel] is currently in negotiations with the City of construct a new manufacturing facility and warehouse that is estimated to cost $15,000,000.”

But the City doesn’t know anything.

City of Peoria, East Bluff, Economic Development, Peoria Public Schools

Open discussion on Peoria High and East Village TIF

28 Comments

I have mixed feelings about the recent windfalls of state money Peoria has been told its getting. In the news recently have been announcements that we’re getting $10 million to upgrade Washington Street and $17 million to renovate Peoria High School and build an addition onto Lincoln Middle School.

On the one hand, the money is going for a good cause, and we can certainly use it. On the other hand, the State of Illinois is in a financial crisis, and this additional spending is not helping to alleviate it.

It has led to an interesting question that I didn’t expect to hear while we’re still reeling from the recent recession: what should we do with all the money? Of course, the Warehouse District money is pretty cut and dried. But the District 150 money is another story. I got this comment recently from school board member Jim Stowell:

CJ – can I please ask if you could open the question of how we should best develop PHS and the surrounding feeder system/neighborhoods – what collaborations we should explore, etc. Thx! In light of the recent funding grant, there exists tremendous opportunity. I am optimistic about the East Bluff residential TIF, but I also have reservations. The Dist. will no doubt be convening meetings, but the discussion needs to begin now. Thanks for providing a forum.

I’d kind of sworn off open threads a while back, but this does sound like it would be an interesting discussion. Other readers have expressed interest in this as well. So, always being happy to oblige my readers, here’s an open thread to discuss Peoria High and the proposed East Village TIF.

I’ll just add that while Mr. Stowell may be “optimistic about the East Bluff residential TIF,” that doesn’t appear to be the official opinion of District 150. The District’s interim comptroller Dr. David Kinney has been attending recent City Council meetings, and when I asked him why, he said it was in case an opportunity came to speak about the proposed TIF. He’s not what you’d call a fan of the idea. On its face, he says it’s a recipe for disaster. The preferred outcome is that it would encourage families to move back into the East Bluff. If it’s successful in doing so, it will require more services from District 150 to educate the increasing number of children, but provide no additional tax revenue to support them. Thus, it would put even more of a strain on District 150’s already stretched finances.

The proposed East Village TIF area is currently being studied for eligibility (this is perfunctory, as no proposed TIF has ever been found ineligible), with the consultant’s report scheduled to come before the council November 9.

City of Peoria

Wonderful Development still sitting on launching pad

12 Comments

At the request of come commenters, I’ve been trying to get information on what’s new with the Wonderful Development. As far as I can tell, nothing.

The City Council initially approved (by a 10-1 vote) an agreement in December 2008 with EM Properties to redevelop the Pere Marquette block, upgrading the Pere and building a pedestrian bridge across Fulton St. to the Civic Center. EM Properties couldn’t fulfill that agreement, so they came back in May 2010 requesting a new redevelopment agreement that was significantly different than the first one. The new agreement would have two hotels instead of one (i.e., they would still restore the Pere and make it a four-star Marriott, but would also build a separate Courtyard by Marriott on the block), and fewer rooms overall. They also requested $37 million instead of $39 million in bonds (i.e., taxpayer subsidy). At the time, the City reported on their Council Communication, “EM Properties has made modifications to their project and has now secured all necessary private financing.” The new redevelopment agreement was approved by a 7-4 vote.

The agreement required in section 3.3, “No later than ninety (90) days after the execution of this Agreement, the Redeveloper shall submit to the City the Design Concept Plan for the Project which Design Concept Plan shall contain the Exterior Architectural Appearance of the Project.” And in section 3.5, “No later than August 1, 2010, the Redeveloper shall submit to the City Schematic Drawings developed in connection with the design-build contract for the Project.” So, I asked the City, via a Freedom of Information Act request, when these documents were submitted.

Well, I didn’t find out exactly when they were submitted. All I received was a letter dated September 10, 2010, from the City’s Corporation Counsel Randy Ray to EM Properties, Ltd., that said:

This letter will confirm that your booklet entitled “Downtown Peoria Mariott Hotel Project — Hotel Site Plans” containing drawings dated May 3, 2010, satisfies the requirements of Section 3.5 of the Redevelopment Agreement between the City of Peoria and EM Properties, Ltd. concerning schematic drawings.

We would take this oportunity to remind you that in order to get a building permit for the Project, the Inspections Department will need professionally sealed construction documents.

Thank you for your cooperation in this matter.

In a follow-up phone call to Randy Ray, he stated that the booklet also included the Design Concept Plan and thus satisfied section 3.3 of the redevelopment agreement as well. However, section 3.4 of the agreement states, “The City shall within thirty (30) days from receipt approve or disapprove the Design Concept Plan.” And for the purposes of that section, the “City” means the City Council. Mr. Ray confirmed that the design concept plan has never come before the City Council, and said he will try to get it on the Council’s agenda in November. He thanked me for bringing it to his attention.

Meanwhile, you may recall that EM Properties was trying to get moral obligation financing through the Illinois Finance Authority to “finance a portion of the energy efficient upgrades of the 270-room historic Pere Marquette Hotel that will be renovated and converted to a Marriott and a ‘to be’ constructed 180-room Courtyard.” They had a big public hearing on it in March 2010. The last I heard about it was in May when the Journal Star reported, “EM Properties, the developer of the Marriott Hotel project, needs approval from the Illinois Finance Authority. The authority next meets June 8, and it’s unknown whether a request for a moral obligation bond supporting the hotel will be on the agenda.”

Well, it wasn’t on the agenda in June. In fact, it’s never again appeared on an IFA agenda. However, there are some related matters on the IFA slate. In August 2006, the current owners of the hotel, Pere Marquette Hotel Associates, L.P., entered into a participation loan with the IFA and National City Bank (now PNC). That loan should have been paid off March 31, 2010, but because of the pending sale to EM Properties, there was a request to extend the final maturity date until June 30. However, the sale didn’t close by then, so another extension was approved until September 30. The sale had not closed as of September 30 because a third extension was requested at the October 12 IFA meeting:

This is a third request by PNC Bank, and the Borrower, to extend the final maturity date beyond the originally scheduled March 31, 2010, maturity date in anticipation of the sale of the Hotel Pere` Marquette to EM Properties.

This request will provide an additional 120-day window for Pere` Marquette Hotel Associates, L.P. to close on the sale of the hotel property to EM Properties, LLC. Again, PNC and the other lenders expect this purchase to close by November 30, 2010.

Despite the expectation that the sale will close by the end of November, the extension goes through January 31, 2011.

I’m not sure what all this means, but I have to say these delays are awfully strange for a project that supposedly had “secured all necessary private financing” back in May.

Television

WYZZ leaves baseball fans with no signal

15 Comments

WYZZ-TV, channel 43, went off the air tonight during the eighth inning of the National League Championship Series. It could have been the final game, as the Giants led the series three games to one. As it turned out, the Phillies won, sending the series back to Philadelphia. Not that WYZZ viewers could know. All they could see was “No Signal.”

Nothing has been posted even yet on their website explaining the outage or apologizing. If you call the studio for information, forget it — you get sent to someone’s voice mail. I did get a real person in the news room who politely informed me that they were having “technical difficulties” and that “engineers are working on the problem and will get the station back on the air as soon as possible.” It wasn’t soon enough. The game ended with WYZZ still off the air.

I hope they get their “technical difficulties” fixed before the World Series starts.

City of Peoria

Case against Ardis — substantive or political?

74 Comments

There’s no love lost between State’s Attorney Kevin Lyons and Peoria Mayor Jim Ardis. Ardis supported Darin LaHood in the last State’s Attorney election and had some critical things to say about Lyons during the campaign.

Well, now the Journal Star reports that Mayor Ardis “may have committed a misdemeanor and subsequent felony by using what appeared to be official city stationery recently to request campaign donations on behalf of a judicial candidate, State’s Attorney Kevin Lyons said Wednesday.” Ardis stated that “he paid for the copies, envelopes and postage and the city letterhead was from a Word document on his home computer,” and so he thought he was complying with the law by not using city resources for campaign purposes.

Not so, according to the Journal Star. A City ordinance “prohibits city employees from engaging in ‘any prohibited political activity during any compensated time … [City] employees shall not intentionally misappropriate any [City] property or resources by engaging in any prohibited political activity for the benefit of any campaign for elective office or any political organization.'” When the Journal Star told Ardis about this section, he is quoted as saying it “doesn’t pertain to elected officials.”

The ordinance in question is from Section 2-336 of the City’s municipal code, and frankly I can see Ardis’s point. There is no definition that I can find of “city employee.” Assuming there is none, we have to look for clues from the context. Here are the first two items under Section 2-336:

Sec. 2-336. Prohibited political activities.

(a) City employees shall not intentionally perform any prohibited political activity during any compensated time (other than vacation, personal, or compensatory time off). City employees shall not intentionally misappropriate any city property or resources by engaging in any prohibited political activity for the benefit of any campaign for elective office or any political organization.

(b) At no time shall any executive or legislative branch constitutional officer or any official, director, supervisor, or city employee intentionally misappropriate the services of any city employee by requiring that city employee to perform any prohibited political activity (i) as part of that employee’s city duties, (ii) as a condition of city employment, or (iii) during any time off that is compensated by the city (such as vacation, personal, or compensatory time off).

Now, I’m not a lawyer, but neither is Ardis, so let’s just look at this from a layman’s perspective. It would appear to me that there is a difference between “city employee,” “constitutional officer,” “official,” “director,” and “supervisor.” Section 2-266 and 2-267 indicates that Mayor is an “elected city officer.” I can find no reference to the Mayor as a “city employee.” So at best, this section’s application to the Mayor is tenuous.

But that won’t stop Mr. Lyons. He’s rattling his saber, saying that he could charge Ardis with a felony through some other legal hocus-pocus. Unless other evidence can be provided besides what was cited in the Journal Star, I’m not buying that Ardis actually broke the law here. This appears to be a politically-motivated non-event. Note that Ardis is Republican and is supporting a Republican judicial candidate, whereas Lyons is a Democrat.

Given Lyons’ reluctance to prosecute cases he has little chance of winning, I predict this one will not be prosecuted either.

Caterpillar

CAT’s growing presence in China — is it a good thing?

18 Comments

Caterpillar announced Sunday that Cat China and AVIC Liyuan Hydraulics Co. “have signed a joint-venture agreement to establish a company to design and manufacture medium- and heavy-duty hydraulic pumps and motors for the construction equipment industry.” The press release was picked up and reprinted in the Journal Star Monday on the web — it will probably appear in Tuesday’s paper.

This joint venture comes on the heels of Cat’s September 29 announcement that they were building their twelfth factory in China, this one to make mini hydraulic excavators. That announcement was met with some criticism, not so much at Caterpillar per se, but against U.S. trade relations with China. From the American Thinker blog:

Why can’t Caterpillar make a profit exporting mini-excavators to China? The answer is simple: China has a 30% tariff on all excavators. In fact it has a similar high tariff on just about every vehicle…. When President Obama’s economic adviser Larry Summers was Secretary of the Treasury under President Clinton, he oversaw China’s entry to the WTO (World Trade Organization), and he let China declare all these vehicles as a “strategic sector” entitled to high protective tariffs….

The Chinese government has long used these tariffs as a lever in order to loot American companies of their technology. First it forces vehicle-making companies to locate their factories in China if they want to sell to the growing Chinese market. Then it forces them to “share” their proprietary technologies with Chinese competitors. Caterpillar already has 11 factories in China. It also has two Chinese competitors – Liugong and Sany – that are producing what one expert describes as “knockoffs” of Caterpillar models, and they are exporting them to the world.

From a similar post (same author) on a different blog, they add, “What we see is American trade pacifism at work. We keep our markets open to Chinese products. They close their markets to American products and then, in return for access, force our companies to build factories in China and give Chinese competitors their proprietary technology.” The upshot is, “If trade were free and balanced, Caterpillar might profitably produce excavators in the United States and sell them in China, but with the Chinese government setting the terms of trade in a way that keeps out made-in-America products, Caterpillar has little choice but to locate its factory in China.”

Well, they have “little choice” if they want to do business in China, that is. It’s easy to see why they would want to do business in China — so obvious I need not recite the reasons here. But is it worth the cost in the long run if they ultimately have to share their research and development with their competition? What happens when they start having to compete with cheaper knock-offs of their products — not just in China, but worldwide? I can’t help but wonder if they’re sacrificing long-term viability for short-term gain.

2010 Election, Chamber of Commerce

Chamber endorsements always a mystery

51 Comments

The Journal Star is wondering why the Peoria Area Chamber of Commerce PAC endorsed Jehan Gordon over Jim Montelongo. I suspect it has everything to do with Montelongo’s vote against the Wonderful Development back in May. The Journal Star didn’t mention that the Chamber PAC also endorsed Lynn Pearson for County Board over Karrie Alms, even though Pearson is also a Democrat and no friend to business. Why? Alms is opposed to the current plan for the museum, which the Chamber supports, and Pearson was for it.

It appears to me that the Chamber has a litmus test for candidates. You have to endorse the Chambers’ pet projects or you will not be endorsed by their political action committee. Your philosophy or record on business issues is irrelevant to them.

Peoria Public Schools

District 150 disputes press release from Rev. Watson

38 Comments

After I posted the press release from Rev. Raymond E. Watson, Jr., I was received some e-mail messages disputing the accusations made. So I made some inquiries. School Board member Laura Petelle stated, “Contrary to what this press release claims, I have not been contacted by this group or any individual claiming to be connected to it, though I realized people sometimes misspell my last name when attempting to e-mail me. However, I attempted to contact them after receiving this press release and they have not returned my attempts at contact.”

In addition, I requested an official response from District 150 through Stacey Shangraw, who referred me to the new FOIA officer. My e-mail to the new FOIA officer wasn’t acknowledged, but Petelle forwarded me this e-mail from Superintendent Lathan (with Lathan’s permission). She also forwarded the e-mail to Billy Dennis (Peoria Pundit) and Emerge Peoria.

Board Members,

In response to Reverend Watson’s “press release” here are the actual facts about PHS. To my knowledge, only one blogger has inquired about the press release.

1) All principals and Central Office administrators in the District, who were not already on multi-year contracts, have been offered one-year contracts. There were no exceptions. Any ongoing multi-year contracts prior to my arrival must be honored. New principals were offered multi-year contracts.

2) Textbooks are an ongoing issue throughout our District. Several years ago, we evaluated our textbook process as a Six-Sigma project. We improved the process, but our high student mobility rate is an issue. To correct his letter, the first Peoria High textbook request sent to the warehouse was dated August 19, not August 1. The warehouse has filled all of the received textbook requisitions that are able to be filled.

3) There are only two plumbing work orders outstanding for PHS. A Sept. 30 work order for a leaking drinking fountain and an Oct. 5 work order for two toilets – one fills slowly and the other has a broken flush handle. A nearby plumbing service would need to be contacted.

4) I am developing a schedule to meet with all parent groups to introduce myself and allow time for Q&A.

5) We have been working collaboratively with the City to address the after school safety issues :

a) The posting of new signs on North Street indicating “No Stopping or Standing” and indicating no left turn onto North Street between the hours of 2:00 & 4:00 PM Monday through Friday.

b) Requesting support from the Parking Enforcement Division to assist in the enforcement of parking violations.

c) The installation of gates that will prevent vehicles from exiting designated entrance / exits.

d) The moving of the public bus stop form Richmond/North to Nebraska/North

e) The purchase of video cameras to tape student dismissal and after school activities.

f) Conduct school assemblies at all high schools regarding sidewalk safety.

Grenita F. Lathan, Ph.D.
Superintendent
Peoria Public Schools
3202 N. Wisconsin Avenue
Peoria, IL 61603