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Grayeb: IAWC is “ripping us off”

Chuck Grayeb gave an impassioned speech at last night’s city council meeting.  He said something along the lines of the “foreign-owned” water company “ripping off” the residents of Peoria.  He mentioned several times that our rates are among the highest in the state, and that the Illinois Commerce Commission gives Illinois American Water Company (IAWC) everything it asks for.
 
Now, if someone is charging you a little much for a service, you might say they are “kind of expensive.”  If they’re noticeably higher than average, you might say they’re “taking advantage of us.”  But someone would have to really be gouging you — or something would have to be grossly overpriced — to be described as a “rip off.” 
 
If it were true that IAWC was “ripping us off,” don’t you think that if the city ran it that prices would go down?  I mean, the only difference is going to be the loan/purchase costs, right?  The revenue stream is going to stay the same — we’re not going to lose any customers in the deal — people aren’t going to be using any less water if the city buys the company.  So why are our rates going to have to increase 3% each year under city ownership?
 
The answer is that IAWC is not ripping us off.  The reason the city wants to buy the water company is so it can have another source of revenue to fund its projects — some of which are laudable, but many of which are questionable.  They tried to sell the idea to the voters as a savings for Peoria residents; when it came out that it wasn’t going to save us anything, but in fact cost us more, they said the reason to buy the water company was because we didn’t want the profits going to a German-owned company, but staying here in the community.  When the residents voted overwhelmingly not to buy it at $220 million knowing all this information, the city said the voters were uninformed.  The real reason people voted against it was because they didn’t think it would be affordable in the long-run; now that we know the new financing numbers and level-debt scenario, the clairvoyant Grayeb is sure that the voters would have decided differently. 
 
These kinds of games are the very reason voters don’t trust the council and don’t want them to buy the water company.  But it’s too late now.  Look out, CILCO — you could be next!

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Thetford, Ransburg: Voters were ignorant

I just hate it when council members call their constituents ignorant. 
 
During the debate on the water company buyout tonight, third-district councilwoman Gale Thetford said the reason over 80% of Peorians voted against the city buying the water company was because they were uninformed.  For instance, she said, many did not know that the city was planning to contract out the operation of the water company.  (I knew that, and I still voted against it.)
 
This reminds me of Ransburg and his belief that the reason he was voted out was because voters just weren’t aware of his record of accomplishments.  Again — ignorant voters.  (I knew Ransburg’s record, and I still voted against him.)
 
That seems to be the belief whenever the votes don’t go your way — it can’t be because of the substance of the issue; oh no!  It must be voter ignorance.  It never dawns on these people that perhaps the people voted the way they did precisely because they were informed. 
 
I had a manager like that once.  Whenever you disagreed with her, she would step up efforts to “educate” you.  Because, if only you just understood her or the company’s position, of course you would agree with her.  I had to tell her a couple of times, “no, I understand exactly what you’re saying — I just disagree.  Can’t we agree to disagree?” 

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Who cares about the weather?

Here’s something I’ve never understood.  Why do half-hour local news broadcasts spend a third of their program talking about the weather?  Does anyone really care that there’s a cold front coming in from Albuquerque?  Or what the temperatures were in Des Moines today?
 
I contend that we really want to know just a few pieces of info:  the temperature, the wind chill/heat index, and the forecast.  These are things that can be flashed up on the screen as a bumper as they go to commercial, like they do the stock prices.  This would leave around eight extra minutes (and an extra staff person’s time) for more in-depth reporting, or at least more sports highlights — anything more exciting than seeing an interminable PowerPoint presentation about the weather.

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All Hail Merle Widmer!

I highly recommend reading Merle Widmer’s excellent piece, “Lest We Forget” on his “Peoria Watch” blog.  I’ve been suspicious of the Peoria Park District ever since they started trying to push through this rails-to-trails conversion of the Kellar Branch.  He doesn’t mention that particular bad idea, but he does give all the facts and figures of other losing propositions, including the RiverPlex and the ballpark.  Way to go, Merle!  It pays to clip and save those JS editorials.

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Chiefs lose again

It’s day ten of the exciting, new, Peoria Chiefs!  And, they lost again.  Record:  2-8. 
 
Boy, am I glad they switched affiliates to the Cubs.  This will really bring in the crowds now!!

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In the Hospital

In case you’re wondering, I’m writing from the hospital.  My wife is here working on cross-stitch, and my son is sleeping soundly in his little bassinet.  Hospitals aren’t real exciting places….  So, I’m able to spend a little time on the blog after all. 

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Journal Star and the Water Buyout

You gotta love the Journal Star’s editorial today about the water buyout (read it here).  Essentially, their strategy is to vote it down for now, then use the next five years to figure out a way to get the appraisal system to come up with the same figure the city wants to pay for the water company.  Once that’s accomplished, push it through again.  Should be able to own it by 2008 that way.
 
Nice strategy, but perhaps a little too overt.  I wonder why they’re tipping their hand….
 
The funniest part of the story was this line, though:  “And did we mention that four out of five voters in the recent referendum told the city not to buy? The council should not ignore that advice.”
 
Ha ha!!  No, no, by all means, don’t ignore it now — wait five years and then ignore it!

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1. The I-74 Overhaul

Yes, of course this would be number one.  I’m not denying that the expressway needed some improvements.  Some of those exit ramps were very dangerous and needed to be reconstructed. 
 
But isn’t this overhaul a bit excessive?  I mean, do we really need six to eight lanes of traffic through Peoria? 
 
It’s almost like they said, “hey, what needs to be done to improve I-74 through Peoria?” 
 
And someone answered, “well, we need to fix those short ramps — especially that dangerous one by the bridge.” 
 
“Yeah, yeah, good!  Anything else?” 
 
“Well, it would really help traffic flow to put in a new interchange at Sterling by the mall.”
 
“Excellent, yes, that would be a good idea.  Anything else?”
 
“Hmmm…. no, not really….”
 
“Okay, well, what do we estimate that will cost?”
 
“We figure about $200 million.”
 
[Furrowed brow] “Well, we’ve got $460 million appropriated…  we’re going to have to come up with some more upgrades.  What else can we do?”
 
“Well… uh…. we could add more lanes — and a tunnel — and, and, let’s see how many roads and ramps we can get to intersect at Knoxville — that would be fun!”
 
And away it went!

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9 Most Irritating Traffic Situations in Peoria

9.  Mt. Hawley Road between Knoxville and Giles Lane.  Why does the city let the school completely close the road during the entire school day?  Isn’t that a bit of overkill, considering they have a flashing light and a crossing guard?  Besides, are the kids trapsing back and forth across the street every minute of the school day?  If they’re only crossing between classes, why not just close the road for five minutes each hour during the switch? 
 
8.  Glen Oak at OSF.  Why can’t you go straight south here and intersect with Knoxville?  Why, when you’re almost to the Knoxville intersection, do you have to turn right and go through an OSF maze, then work your way back?
 
7.  Speed humps on Prospect Road between Peoria Heights and Knoxville.  Give me a break.  Can you see this happening in the first district?  What a waste of taxpayer money for a bunch of rich crybabies.  There are worse problems in this city than someone going a breakneck 40 mph past your mansion.
 
6.  Sheridan Village entrance on Sheridan Road.  If you’re traveling north on Sheridan and want to turn left into Sheridan Village, there’s a blinking red arrow, which everyone knows is the same as a stop sign.  You stop, check for on-coming traffic, and then proceed through the intersection if it is safe.  But, surprise!  This blinking red arrow will, without warning, turn into a solid red arrow, which means that you have to stop until you receive a green arrow.  While the light is a solid red, the exiting traffic from the Sheridan Village parking lot has a green light.  So, you drive up to the light, see that it’s a blinking red arrow, and stop.  You see that the cars exiting Sheridan Village are stopped, and you see that on-coming traffic is far enough away that you can proceed safely through the intersection, so you start to go.  But suddenly, the cars exiting SV start through the intersection at the same time — you slam on the brakes thinking they’re running a red light, but surprise!  You’re the one who ran the red light.  It changed to a solid red arrow while you were looking at the on-coming traffic.  Sucker!
 
5.  People who don’t know how to navigate four-way stops.  I was behind someone today who apparently was never going to go until there were no other cars at the other stop signs.  Or he may have thought everyone was supposed to go one at a time in clockwise fashion, and got confused when cars traveling opposite each other went through the intersection at the same time.
 
4.  People who don’t know how to merge into traffic.  This is legendary, but must be included on the list.  One more time, people:  you don’t slow down on merge ramps and stop at the end of them, waiting for an opening to pull out into traffic.  If they wanted you to do that, they would have made it a T-intersection.  To use a merge lane, you speed up to the highway speed and gradually blend into the traffic.  Hence the word “merge.”  Look it up. 
 
3.  People who don’t know how to let other people merge into traffic.  It should just be common courtesy that if you’re in the right lane and you see someone preparing to merge into your lane, move over to the left lane.  I can’t tell you how many times I have to slow down in a merge lane because some numbskull is pacing me in the right lane when there’s absolutely no one to his left. 
 
2.  People who refuse to stop when they clearly are supposed to.  This covers a whole bunch of infractions that I didn’t want to split up into separate beefs.  But you’ve seen them — the green arrow is turning yellow, then red, but the people keep on turning.  They follow the last car like they’re part of a funeral procession and entitled to go through even though they no longer have an arrow.  Sometimes two or three cars will do this.  Same for running red lights.  They see the car in front of them enter the intersection on a yellow light, so they follow, even though when they enter the intersection, the light is red.  There are many variations of this.
 
And the number one most irritating traffic situation is….  see next post…..

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He’s Here!

No sooner had I sent my last message, then my wife went into labor.  Our son was born at 4:50 a.m. today (April 17).  So, no blogging for now….  I’ll get back to it in a couple of days!