Besides the double-taxation outrage that was deferred for a month, there were two other notable items passed by the council tonight:

• Boots for parking ticket scofflaws — The council passed the ordinance that would allow an immobilization device (commonly referred to as a “boot”) on a car that has five outstanding, unpaid parking tickets on it. There were two amendments made to the ordinance — one was to allow 48 hours (instead of 24) for the tickets to be paid before impounding the car after the boot is applied; the other was to send notice to scofflaws that their car will be booted if they don’t pay up via certified mail instead of just regular mail.
• Phase II of Riverfront Stonehenge Village approved — Riverfront Village has not been successful. Every year for the past six years, on average, the city has taken $100,000 from the Central Business District TIF and used it to pay for Riverfront Village losses instead of using it to pay off the bonds of the TIF. That’s $600,000 it’s lost over six years.

  Nevertheless, based on the City Manager’s projections, the new three-story office building that developer Mike Wisdom wants to erect on the stilted concrete pad will make that deficit disappear. I’ll believe it when I see it. Projections don’t mean much — the original project was supposed to break even, not lose $100,000 per year. We’ll see if these new projections are any more accurate than the last ones.

  One thing they’re going to do is apparently build a new pedestrian walkway that will take visitors right down to the new museum square. Considering how much money the museum project hasn’t raised, this walkway could be our own personal “bridge to nowhere.”

Update (3/28): A couple of things about the Riverfront Village project. If I could wave a magic wand, I would get rid of it as it’s currently configured. I’m not philosophically opposed to having development along the riverfront, but I think you should be able to actually see the river and enjoy the river view from said development, that it should be pedestrian-friendly, and it should be aesthetically pleasing. But, considering the monstrosity we know as Riverfront Village is already there and we can’t feasibly tear it down, we should take this lemon and try to make lemonade if we can. Perhaps this “Phase II” is a way to do that.

Regarding the pedestrian walkway, it’s come to my attention that my post made it sound like I was saying it would span Water street and the train tracks — no, no, it doesn’t do that. It’s just that it’s supposed to “connect” (the City’s word) with Museum Square eventually. Essentially what it does is provide access to the concrete pad from the Water Street side so you don’t have to walk around to the river side to get up to the businesses on top. It’s hard to argue that this wouldn’t be an improvement. But the council communication made it sound like the purpose was to poise it for connection with Museum Square, which seemed like a spurious use of city money.

Parking scofflaws beware, you may find your car immobilized if the city passes a new ordinance Tuesday night.

City Manager Randy Oliver is requesting that the City Council pass an ordinance that would allow a car immobilization device commonly known as a “boot” (an example is pictured at right) to be attached to a vehicle that has five or more outstanding unpaid parking tickets. Oliver believes parking ticket collection will be improved by this policy.

I agree. There’s really no good excuse for a person to have five or more unpaid parking tickets. If you’re going to have parking laws, they should be enforced. I don’t think there’s any doubt that this would be plenty of incentive for someone to finally pay what they owe to the city.

It looks like Randy Oliver will be getting a raise on Tuesday night:

The Mayor and City Council conducted an annual review of the performance of the City Manager. Based upon that review, the attached Resolution increases compensation 2.8% from $153,985 to $158,297, with the automobile allowance remaining at $575 per month and the deferred compensation percentage remaining at 12.5%. The raise is retroactive to January 1, 2007.

On the one hand, 2.8% is pretty meager, but on the other hand, when you make as much as Oliver does, that’s a $4,312 raise — equivalent to an almost 11% raise for someone who makes $40,000 per year. So he’s doing okay. The other thing that a 2.8% raise possibly indicates is that his performance is so-so. I mean, 3% is kind of the standard raise, isn’t it?

That’s one thing that’s got to stink about being a public servant — everyone knows your salary.

The Journal Star reports on a candidates forum that took place last night, sponsored by the Glen Oak Neighborhood Association, that I was unable to attend, unfortunately. As I was reading about it this morning, here are some random thoughts I had about it:

“It’s not (a decision) I was happy about [to downsize Fire Station 11], and I think everyone on the council would like to see the City Council come up with the money,” Thetford told the crowd. “But, I also challenge you, that happened in 2004. This is 2007. If that was a major priority of the council, there has been time to find the funding.”

Great diversion, shifting focus onto the current council. But forgive me for not following the logic. Thetford got us into the mess, the current council hasn’t been able to fix her mess yet, so we should reelect Thetford because…?

Only a few candidates voiced caution over the cost…. “We have to facilitate growth in the community so we’re able to pay for the services our citizens are clamoring for,” Spain said.

Thank you, Mr. Spain. You have provided in that short sentence the very reason I will not be voting for you. You see, it’s that kind of thinking that has gotten us to this place where we’re shoveling money into developers’ bank accounts, but not enough money for fire protection.

No, that statement is completely backwards. We should be providing basic city services in order to facilitate growth in the community. That’s the crux of the difference between what has been termed “progressive” candidates and “basic services first” candidates.

“In my brochure, I say that properly placed fire stations are key to a proper foundation,” said Dan Irving. “We need to start having those discussions right now. When it comes down to finding the money for it, it’s all about prioritization.”

Dan has it right. It is indeed all about prioritization. When the city provides first-class police protection to keep crime down, fully-staffed fire stations to protect citizens’ lives and property, and well-maintained infrastructure such as transportation corridors and sewers, that will be attractive to residents and businesses alike. And if further incentives are necessary to attract some businesses, that can be discussed — but those incentives should never come at the expense of basic city services.

The City of Peoria owns a lot of large, specialized vehicles (snow plows, backhoes, graders, fire trucks, etc.), and thus, they employ mechanics to maintain its fleet as well as professional drivers for CDL Truck Driving Positions. Now the city is looking to possibly outsource this service and lay off its 11 fleet maintenance employees. City Manager Randy Oliver justified this course of action in his Request for Council Action:

During the 2007 budget review sessions Council asked staff to continually seek opportunities to reduce service delivery costs. Fleet maintenance, an internal service provider, was an area discussed as a possible service where the City could potentially reduce costs and/or enhance service by contracting with a private vendor. The attached RFP [request for proposal] calls for a vendor to complete all the current fleet maintenance services provided by the Fleet Management Division of Public Works and the Fire Garage in the Fire Department. The vendor would use the City’s current tools and facilities at Dries Lane and Fire Station 8. The City would retain ownership of all the major repair equipment. Smaller hand tools would be the responsibility of the vendor.

Contracting is something that many governmental entities are considering. Cities contract out services generally to reduce costs and/or improve services. Seeking proposals will also serve as a measure to compare costs between in-house and private service delivery. While a change in service delivery may be justifiable on the basis of any cost savings, as a practical matter, however, the cost savings should be sufficient to justify the organizational change. Many local government agencies use a cost savings threshold to determine whether the change is worthwhile. An attached spreadsheet is how staff would determine any cost savings.

This has caused a firestorm of controversy, complete with accusations of union busting. At last night’s council meeting, the council voted 6-5 to defer this discussion until May 8 (after the election, incidentally) “to give labor and management time to discuss possible cost savings,” according to the Jennifer Davis’s report for the Journal Star.

The employees, of course, feel that they’re uniquely qualified to provide this service for the city and should be retained. That’s a good argument to make, and they may be proven right. I don’t think that these employees will get dumped if some private company comes in a dollar less than what it costs to provide services in-house. I’m confident their experience will be taken into consideration.

The employees also don’t want to lose their jobs, of course. They point out that these are good, head-of-household jobs, which is true. Even neighborhood activist LaVetta Ricca sprang to their defense last night:

“When this council wants new TIF areas or money for businesses, you all say these businesses are going to provide good-paying, head-of-household jobs – like Firefly (Energy’s inclusion in an Enterprise Zone) last week,” Ricca said. “Because, as you all say, this city depends on good-paying jobs. And now you’re saying you want to get rid of these guys, these guys who’ve lived here for years, who’ve been dedicated to this city. I really have a hard time understanding this.”

But this is a spurious argument. It’s not the city’s job to take taxpayer money and manufacture good-paying, head-of-household jobs. The city’s job is to provide the services residents need with the best balance of quality and value it can get. There are plenty of professional services that the city could bring in house but are more economical and fiscally-responsible to outsource to private companies. Fleet management should not get any special treatment — certainly not on the basis that they get paid so well. That’s the very reason the city manager is looking at outsourcing them!

TIFs and Enterprise Zones are tools the city uses to attract private investment and the good jobs that generates. Are TIFs and Enterprise Zones abused? I think so. But that’s not an argument for creating or maintaining in-house services that could be justifiably outsourced.