Ombudsman Ted,

Why do you allow Tim West to run a blog site which in essence competes with yours. Many times he chooses the same topics.

It is obvious to me that his blog site has failed after several months....you need to be a good Ombudsman and shut it down...for his sake and the Naperville Sun's sake.

I have always felt Tim West was not a very popular man. He does not have a following after 30 years working for the Naperville Sun! He has never changed his ways.

I think it is time to jolt Tim West into changing his ways...for his own sake. I hate to see a man work for 30 years and not leave the slightest of legacies. I don't know how much time he has left at the Naperville Sun but I sure would like to see him salvage his career and leave some legacy.

He could start by blasting away at City Pensions editorial after editorial!

The Napergate Man wrote a 100 pages in your paper and left some kind of legacy before retiring. Tim West has written 100,000 pages and no one seems to understand what he stands for, what his agenda is and how he would like to be remembered.

If he retires tomorrow, I will remember him for writing a column about a Blue Hummingbird in his backyard. That is his legacy as far as I am concerned!

I hope you can tranform him in a way where he leaves a legacy of bringing positive change to our beautiful city, Ombudsman Ted!

I hope you guys in the Naperville Sun can tolerate a little constructive criticism on your blog site and publish my post!

Thanks!

Host Ted,

I would like to see a response to Kelly if you can make some time.

She does make some valid points and it would be nice to see a team effort at the Naperville Sun trying to tackle City Hall instead of a solo effort by yourself since Jim left us.

We can all see from this blog site how difficult it is to deal with all these city issues...how complicated they are.

I guess it is apparent why so many people admired and still admire the Napergate Man. We are just learning how difficult what he did was from our experiences on this blog site. Most of us can't even get the answers we need to begin solving the problems in town causing us to have runaway taxes.

Thankfully CM Bob has given us some of the break throughs we need. In the Napergate Era CM Doug Krause and Jack Tenison gave the Napergate Man the numerous break throughs he needed to fight City Hall. City Hall is not very transparent. You have to break walls down to obtain information from that fortress.

I hope you can endorse more help at your newspaper to give you a hand. This is not a one man job. The Napergate Man may have simply been an exception who could fly solo!

Response from Ted:

I can't discuss story assignments that are in the works. That's proprietary information. I can tell you that all good investigations take time.

Ombudsman Ted,

Since it seems like everyone in town is upset about the mishandling of taxpayer funds by our city officials can't you get your columnists to focus on this issue.

Tim West, proved very capable a decade ago, when he ripped City Officials for not being able to account for the lengthyy Napergate Trials. He proved up to the task.

Why can you not delegate the pension downfall to Mr. West and see what he can come up with? If he was outraged about a million dollars of unaccounted money for the Naperate Trials, can you imagine how upset he will be about this $51 million pension downfall despite the milking of the taxpayers 20% of matching funds each year for these city pensions.

You have many top notch people at your disposal at the Naperville Sun. Please use them to help you!

A good leader delegates. You seem unwilling to delegate. Why, Ombudsman Ted?

Marilyn –

“TB finally admitted his brother is a fireman and we all FINALLY understand where he is coming from." And on and on.

I think maybe you misunderstand. I don’t fight any battles for my
brother; he’s a big boy and can take care of himself. Besides, I was very clear that he does NOT work for Naperville so there's no correlation between my brother's salary and our taxes.

The fact that my brother is a non-Naperville fire fighter does not affect my opinion that I don’t mind spending money to attract and retain the best and brightest for all of our safety. The reason for my “strong opinions” is just a difference in priorities. There’s no right or wrong, just preferences.

You want to talk about saving money in the city? I’m all for it, but I think gutting the pay and benefits for our first responders is a recipe for disaster. I think that should be the last area cut (as a last resort), not the first.

T.B.

Marilyn,

That was quite a comical read, I must say.

The shots fired incident had a very immediate response from NPD. I heard it on the scanner. Multiple units converged rapidly on the area. They got description of the vehicle and the occupants and that the shots were fired into the air and the vehicle apparently took off via Rt 59. You said yourself those businesses do not want police presence around, so I can’t understand why a Napergatian complained prior that there was no presence over there. Do they want a squad parked there or not?

I didn’t pay $50 for any search, I paid nothing. I merely said one could pay $50 for an internet search and everyone assumed I did. That was kicker of the whole deal. This stuff is public record and available for free if you know where to look.

I never denied anything vehemently. I said you can believe what you want about who I am and I offered several times to meet you for a FOIA filing and a cash hand out for your share of your real estate bill that went to police overtime. You declined both. You can pull the store video of EVL today and see if you see the President of the FOP in there. I can tell you the clerk was wearing a brown shirt and the coke truck was outside unloading. See if the President of the FOP was there at EVL on Bailey today. That will show your ‘guess’ is wrong.

I’m not sure where you think I am blaming anyone for a mess at city hall, yet you claim I am. Perhaps when someone’s so angry and emotional, they misread things. Try reading it again after you’ve calmed down.

Joe,

I think you like to speculate and make your own conclusions. Most of the times you are really off.

1. That Extra Value Liquor store was sold by the Napergate Man many years ago that is on Bailey Rd.

2. I believe either Jim Bartlett from Bloom Above called the Naperville Sun or the Naperville Sun called Jim Bartlett. There was a first and last name given here. No anonymous person so we know it was not the Napergate Man who opened the bridge situation. Maybe Host Ted can tell us who initiated that.

3. No liquor store owner wants police sitting in front of his store. That is very bad for business. So I doubt the Napergate Man would complain about the NW PLAZA and want police stationed in front of his store. If he makes the slightest mistake the police would be there to nab him. Most customers who go to liquor stores don't want police to see them entering or exiting.

4. Many people complained about the danger of having 3 nightclubs in that NW PLAZA with no police. You stated the police must have done some research and knew what they were doing. Well, the Naperville Sun reports 5 shots were fired outside a nightclub in that plaza and no police were there. If the Napergate Man was the only one that warned of this danger in this entire town, maybe he is a genius of sorts. I believe many residents saw this coming. There was also a baseball bat incident in that plaza that was not reported by the Naperville Sun.

5. The NPD towing incident had nothing to do with the Napergate Man. That was between you and Ameena. The Napergate Man was arrested but no one ever said his vehicle was towed unless I missed it somewhere. I believe Bob said his vehicle was locked behind Potter's and the police took his keys. He was just not allowed to drive.

6. As far as the license stops, I recall you digging them up by first telling us you paid 50 bucks and then telling us you did not. I think his supporters just came out and defended him.

7. I don't think anyone is "spewing" anything in his name. There are several thousand Napergatians in town who speak for themselves.

8. Do you really want to believe that in a town of 144,000 residents only the Napergate Man is upset with police OT and police pension? Do you think only the Napergate Man gets a real estate tax bill? I think every resident gets a real estate tax bill and personally I am shocked only hundreds have come forward on this blog site instead of thousands. Maybe some people do not write but simply vote. So we will see!

9. As far as your comment "just you wait and see" well I just noticed I said "we will see." By that I mean, we will see if the voters will come out and vote. What does that have to do with the Napergate Man?

10. As far as your comment, "Naturally, it's denied but what I have found out over the years is the more vehemently things are denied, the more they turn out to be true." that is very interesting.

The Napergate Man never came on or denied anything. However, you have been accused of being Joe the President of the Fraternal Order of Police. You have denied that vehemently. Based on your logic, this is than true. Yes, that is very interesting, is it not Joe! Why don't you just come on and admit it? TB finally admitted his brother is a fireman and we all FINALLY understand where he is coming from. I respect him for making this FULL DISCLOSURE! I think it was important he made it and people will be more sympathetic to his comments since he is defending the interests of his brother like any brother should! We all knew there was a reason for his strong opinions. Now we know!

11. The Napergate Man never ran for elections even when he was endorsing candidates and heavily involved. Why would he suddenly want a political career? That would not fit his lifestyle of the past. He was simply a watchdog never interested in political power or office. Just my opinion based on my observations! Unfortunately, I am speculating but I think most opinion is speculation anyway!

12. Both Host Ted and Moderator Jim seem to have gotten quite upset with the waste of government spending in recents months. Not just the residents. It is as if you are implying that the Napergate Man is behind all this...like the rest of us do not get upset when we get a 20% increase in taxes. The Napergate Man does not pay our taxes. We pay our own taxes. So we the residents both Naperivillians and Napergatians are upset and have a right to be upset. Do I wish the Napergate Man was adding a little fuel to the fire to heat things up? Yes, I do. Will he? I don't know! According to you Joe, one would believe you spotted him at the gas station buying fuel to ignite the fire! I guess you have those Google Aliens watching him for us...lol...

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It is easy to go on since I have been on these blogs a long time just like you, Joe! I think you need to stop worrying about the Napergate Man and worry about what you can do for your City! How you can help it. Your friends in the police and fire dug themselves a hole of over $50,000,000 dollars because they want to receive more than they are willing to pay into the pension. I suppose this is all the Napergate Man's fault.

The Napergate Man was just like Moderator Jim. He is just like Host Ted. He was simply reporting the news. He just knew where to look in the PAPER AGE. We are just learning where to look in the INTERNET AGE. As Host Ted said, he was willing to drive, research, and talk to City Council Members. He was simply being a reporter and not a politician.

He was the messenger. Now you are trying to blame him for the NEW MESS at City Hall. Maybe it is all his fault since he stopped watching City Hall.....and this is what happened. I guess I agree with you it is ALL HIS FAULT!

And I am sure he called Host Ted and told him to put a thread on the Bailey Rd Bridge and Host Ted is now working secretly with him. I think all these great threads are Host Ted's doing. I doubt the Napergate Man controls anything the Naperville Sun does. Maybe Host Ted can confirm what I am saying. It seems like you become a CONSPIRATORIAL THEORIST as of late while accusing others of being the same! Very funny!

OK, Joe, stop blogging so much and try to represent the Fraternal Order of Police a little better. I think 27 million of that 50.5 million is police related and your RESPONSIBILITY for taking advantage of the City Council with the bullsh$t you have fed them over the years. A lot of it right here on this blog site since they most likely read it. FIX the MESS and stop worrying about the NAPERGATE MAN! Why don't you investigate if RJ is City Manager Bob Marshall. He sure seems obsessed with defending anything he or the city does!

Good luck, Joe! I don't envy you for what you have to look forward to. Tell your union police officers the truth. Tell them they caused this pension mess....The Napergate Man has absolutely nothing to do with it.

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

PS. We hear about a lot of problems in Naperville such as parking decks, ponds of Hobson West, School Districts, etc. etc and just by coincidence I guess an Extra Value Liquor is not located in those areas. Your theories don't hold water! The Naperville Sun wanted to do a story about this Bailey Rd. Bridge and talked to a flower shop owner by name and you insert the Napergate Man right in the middle. No one but you Joe! And you wonder why you have no credibility on these blogs!

Note from Ted:

I don't know whether the florist contacted the reporter or the reporter contacted the florist. I trust the reporter, I'm confident the florist said those things to him. I actually edited out some of his harshest criticism of city officials, and made sure the city's side was fairly represented.

Anon,

I'm beginning to really suspect he's been here a while blogging right along with us, incognito.

First, we hear about the horrible unfair NPD with towing, suspended license stops, mental anguish inflicted on a dog, etc. Then we hear about how wasteful police OT is and how bad it is since there aren't as many police assigned to the NW part of town up by the billard's place on Rt 59. Coincidentally, there happens to be an Extra Value Liq store there (odd coincidence).

Now we're hearing about how bad the city of naperville is to the business owners located next to a bridge closure, where (hold onto your hats) there happens to be yet another Extra Value Liq store. We've heard all about the NGM's personal life and people put forth information that rightfully so should only be known to him and or his closest of friends or family for the past several months. And, like you said, we keep hearing a "just you wait and see" of other forms of retaliation and threatening verbiage being spewed 'in his name'.

Naturally, it's denied but what I have found out over the years is the more vehemently things are denied, the more they turn out to be true.

If it walks like a duck and sounds like a duck.. it's probably a duck.

It's a shame Jim will miss all this because it's been almost like an enjoyable year-long Infomercial as a run-up to the next set of elections. What remains to be seen is if he's written the last chapters and actually has candidates that can live up to all of the hype or if he will run himself for Council.

Mrs. Jane Q. Public on June 11, 2008 6:05 PM

We need to stop whining and just do some of the things the Napergate Man did.

Maybe you ought to try something instead of whining about what others may or may not be doing.

____________________________________________________________________

Yes Mrs. JQP the Napergate man has moved on to other things, but for some reason he is used as a "threat" against anything and everything by some posters on this blog. Constantly referring to his past achievements does us no good - yes he was effective, but in your words, "we need to continue his legacy instead of expecting him to go on forever." The constant threat that, "he may come back", or "he may start running ads" also does us no good in the present.

I implore the Napergatians to take up the current cause and stop living in the past. JQP is correct that it is time to stop whining and do some of the things the NGM did. We also need to stop asking the Sun, or Councilman Bob to do everything. For once I would like to read that someone actually filed a freedom of information request, or actually called and spoke with someone at the NPD or city.

And as for your suggestion to me to stop my whining and do something. I am, I'm trying to motivate you and the Napergatians to move on to the next step! With 30,000 members and an intricate e-mail distribution list it shouldn't be too hard to rally the troops?

Ms Jane,

"Do you really expect the Napergate Man to spend a year and a half on here trying to convert you 4 guys to his views? That would be a waste of time."

No, I certainly don't expect him to do that but it's sure been fun watching some 'followers' actually try it. It's rather entertaining watching all of the corruption, conspiracy, out to get him, those bad naughty downtown businesses, establishment, us versus them, entitled, oppressed, etc angles you all have taken against things.

You're right, I am just a joe-six pack regular guy with a life and family too and get this: a job. My free time comes from working smarter, not harder and this has always been an enjoyable flashback to my college days where I was of the same mentality you all are in that it's always someone else's fault that my life sucks. One day, I woke up and realized it wasn't anyone's fault but my own and I never looked back into that mindset because it was very immature and self-destructive. So, thank you for that walk down memory lane this past year and for reminding me how fortunate I was to wake up one day and make a change for the better. Unfortunately, not everyone wakes up with such an epiphany in their lifetime. I hope one day many on here have it for themselves. Life will get a whole lot happier.

A letter to Mr. Higgins that also belongs here since some bloggers are not cross bloggers.

____________________________________________________________________

Mr. Higgins,

Have you spoken to Councilman Bob yet. We all would love to hear what he has to say about these out of control city pensions.

Can you imagine that we the taxpayers throw in 21.16% into their pension fund and they are underfunded by 28,000,000 dollars. 100,000,000 million for pension liability minus 72,000,000 for pension assets. The difference is 28 million and can be found on page 66 of the City Financial report as one blogger pointed out. I verified it.

Are we the taxpayers suppose to give them 42% of their wages now as a pension donation to subsidize their retirement pensions to come out of their huge deficet? Where does it end!

OR

1. We could reduce their starting wages to 40k from 60k and reduce future pension payments by 33% since pensions are based on salary. The City Council controls the salary and not the State of Illinois. It is not the fault of the state they decided to overpay cops by more than 20k the average of surrounding and national communities. Blogger Diana on the Ombudsmen Thread did a very detailed analysis to show our horrendous overpayment of cops. More than $13,000 what an FBI agent makes and he is usually the cream of the cop. $20,000 more than neighboring Romeoville!

2. We could ask police officers to contribute 30% of their wages instead of 9% if they want 75% of their highest pay when they retire as young as 51. If that does not do it we can see if they will pay 50% of their wages towards pension in order that they get 75% of their wages when they retire. Cops are living 30 years after retirement so how can they expect to get 75% of their salary when they retire if they only give 9% of their salary to the pension fund. The math just does not work! Especially when the retirement pension is based on the last year and not the average of the years as in Social Security!

3. If they don't want to contribute 30% to their own retirement from their own wages they should not expect us to contribute 41% instead of 21%.

4. They could delay their retirement age till 65 as civilians do. City Manager Bob Marshall retired at 51 and he is running marathons while gainfully employed at $165,000 by the SAME City that retired him. Why is it necessary to give him 85k a year in retirement money when he is not even retired. How insane! Does anyone expect our City Manager who is benefiting from our broken system to fix it...lol... Let us hope he is not made the permanent manager. He will make sure we pay the 41% in matching funds to keep his 85K flowing instead of the 21% in matching funds we currently pay that is causing a 28 million dollar deficit.

5.Aurora limits its contribution to cops and firemen to 10% and makes them worry about the rest of the money. Their starting pay is 43k while ours is a shy short of 60k. They work just as hard as Naperville cops in a town full of gangbangers. Having lower salaries means having lower pensions that could possibly be affordable on this 10% matching funds. Aurora will only give 10% if a cop gives 10%. If a cop or the cops only contribute 8%, Aurora will only contribute 8%. They installed a cap...where is our cap City Councilman Bob. I guess we lost all our caps with home rule and we can just tax the residents 20% more each year to fix the problems...hmmmmm!

What do you say Mr. Higgins you give us some support since the Napergate Man retired and you seem to want to be involved? If the Napergate Man was advertising this would be a full page ad that could influence elections. Let us hope Host Ted sees the benefit of exposing this racket. Only if it is EXPOSED can it be STOPPED.

Thank you!

PS. Please don't forget to report back to us after you talk CM Bob.
I suspect Ted's Threads are just too hot for him to handle. Just like those Napergate ads were too hot for those before him in office to handle.

I urge everyone to leave the teachers alone. They do pay for almost all their pension money from their salary. We, the taxpayers, are not matching with 21% like we are with the cops and fireman that is not even half of what is need to keep them floating. Go after City Hall and leave the teachers alone. There is a good reason the Napergate Man never went after the teachers. He probably knew they were not milking the taxpayers. Their corruption is an interanl matter that is not costing the taxpayers anything like the corruption at City Hall. Let us stay focused on the BIG FISH!

Ms.Jane Q.Public and all the other naysayers:
Once again, my source for the police pay list is the County Sheriff John Zaruba and the Daily Herald, not the union, or not a lie as Becky claims. I don't know why there is a discrepancy with the various village websites, I just know what the Sheriff said and the Daily Herald backed up.

By the way, Beck, why is it you can't debate without the personal attacks? Does hiding behind a keyboard give you so much courage that you have to talk to me as you would never dare to in person? By the way, if it is tollway Diana as you assume, I proved her and her friend to be liars. Recent articles in the Chicago Trib also back my facts. Why don't you and the rest of the cult members just try debating instead of character assassination?

While you were all busy attacking me, you conveniently glossed over what towns of comparable wealth pay their officers. Instead you want to compare pay with the national average, which includes every one cop town in the United States. I can understand why you want to dismiss comparable towns, as their pay completely destroys your argument.

By Joe on June 11, 2008 12:54 PM
Anon@11:14am

"I wonder why the Napergate man is now silent on this issue if he attacks corruption everywhere?"

Maybe he's been blogging on here like everyone else; not revealing his true identity. Since we all don't know each other in person, it's a possibility one has to consider.

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Joe,

Not everyone is retired like you and can live on this blog site. He to the best of my knowledge still owns businesses. He has family! He most likely has a life that he tries to live in real time!

When he did his Naperagate Ads, he wrote them and moved on to the next project until it was time for another Napergate Ad. He reached 22,000 subscribers and 50,000 readers. He made his point! He did not spend all day arguing with his readers. They either agreed with him and showed it in the election or disagreed with him and showed it in the election.

This blogging era is different. While it seems to appeal to people like you, Ken, RJ and TB with much time on your hands, it does not seem to appeal to the likes of Mayor Pradel or the Napergate Man.

Do you really expect the Napergate Man to spend a year and a half on here trying to convert you 4 guys to his views? That would be a waste of time.

If he wants to do anything he will take a few full page ads in the Naperville Sun before election and try to influence the masses that could be influenced in the right direction. He is not going to waste his life arguing with 4 individuals.

I know you feel you are very important, Joe! But the Napergate Man may feel you are nothing more than a Joe Six Pack who walks in one of his liquor stores every day! No offense intended...just trying to be honest with you, Joe!!!

Ms. Jane Q. Public on June 11, 2008 8:26 AM

The Napergate Man never worried about popularity or being liked. He just attacked corruption everywhere.

I wonder why the Napergate man is now silent on this issue if he attacks corruption everywhere?

------------------------------------------------------------------

Anonymous,

He attacked corruption for 20 years and paid for hundreds of full page ads. A person has a right to retire after 20 grueling years of fighting City Hall in courts, in the media arena and City Council Chambers.

I think we need to continue his legacy instead of expecting him to go on forever.

Host Ted is continuing the legacy of Moderator Jim. He is getting the job done! We need to stop whining and just do some of the things the Napergate Man did. Some of the things Host Ted is doing.

Let us be like Host Ted and try to work with the card dealt to us. Did Host Ted ever imagine he would have to expose corruption at City Hall by himself without Mr. Lynch's help and support in this sudden way? I doubt he did but he is doing whatever he is capable of doing and I admire him for at least trying.

Maybe you ought to try something instead of whining about what others may or may not be doing.

Anon@11:14am

"I wonder why the Napergate man is now silent on this issue if he attacks corruption everywhere?"

Maybe he's been blogging on here like everyone else; not revealing his true identity. Since we all don't know each other in person, it's a possibility one has to consider.

Ms. Jane Q. Public on June 11, 2008 8:26 AM

The Napergate Man never worried about popularity or being liked. He just attacked corruption everywhere.

________________________________________________________

I wonder why the Napergate man is now silent on this issue if he attacks corruption everywhere?

Formerly Patricia,

"You remind me so much of old Joe when he challenged everyone to bring his real estate bill so HE could compute it. It turned out John Q. Public had to teach him how to compute his own...lol..."

Please keep in mind that I was right the first time with the real estate bill calculation on April 25th and people called BS on it.. I over thought it after that, in error, and it turned out John Q said it was exactly like I initially stated.

Thanks for the compliment on me being right the first time though. It's appreciated and welcomed.

At the end of the day, if you think the pay is so badly padded for the work they do, why don't you go do that job and get in on the action. I personally wouldn't want to have that job for DOUBLE the top paid employee and because of that I am happy to pay someone what they currently make.

Stuart –

Of course I would assume that a NPD officer would undergo training, but nobody has said how much or how long. If you know the answer, I would be interested in hearing it, but I couldn’t find it on their web site.

An FBI agent’s training is 21 weeks (per fbi.gov) so while they may start at $51K in training at Quantico, they would be making $67K after 21 weeks when they report to the field in the Naperville area.
The availability pay vs OT issue is a valid one, however, keep in mind that even though an FBI agent is paid for 50 hours (the extra 10 being STRAIGHT time by the way, not time-and-a-half) they often work many more hours for which they are not compensated. Getting paid OT at the federal level, I’m told, is difficult and infrequent.

I will answer some of your questions (demands?) as they form a baseline for my opinion. Yes, I am a Naperville taxpayer. I do not believe in giving “excessive” money to our police dept. I just happen to value safety and I think it should be a priority for the city. I am all for being cheap in some areas, but not in safety.

I never said anything about the NYC police or their qualifications. I make no judgments on anyone’s qualifications. I just want the best for my (and your) protection. Period.

Perhaps you and Becky are right that “We should be compared to regular police depts. and not the FBI in the first place.” Then again, it was Diana who brought up the FBI comparison--not me.

**********

For all of you who think being a Naperville cop is an over-paid, stress-free, cushy job:

You’re in luck. They’re hiring! Go to their web site http://www.naperville.il.us/npdrecruitment.aspx and apply for a job.

The deadline is September so you have plenty of time.

**********

Becky –

Nobody in my family is a police officer; however, my brother is a fire fighter in the Western suburbs (NOT Naperville). Is that “coming clean” enough for you? Is that straight forward for you, or still too “circular”? It’s nice to see you got the Napergatian talking points.

Is it so hard to accept that I just think being a cop or fire fighter is a thankless job which should be well paid? Why must you attribute my opinion to some sinister motive such as being for my own benefit?

Is it impossible for you to believe that two people can look at the same set of facts and come to differing conclusions?

I would put forth the notion here that these are all opinions and therefore nobody is “right” and nobody is “wrong”. What I find amazing is the Napergatian dogma that anyone in disagreement is somehow “wrong” or dense, as if you’re the watchdogs of opinion or something.

Becky, how about you come clean now and answer some of my questions?

**********

Lastly, for those in sticker shock about starting salaries, check out this article posted on Yahoo this morning:

http://hotjobs.yahoo.com/career-articles-10_hot_jobs_that_start_at_50k-418

It lists 10 jobs that start at or above at $50K.

“You may be the new kid on the job block, but that doesn't mean your salary has to start low on the totem pole. The PayScale.com Salary Survey identified an array of exciting jobs that pay a total compensation close to or above an impressive $50,000 per year right from the start.”

T.B.

Here is your post from the teachers' pension thread in response to a blogger that motivated me to write my prior post on this thread. I think you made a lot of sense and just like you said the taxpayers are footing the bill, no matter how you slice it! Very well done and said, Host Ted!

====================================================================

Host Ted,

Apparently your school thread loyalists do not read other important Sun threads. Could you please back what I am saying since I am sure you read it before posting as I have. I hate to see the teachers attacked for receiving about one half of one per cent. The cops and firemen are getting 40 times that. People blogging on this site are in their own world and vastly misinformed about REALITY. Thank you!

Response from Ted:

Years ago when I was a reporter for The Herald News in Joliet I spent weeks on an analysis of salaries in Joliet. It turns out about half the highest-paid workers in that town are firefighters. So I asked why, and explained overtime, and benefits, and "Kelly days," which are free days off that they get in their contract on top of vacation and sick time, and I got into the whole hiring thing with the police and fire commission and guys being passed over on the list to get to nephews and cousins of existing firefighters and elected officials--you know, the same stuff that goes on everywhere. Bottom line, some guys make $100K for working 100 days a year, and have second jobs to boot. (To this day I don't believe the city of Joliet has hired a single female firefighter.) It was a good report, stirred things up for a while, and I wasn't very popular among firefighters.

The point is, when you start looking into salaries, overtime, contract provisions, benefits, pensions for ANY group of public sector employees --teachers, police officers, public works, etc.--you're bound to find some abuses, irregularities and poor policy decisions. I'm not choosing sides here. The amount of Naperville's contributions to employee pensions concerns me, but so do end-of-career bumps in teacher and administrator pay that end up giving them better pensions. Either way, taxpayers foot the bill, either through local or state means.

Host Ted,
I really enjoyed your response to a blogger on the teacher pension fund. I thought it belonged here. I would not worry too much about being unpopular with 200 police and 200 firemen in town. That will happen....it is simply not avoidable! But in truth, you will become very popular with 149,600 residents by stopping the fleecing of the taxpayer. It is amazing how much we are learning on Ted's Threads so quickly about the craziness of these retirement pension funds and systems. They are really out of control. And I believe it is our City Council that is allowing this 21.16% contribution to the police and firemen and not the State of Illinois. If our City Officials are going to let police retire at age 51 and give them 85k someone has to pay 21.16% to fund this police officer(to the tune of this amount) who may easily live for another 51 years.

Aurora is limiting itself to a 10% pension contribution for police and firemen and 5.5% for other Aurora employees. I just don't understand who decided that police and fireman are better than other city employees. It seems like they have powerful unions that grab taxpayer money as if there was no tomorrow. Your comments about firemen in Joliet making a 100k for a 100 days hit a nerve with me. And to think they are saving every opening for their close relatives smacks of cronyism and corruption at its worse. And top that with second jobs since they work so few days a year.

I think if you present the facts of these retirement pensions to residents in a very simple understandable way in your print edition we will have a tax revolt in this town. I suspect residents just don't know what was going on. Without Ted's Threads and really your excellent Citizen Journalists, I would have no clue what is going on. Forget about popularity, Host Ted, with police and fire fighters. Just go with your heart and do what you think is right. You may start a state wide trend of fighting these ridiculous pensions and your mother newspaper may join you.

The Napergate Man never worried about popularity or being liked. He just attacked corruption everywhere. He did not care if anyone liked him or not. Reading your blogs site, it seemed over time people respected him and liked him. Even the group of five that dislikes Napergatians have shown respect for the Napergate Man. I would like to see you follow in his footsteps Host Ted without having any fear. Let the chips fall where they may! I believe if you simply told the truth about the inner workings of the city, you will reach ICONIC STATUS with the 99% of the residents who are not government employees. Maybe even with the government employees who feel they are not being treated equal to police and firemen.

I mean look at the benefits Aurora gives their cops and Naperville's are even better across the board. I think they got $1800 for a vest instead of $550 Aurora got if I recall correctly. Can you imagine 120 sick hours annually or 15 days a year. We get 3 sick days a year in my Fortune 500 company! Imagine a 100% health and 100% dental. We pay 500 dollars a month towards our health and we receive no dental. People are just not aware what government is giving itself. But the saying goes "pigs get fat and hogs get slaughtered." I think our City Officials have allowed the pigs to become hogs and they are about to be slaughtered. Everything comes to an end, when greed become uncontrollable. It has become uncontrollable in the City of Naperville!

I got carried away so I will repost your post in a separate box in order not to take away from it. At least you seem to disagree with this unusual group of five who believe you can not give police and firemen enough! Don't you think this group is a bit unusual or maybe has a hidden agenda? I know they have denied they are cops and firemen but I have my suspicions. No one defends the rights of others in the way they have defended....usually you only defend your rights with such forceful opinion!

Speaking of your remarks which I will post in the next box, you noticed that Joliet never hired a female firefighter. It just reminds me how this group of five has not been a able to recruit one female blogger to their viewpoint in nearly a year and a half of blogging. Of course they have not been able to recruit a male blogger either. I think it shows you how unpopular their position is of giving the police and firemen all they want and more. No one is buying it, Host Ted!

Keep in mind when feeling a need to go with the majority, these 4 bloggers are only 4 individuals who blog day and night. They may be influencing you subconsciously because they are in your face day and night. They want you to believe the majority is like them. But in reality almost everyone in every subdivision has an issue of contributing 21.16% to police and firemen for pensions when they are getting NO PENSION! I think it is very much resented....simply because it is unfair and should be abolished.

Why would any taxpayer care to subsidize the pension of a government employee to that extent when he gets NO PENSION! With police officers now making a starting salary of nearly 60k and benefits never seen in the private sector, they should subsidize their own pensions. We the taxpayers should contribute 0 to it!!!

Paying police

The top five and bottom five starting salaries of 31 law enforcement agencies in DuPage County.

Top 5

Aurora: $59,113

Elmhurst: $55,380

Itasca: $52,692

Naperville: $52,343

Villa Park: $52,115

____________________________________________________________________

Ken,

Even if we went with "your" list of Top 5 in Dupage that you posted, Naperville would still be the highest. You have it incorretly listed at $52,343 when it seems like everyone in the City of Naperville who has been blogging with us knows it is $59,216.98. When you do this kind of work in 10 minutes, how do you expect to get it right? You can't even copy and paste what is in black and white. You could not even get your own City of Naperville right, Ken! Who can depend on you for anything resembling reliability?

I don't know why bloggers are going to such efforts of proving you wrong. Of course, they are succeeding but why they are bothering is beyond me...don't they know you are a man of ZERO CREDIBILITY by now!

I like how you or some union official increased Aurora's starting police pay from 43-45k all the way up to 59k. Wow! Are you going to believe the Dupage Police Union who was using FUNNY numbers to increase wages for their rank and file or the official Aurora web site that is making an actual offer to new recruits to join the Aurora Police Dept? Who are you going to believe, Ken? I guess you already threw you hat with the police union that appears to have made up numbers. We know 2 of the 5 were wrong and I bet if anyone checked on the other 3, they would find they were also fabricated. Just a hunch! Don't have the patience Diana has for this kind of research.

You remind me so much of old Joe when he challenged everyone to bring his real estate bill so HE could compute it. It turned out John Q. Public had to teach him how to compute his own...lol... It took quite a while but Joe finally caught on and hushed up a little. It seems like nothing hushes you up Ken! You are always on a roll! Take a deep breath once in a while Ken and try to recompose yourself! Joe is at least trying and not being as fiesty as in the past when he would call in space aliens to read street markings to give Ameena a hard time after her car was towed wrongfully!

If someone was going to dispute Diana's number's with any kind of authority, it would have been our own Joe. As possible head of the Naperville Fraternal Order of Police as rumored extensively, he probably knows what is going on. Instead of disputing Diana's numbers, he simply stated Naperville is the highest paid and he has no problem with that and could care less if taxpayers can afford these high salaries. As far as he is concerned, he seems to feel if you can't afford whatever his police union wants to pay police, just leave town...move elsewhere.(see By Joe on June 9, 2008 10:29 AM) At least he is finally talking straight even though I disagree with most of what he says! He needs to be commended for finally talking straight instead of in circles.

Between you and TB talking in circles day and night, I have a massive headache. I need to go get my aspirin! Why don't you guys take a chapter from Joe's long saga on this blog site and simply talk STRAIGHT! Otherwise I am billing you guys for my next bottle of ASPIRIN!

Host Ted,
I found this on the internet about our neighboring City of Aurora also nicknamed the City of Lights! Sorry it does not copy and paste well on your template. Maybe you can find a way to upgrade your template. It just distorts nice data in the way it is originally pasted. Does not alter the data but destroys columns and lay-outs if you know what I mean!

I think Ken was using average police salaries or possibly numbers embellished by police unions for negotiating purposes while Diana was using "starting" police salaries obtained from official police or city web site sources. Apparently police unions know Council Members do not have time to check their work, so they embellish numbers to get higher pay...it is like a vicious cycle with each police dept saying the other police dept makes more, so give me more. It is an endless cycle that our elected officials do not seem to know how to control or stop. If the cycle can not be stopped, pretty soon cops will make more than doctors. I doubt most lawyers are making as much as a cop the first year out of college despite having to go to graduate school for 4 additional years of education!

If you read the below carefully, you will see that the City of Aurora limits its contribution to the retirement pension funds to 10% of the officer's salary. In Naperville, they go up to 21.16% of the officer's salary. One has to question why the City of Naperville has agreed to give so much to the police union at taxpayer expense. If it was State Law, why does Aurora match with 10% while Naperville with 21.16%. It seems to me this part is under the control of the City Council and not the State of Illinois and some of the politicians or city supporters who posted here want to pass the puck to the state in order to take the heat off themselves for giving taxpayer money away as if it grew on trees in our backyards.

It just seems to me with both the Mayor and City Manager being former policemen combined with the Police Chief, they are simply taking care of their own at Taxpayer Expense. This really requires another editorial, Host Ted, calling for FAIRNESS! Our city appears to be under control of the police and they do as they please. Very frightening!

And it really seems like the city council is back to "rubberstamping." Don't mean to steal those famous words from the Napergate Man, but it seems that is what they do. "Rubberstamp and rubberstamp!" Collect their salary and pension...then go home! Come back in 2 weeks and do more "rubberstamping!" Pick up their paychecks and go home. Mindboggling!

See the below copy and paste off of Aurora's Web Site! If anyone can explain to me what a "Lateral Officer" is I would be most appreciative. It seems like they make a few thousand more than a new recruit when hired...not sure! These numbers are very much in line with what Diana posted. She actually posted the middle number and not the low number. It shows how fair she was trying to be with her analysis.

If one wants to attack Diana's work it should be done with proper research. Not numbers unions throw around for bargaining purposes. Apparently, if these numbers were being presented under oath, as Ken claims, than the police unions are willing to lie under oath.

If the Dupage Police Union is stating an Aurora Police Officer starts at $59,113, while the City of Aurora is only offering $43,737.00 on its Web Site for a new police officer, I would say the police union did a little embellishing. They succeeded in getting their salaries increased from 41k to 48k next year according to an article I read somewhere recently. So they embellished well and got rewarded 7k for embellishing. And I am sure the Aurora Police Union is going to come and say we make less than Dupage County Police even though we fight gangs. They will then get 52k so they can return to being 4k higher than Dupage Police Officers. And then Dupage will be back after Aurora gets its raise. And I am sure the Naperville Police Union will not stand still. They will say we use to make 18k more than Dupage Officers and now we are only making 11k more. We want to go back to 18k more so give please give us 66k or we are going on STRIKE! Where will all this craziness end? Does Councilman Bob have any solutions to this police mess? Please help Councilman Bob and stop this atrocious vicious cycle being committed on the hard working taxpayer in these rough economic times.!

Maybe as anonymous once stated we should go back to State Rule instead of Home Rule. At that point we are limited to increasing residential taxes by 5% per year. Once that happens we can tell the Police and Fire Unions we can no longer hammer the residents for 18 to 20% increases as we are no longer a home rule town. They will have to accept reason or all resign. I do not believe one single police officer or fireman is leaving Naperville if we stopped giving them the kitchen sink. No other town is giving away kitchen sinks! They will swallow their egos, work hard, and appreciate what they have like the rest of us! They need a reality check of sorts.

Hope you can help out a little Host Ted! I hate to see this huge burden thrown on your back because of Sun budget cuts that cost us the hard working Moderator Jim. I hope the City of Naperville realizes they are due for some budget cuts. The Naperville Sun had a very lean and mean operation...and cut. The City of Naperville has tons of excess fat and refuses to cut anything other than tokenism for public consumption as they say!

____________________________________________________________________

Aurora Police Department

Police Officer - Aurora

Company:
Aurora Police Department


Salary/Wage:
43,737.00 - 66,764.00 USD /year 1 to year 8/

Full Time, Employee

Shift:
First Shift (Day), Second Shift (Afternoon), Third Shift (Night)
Job Category:
Law Enforcement/Security Srvs

Career Level:
Entry Level
Education Level:
High School or equivalent

Job Description


Salary:

Basic Officers (Entry Level) start at $43,737.00 per year with annual increases based on satisfactory performance up to $66,764.00 in the 2007 Contract.

We are also hiring Lateral Officers! They start between $45,268 and $49,978.00.

OFFICER, IV
$43,737

OFFICER, III
$49,978

2008
BASE

OFFICER, IV
$45,268

The city of Aurora is an equal opportunity employer and encourages applications from all sectors of society.

Job Purpose:

Protects citizens by preventing crime; enforcing laws; apprehending suspects; monitoring traffic.

Duties:

* Prevents crime by explaining and enforcing applicable federal, state, and local laws and ordinances; teaching preventive, protective, and defensive tactics; mediating disputes; patrolling assigned area; responding to notices of disturbances; conducting searches; observing suspicious activities; detaining suspects.

* Apprehends suspects by responding to complaints and calls for help; observing violations; making arrests.

* Conducts criminal investigations by gathering evidence; interviewing victims and witnesses; interrogating suspects.

* Documents observations and actions by radioing information; completing reports.

* Reports observations and actions by testifying in court.

* Maintains safe traffic conditions by monitoring and directing traffic; enforcing laws and ordinances; investigating accidents; providing escort; reporting unsafe streets and facilities.

Skills/Qualifications:

Decision Making, Legal Compliance, Handles Pressure, Deals with Uncertainty, Lifting, Physical Fitness, Judgment, Objectivity, Dependability, Emotional Control, Integrity

Minimum Qualifications:

Be twenty-one (21) years old by the academy start date
Be a U.S. Citizen
Have earned a College Degree or Equivalent
Be able to perform the minimum essential job functions of the position
Corrected visual acuity of 20/20 and normal field, night, peripheral, color and distance vision
Ability to speak, hear and understand ordinary speech
Meet all mental physical and medical standards
Have a valid U.S. drivers license

Benefits:

Uniforms and equipment provided (officers purchase their own firearm from a list of approved weapons)
$550.00 Vest allowance every 4 years
80 hours of vacation annually increasing with seniority
Nationally recognized schools and recreation
9 Paid holidays a year
Career advancement and special assignment opportunities
16 hours Personal Leave annually (that can be converted to 16 hours additional pay if unused)
Diverse community and workforce
120 hours Sick Leave annually
Health insurance (some premiums covered 100%)
Dental insurance (some premiums cover 100%)
Life insurance
Disability insurance
Retirement (10% of salary matched by the City)
Deferred Compensation
Training

All Recruits selected for entry into the Academy will earn pay and seniority beginning their first day. The police department provides all necessary training and ammunition for the duration of the academy and an officer’s career.

The city of Aurora is an equal opportunity employer and encourages applications from all sectors of society.

By T.B. on June 10, 2008 1:40 PM
Diana –

You seem astounded that the starting salary for the NPD is higher than that of an FBI agent. What you failed to mention is that the starting NPD salary is only higher than an FBI agent IN TRAINING.

However, once the agent reports to the field, they are paid an additional 25% more in “availability pay”.

“Newly assigned Special Agents are paid as GS-10, step 1 ($43,441) plus locality pay and availability pay.

The base GS-10 salary plus locality pay for the Naperville area is $53,974 [opm.gov]. Add in 25% Availability pay of $13,494 [rounded] and you get a starting salary for an FBI agent in Naperville of $67,468.

T.B.

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T.B.,

For an MBA you sure can not do a proper analyis.

1. Just as an FBI has to undergo training when hired, an NPD officer has to undergo rigorous training upon being hired. They are both in training so comparing the $43,441 of the FBI to $59,216.98 is fair. Diana was right!

2. I will take your word on the locality pay and assume an FBI agent working in Naperville would be paid $53,974. That is still more than 5k less than an NPD police officer.

3. Here is where your analyis really falls apart. The availability pay of an FBI agent is based on his willingness to work a 50 hour work week...not 40 hours. An NPD officer only works 40 hours for the $59,216.98.

When a Naperville Police Officer works 50 hours a week, the last 10 being at OT to equal the time of an FBI agent, he is paid $59,216.98 plus $42.70 for each of his addtional 520 hours to equal the FBI agent time. That would add $22,204 dollars to the Naperville Police Officer's pay, if he worked 50 hours per week as the FBI agent is required to work.

Thus if you want to add in the 25% Availability pay of $13,494 [rounded], you in fact do get a starting salary for an FBI agent in Naperville of $67,468. But to do a proper comparison you have to add the $22,204 dollars to the NPD officer who works 50 hours a week and you get $59,216.98 plus $22,204 dollar for a total of $81,420.98. When you do a fair comparison, you will see that the NPD officer makes $13,952.98 than the FBI agent in the same city and based on the same exact amount of hours.

It just happens that this 25% availability pay is for willingness to work 25% more than the normal 40 hours which is 10 hours resulting in a 50 hour work week for the FBI Agent.

As an MBA, Mr. T.B. I would expect a more thorough and accurate analysis from you. Also what is your agenda for defending this excessive police compensation that Diana showed is the highest in the nation outside of California. Please explain your self-interest and why you are favoring the police over the residential taxpayer who pays them. As taxpayers we are employers! We need to watch our costs! Are you not a Naperville taxpayer? If not, what town do you live in! If you are, why is giving excessive amounts of your money to the NPD so important to you? It is very unusual behavior for an employer(you and I) to have to give our employees( the police) much more than we have to in order to be competitive. In the real world if we were acting in this manner we would both be out of business. I guess in the City of Naperville's unreal world you just increase taxes by 18-20% and hope taxpayers don't notice. Somehow it seems this time taxpayers are noticing because a combination of issues have made taxes borderline unbearable.

Are you saying NYP officers who only make $35,881 are not qualified to to protect this town? They literally cleaned up NYC in the last decade receiving national recognition for their extraordinary efforts! And the standard of living is much higher there so why do we have to pay $24,000 more in Naperville for a police officer! What evidence or proof can you provide that a NPD officer is more qualified, has better credentials, has more risk to life, etc. than an NYPD officer? Explain your justification in paying our police more than NYC police officers! Cost of living won't work because we all know the cost of living is much higher in New York City!

We should be compared to regular police depts. and not the FBI in the first place. It is shocking that an NPD officer makes more than an FBI agent. An FBI agent is one in a thousand gem found in the rough. They are very highly qualified with impeccable credentials. Most police officers dream of becoming an FBI agent one day. There is no need for a Naperville Police Officer to dream for a PAY CUT! Very odd world we live in, thanks to our City Council not having any b@lls when it comes time to standing up to the POLICE UNION!

The below verifies Diana's Romeoville Claim...to be exact. It is hard to believe that Ken could not even get the City of Naperville starting salaries right. They have been discussed on this blog site for quite a while and he posts obviously erroneous numbers. You would think the guys would read what others post, but it seems obvious all he does is write, write, write without regards for research, accuracy or truth!

What is this about this Overtime Fan Club wanting to give the police anything they want? It just seems like they are benifiting from some direct or indirect way from his outrageous police compensation plan! How about some truthful disclosure my friends?

Police Officer

Village of Romeoville, Illinois

13 Montrose Drive

Romeoville, IL 60446

815-886-7219

www.romeoville.org/police.htm

Salary: without degree $38,968 with degree $41,862

Population: 25,000+

Sworn Officers: 50

The Village of Romeoville, Illinois, an Equal Opportunity Employer, is seeking

qualified candidates for the position of Police Officer, without regard to

race, color, creed, gender or ethnic origin, to establish an eligibility list

for current and future openings in the Police Department. Applicants must be between 21 years of age and 35 years of age at time of hire.

Romeoville Police Department.

Ken,

The numbers you posted are all wrong. Your source is obviously not reliable.

Your Naperville and Aurora numbers are both wrong. I just checked both Web Sites.

It confirms Diana's work!

How can you post that the starting salary for a Naperville Cop is $52,343 when the City of Naperville on its own Web Site is posting the starting salary is $59,216.98. Duh!!!

I am surprised Host Ted allows you to post misinformation making everything so confusing.

I commend Diana for staying up all night and going straight to the source of accuracy. She went straight to the police depts. Web Sites. Most information on the internet is not even reliable unless you go to the ORIGIN. That is what Diana did! That is what you did not do! Live and learn, Ken!

Host Ted,

Here is how Aurora handles its retirement pension situation.

___________________________________________________________________

Retirement Plan
Career Service Employees:
The City of Aurora’s Retirement Pension Plan is a defined benefit program. Employees must contribute 5.5% of their salary on a pre-tax basis, and the City matches their contribution. Retirement eligibility is determined by age and years of service.

____________________________________________________________________

The employee contributes 5.5%. The city matches it. That is how I understand it.

In Naperville Police and Fire Depts, the employees contribute about 9% and the City Contributes over 20%. They obviously want them to live like Kings and Queens when they retire. Making sure they get 85k when they retire at age 51 is a bit much. It is OVERKILL! At mostly taxpayer expense!

The City of Naperville is willing to hire cops up to the age of 34 and retire them at 65. This means cops can work till 65 or the retirement age would have been changed by the City Council and the Chief. Just my thoughts!

Anon,

How much would it cost to construct and operate on a yearly basis a branch court house?

So, Anonymouse, you are saying that the Dupage County Sheriff lied in a public meeting, and the Daily Herald printed those lies? I'll stand by my sources and consider myself in good company.

You did nothing, Anonymouse, to show where Naperville's salary is out of line with cities of equal wealth in the Chicagoland area.

I am still seaching for Aurora. I found that Aurora is building its own Branch Court Facility. This is something the Napergatians suggested Naperville do but the Group of Five said can not be done!
Apparently Aurora realizes it is time to cut OT resulting from travel and reduce gasoline expenses by having its own BRANCH COURT FACILITY. If our City Council cared about us, they would be building a Branch Court Facility instead of a 3rd Deck at the Library that is NOT NEEDED AT ALL!

__________________________________________________________________

Aurora Police Headquarters and Branch Court Facility Request for Qualification Proposals

1. Leopardo Construction requests Qualification Proposals on behalf of the City of Aurora for the construction of a Branch Court Facility to provide independent furnishings design and specification services Branch Court Facility. Qualifications will be received at the City of Aurora, City Hall at 44 East Downer Place, Aurora, Illinois 60507-2067, by HAND DELIVERY, to the attention of City Clerk located on the 2nd Floor by 2:00 p.m. local time on Wednesday, June 11, 2008.

------------------------------------------------------------------

While searching for Aurora, I found out the starting salary for a Dupage Police Officer is only $41,697. Dupage Police monitors about 120,000 residents in unincorporated Dupage which is a little less than Naperville's Population. They police the unincorporated areas of Naperville for almost 19k below Naperville Police. Now we know why people would rather live in unincorpated Naperville. Why most of the mansions are being built in unincorporated Naperville such as in the Hillside area! Taxes are much lower becasue Dupage County is much more frugal than the City of Naperville!

Going to the source is no easy task. Copying the unreliable research of police unions who have an agenda to increase wages is not reliable. Let us not be plagiarising, Ken Boy, and do some real research as Diana does! GO TO THE SOURCE! Don't be lazy and blog all day and night! Do your homework for once!

I did see that Diana's Aurora Police starting salary number was accurate. It is just a matter of finding it again to post!

Ken,
Sorry but your research is flawed, inaccurate, and mixes starting salaries with average salaries, mixes years, and is nonsense.

Here is a copy and paste that proves Diana's number form the City of Naperville web site. You can find the $56,397.12 number Diana listed. She was actually being conservative as the City of Naperville says adjusted properly it is really $59,216.98. Diana was being overly honest and even provided the lower number. If you want to stick it to Naperville, she could have provided the higher number. I also verified the Aurora starting salary of Aurora $45,268 for 2009. It is also right on their web site. As soon as I will get a chance I will post that. The difference between you, Ken, and Diana, is you were lazy and believed internet numbers floating on the web that are used for negotiating purposes. Diana spent all night and went to the individual web sites of the cities, city by city. You are now being discredited! Diana can not be discredited because she did her research without depending on others. She went direct to the source!

Also since NPD officers are sent to training after hiring at the $59,216.98 and not before, her comparisons to the FBI were very accurate. TB, unfortunately tries to mix apples with oranges and confuse people by talking in cirles which has become his TRADEMARK!

TB needs to provide full disclosure here and admit how many of his relatives are Police Officers to try to explain why he feels we should donate 21.16% of our hard earned tax dollar to their pensions on top of the 9.91% they donate of their own money. It is being revealed we only donate .58% to our teachers while they donate their OWN 9.4% or whatever number that was exactly. If teachers can build their own pension with almost no taxpayer help, than police officers have to be big boys/girls and not depend on these HAND-OUTS from TAXPAYERS!

The fact that you lie and deceive Ken, is all below in writing. Many police unions pad numbers of other depts. when negotiating for higher salaries for their own. You apparently used padded numbers or used average salaries instead of STARTING SALARIES to try to discredit Diana's excellent work....about STRICTLY STARTING SALARIES locally and across the nation!

I am guessing this is Tollway Diana and she will not easily be discredited.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Read below, Ken Boy! The City of Naperville WEB SITE verifies Diana's numbers. I will do Aurora next and I will do every city by city if necessary to prove Diana's work. I have no doubt she posted honestly! But I have doubts you posted honestly. I urge Host Ted to do his own research and see for himself this Group of Five are nothing but trouble making distorters of FACTS and TRUTH! Aurora is coming up NEXT! I have seen it but I want to make sure Host Ted knows who is telling the truth, here! So I will post at least Aurora. My guess is Ken was trying to compare Aurora's average salary with Naperville's starting salary. He simply got caught with hand on the red hot stove! Be careful, next time Ken Boy!

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NPD Recruitment and Selection

On this Page...
Introduction
Eligibility Requirements
Eligibility Testing

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Introduction

The City of Naperville, Illinois (population nearly 143,000), a progressive and growing community located 35 miles west of Chicago, seeks individuals with a high degree of personal and professional integrity to participate in a competitive process to establish an eligibility register for the position of Police Officer. Eligibility testing occurs every other year and will take place in fall 2008.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Eligibility Testing

The Board of Fire and Police Commissioners is currently recruiting for the position of Police Officer.

Applications will be available March 1, 2008

Application deadline is September 2, 2008

Apply online at www.publicsafetyrecruitment.com or by calling (800) 343-HIRE.
Note that applications WILL NOT be available at the Naperville Police Facility or at the Naperville Municipal Center; only through Public Safety Recruitment's Web site.
All applicants must be available for the following exams:

Orientation and Written Test (Mandatory)
September 19, 2008
Naperville Municipal Center
400 S. Eagle Street
Naperville, Illinois

Physical Ability Test
September 20, 2008
Naperville Police Department
1350 Aurora
Naperville, Illinois
(630) 420-6665

The Police Officer position is non-exempt, paid by an hourly wage negotiated between the City of Naperville and the Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 42. The hourly wage rate for the fiscal year '08-'09 is $27.114/hr. Expressed on an annualized basis, this equates to $56,397.12. Also, of the 11 paid holidays each year, six are calculated into the position's pensionable earnings, holiday pay and experience bonus for a total annual earnings of $59,216.98. Other benefits include:

Diana –

You seem astounded that the starting salary for the NPD is higher than that of an FBI agent. What you failed to mention is that the starting NPD salary is only higher than an FBI agent IN TRAINING.

“Special Agent trainees are paid as GS-10, step 1 (on the Law Enforcement Officers’ salary table) plus the Quantico, VA locality adjustment (17.50%) during their time at the FBI Academy. This equates to $51,043 on an annualized basis….” [fbi.gov]

However, once the agent reports to the field, they are paid an additional 25% more in “availability pay”.

“Newly assigned Special Agents are paid as GS-10, step 1 ($43,441) plus locality pay and availability pay. Locality pay (which ranges from 12.5% to 28.7% of base salary depending upon office assignment) is additional compensation to account for differences in the labor market between different areas. Availability pay is a 25% increase in adjusted salary (base salary + locality pay) for all Special Agents due to their requirement to average a 50-hour work week over the course of the year. Thus, with the locality and availability pay adjustments, new Special Agents in their first Field Offices earn between $61,100 and $69,900, depending upon the region of the country to which they are assigned.” [fbi.gov]

The base GS-10 salary plus locality pay for the Naperville area is $53,974 [opm.gov]. Add in 25% Availability pay of $13,494 [rounded] and you get a starting salary for an FBI agent in Naperville of $67,468.

T.B.

Nice job Ken!
Score is..Ken- 1.. Kotex mafia- 0
NEXT!?

Diana, you got me a little curious. I started looking at salaries of comparable towns to Naperville. Here are a few:

Barrington-$51,113
Downers Grove-$48,546(not as big or wealthy as Naperville, but close location)
Lake Forest-$52,119
Mundelien-$54,908
Oak Brook-52,427 (not nearly as big, but more wealth)

Funny how when you compare apples to apples, you see why Naperville has to pay well to attract good personal.

But here is the coup de gras:

In my minimal research, which took about 10 minutes on google, not a whole night, I found an article from the Daily Herald, at the following link:http://www.dailyherald.com/story/?id=160164. Here is the interesting part, a list put out by the Dupage County Sheriff listing area salaries for police:

Paying police

The top five and bottom five starting salaries of 31 law enforcement agencies in DuPage County.

Top 5

Aurora: $59,113

Elmhurst: $55,380

Itasca: $52,692

Naperville: $52,343

Villa Park: $52,115

Bottom 5

College of DuPage: $39,962

DuPage Sheriff: $41,697

West Chicago: $41,725

Oakbrook Terrace: $43,038

Warrenville: $44,449

Source: DuPage County Sheriff

Isn't that amazing, Diana? Your facts about Auroa are wrong. Wonder how much of your other research is wrong? What does that do to your argument's conclusion?

Joe kind of touched on this subject, but not completely. The cost of the exact same house built in Aurora as opposed to Naperville is at least $50,000 less. The discrepancy grows as the price of the house grows. I imagine that by paying their officers more than surrounding communities, the city is hoping that their officers may be able to afford to live in Naperville.

It seems that many here want the Naperville address but not the costs that go along with that prestige.

Becky,

I'm not saying they should match the dollars, but at least match the level of pay versus the standard of living.

$20,000 goes a lot farther in Flint, MI than it does here. I know, I lived in north of there back in another life.

Pay a person to protect your life $100,000 and pay another $10,000 and you tell me which one is more willing to take a bullet for you.

Pay does matter, they are human beings. Pay obviously matters to you otherwise you wouldn't be on here complaining about how you all feel they are making too much from blog to blog.

I've been there, done that with employee compensation. Trust me, when the employee doesn't have to worry about making ends meet or having to give you piss-poor performance because they need a second job to survive comfortably there is a night and day difference in their loyalty and dedication. I've always seen better results from well taken care of employees than ones who have been flicked mere 'scraps'.

Maybe the trivial jobs of ringing up someone's next 'fix' be it tobacco or alcohol fits the 'pay them the least you absolutely have to' mentality just fine, but police work is in a totally different league than that simple stuff.

Diana,

Apparently the Napergatians are taking the summer off from blogging. Or mourning the loss of Editor/Publisher Jim Lynch and deservedly so! The Napergatians would have loved what you just did!

I commend you for your great research and hope Councilman Bob and other council members use of it when confronting the union.

I am a little disappointed with Council Members Krause and Senger. I beleive the Napergate Man endorsed them but they have lost their roots and seem to have joined the "rubbber stampers" on the City Council. I wish they would join Council Man Dick Furstenau in true oppostion to corruption and cronyism!

We surely have a battle ahead of us. But at least the facts are there, finally, to show something is very wrong with those in charge at City Hall!!

I hope as others that Host Ted can continue on the path Mr. Lynch was taking us. I can see why so many people are missing him! He had just turned the corner and decided to watch out for his readers and the residential taxpayers. He became bold in his last 2 months! People finally fell in love with the guy. I wish he would have started that way when he first came from the East Coast instead of waiting till his unfortunate departure!

Mr. Lynch reminds me of former President Jimmy Carter! When he had the power to help the Palestinians he did not. He was afraid of AIPAC and the Israeli Lobby! Once out of the oval office and without power he has been on a quarter century crusade to help them! Too little to late, for Jimmy! It may have also been a little to late for our own Jimmy! They were both LAMEDUCKS when they decided it was time to ACT!

Let us hope Host Ted has more courage than the 2 Jimmy's and does something about City Hall when he still has the POWER....not after he loses it! Let us hope he is not afraid from the Establishment Lobbyists like Jimmy Carter was afraid of the AIPAC Lobbyists!

Joe,

Sadly Joe, you only see one side of the equation. When you say other towns should follow our lead and pay what we do, you are telling the residents in Flint, MI, Mobile, AL and Augustana, GA to more than double the salaries of their police officers. You are also telling them to more than double the amount of taxes they pay so they can afford to pay them 56k when they are willing to work for 25k.

As many said before me, you must be the President of the Fraternal Order of Police to feel so strongly for police and so weakly for struggling residents. Nothing else makes sense, Joe!

Police officers should not be motivated by money. More money does not mean better performance when you are a police officer. Making so much money with huge pensions on the horizon may make a police offcer not willing to risk his life when the time comes. Obviously our Armed Forces are willing to risk their lives for us for minimum pay. They are not in it for the pay!

When Naperville pays one of the highest salaries, if not the highest salary in the nation outside of California, they attract the police officer looking for the most money and who knows how to say the right things during the interview. Maybe some are being hired because they have connections to the estbalishment. Our police and fire fighters are commanding 20k more than the private sector right out of college! So many people are fighting to be police officers and fire fighters not because of wanting to serve like in the old days, but because the MONEY IS GREAT! We may be getting all the wrong people by paying much more than we have to.

I took some time to confirm Diana's Aurora and Naperville police numbers. They were accurate! We are bordering towns with similar populations and we pay $11,000 more than Aurora and have better benefits? Why! We should be paying 11k less and not more because Aurora Police Officers are in the line of fire since Aurora is the gang banging capital of the suburbs as we all know!

I hope the city council can renegotiate a fair salary with the police union. If we negotiate starting salary to be 11k less than Aurora, that would put Naperville Police at about 34k which seems the national average! By reducing salary we can also reduce retirement pensions and save a huge amount of money. Other cities obviously have lines of qualified applicants at 35k. What is the point to offer 56k...to have longer lines of qualified applicants who may only be in line for the MONEY!

Response from Ted:

Nice research, Diana. I'll pass along to reporter, hopefully we can turn it into a story. What's your source? Where did this information come from?

--------------------------------------------------------------------

Host Ted,

For the ones in the area, I just went to the Web Site of each City and grabbed the lastest numbers right off the respective City Sites. That is how and where they recruit police...right on their Web Sites. Anyone can verify the info very easily! It just takes a long night!

Thanks for the complement!

Diana

PS. The second column was from comparative studies found on the internet that included Naperville and correctly reflected starting salaries in 2004/2005 so we can be comparing apples to apples.

Notice the staring salary for a Naperville Cop increased from $48,209 to $56,397 in about 3 years! I was shocked to learn we pay more than the FBI and New York City Police. Think of how expensive NYC is and we pay 20k more than them for cops. It shows you our City Council Members are very weak with no negotiating skills...unwilling to do their homework...more interested in collecting their own pensions that City Staff tailored for them. It is a racket! I hope you can stop it, Host Ted! They will respond to some ink and get off their behinds and do some research as I did!

Finally, I hope you can turn it into a story. Maybe Councilman Bob can shed some light as to why the situation is out of control in Naperville. NYPD was ranked best in the nation for large cities and have done a remarkable job bringing down crime in NYC as is well known!

Well paid employees tend to have better incentives to do a good job and remain very loyal when they feel they are taken care of by their employer. Pinch any worker's wages and benefits to the point where their ability to live in general becomes difficult and see how much they 'care'.

I find nothing wrong with being at the top of the list for well paid police officers. In fact, I'm proud we do. Other places should follow our lead, not the other way around.

Ombudsman Ted,

Sifting throught the internet I learned that Illinios pays its police officers 3rd best in the United States of America. California was first due to an incredible cost of living there. Naperville was even substantially higher than some California cities like San Diego by 6000 dollars in starting salary...see second list below!!!

Despite Illinois being 3rd highest in the nation, Naperville was the highest I could find in the State of Illinois and possibly the highest in the country outside of California!

HERE ARE SOME SAMPLES FOR STARTING POLICE OFFICERS IN THE AREA:

1. Chicago $43,104 for 2008
2. Aurora $45,268 for 2009
3. Naperville $56,397.12 for 2008(notice the highest starting salary in IL)
4. Romeoville $38,968 for 2008
5. Bolingbrook $45,800 for 2008
6. Peoria $38,805 before 2007
7. Springfield $34,429 before 2007
8. Rockford $38,000 before 2007

Obviously, one can see our City Council members have been very weak in negotiating with the police union in town. Or maybe they did not bother to do their homework!

On a National Basis the starting salary for an FBI Agent who is suppose to be the cream of the crop of law enforcemnet is $48,159 for 2007. More than 8k under a Naperville Police Officer! Can anyone imagine that!

HERE ARE SOME SAMPLES FOR OUT OF STATE POLICE AGENCIES STARTING SALARIES FOR MOSTLY THE YEARS 2004/2005. NAPERVILLE IS #21 ON THIS LIST WHICH IS IN RANDOM ORDER:

1. New York City $35,881 for officers starting after 1/1/ 2006.
2. Flint, Michigan $26,000 (2004)
3. Augustana, GA $26,103 (2004)
4. St. Louis, MO $34,182
5. Newark, NJ $34,286
6. Brownsville, TX $27,312
7. Baton Rouge, LA $27,507
8. Spokane, WA $35,893
9. Hartford, CT $35,243
10.Orlanda,FL $36,200
11.Cedar Rapids,IA $35,568
12.Anchorage,AK $39,187
13.Columbia,SC $28,704
14.Omaha, NE $32,256
15.San Antonio, TX $36,960
16.Charlotte, NC $32,214
17.Kansas City, KS $32,240
18.Portland, OR $37,794
19.Columbus, OH $36,358
20.Pittsburg, PA $36,501
21.Naperville,IL $48,209 (2004) (notice the highest starting salary on this diverse list of cities from across the nation)
22.Virginia Beach $36,622
23.Mobile, AL $25,980
24.Lansing,MI $35,792
25.Denver, CO $39,144
26.Salt Lake, UT $31,245
27.Knoxsville, TN $28,500
28.San Diego, CA $42,328
29.Detroit, MI $30,258
30.Indianapolis,IN $35,456
31.Houston, TX $33,955
32.St.Petersburg,FL$34,810
33.Winston-Salem,NC$29,469
34.Kansas City, MO $38,304
35.Miami, FL $36,189
36.Washington,D.C $39,644
37.Raleigh, NC $31,070
38.Madison,WI $36,757
39.Atlanta, GA $34,107
40.Columbus,GA $25,204

Naperville can be found as #21 above and had one of the highest starting police salaries in the nation. I could only find a few in California that were higher such as San Francisco!

Most states offer policemen an average pension of 50% when they retire after 30 or 40 years. Many Illinois towns including Naperville offer 75% or above after only 30 years of service. The starting salary of a Naperville Police Officer exceeds that of Chicago, New York City, neighboring Aurora(by 11k with a similar population size but much higher risk to life), and even the nationally prestigious and well renowned FBI!

The facts seem to indicate our City Council Members are not doing their research before they negotiate with the union. One has to wonder if City Manager Pro-Tem Bob Marshall, Mayor George Pradel, and Police Chief David Dial who all collect huge pensions or will collect astronomical pensions soon due to the power of the union, will be willing to take on the union that ENRICHES them. Will they be willing to BITE that HAND that FEEDS them so well??? My guess is NO! Thus we have a dilemna in this town and 18-20% annual tax increases may be the norm for the City of Naperville residents unless the Naperville Sun and the residential taxpayers decide to stand up to the police union.

Information is available on the interent. Why are our council members who we pay 10k a year, give health insurance worth another 10k, life insurance, cell phone credits, internet credits and even pensions not willing to control the union? Is there some scam in this town between the City Council and City Officials to enrich each other at the expense of the residential taxpayers and business owners? How do we stop this possible scam without the help of the Napergate Man? How do we expose it? How do we get new candidates elected to office?

I spent all night digging this information for you, Host Ted! I hope you can do something with it and lead the charge. There is no more Napergate Man and now there is no more Mr. Jim Lynch! It was a DOUBLE BLOW we could hardly afford! It is you all by yourself! Are you up to the task and new challenge, Host Ted!

If you are, GO GET THEM! You control the MIGHTY POWER OF INK! The ball is in your court! Good Luck!

__________________________________________________________________

PS. Everything was lined up perfectly but unfortunately the Sun Template could not keep my data lined properly after posting! Sorry, if that causes an inconvenience or is not clear. I tried my best!!!

Response from Ted:

Nice research, Diana. I'll pass along to reporter, hopefully we can turn it into a story. What's your source? Where did this information come from?

I'll just wish you good luck Jim, and leave the political messages for the posts they belong on. Consider it a parting gift.

I will miss your fair and impartial ruling of the board here. Glad Ted is well equipped to carry on.

Best of luck, and I'm sure someone with your talent will land on your feet if you haven't already.

Ken

A couple of comments.

1. Good luck Jim. The print and internet media world seem to be in a financial turmoil. Somewhere there needs to be a model that will fund responsible journalism. Hope you can find it.

2. The Sun has a great look. But it needs more editorial content. I read that the Tribune is seeking a 50/50 mix (editorial content to ads). I have no idea what the sun is, but other than topics the Sun decides to cover, you walk away without any idea of local events.

3. In depth investigative reporting. That is sorely missing. We get exhaustive summaries of the Rezko trial, but not other matters. Look at topics on these webs. Pick a couple and really work them.

4. Stop being a cheerleader for local institutions. Grant them praise when they do well, but be objective. A simple case, 204's purchase of the AME land. Not once did you report on the proper valuation of the land. The huge gain by the church in a poor location and down market without any appraisal points to a sweetheart deal. When the City of Chicago buys land for $1.1 million in appreciateing Bridgeport that Degnan (or whoever)bought ten years earlier for $100,000, your sister paper questions the transaction. Instead you must have reported five times how the 204 superintendent thanked the AME church. The elders of that church must laugh everytime he thanks them. (By the way, with the poor planning of 204, they were stuck paying more since every landowner knew they had to do something quick.)

5. Other stories you should cover

Reasons district 203 has not cut costs proportional to enrollment decreases. With the 1,000 student enrollment decrease and 25 students to a classroom, there should be a 40 teacher reduction. Instead, they point out how they add 2 to 4 teachers for new initiatives. It does not reconcile.

Why does the City of Naperville increase the property taxes 6% in 2007 and 11% in 2008 compared to CPI limits? I know they can, but did they justify WHY? Could the reason be mismanagement of Peter Burchard? Instead, the coverage focused on Burchard's departure and Dick F.

Why don't police officers schedules include court time? Hire more police and eliminate overtime. You would pay $1 million for the extra officers and save $500,000 on overtime (to your credit, I calculated these numbers from your press reports).

6. You would expect that as an entrepreneurial small paper you could do more. Turn your reporters loose and make the paper interesting. Great cities get that way from innovation and enthusiasm. Get my perspective correct. If you do not CONSTANTLY review your situation and innovate, you fall behind. Naperville was a good upcoming community, but today seems to be falling into complacency. Maybe it is inevitable, but it would be nice to try to stay on top.

Moderator Lynch,

Just wanted to wish you a very prosperous future. We will truly miss you!

Also wanted to take the opportunity to thank Councilman Bob for all the questions he has been answering for me and others.

Having a Councilman on your blog site has made the debate much more civil and productive.

I agree with Mr. Lynch that the Napergatians "are certainly a force that needs to be reckoned with." They have proved themselves in the past and can easily prove themselves in the future. They are always logical and reasonable.

It seems like this terrible economy combined with City Halls's wasteful spending resulting in extremely high taxation, is just the catalyst the Napergatians need to get rolling again. The only thing they have been missing is a forum to debate in...a little ink would further help their cause.

It is hard for me to see how anyone could be against their agenda...unless they are the recipients of one of these huge pensions at taxpayer's expense!

I hope Councilman Bob one day gets over his denial and accepts the Napergatians as the Naperville Sun seemed to have accepted them. The Napergatians have shown nothing but respect to Councilman Bob so it is difficult for me to understand why he chooses to pretend they do not exist! Or sometimes deliberately ignore them! Not one Napergatian has ever said a bad or inappropriate word about Councilman Bob.

Anyway, good luck, Moderator Lynch, and thanks for showing the Napergatians some respect. I hope you do well whatever the future may hold for you!

Moderator Jim,

I am one who loves to read your blogs every night before I crash out. Today your announcement that you are leaving caught my eye. I had to read it twice. I knew you were leaving but not this soon.

I think with your loss the Naperville Sun itself suffers a great loss. I am very puzzled that the top and most important guy at the newspaper is being laid off. It makes no sense to me!

Could they have not found somebody close to retirement age in the Naperville Sun and retired him or her early and saved your position? It just seems like a travesty of justice to lay someone off who worked as hard as you did. Not only did you run this blog site but you handled all your editorial and publishing duties at the print edition all at the same time. I am quite sure you were not being paid double or triple like City Manager Bob Marshall, but yet did double or triple the work most Publishers/Editors do!

It seems to me like you were one person doing 3 jobs. How much more efficient can a guy be? You are the kind of publisher, newspapers die for. I am surprised the Chicago Sun Times laid you off. Please apply at the Chicago Tribune so we can remain in touch with you and continue reading your hard hitting Friday Editorials.

I will be looking forward to reading your last editorial tomorrow. It will be a sad day for me. Good luck in all your future endeavors!

I just read that you are leaving us tomorrow.

I just wanted to come on and thank you for the time you took a moment out of your very busy schedule to review my letters and help me get them posted.

In case you forgot, I was the one that once sent you a letter full of libel and slander without realizing it. You were kind enough to e-mail me directly and work with me until my post qualified for publication. Most editors/publishers would never take this kind of time to help a poster or writer.

I do appreciate all your efforts to get my pro-Napergate posts published. And I do appreciate your nice words towards my fellow Napergatians.

I have to keep this short as I have to work tomorrow and it is way past my bedtime.

But good luck to you, Mr. Lynch, and thanks for your services to our community.

I hope one day our paths may cross again!

Mr. Jim Lynch,

I usually just read the blogs after a night out with the girls every Thursday. I feel obligated to write today since you announced that today is your last day.

I just wanted to thank you for all your efforts to build this blog site. Also want to thank you for your nice comments regarding Napergatians. It has been a very long time since anyone at the Sun had anything nice to say about us even though our main agenda is fighting city waste and high taxes. You can add corruption and cronyism whenever we find it.

It seems we just learned about you a few months ago through this blog site and now you are leaving us. You did wonders for the Naperville Sun that was a very tired townsey tabloid before you arrived. It seems like you woke it up!

I do feel bad for Host Ted and wonder how he can wear your hat and his hat and find enough time to sleep every night. Maybe the rest of the employees at the Napervile Sun will take on additional responsibilities to relieve his new double load.

It is puzzling how the Naperville Sun has difficulty paying a productive guy like you, but the City of Naperville has no problems paying a guy like Mr. Bob Marshall both a salary and pension while helping him build a second pension. Wow! Those guys in City Hall don't know how good they really have it! They should enjoy it while it lasts as I suspect it is not going to last much longer with all the foreclosures and pending foreclosures taking place in Naperville.

Nothing but the best to you Mr. Lynch. Sometimes as we can all see government makes the private world pay for its excesses. I have no doubt you will find another Editor/Publisher position somewhere very quickly. Which ever newspaper gets you will be very lucky!

Moderator Ted,

Please lock this thread and start a new Ombudsman thread. Jim's words should be the last ones on this thread.

Wishing courageous Jim the best,

Bubo

Thanks for your very kind words to Marybeth indicating you have grown to respect the Napergatians.

Likewise we have grown to respect you with time. As you have noticed all Napergatians are sad to see you leave. While we had our difficulties it looks like we resolved them all in the last few months.

It seems like in the first year of this Blog Site, we all got carried away and said things we now regret. Maybe we were all releasing tensions stored for 7 years.

I think in the old days the Napergate Man released our anger through his ads. When he stopped his ads our anger built up and we took it our initially on the Naperville Sun instead of City Officials. Many of us attacked the innocent messenger.

Since I did my fair share of attacking, I would like to apologize to you before you depart us, Mr. Jim Lynch.

I think once we all developed an understanding the attacks almost stopped completley at least against the Naperville Sun. Hopefully we will develop a better understanding with this Group of Five and those attacks and counter attacks will stop.

Thanks to your efforts and those of Host Ted, this blog site has been much more civil. I am sure a lot of bloggers including Napergatians got tired of the attacks and counter attacks and left. I do expect them all to be back when they notice how much more civil it has become.

I think Councilman Bob broke some ice here by showing some boldness. I hope City Manager Bob Marsahll, Mayor George Pradel, the Napergate Man and many others will follow his example and begin debating with us. Maybe they have all been waiting until the atmosphere becomes more civil. Hopefully, it has!

I hope you don't forget us, Mr. Lynch, and blog with us even if you return to the East Coast. Remember the internet is world wide so we can be reached easily. I am sure we will enjoy hearing from you even if you are not the Moderator. You have become like a friend and it would be terrible if you never peeked on us again and said hello.

Good luck in your future endeavors and thanks for your kind words about Napergatians. I am sure they will be all thanking you once they log and see your very respectful words.

Be assured we will work with Host Ted and cut him all the slack he needs. He has also proven he does not tolerate city waste or cronyism. We are on the same page as Host Ted.

I caught those commentaries in the Chicago Sun-Times about state pensions that were mentioned on the Pension Thread by Marybeth and Luscas. It was investigative journalism at its highest. Since the Chicago Sun-Times owns the Naperville Sun, I have to believe that Host Ted will not be asked to hold back as may have happened in the old days when the establishment owned this newspaper.

I was reading somewhere that Naperville has 349 foreclosures or pending forclosures. Something like 109 homes repossesed by banks. And another 100 plus being acutioned. I think City Officials really need to do something to show residents they are doing their part to save their homes from foreclosure.

Reducing 1 million out of a 380,000,000 million dollar budget is tokenism to quiet the public down...it is simply for public consumption. I hope Councilman Bob sees this nonsense and demands his fellow council members join him in demanding the budget be reduced 5% or $19 million. Reducing a quarter of 1% is very unacceptable in this very rough economic environment.

Imagine a Fortune 500 corporation announcing we made a quarter of a per cent cut to our budget by not filling a few positions we have open. That is pretty much what our City Finance Director stated on the Pension Thread. I guess he would like to see another 1000 forclosures in the next few months. Everything contributes to foreclosures especially and including all the taxes we are experiencing to pay for police OT, near 6 digit pension payments for police retirements 14 years before the mandatory retirement age, dumping vehicles in their prime, excess cops on Chicago Ave, high rise subsidized parking decks, unnecessary magazines, etc. etc.

I wish you could remain with us to finish evaluating the waste at City Hall. It was terrible to lose the Napergate Man! Now we have to lose you! I guess the burden is now mostly on Host Ted to lead us to uncovering the waste at City Hall. I just have a feeeling he is not only going to be a good reporter but a great leader. I wish both Host Ted and Moderator Jim the best of luck in their very divergent paths!

Jim, good luck in anything and everything you do.

Thank you for the job well done here.

Jim,

Good luck in your future endeavors. I hope your stay in Naperville was a good experience for you.

My only advice is don't start a blog at your next paper! Too much work!

Moderator Jim,

I was writing on other threads hoping we can save your job. I just arrived here and saw your announcement. I just want you to know I am very sad you are leaving us.

Are you going to a new newspaper that is local or are you still searching for a new job?

I hope one day you will return to the Naperville Sun. I believe if Chicago Sun-Times officials gave you a little more time, you would have circualtion booming.

I know many Napergatians are interested in renewing their subscriptions due the changes you and Host Ted made in the last year. In my opinion, the changes you undertook from converting this paper from tabloid to investigative have been REMARKABLE!

I wish you luck. It seems like you have mentored Host Ted very well. It should not be hard working with him. At one time he played devil's advocate so intensely he turned every Napergatian against him. I think he realized that was not a smart game to play and I sense from reading these blogs the Napergatinas now all support him for the excellent investigative reporting he and you have done especially in the last few months! You are on you own Host Ted! Let us see if you can do it alone!

Farewell, Mr. Jim Lynch, and I hope you have success in all your future endeavors.

Moderator Jim,

Thank you for all of your efforts, and good luck in all of your future endeavors.

-JQP

Moderator Jim here.....Just wanted to say thanks for all the kind words on this thread. Tomorrow (June 6) is my last day at The Sun. It's been great working with Host Ted on these comments and participating in this important community discussion which I urge you to continue. But, try to give Ted a break if you can - it's not easy for one guy to handle all the comments and to those who have volunteered to help, thanks, but company policy will and would never allow that. Anyway, thanks again and all the best. Keep up the good work and, above all, keep the home fires burning.

- Jim Lynch

Well, An Observer, if you were actually observant you would notice that only two people are debating on the Drew Peterson thread. If you were truly observant, you would have noticed that debate has gone on over a half a month between the two of us, thus the number of posts. If you can't tell the difference between a debate and the cult sending out an e-mail to rally the group's attack, you are not an observer at all.

While I strongly disagree with the anonymouse that I am debating against, I have not called him/her any names or attacked as you just did me. My self esteem is just fine. Seems yours is a little low if you have to attack someone you disagree with. Counting posts seems a little obsessive too. By the way, why didn't you count posts on a thread that the napergate cult has taken over, like this one?

Last but not least, I am just shocked that I make an offer out of the kindness of my heart to help out poor beleaguered Ted, and the napergate cult members feel a need to attack me. After all, I am just trying to be helpful by offering my fair and impartial assistance.

An Observer wrote:

"I was reading the Drew Peterson gun thread and noticed Ken had written 13 of the 28 posts single handedly....this is the same guy that would complain if 13 DIFFERENT Napergatians posted 13 times out of 28 times. Just for the record not one Napergatian blogged on the Drew Peterson Gun Charge Thread."

Great detective work Observer. In true Napergatian fashion, you neglected to mention that on the thread in question except for 2 posts,Ken and anonymous were the only two people posting. 13 posts each. Looks like they were having a debate/ discussion between themselves.

The complaint about Npaergatians taking over the Blogs stems from just about every topic getting turned into a Napergate thread, certain posters demanding users to be banned/censored and demanding that there always be a Napergate thread on the main page, as it seems Napergatians are lacking in the finding things on a blog site department.

I haven't looked yet, but I suppose somehow the clothes dryer thread has somehow turned into yet another conspiracy that the City or NPD is behind.

Ombudsman Ted,

Many complaints were issued by Ken against Napergatians for attempting to "take over" or "control" specific threads! Sometimes he would allege the Napergatians were taking over the whole Blog Site.

Of course in the case of Napergatians it may be nothing more than a perception because of the sheer numbers blogging.

I was reading the Drew Peterson gun thread and noticed Ken had written 13 of the 28 posts single handedly....this is the same guy that would complain if 13 DIFFERENT Napergatians posted 13 times out of 28 times. Just for the record not one Napergatian blogged on the Drew Peterson Gun Charge Thread.

I would like you to address this hypocrisy in an individual accusing a large group of an "attempt to control" when they are simply each posting one or two times expressing various opinions, while he who accuses, posts 13 times out of a total 28 on ONE SINGLE THREAD!

I hope you can see through all this Ombudsman Ted.

It seems like Ken has a very very sick need to be a CONTROL FREAK while accusing others of attempting to do, what he ACTUALLY is doing.

I hope you can address this issue.

Maybe it will help Ken REALIZE that he has the DISEASE of the RISE!!! And then hopefully the Naperville Sun could get him some TREATMENT! Imagine this guy is so sick, he is now asking you to allow him to take additional control by being your ASSISTANT! Very laughable! It would not be long before a sicko like him would sabotage your job so he could be the MASTER CONTROL FREAK!

------------------------------------------------------------------

PS. If you want a volunteer assistant I would recommend the level headed John Q. Public. He seems to be the most neutral on your blog site based on his intelligent and unbiased postings. Ken would think this is a computer war game and would hit the delete button until only he and Joe would remain standing. In the end, he would even turn on Joe to satisfy his tormented ego! Ken apparently suffers from very low self esteem! Please recommend a psychologist or psychiatrist to him ASAP!

I know it was a few days ago, but I have now read Maryann's post through a couple of times.

I am pretty sure, based on this rambling and pointless word-salad, that she is a complete looney.

I also feel safe in adding Rachel, James, Samantha, Brenda, Cindy and A Napergatian who have also joined the Naperville chapter of the "Second-shooter-on-the-grassy-knollers" whose job it is to ferret out conspiracies where none exist.

Special commendation though to Liebert for refering to an incident from 81 years ago to support the cause. That is truly above and beyond.

(PS this thread IS supposed to be about the ombudsman, right?)

Host Ted,

The thought that Ken could be an impartial assistant is laughable.

The Napergatians seem to be focused on the bulls-eye....reducing government waste and decreasing taxes.

They will continue to get support as long as they stay focused.

The few that are harassing them amount to pimples on butts...I am little surprised why any human being would want to be a pimple on someone else's butt. But this is what this small group has chosen for the their full time hobby!

If they want to live their lives as pimples, more power to them!

RJ, you know Cindy and all the other cult members wouldn't know a fact if it bit them in the...well, you know. I find it hilarious that the cult forgets that they started the name calling, belittlement, and vicious attacks. Then they self-righteously ask to have everyone that disagrees with their small group to be banned, even though they have been the only ones admonished by their new best friend Jim to tone it down. The term hypocrite comes to mind every time I read one of their self aggrandizing posts.

I guess that is why Ted thinks we need an ombudsman to keep the peace, since they can't control themselves. Ted, my offer to act as a fair and impartial assistant moderator still stands. I am sure this is too much for one person to handle, so I am glad to offer my help.

Cindy, care to back this statement up with some facts? "The Group of Five and a few others attacked the Napergatians viciously....."

Hint; Fact isn't just you saying it is so.

While not discounting the notion of waste in any level or branch of government, I think it may be a bit premature to turn a blind eye to D203. The teachers get a new contract in 2005 and then secretly support a group to affect the 2007 school board elections? This hardly sounds like efficiency at its best.

T.B.

I wouldnt pat yourself on the back just yet Randall... Im pretty sure you will see the bike cops in full force all over down town, not just on Chicago Ave. The Napergate followers couldnt even get one person to file the FOI and you think the police department is going run the town based on your blogs. All I have to say about that is WOW...

Moderator Jim,

I am in a hurry to get to work but I wanted to take a moment and thank you for all you have done for the Naperville Sun and the City of Naperville.

The Napergatians had no voice in this town unless the Napergate Man paid for those full page ads. I thought that was very unfair.

Your blog site bought some fairness to the situation as you gave us the space we needed to express our thoughts and agenda.

You really did a nice job!

I hope Host Ted takes it one step further and finally recognizes us in the print edition.

I do believe the Napergatians were very instrumental in getting rid of those bike cops on Chicago Ave and other areas of downtown Naperville. They were simply not needed and I suspect Chief Dial knew that all along. Some one had to push him.

The City Council along with the Napergatians deserve credit for pushing him.

As other Napergatians said, I do hope this is a first step in the right direction with many more on the way!

I would like to see someone at the Naperville Sun call the Chief Judges of Dupage and Will County to see what can be done about avoiding all that OT police use up there. It does seem ridiculous. It is intolerable. It is unacceptable. It is simply UNBEARABLE!

If they have to be in court, than we need to set up our own fieldhouse. Many smaller towns have fieldhouses so we can have one if we wanted to. Maybe gas becoming so expensive will be the motivating factor to bring this change on.

Good luck, Mr. Lynch! We will sorely miss you. Thanks for waking up the sleepy Naperville Sun. I hope circulation improves and you can come back one day. I honestly was shocked when I first read about it on a School District thread when it was revealed by Mr. Higgins!

Host Ted,

The Napergatians got a lot of flak the last year for calling out the Naperville Police Dept about the excessive waste on Chicago Ave. Especially those police from the schools during summer vacation on bikes.

They were obviously put there for no other reason than to enable them to collect their paychecks in the summer.

Chief Dial did not care to utilize them in the practical manner of reducing OT by using them to give others with accumulated OT compensatory time off to reduce their OT. He had failed the taxpayer while enriching his police officers at our expense!

I have been downtown the last few weekends and really seen the reduction in police....no bike cops....thank God! Hopefully those dangerous police motorcycle bikes will be auctioned off at the Ribfest and Last Fling to raise money for the poor. And I really hope the City Council stops that SHAM of using our cultural money from sales tax to pay police OT. There is plenty of time before these fests. The fest orgnaizers, Chief of Police and City Council should be looking for alternative ways to pay for security. I suspect another sham using cultural money from the taxpayer will spell the end of any City Council member who approves that measure or silently accepts it.

It is really time our City Council started doing their homework before voting. Are they taking their packets home? Or are they just skimming them before a City Council meeting starts. I suspect the latter and that is part of the reason the City of Naperville has become an INEFFICIENT MONSTER!

The Group of Five and a few others attacked the Napergatians viciously who called for savings on Chicago Ave. Ironically, Chief Dial in the end did agree with us.

I think the Group of Five needs to apologize for their attacks on Napergatians simply for trying to save the taxpayers some money. Even the City Council had enough of the NPD and demanded a 5% cut in OT.

I would like to add as others did that the 2 or 3 police officer monitoring downtown are doing a superb job. I observed not one incident the last few week in downtown.

Finally, I do want to say I will miss Mr. Lynch. He gave the Napergatians a lot of TOUGH LOVE and I would have to say he earned our respect over the last few months. Especially when he allowed us to blog where ever we wanted once he realized the Group of Five were the real trouble makers trying to control his blog site.

I think this is my first time blogging in a month. How am I trying to control anything. I am sure the Group of Five each blogs 100 times or more a month. Please let us be realistic and call it as it is.

I just hope Host Ted follows in the huge footsteps of Moderator Jim and does not fall prey to the GOF. As one blogger said they are a very very UNUSUAL!

Moderator Ted,

The reason the Napergatians are focused on City Hall and not District 203, is the waste is mostly in City Hall. I mention District 203 because the core base of Napergatians lives in District 203.

A teacher in district 203 starts out at only $41,000 per year. He or she is required to contribute to 35% of their health insurance. It is a myth teachers have the summer off. They have many duties in the summer getting ready for the next school year. Teachers also work horrendous hours during the school year and do not get OT.

In comparison a Naperville Police Officer starts out at 56k a year. He pays nothing towards his health insurance. He gets paid for every hour of OVERTIME he or she puts in. Teachers have risks to their lives, too! One time a student tried to throw a brick at a teahcer at NCHS. The teacher did not have a gun, mace or a vest to protect herself.

Teaching students is much more difficult than writing parking and traffic tickets. Much more stressful! Grading papers at home is much more difficut than walking up and down Jackson Street during the LAST FLING and getting paid up to $900 dollars for your OT shift(75 dollar X 12 hours.) I arrived at 75 dollars because the very senior officers are the one who get first crack at OT and they usually make 50 dollars per hour in regular pay and thus 75 dollars in OT pay.

Imagine in one shift, they make what many citizens make in a week or two. All benefits paid. And can retire at age 51 with 85k per year until they pass away.

I think the Napergatians are correct on being focused on the police and City Hall. Thom Higgins who appears very credible has indicated that District 203 is one of the most efficient shcool districts in the nation. Do they have a little excess fat...probably...but not like City Hall and the NPD.

I think we need to stay focused and leave Disctrict 203 alone. They need a lot more money than the police. Of course! They have our kids all day. Many times you see a police car once a month in a subdivision. So the fact that we need more for our schools is irrelevant. Much more time and labor is needed to educate compared to policing. District 204 is a different story and got itself in a legal mess which is very costly!

T.B., I see what you're saying. The local taxing bodies -- city, schools -- for the most part are service industries, so 70 to 80 percent of their costs are personnel-related. A school system doesn't make widgets, it educates kids by hiring teachers whose wages and benefits are paid by the taxpayers. That's why schools get so much of our attention, we try to be proportionate to the amount of money they get from us. If three of every four tax dollars are going to the schools and three out of every four of those dollars are going to pay teachers, then we'd better keep a close eye on contract negotiations, salaries and benefits for administrators, etc. Paying taxes is one huge cycle, hard for a newspaper to tell that story in one sitting.

Hey Ted –

I see you point, I just think taxes and budgets are interwoven. One begets the other, right? Doing a story about who gets your money without discussing how it gets spent just felt...incomplete.

It would have been nice to see, for instance, that the school districts get about 74% (I think that was the number) of our tax money and it’s broken down into categories such as salary, supplies, utilities, etc. (by percentage).

As more and more people call for cuts in the city and school budgets, I also wonder how much the city and schools are spending on fuel costs. Cuts will be increasingly harder in departments dependent on transportation (as opposed to, say, HR).

As for the $5K in subscriptions, I agree this is a small amount. My father was a CPA for more than 30 years and he always made sure the books balanced because he said an account out of balance by even a penny could be a sign of a larger problem. That’s how I look at the subscription issue…$5K is a small amount, yet is an ominous sign of how callously the city council spends.

Just my two cents.

T.B.

By Roger Waters on June 2, 2008 9:42 AM

causation and coincidence are often confused for each other and probably are with respect to police numbers.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Mr. Roger Waters,

I believe the removal of the bike cops from downtown was not simply a coincidence. It has been a long policy to put them somewhere when the school year is over. They were put on Chicago Ave. mostly to keep them on the payroll and give them something to do. Mrs. of the Police Officer who I believe is married to a Naperville Police Officer explained this to us. I believe she is very credible and have no reason to doubt her or anything she ever said!

The Napergatians have seen so many cops on one intersection as a waste since this Blog Site was born. Most felt 3 cops on that intersection can do what 12 were doing. It seems like they were right. In the last month despite the summer season and the end of school we are seeing only 3 cops.

Police Chief David Dial may have not responded to the Napergatians. But he apparently responded to the City Council that demanded he reduce OT by 5%. This seemed to be the best place to reduce OT. I am pretty certain he is now using the school police to give police officers with lots of OT some compensatory time off. He should have been doing that many years ago.

I think the City Council forced his hand on this issue and he simply went along with the Napergatian recommendation which was the most practical one where one could almost see and feel the waste of TAXPAYER MONEY.

Police Chief Dial would have not done anything if the City Council and the Napergatians did not pressure him. He did respond to pressure. Sometime pressure is good when someone is stuck in a rut. I am glad to see Chief Dial get out of his rut and I hope this is the first of many measures he takes to reduce OT in his dept.

I hope he sets an example to other Dept Heads, that if there is a will to reduce there is a way to reduce. As Ernie, I am for a reduction of at least 5% in all city departments. If the head of a department can reduce expenses by 10% without hurting services, give him a one time 10% bonus for a job well done. The savings he or she will get us will not be one time as his bonus. They will be permanent.

We need to put an incentive out there for the Dept. Heads to cut excess fat. The City Council needs to demand the 5% reduction. If a certain dept. can not find 5% excess fat, the Dept. Head needs to appear before the City Council and explain why there is no excess fat in his Dept. If they agree with him that is the end of the matter. If they disagree with him they need to send him back to the drawing table.

I hope our City Council pressures all depts. to reduce as they pressured the police dept to reduce. But the 5% of Police OT is tokenism and needs to be extended to 5% of the total police budget. At least it is a small step in the right direction and our City Council needs to be commended for taking this first baby step to resolve the out of control budget problems in the City of Naperville that are resulting in high taxes.

Thank You!

To Establishmentman on June 2, 2008 10:09 PM

The 'vendetta' claimed to exist against the NGM by the NPD is the same one that obviously exists between the NGs against the NPD.

They are cut from the same stone.

Why else would a group zero in on and spend so much time and effort on .8% of the city budget (police OT) and basically ignore the other 99.2% of it?

I welcome them all to prove me wrong and let's focus on the 99.2% for a change.

Napergatian on June 2, 2008 6:37 PM

I urge no one to respond to TB or his shadow supporter. TB is apparently a trouble maker who is looking to stir the pot with old comments that we have all moved beyond.

I am more than happy to apolgize to the Naperville Police for those distasteful and old comments that were made by less than 1% of Napergatians in the heat of the moment.

-------------------------------------------------------------

It's good to see someone from the group apologize for the attacks on the NPD. It seems that everyone is ready to move on and not deal with "old comments" anymore. I assume this also means we won't have to keep reading any more about what the Napergate Man achieved in the past? His record was remarkable, but as you mentioned in your posting it is time to move on.

Reading the archives (a great way to get up to speed on the Napergate movement by the way), I can't help but notice how often someone cuts and pastes the same list of his past achievements. How about we focus on current events and helping rid this town of unnecessary overtime, government waste and incompetence? You see, many of us are also fed up with wasteful spending and mismanaged government.

Basim Esmail was a great leader and started a good movement. He obviously has decided to stay out of the limelight for now, let's give him his due but let's also start focusing on the future and not the past. Councilman Bob commented that he has ignored Napergate comments in the past, and even referenced the NGM as someone who brought about change, but also that it was done in the past - let's focus on the future!

As usual, when a non Napaergatian defends himself, he is told to stop digging up the past and move on, yet the whole Napergatian conspiracy/vendetta against the NPD is based on past history which isn't relevant today, nor have the claims ever been proved.

As far as TB being banned, I am sure that will happen the same day that a majority of the Napergatians are banned for their constant name calling and belittling of anyone who dares not toe the party line.

I find it strange how the Npargatians are for accountability and less waste in City Government, yet all they seem to focus on is the NPD. I guess all the other departments have been cleaned up and are running efficiently from the looks of things.

To “A Napergatian” –

Ah, ostracism. If you can’t insult me and can’t argue with facts, just ignore?

Though you urge people to ignore my posts, I think you’d be surprised that I actually like your post for at least one reason – repudiation of the distasteful comments by some Napergatians regarding the police. Yes, I said SOME Napergatians and have never said ALL of them as Maryann falsely stated.

You may disagree, but I have taken pains to not paint the Napergatians in broad strokes and lump them all together. Oh, I’ve had disputes with some, but I have tried very hard not to say “all Napergatians are”…something. If you can find where I have done so, I would be more than happy to apologize.

And along those lines, I don’t consider myself a part of any group much less a “group of five”. I am neither Napergatian nor Establishment--call me Naperville politics agnostic. I like my independence. Just because I'm not with you, that doesn't necesarily mean I'm against you. You may eb shocked to learn that we share some of the same concerns regarding the city and spending, just differing views of how to achieve our goals.

I’m not looking to spew hatred against Napergatians as you have suggested; however, I will defend myself if unjustly attacked. The facts are the facts so I don’t see why it mattered how old the comments were that I referred to. I think this was especially true when the comments were (until you) never repudiated by your group.

Your utter failure is that you see your "logical and practical solutions" for the city as the ONLY solutions and any divergent opinion is apparently unwelcome. Is that what you're saying?

You may say my comments were “nothing new and unusual”, but the same could be said for some of the attacks coming from some Napergatian writers. While some prefer to argue with the message, some prefer to argue with the messenger.

**********

To Ernie –

Your proposal of reducing costs in all City Departments across the board by 5% in the next 12 months is intriguing, but I think some departments could be cut more than others so 5% on average may be more attainable without cuts to city services.

*********

Ted –

Sorry for this diversion in your new thread, but some things needed to be said and some issues couldn’t be ignored. You will, I'm sure, do a great job.

The recent Taxman Cometh article was a good start, but too broad. Can the reporter drill down further to get at more of the heart of the matter? I was disappointed that the article was so short both in length and on details. More examples of exactly how the city spends our money (like on newspapers and magazines) would be appreciated.

T.B.

Response from Ted:

T.B., it wasn't a budget story, it was a tax story. When tax bills went out we got calls from people saying, "I've tried selling my house, I know my market value is down, how come my assessment isn't? Why am I still being charged taxes for what my house was worth a year ago, instead of today?" That's what we tried to answer.

We get it, people want to know how the city spends money. And judging from the city's ultra cautious response to us (I saw a city official the other day and asked for the time, he said I'd have to file a FOIA), they're aware that if there is any wasteful or questionable spending we'll find out about it. I thought the information in Sunday's story was useful--it bears repeating that about three of every four dollars you pay in property taxes goes to schools. The rest to city, county, forest preserve, etc., COMBINED. The 204 people seem to get it. They know the schools get the lion's share of their money so they are more inclined to demand accountability from their school board than the city. But, heck, if you want to know that the city spends $5K a year on subscriptions, I get it, it's the principal that matters, not the amount. We'll do more stories like that, sure. We're populists.

To A Napergatian on June 2, 2008 6:37 PM

I would actually like to have a new place to talk about the 5% you mention. Obviously, Jim's farewell blog is not the appropriate spot for it.

Until then, keep in mind that motorcycles are much cheaper to operate than cars. They burn less fuel and the proper 'protective gear' for the rider is far beyond what it was just 5 years ago.

Hopefully Ted will indulge us with another more appropriate topic area for that discussion; when he gets a moment of course.

Dear Fellow Napergatians,

I see a trap is being set for you on this thread. I urge to stay focused on communicating with the Ombudsman and asking him questions about how the Naperville Sun operates.

I urge you to continue saying farewell to Mr. Jim Lynch and wishing him luck in his future endeavors.

I urge no one to respond to TB or his shadow supporter. TB is apparently a trouble maker who is looking to stir the pot with old comments that we have all moved beyond.

I am more than happy to apolgize to the Naperville Police for those distasteful and old comments that were made by less than 1% of Napergatians in the heat of the moment.

TB again is spewing his hatred against Napergatians by digging comments out of the retired archives. Please ignore him and do not respond to those old comments. Do not lower yourself to his level!

Stay focused on Ernie's proposal of reducing costs in all City Departments across the board by 5% in the next 12 months. It is an excellent proposal and it seems to have Councilman Bob's ears.

Please try to address Ombudsman Ted and avoid addressing TB, Joe, Ken and RJ. We all know they have one purpose! To take a small Napergate comment, blow it out of proportion, and claim the Napergatians just took over the blog site. They have played the game so often it has become very transparent.

Finally, I would also like to wish Moderator Jim well and tell him we will miss him. It is sad that he will not be here to ask the Group of Five to tone it down when they suddenly erupt.

They always seem to erupt like a volcano when Napergatians offer logical and practical solutions to our city problems. That is all the Napergatians have been doing on this thread and suddenly as you can all see, the GOF erupted and spewed their venom like rattlesnakes....nothing new and unusual. Simply business as usual for this UNUSUAL GROUP!

Ted, good luck with the new ombudsman role.

If you are looking for help with the Potluck Board duties, and your helper does not need to be a Sun publications employee, I am more than happy to offer my services as a fair and impartial moderator.

Anon-

I will, of course, respectfully disagree.

I don't crave any “attention” as you seem to think. All I did was to call Maryann out (one of her favorite phrases) for the hypocrisy of what she wrote and backed it up with specific evidence.

You think I’m self-centered or self-obsessed, while I just happen to think I was defending myself. So now I’m now being attacked for lamenting the attacks on these threads? That’s too funny!

Maryann wanted to have me censured for being “inflammatory and libelous” so I just thought I would show her where she and other Napergatians have done much worse than she accused me of doing. The utter hypocrisy of her post is laughable.

By the way, I acknowledged the "hatred" comment and also stated it was wrong to use it with regard to Belinda. I also never used it in a broad stroke against all Napergatians.

I agree that “This blog site is not about personalities. It is about ideas, thoughts and constructive criticism so we can move forward.” The problem, as I see it, is there seems to be very little “constructive” criticism and a lot of plain criticism. I have called often and loudly for civil discourse here. That’s all I ask. Is it really that hard to agree with me that there are too many insults thrown about these threads?

I am not and never have tried to turn the police against the Napergatians. I wish I had such power!

As to your point that it was somehow distasteful for me to bring up the past language used by the Napergatians regarding the police…the truth hurts, doesn’t it? Instead of attacking me for pointing out the truth, how about you agree that those words were inappropriate, went too far, and repudiate them in the name of your group? That would be real progress.

T.B.

Guess who came to dinner.

A blog about Jim leaving turned into another NG pile. Lovely. It was nice during the hiatus but apparently all good things must end.

T.B. on June 2, 2008 1:18 PM

I read your posting and went back to read some of the referenced posts on archived threads. I agree the posts you point out do nothing to further each persons case and cause me to paint the Napergatians with a broad brush, especially as I read some additional posts in the archive. I also found a number of comments from the editors that warned particular posters to tone it down. I understand that everyone can post what they want, (anonymously), but what I hoped to see was someone apologizing or "calling out" their fellow Napergatians to tone it down. It seems that a 30 day time out is only a remedy for those who disagree with the Napergatians?

Naperville Sun editors on April 9, 2008 11:25 AM
The Napergatians must stay on the Napergate thread - simple as that. Say whatever you want - as long as you don't libel anyone - but say it on the Napergate thread. And, remember, any Napergatian who blogs about Napergate on another thread will risk permanent banishment from the entire blog.

Naperville Sun editors on April 8, 2008 7:08 PM
Honestly, Maryann, I'm tired of screwing around here. If you want to post Napergate stuff do it on the thread and not elsewhere. Last warning or you risk permanent banisment from this blog.

Naperville Sun editors on April 9, 2008 5:22 PM
Moderator Jim to John Q.: Thanks....finally a voice of sanity cries out in the Napergatian wilderness.

April 9, 2008 9:09 PM
Response from host:
A number of factors contributed to The Sun's decline in circulation, none of which had anything to do with Basim Esmail.

April 10, 2008 10:31 AM
Response from Ted:
I'm sorry that we don't meet your expectations, but I remind you we are providing this forum. I think we're very tolerant of criticism like your's. What you call censorship, I call the moderators' efforts to maintain a sense of dignity on this forum. What is your point, other than to criticize The Sun? If you don't like the way we run our forum, you don't have to participate. The original intent of this forum was not to provide a platform for people to criticize the newspaper; it was to provide an opportunity for people to discuss issues relevant to Naperville today.

Kathleen on February 27, 2008 1:18 AM
But it seems very probable that the Naperville Police knew he did not know about his suspension, but just seemed to want to be pricks that day.

Elizabeth on March 5, 2008 7:12 PM
The POLICE were PRICKS that night.
Yes, these cops on Chicago Ave. were the MOTHER of ALL PRICKS that evening.
The PRICKS wanted a violation
To do all this to one man over a technicality he obviously did not know about and THAT THEY KNEW HE DID NOT KNOW ABOUT with 100% CERTAINTY could only be COMMITTED by the SCUM of the EARTH? The officers involved in this specific incident were SCUM, SCUM, SCUM!!! PRICKS, PRICKS, PRICKS!!!

Susan on March 5, 2008 8:16 PM
Pretty strong post, Elizabeth. I may not like your choice of words but I agree with your message. Those cops were nasty and ruthless that evening. They were the devil in disguise. They were evil doers! They were looking for trouble! They started trouble! I hope my words were a little softer than yours. But you did a great job and made your POINTS!

TB,

You seem very obsessed with yourself. Maryann mentioned you very briefly in a very long letter that was dealing with city problems and issues.

Your entire large post was about yourself....as if the world circles around you.

This blog site is not about personalities. It is about ideas, thoughts and constructive criticism so we can move forward.

You above letter showed you were extremely self-centered.

We are in June now not March! What is the point of bringing up old comments that have been dealt with long ago?

The Moderator asked the Napergatains to stop using those terms. They listened. It is very distasteful for you to bring them up in reference to the police after they were stopped by the Moderator in March.

Again this is another attempt by you to turn the police against the Napergatians. Just as your word "hatred" for police has been used recently in a similar attempt.

You are a real trouble maker, TB. The Napergatians listened to Moderator Jim.

Check on your buddy Ken who openly defied the Moderator and continue to call the Napergatians a cult.

Why don't you have a few words with Ken and then come back and tell us how we can make cost cuts instead of only talking about yourself to boost your immature ego! I guess Joe got over his daily need for rises. When are you going to get over your daily need for rises?

Maryann –

If you’re going to criticize me at least quote me accurately and don’t misrepresent what I have previously written. You've once again gotten your facts wrong.

You wrote that ”It is very sad that you or Moderator Jim allow TB to post numerous comments stating that Napergatians have "hatred" for police. I think all those comments should be deleted. They are inflammatory and libelous. TB should be given a TIME OUT for a month.”

For the record, I did not state that Napergatians have hatred for the police--I said that Belinda did. And numerous times? Try one or two posts. I also said that saying that about Belinda was in error and I would reserve the use of that phrase for those who actually called the police fascists, scum, or worse. This was done numerous times on the Napergate Man Unmasked thread by Elizabeth (March 5 @ 07:12 PM), Susan (March 5 @ 08:16 PM), Anonymous (March 5 @ 08:38 PM), and Melissa (March 5 @ 08:55 PM). Some of them called NPD officers words which slipped through but that Moderator Jim would not allow to be repeated in later posts.

I find it curious that you think I am “inflammatory and libelous”. Have you ever said the same to a Napergatian? How about when I was being called dense, a freak, incompetent, and a loser on the Napergate Man Unmasked thread? Did you speak out then? How about when Elizabeth, Susan, Anon, and Melissa were ranting against the police? Did you ever step in and say they'd gone too far?

How about your own statements regarding me, Maryann? You wrote “He [TB] has really reached the point of ANNOYANCE and ARROGANCE!” (Police OT thread, May 4 @ 6:48 PM) and “TB supports FRAUD, CRONYISM, SCAMS, and SLUSH FUNDS being implemented against the Naperville Taxpayer” (Police OT thread, May 5 @ 1:34 PM). That’s not inflammatory? It's certainly libelous.

I guess by your own “rules” we won’t be hearing from you for a month while you’re on your time out, right?

T.B.

P.S. Jim Lynch – Great job and good luck.

Response from Ted:

It was great having Jim help with this forum. Obviously, any time two people are doing something there's more time to put toward it than one. With only one moderator there are times it will be impossible to acknowledge every comment and explain why it was rejected.

________________________________________________________________

Host Ted,

Your words "it was" bother me. Does that mean Moderator Jim will not be bloggin with us for the duration of time that he will remain with the Naperville Sun?

Is he no longer able to make an appearance? Many of us would love to chat with him in his last few days or weeks.

Please arrange if possible that he moderate for us a few more times.

I guess it seems we appreciate him a lot more since we are losing him combined with the fact that we have finally seen the fruits of his labor!

____________________________________________________________

PS. I hope Moderator Jim was not relegated to the task of looking for a new job in his last few weeks at the Naperville Sun. I hope he can find time to look for a new job and continue blogging with us and improving the direction the Naperville Sun is taking.

Truly, I am devastated that the Naperville Sun is losing Mr. Lynch. While he was slow to show his cards, he finally showed them. He was truly converting the Naperville Sun to a no nonsense newspaper that was beginning its long awaited watchdog duties. I just hope all his good work does not go down the drain with his departure. Let's build on his work and continue his legacy. The Naperville Sun never had a an Editor/Publisher quite like him.

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Here is a question for Ombudsman Ted and not Host Ted.

Why did the Naperville Sun choose to lay off Editor Publisher Jim Lynch instead of Editor Tim West? It seems Tim West is almost at retirement age. Could they have given Mr. West a parachute of some sort and laid him off since he is so close to retirement and saved the energetic, young and creative Jim Lynch? Or maybe give Mr. West early pension if the Naperville Sun gives pension?

Since you offered to be an Ombudsman, I hope you can make time to answer my questions. You did a very nice job answering Maryann's questions by the way even though I don't fully agree with everything you said!

Also how should we address you in the future once Mr. Lynch leaves. Do you prefer Host or Moderator? Will you be the Moderator and appoint one of your assistant editors to be the new Host? Or will it be a strictly one man show!

I suggest you endorse the help of one of your assistant managers as monitoring a blog site like this could unnerve anyone in due time! It is always better to have 2 instead of 1 as bloggers have a better chance of getting a response which is important at times! Plus, it will help you keep your sanity as this is obviously no easy task!

Response from Ted:

Jim has not participated in this forum since the May 9 announcement. I'm working on getting help. Jim's aware of the remarks about him on the forum.

Ombudsmen Ted,

Since you want us to be blunt and complain to you as if you were an Ombudsman, here is my complaint.

It is about Host Ted! The difference between Host Ted and Moderator Jim is that Host Ted deleted numerous letters not to his liking with no comment. Moderator Jim never deleted a letter without revealing it publicly and giving a reason. He usually had a very good reason for not publishing a post such a libel or profanity.

In your case many of the letters you deleted that were published on the Napergate Network through their elaborate e-mail system showed no good reason why those letters were deleted. It almost showed a pattern on your part of wanting to help the city...of wanting to help the minority bloggers have a chance against the majority bloggers!

I sincerely hope you never delete a letter again if you want your Blog Site to continue to grow exponentially and have the credibility it deserves. I hope you can admit this is a mistake that appears to now have been corrected by the Naperville Sun...possibly Mr. Lynch! And many of these letters were actually deleted from Napergate Threads where Napergate was not prohibited. And in my opinion Napergate should not be prohibited anywhere on any thread as long as it is discussing the issue at hand.

I will give credit to the Naperville Sun for stopping most of these deletions in the last month or so. A few months ago it reached a peak where you could read more letters on the Napergate Network than you could on the Sun Blog Site.

Please don't be bothered by the possibility that the Napergatians want to form an influential party in this town. They have a right to promote their party name and they are doing that. It should be obvious to the Naperville Sun and to City Officials that the Napergatians intend to put up a Slate of Candidates unless they reduce expenses and taxes before the next election in 2009. Putting up a slate of candidates who are concerned with stopping city waste does not make us a cult as one of your bloggers continues to reiterate as if he has diarrhea of the mouth. Moderator Jim did ask him to stop the use of that word. I would like the Moderator to force him to stop the use of that word before he leaves us. Or if you have the power Ombudsman, please ask Host Ted to demand this blogger stop the use of this word over and over again in each one of his posts. As anonymous stated he not only has hollow common sense but apparently a lack of intellectuality to move to another point. He had never proposed any cost cutting which is the theme of most of these latest threads. He is stuck in a rut and unable to get out of it. He is in a ditch! He is in the gutter! Please help the guy get out of whatever he is stuck in!

As one blogger said reducing only 5% of police OT is window dressing. No one is going to buy that. Asking Chief Dial to reduce his budget by 5% as Ernie is proposing is something acceptable. Asking all departments to reduce their budgets by 5% is even better and should be done in the form of an editorial on the FRONT PAGE before Mr. Lynch leaves us. If he did such an editorial we would be extremely thankful to him for his brave service to this town.

Let us all work together and try to do that. Since you know that City Officials are reading Ted's Threads in large numbers, please publish every letter and even those that put massive heat on them to perform. The good old days are gone! We are in a new ERA where waste can no longer be tolerated. Gasoline has risen to $5.16 in some areas of California according to CNN. Those prices will soon arrive here.

This will pinch everyone very hard. To survive these rough times we need to implement cuts everywhere and especially in City Hall where serious cuts have never been undertaken! Let us roll and make our City better!

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I temporarily do not live in Naperville but my parents and siblings do. I have not been to downtown Naperville this year so I have not personally witnessed the removal of the school bike cops. If this is true as being reported on Ted's Threads, I want to commend and praise the Chief of Police for taking this necessary and important cost savings measure! It is too bad it was too late in coming but it finally came....so I am thankful for that! I am sure when the Police Chief was ordered to reduce OT by the City Council he chose the area where he felt the most waste was taking place...how ironic that he agreed with the Napergatians!

Let us see if we can now eliminate all that OT that Naperville Police officers are getting in the courtrooms. If they have to be there as some are saying, let us schedule them to work 32 hours a week so their last 8 hours in the jury box are not OT. If this is mandatory and can not be changed, let us take this measure and if we have to hire a few more police officers, than let it be. I believe when you know you will have this OT for certain and it will be year round, a disservice is being done by our community in not hiring more police officers.

Also, let us try to hire new police officers without offering them pension. We may have to grandfather in the current police officers if we made promises to them. But since we are offering a salary of 56k to new police officers with an undergraduate degree which is much higher than almost all civilian jobs, there is no need for pension anymore. They can join the Social Security system. Most police officers at age 21 or 22 have little concern for pension. Many may not even know what it means. They are concerned about their gross pay. We have a great gross pay for them and that will recruit the best! We need to be a leader as we are the largest City in Dupage. Maybe other cities will follow our lead and eliminate police and fire pension in their towns.

My understanding is there are an over abundance of qualified applicants fighting to be policemen and firemen in Naperville. The reason for this is we are overpaying combined with the fact no policemen or fireman has been killed in duty for nearly 81 years. It is a very safe job as long as motorcycles are banned by Chief Dial. While on the subject, I would like to ask Chief Dial to ban all police motorcycles as they endanger the lives of policemen. No police family should be without their loved one due to a preventable motorcycle accident.

Police Chief Dial wrote a column on a police officer in Naperville who was permanently disabled due to a motorcycle accident. I do know the Napergate Man personally and he told me telephonically while he was in jail for those 4 hours, he was told by the female booking officer that the delay was caused because her colleague who was suppose to be helping her that day had been seriously injured on a motorcycle accident. If what she told him is true combined with the revelation by Councilman Bob Fieseler that we lost a Chief of Police in 1927 to a motorcycle accident, my question is why did the City Council approve these very dangerous motorcycles that are not suited for police chases! I hope Councilman Bob Fieseler can answer this question for me.

Since I got caught up rambling, I would also like to thank Councilman Bob Fieseler for appearing on these blogs in a serious way to contribute to the discussion and help reduce waste at City Hall.

And finally I agree with all the others that posted before me, Moderator Jim will truly be missed. He was a fair man! He allowed me to edit and repost instead of simply trashing my posts. He cared to respond to my posts and communicate with me. I thank him for that. I wish him success in all his endeavors. I am doubtful that the Naperville Sun can continue in the path that he began....I hope I am proven wrong!

Response from Ted:

It was great having Jim help with this forum. Obviously, any time two people are doing something there's more time to put toward it than one. With only one moderator there are times it will be impossible to acknowledge every comment and explain why it was rejected.

downsizing a company sucks

Jim will be missed

causation and coincidence are often confused for each other and probably are with respect to police numbers

As for your comment about city costs, there is a very public process in which you can air your concerns. The budget process provides numerous opportunities for public comment. We have a reporter observe those discussions, we report on them, we review the budget document, and if we ever felt that elected officials like Councilman Bob and the rest of the council were not doing their jobs by questioning expenses, or if we see anything in the budget that raises red flags, we'll report it. The truth is, we haven't seen anything irregular.

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Ted,

The truth is that the Naperville Sun until recently has never shown the courage to challenge the Council Members to look for inefficiencies in City Hall. I have seen the process starting but extremely fearful with the loss of Mr. Jim Lynch that the newspaper will return under the reactionary control of Mr. Tim West.

Mr. Tim West has only challenged City Hall once in his 30 year history with the Naperville Sun. That was when he demanded to see the cost of the Napergate Trials and they told him we don't have any records. Other than that one time I can not think of one other occasion when he seriously challanged those in power at City Hall!

I sincerely hope you follow in the large footsteps of Jim Lynch and not those of Tim West. You guys at the Naperville Sun have to understand you are helping our City and even our City Officials when you demand excellence from them. When you demand they stop wasting taxpayer money! When you say nothing is wrong, they actually believe you guys and continue with business as usual. Please don't make such statements unless you are sure there is nothing irregular going on at City Hall!

Your statement that you have not seen anything irregular bothers me. You don't see unless you look! Have you really been looking! You keep claiming you don't have the money or manpower to look for improprieties in City Hall. So how can you make such a statement!

I think Blogger Ernie made a great proposal. Unless you are an insider, you really don't know what is going on in City Hall. Most insiders are not going to take a chance and squeal. They can not afford to lose their $85,000 pensions if the squealing can be tracked down.

Let us go with Ernie's proposal and run an editorial that all City Depts. buckle up and cut their EXPENSES by 5%. Let us demand it! Any dept can slash 5% if it wanted to. Since City Hall was programmed and staffed for the growth of the 90s and this massive growth stopped, there needs to be some lay-offs to bring the staff in tune with the decline in growth especially regarding building permits, inspections, zoning and other related matters.

Good-bye to Mr. Lynch. We will truly miss him! I hope you don't return to your old self Host Ted and began rubber stamping the estbalishment all over again! Please Ted, don't return there! You would be doing a disservice to yourself, your newspaper, your readers, the taxpayers and above all those in City Hall. Push them to perform and eliminate waste! Let us stay on the roll Mr. Lynch put us on!

I hope Mr. Lynch pops in to say hi to us on this blog site before he leaves. We will genuinely miss him and his great service to our community!

Ted,

Mr Lynch was brave enough to allow discussion of difficult topics on the blogs and print some things that didn't meet the image that the Realtors and Builders want to promote for the city.

The City is almost at build out, and it is my sincere hope that the disproportionate influence of these two groups will diminish to level commensurate with their stake in the City.

In the successful organizations I have been associated with, the members were allowed to not only see problems; but, openly discuss them in the hope of finding a solution and implementing a correction. We actually had meetings on how to identify and fix problems.

Naperville has to face the problems and fix them wherever and whenever they may occur.

Mr. Lynch used the Sun as the community-communications-device allowing not only top down communication, but bottom up.

My sincere hope is that the Sun will continue to be a place were we can not only see and discuss what is going well in the community; but, also identify and discuss its' problems so that we can fix them.

I wish Mr. Lynch the best wherever he may land and offer you my thoughts and support in fitting into some shoes that Mr. Lynch enlarged substantially during his tenure at the Sun.

Bubo

Anonymous,

Maryann made this statement,

"I noticed the 6 bike patrols downtown have been eliminated this year. The School Police are no longer working the downtown on bikes. Police presence has been reduced on Chicago Ave. I have not seen the motorcycles either."

I have been downtown Naperville the last few weeks and made the same observation. The Napergatians hammered on this issue for a very long time. Chief Dial apparently agreed with them. He will never admit it in words but he admitted it through his actions. He removed them!

Chief Dial was stuck thinking in a box. The Napergatians got him to think out of the box. Kudos to both Chief Dial and the Napergatians!

Why don't you propose something to help reduce taxes, Mr. Anonymous!

Do you see no excess fat in this city? Maryann has always told the truth on these blog sites. She was not a Napergatian to my knowledge when she first appeared here. She evaulated who was telling the truth and became a Napergatian. And has done a wonderful job! She is a remarkable lady with excellent insight!

Ombudsman Ted,

In the last 2 months Moderator Jim treated the Napergatians very fairly on your blog sites. He finally saw through the Group of Five who were the ones trying to control your non-district threads and yet complained the Napergatians tried to control them.

He finally allowed us to blog and mention the word Napergate if we so chose. He allowed us to mention we were Napergatians. He pretty much "legalized and sanitized" the Napergate Party for purposes of your blog site.

Now that you are the man in charge are you going to allow us to operate as a party or are you going to ban us the minute Mr Lynch finally leaves us!

Like many others I will miss the Mr. Lynch of the last few months as he suddenly did a turnaround and became a very fair and effective editor. As I said he probably finally saw though it all.

Most Napergatians only blog once or twice a month and if 300-500 just blogged once a month, there may be an appearance of control. But there was no ORCHESTRATED or CONSPIRATORIAL control. The only thing we are guilty of is havig large numbers willing to blog and many others who see our viewpoint and willing to join us.

As you can see for yourself, Ken, TB. and RJ blog relentlessly and no one sees their viewpoint but themselves. As one blogger stated their viewpoints are "hollow." I challenge you to find ONE NAPERGATIAN who blogs half as much as one of those 3 guys in a month. You won't! Yet they say we are here manipulating and controlling while accusing others unjustifiably of their sins.

Sorry, but they are here to stop our message because our message sells! It resonates very well with taxpayers and residents. It resonates very well with voters. They simply want to silence us because they FEAR US! They fear that we will will put a slate of candidates together and get a few of them elected in the next election.

As you can see, Ted's Threads, have become popular and influential. We no longer need the Napergate Man to buy us full page ads in the Naperville Sun to be influential. As long as you do not CENSOR us we can get our EQUAL TIME on your blog site and make a difference.

As you know during election time, your newspaper never gave the Napergate Man or Napergate Party equal time in your print edition!If we put up a slate of candidates, will you give us EQUAL TIME for the first time in the history of the Naperville Sun???

You would think a newspaper would want a 2 party system instead of a one party establishment system. I sincerely hope, Ombudsman Ted, you continue to show the courage that Publisher/Editor Jim Lynch showed in recent months. He really showed some big time COURAGE!

Marlyn is great at doing one thing. Stating her opinions as facts when she has not one bit of evidence to back any of her statements up. They are her opinions and the Sun editors have on numerous occasions not posted her comments because they were out of line and personal attacks.

Im glad the editors can see through her agenda and the rest of the over the top so called Napergatians.

The budget process provides numerous opportunities for public comment. We have a reporter observe those discussions, we report on them, we review the budget document, and if we ever felt that elected officials like Councilman Bob and the rest of the council were not doing their jobs by questioning expenses, or if we see anything in the budget that raises red flags, we'll report it. The truth is, we haven't seen anything irregular.

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Host Ted,

Of course you have not seen anything irregular because you have not properly investigated or looked for it. A citizen in Naperville will not know if a Fire House should be staffed by 9 Firemen or 11 Firemen. It is not as if we can just walk in and begain interrogating firemen or launch an investigation!

It is the duty of the City Council to do studies to make sure we don't have overstaffing in City Depts. I don't believe they are doing these investigative studies. Maybe the bloggers on your site will succeed in pressuring them. At least one Councilman named Bob has shown genuine concern and is responding.

While the Napergatians were attacked for a long time because they felt the 6 cop bikes from the schools hanging around downtown were unnecessary and an extra cost, in the end they turned out right, and Chief David Dial removed them from Chicago Ave. My hat goes off to the Police Chief!

If you go downtown, until closing you only see one or two cops. At closing it appears a few more cops come from other beats for 15-30 minutes to make sure the closing takes place in an orderly fashion. I commend Chief Dial for finally taking a course of action that is cost effective and practical. But why does the City Council not notice these things?!? Are they not paid 10k in salary, given pension, insurance, phone allowance, internet allowance and even life insurance to keep an eye on the situation? The Napergatians are not paid but yet are OBSERVING!

Not one City Council Member ever complained about the excess cops on Chicago Ave. The Napergatinians did and something was done about it. Yes, Host Ted, many top City Officials do read your blog site and do respond. Apparently Chief Dial realized after a year and a half of complaints about these bike cops on Ted's Threads, that they were EXCESS FAT on Chicago Ave. but maybe could be PRIME LEAN STEAK somewhere else.

I have not seen them this year thankfully. I hope they are relieving other police officers in more important duties in order to minimize OT.

Finally, I just want to tell Moderator Jim we will dearly miss him. He was fiesty with the Napergatians but we learned to live with him and it all worked out just right in the end!

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I would like to commend the 2 or 3 cops who have been monitoring downtown the last 3 weekends. The downtown has been especially crowded but very orderly. I have not seen one single fight or the slightest of incidents. In my opinion this proves that sometimes 3 cops can do what 12 cops can do. Let us SAVE TAXPAYER MONEY when we can! Keep up the excellent work, Chief Dial! Thanks for stepping up to the plate and helping keep city costs down. I urge other Dept. Heads to follow Chief Dial's lead in cutting costs!

Ombudsman,

I would like to express my disappointment with the removal of Mr. Jim Lycnh from the Naperville Sun. I would also like to ask if there is anything you as an Ombudsman can do to save his job!

As South Side said he was quite an asset.

We all know the Naperville Sun slid from 22k in subscriptions to 15.2k before Mr. Lynch stopped the slide and reversed it. Actually moving it up to 16.2k.

After you reported that 16.2k number last year, Ombudsman Ted, did the Naperville Sun reverse again back downwards or has it continued on the steady rise Mr. Lynch set it on?

Please be kind enough to give us the latest SUBSCRIPTION NUMBERS.
I believe they would be available to any advertiser who chooses to advertise in the Naperville Sun so I an not asking you for TOP SECRET INFORMATION!

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I am a former subscriber who was considering renewing her subscription based on the investigative reporting and hard hitting editorials of late. The Naperville Sun had just become an exciting newspaper. Now, I will have to hold off until I see which direction the newspaper takes without his leadership. I am praying it does not return to its old monarchy style of heaping praise on the establishment regardless of performance.

Response from Ted Slowik:

Virginia,

Circulation figures are reported to the Audit Bureau of Circulation as the industry's means of verifying value for advertisers, and the figures are publicly announced, so I am able to tell you that The Sun's average daily circulation is around 16,200, an increase from the same period a year ago.

Ted, Thanks for the quick response on Friday. And yes the Sunday edition was much more to my liking. Good luck in your new position at the Sun, I wish Jim Lynch well as he was quite an asset to the sun while he served our community as editor.

Maryann,

As I've said before, not every thread is a home run. The spirit of this forum is to provide something for everyone. Sometimes topics are put up that appeal to fewer people. If all I cared about was getting hundreds of comments each time this forum would consist exclusively of District 204 threads.

Topics pass from the home page--it's going to happen. It's easy to find them in the archives, by month or topic.

Once again you state as fact something neither you nor anyone else has been able to prove--that city pressure some 15 years ago somehow stopped publication of some Napergate ads. I have proposed numerous other possible explanations and I'm not going to do that all over again. I just have to call you on your statement and say I completely disagree with the theory that city pressure somehow resulted in those ads not being published.

We don't know exactly how long Jim will be staying on.

For some time I've been wanting to welcome Naperville City Council member Bob Fieseler and thank him for participating in this forum -- I think that's great. I've come to learn that many people in leadership positions in Naperville do read this forum, and I have to admit I'm surprised by how many do. Also it's sometimes curious how impatient some of our participants are. Sometimes events occur and in the newsroom our No. 1 priority is to get a news story posted onto the Web site and sometimes on this forum people are already commenting on it before the story is posted. So we have a great many knowledgeable participants who are plugged in and who know what's going on and if any insider ever wants to share confidential information you can always contact me directly at tslowik@scn1.com.

As for your comment about city costs, there is a very public process in which you can air your concerns. The budget process provides numerous opportunities for public comment. We have a reporter observe those discussions, we report on them, we review the budget document, and if we ever felt that elected officials like Councilman Bob and the rest of the council were not doing their jobs by questioning expenses, or if we see anything in the budget that raises red flags, we'll report it. The truth is, we haven't seen anything irregular. Yes, the costs for personnel wages and benefits and for operations seem high. But are they excessive compared to other towns of similar size? We don't think so. We recently did a big story about police overtime after looking into that, partly because of the many comments on this forum. I would agree with Councilman Bob that a large part of the city's costs are due to benefits for public sector employees--programs like pensions that are governed by state law. Maryann, I wish you would really direct your energy in that area because if you want to do something about corruption and waste boy you could have a field day in Springfield, there's so much wrong with this state. But we're not the Springfield Sun, and our focus has to be on Naperville, though at times we will talk to our local state representatives and senators about the problems in Springfield. So bottom line, I respect your opinion that Naperville should look into cutting costs, and if you're really serious about it you can do what we do and closely monitor the budget process. If you do that, and can tell me specific areas where you think there is waste in the city budget, I would be happy to hear your thoughts.

Host Ted,

Congratulations on your new position as the Head of Naperville Sun operations.

It is truly sad to see Moderator Jim leave despite our disputes with him. He was a class act!

I also hated to see the pension thread drop off the Main Pain just as it was getting interesting with Council Man Bob participating.

I remain puzzled a year and a half later why duds like the genetic discriminination which only get one hit in an ENTIRE WEEK are not deleted so Councilman Bob can stay with us a little longer and have good visibility on the PENSION THREAD. Another dud appears to be the COD President Thread!

You're the boss but I suggest as I did a year and half a ago, once you have had a dud for a few days, I would delete it and save the good threads a little longer on the Main Page!

Overall you guys are doing a great job. I noticed like many others that your newspaper finally became a watchdog newspaper. I actually began a subscription.

Once again I am very saddened to see Moderator Jim depart as the Naperville Sun was being built into an investigative watchdog type of newspaper! He seemed to be a tough but fair man!

I hope you continue the legacy for investigative reporting he started!

I am sure the City of Naperville and School District 203 are happy Moderator Jim is leaving us. It seems like he was about to demand that excess fat be eliminated in all city departments. That would have been a great front page editorial!

How long is Moderator Jim going to be around Ombudsman Ted? The City of Naperville can no longer put real heat on him if he demands some streamlining and cost cuts in City Hall! It would be easier for him to do it as he departs than for you to do it and take all the forthcoming heat. As you know the city is capable of putting massive amounts of heat! They were able to stop production of Napergate V and VI in the past! That really is a well known fact.
Do you feel as the top man you will be able to handle the pressure City Officials will apply to you not to run editorials asking for expense and staff reductions where NECESSARY? Are you up to the task, Ombudsman Ted!

I hope the heat the City of Naperville puts on you in the future does not prohibit you from doing your watchdog duties. In the end all you are doing is giving them TOUGH LOVE! Maybe even keeping the Establishment in Power, if they listen to you.

If they do nothing and continue "Business as Usual" I am certain the entire council will in due time be ousted.

I was watching a series on CNN called $4 Dollar Gas and What Next! It was rather frightening. One gas station in California was selling unleaded gasoline for $5.16 cents per gallon!

Many families across the country unlike Napervillians have already been hit pretty badly. They were already upside down regarding their home mortgages. They recently found out they were upside down on their gas guzzling SUVs. They went to trade them in for more efficient smaller 30 mile a gallon cars only to be told that their SUV they thought was worth 50k is now only worth 30k and they were upside down on their CAR LOAN! Can you imagine being upside down on a vehicle a year after you brought it to the tune of 20k?

Thus they needed to come up with 20k in addition to the down payment on a new car to make the trade. Most did not have this money so they could not solve their gasoline crises! They were doomed either way.

I don't see kids in Naperville driving SUVs anymore. They are pumping 3 dollars of gas into the smallest family vehicle. Times have really changed, Ombudsman Ted!.

I really do hope the City of Naperville changes its ways regarding police pensions, police OT, police Charity scams, police gas guzzling SUVs, and on and on.

I noticed the 6 bike patrols downtown have been eliminated this year. The School Police are no longer working the downtown on bikes. Police presence has been reduced on Chicago Ave. I have not seen the motorcycles either. Hopefully those dangerous things have been garaged permanently after Councilman Bob revealed our former Police Chief died on a motorcycle. I believe Chief Dial once wrote a column on another police officer who was seriously disabled from his motorcycle accident. And yet the Naperville Police notified the Napergate Man that he was held for 4 hours because yet a third policeman was seriously injured on a motorcycle accident.

I hope Councilman Bob passes a resolution eliminating motorcycles for the police department. They may see it as punishment but I see it as tough love to protect our police officers from harms way.

It is very sad that you or Moderator Jim allow TB to post numerous comments stating that Napergatians have "hatred" for police. I think all those comments should be deleted. They are inflammatory and libelous. TB should be given a TIME OUT for a month. He has become very emotional and is losing some of his bearings as of late.

Basically as Ernie suggested on another post, I would like to see all City Depts. cut expenses by 5% across the board. Does that means I hate firemen? Does that means I hate streets and sanitation?
Does that mean I hate building inspectors?

It simply means I am trying to reduce expenses so my taxes will be under control again! Where is the "hatred!"

At one time our City was growing very rapidly. We needed a lot of personnel such as building inspectors to check on all the construction! Now that our growth is down by 70% or 80% why do we need so many building inspectors on the City Payroll? Plainfield is the 7th fastest growing town in the nation. Why can't we see if Plainfield will put them on their payroll? They did a great job for us but their time has expired...we can't let them leach on forever just to collect their pensions at taxpayer expense!

Sometimes when you have pensions, employees who no longer have any productive use pretend to be busy for another 10 years because they want their PENSIONS. Who wouldn't want 85K or whatever handouts we are giving out? They are not going to quit. Since the city never eliminates excess fat as the Naperville Sun, Edwards Hospital and recently Lucent, they are like tendered Professors who have immunity from losing their jobs. But at least the tendered Professors is really still teaching as he was before!

I think the police dept. was simply being used as an example for cost cutting. Police are more visible and we can see what they are doing. We can notice their inefficiencies. It is much harder to spot inefficiencies in other depts which may be 10 times worse unless you are an INSIDER!

I would like to think that our City Council are insiders. I would like to challenge them to do something. Councilman Bob seems like a caring man up to the challenge of investigation and doing something. I suspect he is an Establishment guy. I am a Napergatain but I am going to give him 100% of my support as he continues in the path he has undertaken. At least he is investigating.

He seems to be a good man with a conscious and courage. I suspect he is going to take some action. I suspect Napergatians will cross party lines to vote for a caring Councilman. I hope he does the right thing and I look forward to voting for him.

Thank You!

And again we will miss Mr. Jim Lynch! He was a fine man. I wish the Napergate Man would have given him that interview he requested. I believe he would have used it in a positive way to put more pressure on the city to enhance and improve!

Sincerely,
Maryann

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Since today is Councilman Bob's birthday I hope you let me go off topic, Host Ted, and wish Councilman Bob a very happy birthday and many more to come!

It is really sad to lose him. I just noticed the Napergatians in particular recently developed a strong liking for him.

I hope Host Ted continues furthering what he started since I assume he is now the new MAN IN CHARGE!

We will sorely miss you, Mr. Jim Lynch!

It took us a year to understand you, but once we did we loved you!

Good look in all your endeavors!

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PS. Since the Naperville Sun and Edwards Hospital are tightening due to severe economic conditions, I would like to see the City of Naperville also tighten up.

Taxes, more taxes and even more taxes will simply not be acceptable from this point on! It is time for some cuts just as in the media, hosptial and corporate world. The City of Naperville should not be exempt. Overtime is simply no longer acceptable or tolerable. New ways need to be found to get the job done for a fair price!

OK, I asked the first question myself and set up this Q&A format because it was the easiest way I could think of to explain what's going on.

On May 8, The Sun's parent and owner, the Sun-Times Media Group, announced a reorganization of one of its suburban divisions, Fox Valley Publications, of which Sun Publications is a part. The restructuring removes the editor/publisher positions at four daily newspapers in Naperville, Aurora, Elgin and Joliet.

Three new vice presidents of the division were named: Rick Nagel for editorial, Bob Wall for advertising and Jerry Alger for marketing and circulation. (Jerry's a former editor/publisher of The Sun and we welcome him back.)

We should have made it clear when the reorganization was announced that Jim Lynch -- our editor/publisher -- would be leaving The Sun. (Sun Publications includes the daily Naperville paper and seven weeklies serving Downers Grove, Wheaton, Lisle, Glen Ellyn,
Bolingbrook, Plainfield, and Homer Glen/Lockport/Lemont.)

Jim's been helping with the transition but the plan is for him to separate from the company in the near future.

Let me just add that when Jim came to Naperville a few years ago, his bold style shook up the sleepy weekly roots of The Sun. I believe he elevated The Sun's watchdog role in the community and that the look of the paper became more professional during his tenure.

Jim's departure has absolutely nothing to do with performance. Circulation, in fact, is up--a rare feat for a newspaper these days. This while demands to cut costs have meant savings in newsprint by reducing the size of the paper and savings in operations by reducing the size of the staff. And keep in mind the editor/publisher positions at those other dailies I mentioned also were eliminated as part of the restructuring.

Jim's been a mentor to me, and I hope to carry on the positive changes he's brought to The Sun. I'll miss him, and wish him the best.

What happened to Jim Lynch?