I’ve got too much to do and not enough time to do it, so please use this space to share your thoughts. What’s on your mind today?
Pundit tries out Blog Talk Radio
I caught a little bit of Billy Dennis’ online talk radio show Sunday. It was very interesting. Billy’s guest was John Bambenek of the Illinois Citizens Coalition and the topic was whether Illinois voters should approve a Constitutional Convention (or “con-con”) to rewrite Illinois’ constitution.
I heard about the last half hour, and plan to listen to the first half the first chance I get. I encourage you take a listen.
With a little help from my friends
Another Bradley student is dead, the victim of horseplay. Once again, the perpetrator was an underage drinker:
According to police reports, the two friends were walking on the sidewalk along the west side of University with about five other people when [Robert] Hurt was allegedly pushed into oncoming traffic and struck by the passenger side of a southbound car near the intersection of Russell Street….
Hurt was taken to OSF Saint Francis Medical Center with severe head injuries and died about an hour later, according to Peoria County Coroner Johnna Ingersoll…. After interviewing witnesses, police arrested [Brandon] Gish. He was also ticketed for consumption of alcohol by a minor along with Brooke A. Rumbold, 20.
Hurt was 21; Gish is 19.
I’ll be interested to hear more specifics on this case as the details unfold. The paper says Gish pushed Hurt into oncoming traffic — this leaves me with many questions. Was he just trying to push him generally, and Hurt lost his balance and fell into oncoming traffic? Did he get pushed into the street in time to get back on the sidewalk if he would have reacted quicker? Or did Gish deliberately push Hurt in front of a car, thinking that his friend wouldn’t be badly injured from the incident, but might walk away with some bumps and bruises? Or some other permutation of these options?
And what about the alcohol? Was it a factor? We know it impairs judgment and reaction time. It had to have played some part in the incident. Bradley has already formed a committee to develop a comprehensive alcohol action plan; it was formed after a previous incident where a student died as the result of a prank involving roman candles.
One thing we know for sure: this is a tragedy, and my sympathy goes out to everyone involved and their families, but especially the parents of Hurt. My deepest condolences to them.
City ready for next snowstorm
From a news release:
About 700 tons of our Canadian salt order has been delivered to Scharf’s pit in East Peoria. Over the next two days, the salt will be loaded onto trucks and taken to Dries Lane.
Ethical? Maybe. Stupid? Definitely.
My experience (limited as it is) with journalists in the Peoria area has been that, when you state that something is off the record, it’s off the record. I haven’t experienced personally or heard from others that journalists in this town have deliberately printed any off-the-record remarks. So I just thought that’s the way it works with all journalists. Then this quote from The Scotsman was published recently:
“She is a monster, too – that is off the record – she is stooping to anything,” Ms [Samantha] Power said, hastily trying to withdraw her remark.
Power is a Pulitzer Prize winning author for her book “A Problem from Hell: America and the Age of Genocide” and a foreign policy advisor to Barack Obama. She has now resigned due to the publication of her comments.
There has been quite a bit of outcry against the paper for publishing her remarks when she very clearly asked them to be off the record. The paper and other journalistic sources I checked defended the paper. Typical is The Scotsman’s official response, which basically says that an agreement to be “off the record” must be reached in advance — it can’t be invoked retroactively to take back unguarded comments. The Scotsman’s editor Mike Gilson:
[W]e are certain it was right to publish. I do not know of a case when anyone has been able to withdraw on-the-record quotes after they have been made. The interview our political correspondent Gerri Peev conducted with Ms Power was clearly on an on-the-record basis. She was clearly passionate and angry with the tactics of the Clinton camp over the Ohio primary, and that spilled over in the interview. Our job was to put that interview before the public as a matter of public interest. It was for others to judge whether the remarks were ill-judged or spoke of the inexperience in the Obama camp.
Doesn’t he sound pious? Of course, the purpose of the interview was to promote Power’s new book, “Chasing the Flame: Sergio Vieira de Mello and the Fight to Save the World,” so all the Obama campaign talk was off the subject, and may explain why she forgot to request that her comments about American politics be off the record until it was evidently too late.
So, did the Scotsman break any ethical rules? Most, though not all, of the sources I’ve consulted say no. Were they jerks for publishing it? Yes. Does it make their reporters look like predatory journalists and their paper look like a tabloid fish wrapper? Yes. Will candidates, aides, and advisors agree to any more interviews with The Scotsman? Not likely.
Sheridan Triangle renewal underway
A public meeting was held Wednesday night at Columbia Middle School to talk about streetscape and intersection improvements in the Sheridan-Loucks Triangle form-based code area. It’s a small stretch of Sheridan road, bounded by the south side of Hanssler on the north, and the north side of McClure on the south.
The process for making changes is outlined on this document that was distributed at the meeting. In addition to public meetings like the one Wednesday where anyone can give input, a Citizen Advisory Group (CAG) either has been or will be established that will include key stakeholders and presumably will require a greater time commitment (i.e., more meetings). I don’t know who is on the CAG, but I will try to find out. Currently, I know that no one from the Heart of Peoria Commission is on it, but perhaps there are plans to appoint someone.
If you can’t make it to the meetings, but would like to give some input, page two of the aforementioned document is a Community Context Audit Form. It needs to be returned by next Wednesday, March 12, which doesn’t give you a lot of time, but it will give you an opportunity to have your voice heard by the design team.
This project is not going to happen overnight. The timetable is spread out so that the final recommendation won’t come before the council until late September this year (tentatively). That may sound like a long time, but it’s only six months, and it will fly by quickly. The important thing is that progress is being made. Everyone’s hope and expectation is that this will be a successful implementation of the Heart of Peoria Plan, form-based codes, and public-private partnerships to revitalize an older area of town, and that it will be a model for the rest of the Heart of Peoria Plan area to follow.
I arrived at the meeting a little late Wednesday, but found the presentations and question and answer time very interesting. There were about 50 people in attendance, including District 150 Superintendent Ken Hinton, which I thought was notable. The best part was after the presentations when we got to interact one-on-one with the consultants and city staff. Throughout the gymnasium, there were several stations set up with maps, engineering drawings, artists’ renderings, etc., that explored different aspects of the planning process, including one station that had a computerized traffic simulation of the area.
I’m encouraged by what I’m seeing as this project moves forward.
Callahan gets the nod
It’s official. Colleen Callahan is the Democratic opponent to Republican Aaron Schock in the 18th Congressional District race to replace retiring Representative Ray LaHood. One of Callahan’s big strengths is name recognition — something she’ll need to battle the name recognition Schock has by virtue of his position as State Representative. Callahan did agriculture news for WMBD radio for many years. She now owns her own communications company. All of this broadcast and communications experience means she should be able to come across well in interviews and debates — an area where Schock has also excelled.
On substance, it will be interesting to see what issue differences emerge. One place where I know they’re on the same page: They both favor increasing ethanol production. My guess is that their biggest points of divergence will be on social rather than fiscal issues.
State has money to burn, evidently
According to Comptroller Dan Hynes, Illinois “still sustains a deficit, ending fiscal year 2007 nearly $3.6 billion in the red based on preliminary unaudited estimates.”
Nevertheless, the General Assembly apparently feels that it has $12 million to spare for the Peoria Riverfront Museum. The House of Representatives approved the expenditure 80-23, and now the bill heads to the Senate where it’s being championed by Sen. David Koehler.
Rep. Aaron Schock voted for it. So I guess he’s okay with deficit spending and fiscal irresponsibility. He’ll fit right in in Congress.
State to purchase, renovate Wrigley Field?
According to the Journal Star today (I’d link to it, but it’s not up on their site at this time):
The Illinois Sports Facilities Authority, chaired by former Gov. James Thompson, is expected to make an offer to the Tribune Co. next week to acquire and renovate Wrigley Field. That bid could include a request from the General Assembly to issue state-backed bonds, authority spokesman Doug Scofield said Thursday.
The main thrust of the article is that this is a divisive issue, as downstate lawmakers don’t see any benefit of this plan to people outside of Chicago. Gee, you think?
Forbes valued the team at $592 million in 2007. They make tons of profit every year despite not winning a World Series for 100 years. Why aren’t they making their own repairs and renovations to Wrigley Field? Why should any taxpayers be forced to give money to benefit this multi-million-dollar ball club?
More on the autism case
First of all, I’ve clearly struck a nerve with at least one person in the medical profession because I’m “ignorant” and don’t have all the “medical facts.” I don’t think what I said is all that different from what Hannah Poling’s father had to say to WebMD, but perhaps he will be more respected since he’s a neurologist:
The experience with Hannah, [Jon] Poling [MD, PhD] says, has not turned him against vaccines. “I want to make it clear I am not anti-vaccine,” he says. “Vaccines are one of the most important, if not the most important advance, in medicine in at least the past 100 years. But I don’t think that vaccines should enjoy a sacred cow status, where if you attack them you are out of mainline medicine.”
“Every treatment has a risk and a benefit. To say there are no risks to any treatment is not true.”
“Sometimes people are injured by a vaccine, but they are safe for the majority of people. I could say that with a clean conscience. But I couldn’t say that vaccines are absolutely safe, that they are not linked to brain injury and they are not linked to autism.”
Poling is hopeful that the decision will trigger government action. “I hope it will force government agencies to look further into what susceptibility factors are out there for children to develop brain injury after vaccination, to look into the susceptibility factors of people at risk.”
Hannah Poling is the autistic girl who was at the center of the case I reported in this post. What her father said, as quoted by WebMD, is all I was trying to say in my previous post. He just said it more eloquently, and hopefully in way that those in the medical profession will find acceptable.
Secondly, here’s coverage of the story from CBS News — note the end of the story where they say their investigation has turned up nine more cases like Hannah’s going all the way back to 1990: