[In the time leading up to the at-large City Council election, I’ll be occasionally pulling out some pertinent data on Gale Thetford and posting it under the headline “The Thetford Files,†lest we forget why she was voted off the council.]
From the March 10, 1999, edition of the Journal Star:
The City Council narrowly approved a deal Tuesday night that will create MidTown Plaza with $5.5 million in public financing.
Third District Councilwoman Gale Thetford, sponsor of the East Bluff project, secured the minimum nine “yes” votes needed to OK the agreement with developer David Joseph. […]
“It was sweaty, but we did it,” Joseph said after the 9-2 vote, when he hugged Thetford outside council chambers.
Ewwww! While you may think the grossest part of this story is David Joseph and Gale Thetford hugging… um… well, yeah, I guess that is the grossest part. But the second grossest part is that the City paid $5.5 million to “clear the land” (including knocking down old ladies’ houses on Dechman) required to make way for this project and made the area a TIF district after rejecting their own consultant’s report that said this was a bad deal for the City. Who did they listen to instead? The developer’s consultants, of course. I’m sure they weren’t biased….
The city’s consultant (Development Strategies, Inc.) predicted, according to a Journal Star editorial on 3/9/1999, that Cub Foods “would draw 90 percent of its customers from other city grocery stores.” Joseph’s consultants (Melaniphy & Associates, Inc.; Deloitte & Touche) predicted “43 percent of revenues would come from customers living outside the city” and that Cub Foods “would draw customers from a 10-mile radius.”
Now I haven’t done a scientific study, but I defy anyone to prove the City’s consultant wrong. I would be willing to bet that 90% of the customers are not only from Peoria, but specifically from the East Bluff, especially now that Thompson’s/Sullivan’s and John Bee have closed.
Another boondoggle, courtesy of the tireless efforts of developer-hugging Gale Thetford. In all fairness, if the City gave me $5.5 million on a silver platter, I might hug… no, no, I wouldn’t. Not even for $5.5 million.
Come on C.J…..you’d hug her for much less than $5.5 Million.
But while Ms. Theford sponsored the ordinance that was adopted, it was passed by a 9 to 2 margin (how does this qualify as ‘narrowly approved?’) so clearly the vast majority of the City Council felt that this was a good deal. It’s not like this squeaked by on a 6-5 vote. It’s obvious that the Council as a whole found the project to be good. Let’s discuss who else voted for this project and are still serving on the City Council….maybe they should be thrown off now!
A 75% supermajority (9 votes) was required to pass the project because the plan required the city to vacate a street and alley. Here were the votes (AL=At Large, #D=District):
YEAS: Mayor Grieves, Gibson (AL), Glover (AL), Greyeb (AL), Nichting (5D), Spears (4D), Thetford (3D), Turner (AL), Unes (AL)
NAYS: Duncan (1D), Sandberg (2D)
And, as far as the hugging thing goes, that was just a literary device. Actually, what’s icky about the Thetford-Joseph hug isn’t so much Thetford, but Joseph.
No, Peo Proud — the rules were different back then, the city council had to pass it by a supermajority — also, relative to land deals — then that council changed the rules to what we have now, a simple majority — that was another mistake…perhaps CJ can research who was responsible for making that motion to allow for more developer welfare on easier terms….
“Hey honey, did you hear about the new Cub Foods opening in Peoria?”
“Yes I sure did. It’s at the brand-new MidTown Plaza. Let’s round up the kids and head into town!”
Seriously, how many people who live in non-rural areas drive more than 2-3 miles for a grocery store?
Returned To Peoria,
The same people who would drive ‘any’ distance for a ridiculous museum. That is it. I am going to start up my own consulting firm. Is there a better way to give people poor advice and get paid for it!!??
Thanks for the full vote total…..I do and did understand that it took a super-majority to pass, but my point is still that 9 out of 11 Councilmembers felt this was a good project. If you look at the other members that voted for this, I don’t think many of them could be accused of having been too overly-developer friendly (I’m thinking of Grayeb, Unes, Spears, Gibson especially).
If there is blame to go around, it would seem to me that there is plenty to share with the other eight members that voted for this. In particular, perhaps Nichting, Spears, and Turner as sitting members should speak up – I left out Grayeb since he’s not running again). Just because she sponsored the vote, doesn’t entitle her to all the credit or all the negative press.
I think Thetford carries more blame than the other council members because (a) this was a third-district project and she represented the third district, and (b) she actively fought for this project. I’m not saying this absolves the other council people of all responsibility — they still voted for this travesty, after all. But ultimately, if Thetford hadn’t been such an advocate for this project, it never would have happened. This project hurt her own district — a district I lived in at the time. It has not done what it promised — it hasn’t revitalized the neighborhood, it hasn’t drawn people from outside the city, it hasn’t increased property values (other than Joseph’s property). It has contributed to the closing of two other neighborhood grocery stores in the East Bluff. It has been a boondoggle from the beginning, just as the city’s well-paid consultant told them it would be.
Don’t get me wrong, I disagree only on the level of blame that is attributable to different individuals and not at all that the project was warranted. It was a waste of money and never should have been built with public subsidies.
Despite her championing of the project, it still took eight other votes and as I recall many of those that voted for the project weren’t entirely friendly/allies/close with her so they obviously voted for it becasue of another reaosn. Perhpas their ties to Joseph or they felt if was a good deal.
I still think she gets 1/9 of the blame plus a smidgeon for making the motion. But that’s about the same as everyone else who voted for it got.
I’m sort of at a loss here. I rarely go by the Cubs Food place (in fact, I don’t shop Cubs Food PERIOD). I do, however, go by Willie and Juanita’s Tamales every other month or so. The shopping center seems to be fairly busy. How is it a boondoggle? I’m in agreement that we needed a Cubs Foods in that area like we needed a hole in the head… BUT, other than the closing of John Bee (I think Thompson’s had closed some time before Cubs Foods opened), where is the boondoggle? It’s just another Peoria crapola retail mess, the same as all the rest… what makes this one stand out?
MidTown Plaza stands out from other strip malls due to its TIF designation. Market forces, not government intervention, should have been the criteria for whether MidTown was built.
It stands out because of the many home-owners it disenfranchised from their homesteads for the benefit of the rich. No one cared about that.