Tag Archives: City of Peoria

Bradley University, City of Peoria

Campustown Save-a-Lot to be leased to Bradley?

30 Comments

Here’s what we know for sure: Campustown developer David Joseph already has another tenant lined up to replace Save-a-Lot, and it’s not a grocery store. Other than that, no one will comment for the record. So the question on everyone’s mind is, “who will the new tenant be?”

Over on Billy’s blog, one commenter suggests it will be an Ashley Furniture store. But in WEEK-TV’s news coverage, the manager of the Save-a-Lot tells a different story:

The Save-A-Lot store manager says the building won’t be empty for long, and he is hearing that it could be replaced with a Bradley bookstore.

I have heard Bradley rumored as a possible tenant from several sources — although they don’t all agree on what exactly Bradley will do with it. Possible uses run the gamut from a bookstore, as WEEK suggests, to offices, to an education center. I wrote to Bradley’s public relations rep — former Journal Star editor Shelley Epstein — but my inquiries have not been answered. Read into that what you will he’s out of town and unable to answer me until he gets back Sunday or Monday.

If the rumors are true and Bradley is going to be Campustown’s largest tenant, is that good or bad for the West Bluff? Let’s weigh the pros and cons.

Pros

  • Bradley would be a stabilizing presence in Campustown. Presumably, security would be increased, which will make the area safer.
  • Since Bradley isn’t buying the space, but rather leasing it, the city will continue to collect property tax revenue. And since the Campustown TIF ended this year, the property taxes will go back to the local governments again, and the city’s portion will go into the general fund.
  • More students and/or employees of Bradley going to school and/or working at Campustown may increase business for the remaining retail stores and restaurants.

Cons

  • The city will lose sales tax revenue. If the store is converted to an office or education center, no sales tax revenue at all will be collected. If it’s converted to a new Bradley bookstore, the old bookstore would likely close, so there would be a net loss in commercial square footage, which translates to a net loss in sales tax revenue.
  • A quality commercial anchor would better serve the West Bluff. As Campustown was originally conceived, a grocery store was supposed to provide basic infrastructure to the West Bluff that would be convenient for residents and an attractive amenity for people considering a move into the neighborhood. Thompson’s/Sullivan’s were excellent tenants toward furthering that vision, but Save-a-Lot (being a low-end grocer) sent a different message. While acknowledging that Save-a-Lot was a poor choice for a commercial anchor, the way to improve Campustown would be to bring in a better grocer, not convert retail space to institutional.

From the city’s standpoint, there’s no question that the cons outweigh the pros. They’re going to lose money. Sales tax is the city’s bread and butter. In an effort to keep property taxes low, the city has been piling up sales taxes and fees to cover the rising costs of public works, public safety, and developer incentives.

It’s not as if the city couldn’t absorb the loss of Save-a-Lot’s tax revenue by itself. But this isn’t an isolated incident. There seems to be somewhat of a trend in retail outlets and residential properties being taken over by non-tax-producing entities. For example, the old K’s Merchandise was taken over by OSF. The old Damon’s restaurant in Riverfront Village was taken over by Heartland Partnership. The old Leath Furniture was converted to a church. And huge swaths of land and houses that used to be on the property tax rolls have been taken over by District 150 for various building projects — or, in the case of the Prospect road properties, expensive blunders. In the case of District 150, taxpayers get hit with a double-whammy: we have to pay millions to acquire the properties, plus we lose the revenue they produced. The city can’t sustain such a trend without compensating growth.

From a neighborhood standpoint, the problem with Campustown has always been crime. The place has a reputation for being unsafe, and until that changes, you’ll have a hard time getting tenants to locate there and you’ll have a hard time getting patrons for those tenants. If Bradley’s presence were to reduce crime in Campustown, I think most residents would see it as a net gain for the West Bluff. Conversely, if Save-a-Lot is gone (and, despite its faults, the store was serving the needs of some lower-income West Bluff residents) and there is no increase in safety in return, that will certainly be a net loss for the area.

City Council, City of Peoria, East Bluff

Council looks to state for help, but won’t help themselves

4 Comments

The city council can be so schizophrenic sometimes.

At Tuesday’s meeting, they first decided to keep taxing residents of the East Bluff Special Service District 18 cents per $100 equalized assessed value for another ten years to continue funding the East Bluff Neighborhood Housing Service, a controversial organization residents feel is ineffective and secretive. The vote was 9-1.

Then, just a couple of agenda items later, fourth district councilman Bill Spears made a motion “to begin discussions [with state legislators] on innovative ways to bring back the core of the inner city by giving incentives, such as tax breaks to homeowners and owned businesses.” After some discussion, that passed 9-1 also.

So they’re for talking about tax breaks with state reps, but not actually giving tax breaks to a distressed part of town when given the opportunity. Tell me that isn’t dysfunctional.

City of Peoria

“Right now is an absolutely horrible time to be in the hotel business”

9 Comments

So says Ben Thypin, senior market analyst for market research firm Real Capital Analytics, in a November 30, 2009, article for Moneynews.com. Why? Occupancy rates are falling on the order of 10%, and more and more hotels are going into default.

Hotel loans have begun falling into delinquency faster than any other kind of commercial real estate debt.

The rising defaults paint a grim picture for an industry with increasingly more rooms than guests, and more hotels still opening every day. It’s a problem that could get worse before it gets better, with demand expected to remain weak and ambitious new projects planned before the meltdown worsening the room glut.

The oversupply means room rates should stay low for at least another year, good news for consumers but not so great for hotel owners and the banks that lent them the cash to build or buy.

In a related story (forwarded to me by one of my alert readers), Governing magazine takes a look at cities building convention hotels and asks the question, “Should cities be in the mega-hotel business?”

[Heywood] Sanders, a professor of public administration at the University of Texas at San Antonio, is the nation’s leading critic of publicly funded convention centers and hotels. He argues that conventions in general, not to mention the facilities that host them, are a declining business. He says that more and more meetings take place online rather than in gigantic buildings, that the recession has only accelerated this process, and that recovery is not going to bring back the old days of massive trade and professional shows with participants flying in from all over the country. The crisis is causing some people to visit Sereno today instead of staying locally.

Sanders cringes as he sees cities betting on convention centers that cost hundreds of millions of dollars, then doubling down on that bet with hotels that cost hundreds of millions more. His research suggests to him that the link between new headquarters hotels and increased convention business rarely emerges. “You get to do a big project with big promises and lots of money for consultants and bond counsel and underwriters and engineers,” he says, “but you may do it at the expense of the very important things that may make a city’s future.” Sanders would prefer that cities invest in schools, roads and affordable housing.

Meanwhile, back in Peoria where we ignore data such as this, the City is still breathlessly waiting to pour $39.3 million into a new downtown Marriott hotel. Jim McConoughey, president of the Heartland Partnership, recently was interviewed by the Journal Star. It included this bewildering exchange:

Q: There has been some criticism of late with regards to the city of Peoria’s involvement with assisting the hotel project with a $39.3 million revenue bond. Given the current economy and considering the struggles with other TIF projects like MidTown Plaza, how do you respond to someone who says that now is not the time to do the hotel and that the hotel project is a different TIF project than MidTown Plaza?

A: I may never be able to convince that person. They are trying to save their way out of an economy. This is about investing. When you look at a hotel project compared to other things, you can look at it in a couple of different ways – one is that they have been collecting taxes on that site for a hundred years. They have needed positives for a very long time. It’s only been in recent years the condition of (the Pere Marquette) hasn’t paid its own way. To have some degree of investment in it is a positive event for that particular project. For the short term, if you did nothing, it would feel like you are taking a less risky position. But the riskiest position is to not do anything.

First of all, the question is incorrect. It’s not a $39.3 million revenue bond, but rather a general obligation bond. That means if the hotel flops, the taxpayers are still on the hook to repay the bond debt.

Secondly, McConoughey is right about one thing: he’ll “never be able to convince that person.” The rest of his answer is basically the Peoria motto, “it’s better than nothing!” McConoughey treats “investment” here as though it is a purely positive thing. In reality, there are good and bad investments, and this downtown hotel scheme is a bad one (for reasons stated above and previously). A great investment today would be in the cannabis industry, with plenty of notable companies investing in it and getting huge returns. You can check out this article “https://www.newcannabisventures.com/sol-global-reports-c244-million-investment-gains-in-q1/” to learn how companies are investing in the cannabis industry.

City Council, City of Peoria

Even the Journal Star gets it

27 Comments

From today’s Journal Star editorial:

You don’t need hindsight to appreciate that the locals are starting to get fed up with the city’s economic development practices, which include doling out substantial subsidies at the same time cops are being fired. In fact budgets say volumes about a community’s priorities. In fact the city’s debt service on its TIF districts has increased at double the rate of inflation during this decade, with potentially more to come through a hotel development Downtown. In fact City Hall’s history is rather checkered in picking subsidized winners and losers. In fact the council had ample forewarning that the MidTown Plaza TIF – which included the now-closed Cub Foods and a $450,000 bill for next year – was a dud; their own consultant told them so.

That’s just a taste — you really should read the whole editorial. Companion article: Main Street merchants struggle while waiting for action on revitalization plans.

It’s all about priorities. The city council didn’t bat an eye at raising taxes downtown to give a $39.5 million grant to a local developer to build a downtown hotel. But there are big cuts to police, road improvements, code enforcement, and snow removal, just to name a few things. In other words, risky economic development schemes that benefit a few people are a higher priority than basic services that benefit all. That’s not right, and it needs to change.

It seems everyone gets that except the Peoria City Council.

City of Peoria

City to AFSCME: We have bargained in good faith

Leave a comment

Here’s the official press release from the City of Peoria:

Subject: NEGOTIATIONS WITH BARGAINING UNITS

The budgetary problems of the City of Peoria projected for 2010 have been well publicized since June, 2009. A number of formal and informal meetings have been held with represented employee groups during the past five (5) months. Many employees and their organizations have recognized the seriousness of the City’s budget deficit. Employees understand that 17% of the metropolitan area is either unemployed or underemployed. To date, seven (7) of the nine (9) labor organizations representing City employees have agreed to reductions in their 2010 compensation package, and in doing so, are to be commended both for their consideration of their fellow members, and for the continued level of necessary services to the citizens of the City of Peoria that such reductions will permit.

The City responded to AFSCME’s request to bargain on September 21, 2009 and suggested five (5) dates during the period of October 1-9, 2009 for such purpose. On October 6, 2009 the City met with AFSCME officials and requested concessions in 2010 to avert most or all potential layoffs that could impact AFSCME-represented employees. The first negotiation meeting for regular contract negotiations was scheduled for October 26, 2009.

The City submitted a formal impact bargaining proposal to the Union on October 28, 2009. It requested a wage/step freeze in 2010 in exchange for a no layoff guarantee of twelve (12) of seventeen (17) full-time employees from November 3, 2009 – May 31, 2010. The Union rejected that proposal on November 3, 2009 and counter-proposed a comprehensive 3-year package with a no layoff guarantee through December 31, 2012, a 9.6% pay increase over the last two years, no residency requirement, adding 2 steps (5% increase) for those at the top pay range and eliminating the lowest two steps (5% increase) for new hires, extreme limitations on the right to contract outside services, and the layoff/elimination of fourteen (14) management employees. That proposal was rejected by the City.

On November 5, 2009 the City sent a notice of planned layoff to the AFSCME organization. The notice contained the names of seventeen (17) full-time positions and two (2) part-time positions.

To date, the parties have met four times in regular negotiations with two of those dates partially devoted to impact bargaining. AFSCME has been provided with relevant information necessary for the parties to bargain. The Union presented a comprehensive economic and non-economic proposal for the successor contract on November 10, 2009. The City had provided its comprehensive proposal on non-economic items on November 3, 2009. The City had advised during ground rule discussions on October 26, 2009 that it would seek resolution of most of the non-economic items first, but would provide the Union with an economic first offer in sufficient time prior to the contract deadline of December 31, 2009 to permit meaningful bargaining. That process is common in most contract negotiations, is completely legal, and does not constitute any unfair labor practice as alleged by AFSCME leadership.

The City is committed to bargaining a successor contract with AFSCME and will continue to do so in good faith. It will also consider any reasonable offers from AFSCME relative to mitigating the impact of the pending layoffs. However, it believes that negotiations are best resolved and more productive at the bargaining table. It encourages the AFSCME leadership to spend available time in that pursuit instead of unfounded threats and allegations.

City of Peoria

Peoria: “Better than nothing”

43 Comments

If there’s one phrase I could erase from all discussions about Peoria, it would be this one: “Well, isn’t it better to do something? Something is better than nothing!” I hear this all the time. Here are just a few high-profile examples:

  • Regarding the proposed downtown museum: If we don’t put a museum there, it will just be a big hole forever! Isn’t it better to put something there? Something is better than nothing!
  • Regarding the proposed charter school for District 150: What, should we just do nothing to improve the schools? At least by putting this charter school in place, we’ll be doing something. Something is better than nothing!
  • Regarding plea bargains for murderers: We know he murdered a man in cold blood, but the jury might not believe our witnesses, so we’re going to let him plea down to an illegal weapon possession charge, so at least he’ll do a few years in the clink. Something is better than nothing!
  • Regarding our new token recycling program: Of course they’ve reduced the number of pickups and you have to rent a special container now for no justifiable reason, but at least it’s something! Something is better than nothing!

It’s gotten so pervasive that I think they ought to make it the official tagline for the city of Peoria. I’ve gone ahead and added it to the logo, as you can see. Doesn’t it make you proud to be a Peorian?

My guess is that most people in Peoria would not want that to be our tagline. But why not? Especially when so many things around here are justified on that basis, why be ashamed to shout it from the rooftops?

I think the answer is obvious…. But not obvious enough to keep people from using it as an argument for their pet projects as if it were some sort of fabulous selling point. I would be embarrassed to try and sell some project or defend some decision of which I was ostensibly proud by declaring, “Hey, it’s better than nothing!”

But for those who are enamored with this bit of rhetoric, consider this:

  1. Something is not always better than nothing. It depends on what that “something” is. Two pennies for a tip is not better than no tip at all — it’s a deliberate insult to the waiter or waitress. Projects like MidTown Plaza are not better than nothing; they’re worse. Now instead of the problems of vacant property, an unstable neighborhood, and a high crime rate, we get to have all of those things PLUS millions of dollars in TIF debt that we pay off with money that could have been used for police officers and road improvements. If we don’t seriously evaluate the “something,” we may end up worse off than we started.
  2. We should be aiming higher than “better than nothing.” Why are we content with “better than nothing” in this city, anyway? Why aren’t we shooting for the best, the highest, the top? Who has bewitched us into having expectations so low that the only thing lower is … nothing? Is this what passes for pride in Peoria: “better than nothing”?

Speaking as a life-long Peorian, I think we sell ourselves short in this city. I think we settle for mediocrity. I think we expect too little. And I think if our city is ever going to turn around and grow, we need to change that paradigm.

City Council, City of Peoria

Liveblogging the City Council 11/10/2009

Leave a comment

Welcome to room 400 of Peoria City Hall. Once again, I’ll be providing live news and comment on tonight’s City Council meeting. The agenda is below. I’ll be updating this post with my comments throughout the evening, so refresh often.

The mayor and all council members are present.

Here’s the agenda:

Continue reading Liveblogging the City Council 11/10/2009 →

City Council, City of Peoria

City Council preview

2 Comments

There’s a city council meeting tonight. Here are some items of interest:

  • There’s a request to use Tazewell County Asphalt Company to seal a parking lot behind the city’s municipal services building. I wonder why the council would even consider patronizing businesses in East Peoria — a city they believe tolerates discrimination, as they made perfectly clear a few weeks ago. Will they reject this bid and any others until these communities adopt the same Fair Employment and Housing Commission statutes as Peoria?
  • Despite all the cost cutting, the city will still have to raise property taxes. A truth in taxation hearing will be held tonight.
  • Comcast’s cable franchise agreement with the city, which expired way back in 2006, is up for yet another temporary extension. Will a permanent agreement ever be reached?
  • Continued discussion on the 2010 budget, including a discussion on the cost of police uniforms.
  • Taxes are also going up in the “Town of Peoria.” You gotta love the “Town of Peoria.” It has the same borders as the City of Peoria, and the City Council members are the Town Trustees. Yet, they get over $2 million in separate tax levies. Illinois: king of superfluous municipal organizations.
City Council, City of Peoria

Moore’s list of critical city positions

7 Comments

It was mentioned during the city council meeting that City Manager Scott Moore asked the council to restore 22 critical positions with the city. The list was projected on the wall briefly, but wasn’t included in the packet on the city’s website (at least, I couldn’t find it). I was able to get a copy after the meeting — here are the positions:

Manager Recommendations for Operations
Positions Restored
In Priority Order

6 Police officers (PPBA)
2 ECC Communicators (AFSCME)
Network Specialist (AFSCME)
Computer Operator (AFSCME)
Legal Administration Coordinator (AFSCME)
1 Animal Control Officer (AFSCME)
Police Records Manager (Exempt)
1 Animal Control Officer (AFSCME)
2 Part-Time Kennel Technicians (AFSCME)
1 ECC Supervisor (Exempt)
Public Safety Coordinator (Exempt)
1 Accountant (Exempt)
1 Code Enforcement Inspector (AFSCME)
2 Police Info Tech for 3rd Shift (AFSCME)

Subtotal (22 Positions)

Note: “ECC” stands for Emergency Communications Center. According to the city’s website, “The ECC provides dispatching services to Peoria Police, Peoria Fire, Peoria County Sheriff, Emergency Medical Services, Peoria County Fire & EMS agencies and other City departments as part of the Peoria City/County Enhanced 9-1-1 system.”

City of Peoria, Peoria Police

Police Benevolent: Why haven’t they agreed to wage concessions?

24 Comments

After the Tuesday night City Council meeting, I caught up with Troy Skaggs, president of the Peoria Police Benevolent, and asked him why the police union had not agreed to any wage concessions. He said there were basically three reasons.

He told me that the union met Monday night, and that City Manager Scott Moore gave a presentation. During that presentation, Moore said this wasn’t going to be a one-year concession. It was likely that the city would be back next year asking for concessions again. And probably the year after that. This was the first time the city had come out and said these requests for concessions would be ongoing and not a one-time deal. That’s the first reason the union was uneasy with agreeing to wage concessions.

Secondly, Skaggs pointed out that the police department is already down 16 positions. Seven positions are vacancies from the beginning of the year that they simply haven’t filled, and an additional nine positions are officers who took advantage of the Voluntary Separation Initiative (VSI) recently offered by the city. They’re not going to fill any of those positions, yet the council wants to cut the department by an additional 17 positions. At the same time, according to Skaggs, the fire department is “back-filling” ten positions, eight of which were vacated due to VSI. So the police union doesn’t see the equity in these two situations.

Finally, the city wouldn’t guarantee that they wouldn’t lay off more officers anyway, even if the union did agree to wage concessions. That really made the union uncomfortable, since they could give up wage increases and lose a bunch of additional officers anyway, meaning they’d be doing more work for no additional pay. Before I talked to Skaggs, I had asked Mayor Ardis about negotiations with the police union, and while he directed me to talk to the union president, he did mention that the police department had wanted some guarantees but the city didn’t feel comfortable with the offer having strings attached.

My take: I can understand, on the one hand, the city not wanting its hands tied in case the forecasted (or actual) deficit gets worse. On the other hand, it doesn’t seem unreasonable to me for the police union to expect some sort of commitment from the city in return for wage concessions.

Bottom line, though, we need police protection. We can’t balance the budget at the expense of public safety. If we “punish” the police union for not taking wage concessions by laying off more police officers, we’re only hurting ourselves.

The council needs to face the music and raise revenue somehow. They simply can’t balance the budget by reducing expenses because the cuts are too deep. Even the City Manager recognizes this — he identified 22 positions that have been cut so far that he’d like to see restored because they’re critical for the city. Those positions include restoring six police officers and several support personnel in the police department.

The real mystery is why the council is so reticent to raise taxes for public safety when they’re so quick to raise taxes for private development schemes like the proposed downtown Marriott hotel deal. Nobody wants higher taxes, but if we’re going to be paying higher taxes anyway, the proceeds should go toward the highest public benefit. As it stands now, we’re paying higher taxes and getting less police protection in return.

Not only is that bad public policy on its face, it only exacerbates the city’s predicament because it drives residents and business out of Peoria. Nobody wants to live where it’s unsafe — whether perceived or actual — and nobody is going to want to shop and dine in Peoria when they can get the same goods and services at a much cheaper tax rate just over the river, or in Peoria Heights, or in any of the other surrounding communities. The city is cutting its own throat.