The City Council this week voted to implement a hiring freeze. There's only three positions open now, including that of fire chief. Otherwise, the freeze won't apply to essential police officer and firefighter positions, so it's more like a hiring chill than an all-out freeze.
The city is trying to close a $5 million gap in its current operating budget. Personnel costs account for 76 percent of the city's budget.
Do you agree with the hiring chill decision? How else should Naperville look to cut costs from its current budget. As it begins the process of discussing the 2009-10 budget, where should the city look to cut costs in the future?
Host Ted,
To quote the computer on the Enterprise, "insufficient information".
Any chance the Sun can get the budgets from ten and twenty years ago and make a few pie charts. By doing this the problem area will usually pop out.
In personnel costs, the bad boy everywhere is the cost of insurance. Our current medical system which is the child of, you guessed it, the Federal Government is killing every company.
If the cost inflater is something other than insurance and Federal mandates I would love to know what it is.
Accountants of the world feel free to chime in.
Simple answer.
Raised property taxes 12% this year, raise them another 25% next year.
It was only a matter of time this was going to be a problem. You can't overpay policemen by at least 20% and balance your books. People in Naperville do well, but we do not make 20% more than others. We are rich based on Barak Obama, but not John McCain. And I think John McCain has this one correct.
To avoid these massive property tax increases, the following has to be done.
1. File a petition to take away home rule (and the ability to increase property taxes) immediately. Make sure there are enough candidates for a primary in February and file the papers for that election.
2. Without tax powers, the council will have no choice but to cut costs.
3. If necessary, file bankruptcy.
WHAT A MESS!!!!
The city's current operating budget - for fiscal year 2008-2009 - is just more than $117.2 million. It's the operating budget that is experiencing the $5.1 million shortfall in revenues, Marshall said.
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The above is a quote from the Naperville Sun today. This is one component of the total budget and we have a shortfall of $5.1 million dollars. There are other components of the City Budget and the city has not disclosed any probable shortfalls in the other parts. I expect another shoe to fall soon.
With 400 police and firemen, we can afford to put a hiring freeze there also. Why should pro tem City Manager Robert Marshall be allowed to hire police and firemen without getting permission from the City Council? That is ridiculous that an exception is being made for police and firemen considering they had a $53 million deficit in their pension fund before the stock market declined 25% in the last year. I suspect witht the latest meltdown in the stock market their deficit is at least 75 million. Hopefully we will hear soon from Council Members Bob or Dick who seem ready to lead the battle against GOVERNMENT WASTE!
The city council was warned by hundreds of Napergatians over a year ago right on this blog site that trouble was looming at city hall. City Officials only reacted after learning they had of a $5.1 million deficit JUST in the operating budget.(NOT THE ENTIRE BUDGET) No measures were taken in advance to prevent this deficit. You would think a city like Naperville would be proactive instead of simply reactive.
I reported this 5 million dollar shortfall on the Firemen's Thread Tuesday night. I am glad the Naperville Sun reported it to its 16,200 readers today. Only thru education can we wake the sleepy folks in Naperville. I am sure they will wake up when they see their city real estate taxes alone go up $400 dollar in the next year. At that point it is too late to do anything about it.
Expect a huge increase in the TAX RATE to make up for the decline in assessed value of property in the City of Napervlle. I am shocked when I hear all my neighbors state they are looking for reduced real estate taxes on their homes due to their collapse in value. Sadly, most people do not understand the real estate taxation system. But in April of 2009 when they get their next real estate tax bill they will be STUNNED!
Anyway, the city took the first step by freezing employement. Hopefully the second step will be freezing employment with public safety employees included instead of EXCLUDED! And the 3rd step in laying off unnecessary employees including in the police and fire departments. I am sure every fire house can funcion with one less fireman.
I am also certain downtown does not need all those bike cops while the schools are closed. Downtown is just as busy in May and late August as it is in mid summer. Yet we only have bike cops when schools are closed to provide work for the sake of providing work to police. Giving those police officers time off in lieu of accumulated overtime makes much more sense!
For those newcomers on this blog site, the police dept. had $3.15 million in overtime last year. That is a killer on the operating budget. The city council did not even address this in Tuesday's meeting. It is as if they think the police are princes that can't be touched. Why are they always off limit in fighting a budget crisis. Why do we need more police officers when our growth is only 1% per yar? Can the NPD try to handle this 1% growth without having to hire additional cops! You would think it would be manageable if police worked a little harder and took on an extra block or two here and there. Does the union prevent the police from working a little harder and adding on a few blocks to their beat? Cops are supposed to be hardened and tough human beings...they should be able to take on a heavier workload!
Can you imagine that our City Council authorized Police Chief David Dial to spend 3 million in OT for the following year in advance! Insanity! So much of this OT is being spent while officers sit in jury boxes like potted plants day after day! So much of this could be avoided by building a satellite court house in Naperville as Aurora and Downers Grove have done. How ironic that we can come up with a $19.9 parking deck at the library we don't need, but yet can't come up with $2.85 million dollars for a satellite courthouse that we need DESPERATELY. The delcine in sales tax revenue in downtown Naperillive indicates there is no growth downtown. So why are we building 3 more parking garages when sales are down drastically and many business are going out of business! Has anyone noticed all the vacancies downtown. Downtown is a another bubble ready to explode. Those $50 dollar s.f. rents that establishment landlords are charging, simply are not sustainable or affordable to even most successful national chains.
A satellite court house would save both residents and police time. It would save both residents and police gas! Officers could be on patrol and only called in when needed which is rare since 99% of residents plead guilty. Instead of having 12 officer sitting like potted plants in a jury box, if we had a local court house, we could have ONE revolving cop to fill in for any police officer who would be called to testify. One revolving police officer costs much less than 12 sitting in a jury box. Chief Dial has to think out of the box as to how to eliminate this OT. He is so stuck in his old ways and refuses to change. He even complained when the city council asked him to reduce his OT by simply 5%. The city council should have asked him to reduce his OT to near zero. If there is a will there is a way.
I was reading the blog site on Money Magazine about Naperville being the 3rd best city to live in. Over half the bloggers complained about the high taxation in Naperville as being their biggest gripe. Expect that to rise to 75% next year when the massive budget shortfall finally bites into your WALLET!
If Money Magazine continues to hear from all the residents as to how bad taxation is in Naperillve, expect Money to remove Naperville from its top 10 list soon! Let us do something about HIGH TAXATION before residents begin fleeing Naperville! We already have hundreds of homes in foreclosure and hundreds of other McMansions that builder are stuck with.
Finally, I want to thank Host Ted for bringing this issue to the forefront in both the print edition and on this blog site. Hopefully, he can write an editorial or opinion soon asking for unnecessary employees to be laid off from City Hall. Yes, we need some serous LAY-OFFS to trim the excess fat. Overtime should be prohibited in the city of Naperville as it is to a great extent prohibited in corportate America.
Anon wrote:
"Our current medical system which is the child of, you guessed it, the Federal Government is killing every company."
How do you figure that the medical system is the child of the Federal Government?
Anon at 9.25 has a good idea.
I'd be interested to see a table from, say, 1981-2008 showing, for each year
- Number of residents
- Number of City employees
- Total City budget in $
Hiring freeze! Is this a joke? Managerial employees for the City of Naperville, or for that matter any government unit have no idea on how to cut costs or manage to restrain spending.
This alledged freeze is meaningless. It all about protecting jobs,salaries and benefits. Nothing changes, just nonsense from government spin meisters.
Ok agreed times are tough there is no denying it. The shortfall amounts to around 4% and the adm. is taking steps to cut costs. This is what should be done, but lets not get crazy here the sky is not falling. We are in a recession and there will be cutbacks accordingly. Real estate values have dropped but not dramatically in our area so it is safe to assume that with falling assessed values the tax percentage will go up but not as dramatically as some would attest to.
Relax have a beer, the wacked out market went up 400+ points today. Enjoy life the world really is a good place and Naperville is at the top of that worldly list.
I think the hiring freeze is what should have been a couple of years ago -- the economic writing was on the wall then. The law firm that I work at put a hiring freeze on 4 years ago. As people leave, their positions are absorbed (that is except for attorneys, since they generate revenue).
I know that my property values have dropped since March 2007 approximate 8-10%. I have also been watching the real estate market in our area and know of at least one house near NNHS that was originally listed for $299,900 (which a couple of years ago was probably what it would have sold for) that finally (after about 6 months) sold for $250,000. Seems to me like real estate values have dropped considerably (albeit not as drastically as say Las Vegas). It sure would be nice to see our property tax bills go down as well -- but like other bloggers on this site, I am suspect that will happen. Government never seems to be able to tighten their belt. Just received my electric bill yesterday . . . last year I used 300 kwh more for the same month as this year but guess what, my bill is even higher this year!
No, the sky is not falling. Yes, we will all probably get through it. But the Council needs to get spending under control in all departments so this town continues to be a great place to live.
Host Ted,
Many employees in the City of Naperville were hired to help deal with the 10% growth we experienced for the better part of 2 decades.
When so many homes, office buildings and commercial plazas are built, much manpower is needed to deal with such expansion.
However, in recent years growth has been hovering at less than 1%. Our population grew 1000 from about 142,000 to 143,000 which is less than 1%.
Why do we need the same size staff to deal with 1% growth that dealt with 10% growth?
You would think this would be an area where our City Council would want to cut manpower!
Do you have any idea why all the "growth manpower" in City Hall remains after the growth stopped?
Who or what are these inspectors inspecting as far as non-existent asset growth??? Little to no housing growth....little to no business or commercial real estate growth is taking place at the current time!!!
Banks are not loaning money...growth is halted for the forseeable future! Why not let these employees go and apply to the Illinois Employment Department of Security for unemployment funds? If we need them, when and if growth ever resumes to 10%, we can call them and offer them their postions back! This is what corporate America does! The taxpayers need relief in these difficult time just as corporate America does.
The Naperville Sun laid off Mr. Jim Lynch when times got hard. It was not an easy decision for the Chicago Sun-Times but they had to do what they had to do to remain solvent and in black ink instead of red ink!
Unnecessary employees at City Hall remain gainfully employed accumulating their 30 years of employment towards retirement pensions, the taxpayers can ill afford.
When is the bubble going to burst in Naperville?
Are you going to issue a warning in the PRINT EDITION before the bubble bursts completely or let it burst and report on it after the fact, Host Ted?
I hope you do city officials a favor and warn them in an Opinion or Editorial....sooner better than later!
Thanks for considering my request, Host Ted!
AA
THE HIRING FREEZE IS A BAND-AID
Without understanding where the growth in the budget came from, it is difficult to know how to trim it. The hiring freeze is a Band-Aid until the City gets a new Manager to make the tough decisions, whenever that is.
The gimmick of bad managers is to have across the board layoffs, or layoffs while they increase management bonuses for putting the company back in the black. I still remember the genius at United laying off the ticket agents thus crashing revenue. I think he lasted three months before the board swallowed their pride and fired the guy. I hope we don’t lay off the guys that fill in pot holes so that we can keep our management structure in place for when the price of asphalt drops.
I would still like to see where the bulge came from, and then discuss what can be done about it. The employees are seldom, if ever, the problem.
IN THE ABSENCE OF ANY REAL DATA HERE GOES:
1. ELIMINATE THE ASSISTANT CITY MANAGER JOB
Eliminate the assistant city manager job, Let Marshal keep the city manager job at his current salary and hire an additional executive secretary to create reports, run the office, shuffle papers, fill in expense reports, schedule meetings and track projects, they are usually more competent than most executives albeit a lot harder to find. This cuts costs and saves 30% on head hunter fees. It may even improve administration by freeing Mr. Marshal to do MBWA in and out of the office.
2. FIRE CHIEF
Eliminate one of the jobs that reports into the Fire Chief and spread the work to the other managers. Pick one of the second level managers to be fire chief or rotate the position with a bonus for the year they are in charge. Again, a good secretary can run the place for them. IKE had his secretary; the fire chief can have his.
3. SALARY FREEZE
Put a salary freeze in place for the worker bees and decide if salaries should be cut by 10% for the three top tiers of managers. This may eliminate the need for layoffs altogether. How many layers do we have anyway?
4. FIND OUT WHY COSTS EXCEEDED REVENUES
Find out why costs exceeded revenues, and then do something about it. Medical costs, pensions, cost of gas, too many managers, employees that can be moved to jobs where they are needed etc.
5. DYNAMITE THE BELL TOWER
Short term: dynamite the bell tower, take the culture funds and use them to pay for the additional police and services the downtown consumes $2.5MM, force Ribfest and Last Fling to charge market prices for their events and pay the NPD out of their pockets for security $250K per year, find some chump to buy swamp land at premium prices and sell them the-land-between-the-lakes $2.5MM. Problem solved.
Growth will be back before you can count to ten. The feds are giving the barn away, but the economy will crank right up.Building will start back up quick as a wink. Let the Sun and Ted report the news not make the news. Keep the papers editorials out of the front page especially if the topic has anything to do with the "sky falling". The best media quote of the day had to do with comparing this situation with the great depression. If only there was someone about 110 that could do an adequate comparison. We live in a great town in a great country at a great time period in history.
Just because the "suits" on Wall Street are ready to jump out the windows, there is no reason for us to follow like lemmings. Enjoy the week-end and the time the good Lord has afforded us. Don't spend it worrying about things that you have no control over.
Let's see what we know so far:
$117.2M operating budget
$76M payroll and benefit cost
$5M budget shortfall
Trimming payroll and benefit cost by 6.58% will save $5M.
Trimming approved overtime hours by 4.39% will save $5M.
This isn't rocket science. This is basic management 101. All we need is a city council who has the backbone to get tough with and demand change from these mopes of department heads who refuse to ever tighten their belts. If there is one single department head who does not have a contingency plan in place, ready to be implement at a moments notice to reduce department spending by 10%, then the basic budget and planning process used by the city is fundamentally flawed.
Why in the world wasn't the city finance director and acting city manager doing their jobs more effectively for the last several months? Do they not know how to forecast revenue and read a trend chart? If they do not understand something as simple as a balance sheet or don't they have the authority, personal motivation, or political savvy to take action at some point before the city is actually in a deficit position; then something is seriously wrong with how this city is being managed.
The city council owes us an explanation on what kind of budget controls are actually supposed to be in place to prevent situations like this or what will be put in place to prevent a similar situation from occurring in future years.
I want to be able to read stories and reports that the city is effectively managing the city budget. I do not want to read reports that indicate those we we trust with our tax dollars are doing a poor job managing expenses in terms of income. Taxpayers have given our local bureaucrats wide authority and if they can't exercise better stewardship then we need to limit that scope of authority and start micromanaging these decisions if they are unable, unwilling, or incapable of professionally managing city affairs to a higher level of performance.
The first and highest priority for the city council right now is to hire a fully competent city manager with a degree in accounting or finance and extensive, practical work experience managing a similar or larger city-wide budget for 10-15 years coupled with a demonstrated track record of controlling spending, reducing expenses, limiting hiring, and lowering taxes. A candidate who is fully vetted and ready to hit the ground running full speed on the first day. Naperville taxpayers are paying top money in our tax dollars. Top tax dollars are supposed to buy us the best, top notch, proven professionals who can demonstrate that they have the desire and capability to meet and exceed our expectations. We are not paying top dollar for inferior candidates or unproven professionals who want to try a career change at our expense. Top tax dollars do not provide a proving grounds for "on the job training". Candidates who need on the job training need to go cut their teeth in some second or third tier city, prove their worth, and then come see us when they have acquired the credentials that our tax dollars demand they possess.
The council has a policy of a cash reserve fund of about 20% to the general fund. It has now accumulated to about $20 million. Now you know one of the reasons why city taxes are high.
This reserve fund was originally called a raining day fund when it had $12 million. Over the years the $12 million has shrunk in purchasing power to about $6-$7 million.
Any changes ahead for the good ship Naper. Nope, just more of the same.
These are really trying times that need a very experienced City Manager. Our city council has not taken the appropriate steps to replace pro-tem City Manager Robert Marshall who has no experience running a city as large as Naperville.
I do not believe he can make the cuts necessary to balance the budget. I doubt he knew he had a $5.1 million operaiing deficit shortfall until the writing was on the wall.
I am very concerned about other parts of our $380,000,000 total budget and what shortfalls we may have there.
Can anyone shed some light?
Since the City of Naperville admitted to a $5.1 million shortfall in revenues as compared to last year and has yet to admit what the increased expenses to run City Hall are, it is only fitting that Host Ted should issue a WARNING!!! The true and complete short fall is the reduced revenue combined with the increased expenses. This will be much more than the $5.1 million decreased revenue as compared to last year....unless no one in City Hall got a raise, no additional employees were hired, gasoline remained fixed in price, asphalt did not increase and a multitude of other variables.
Host Ted would not be making the news. He would not be generating panic. He would simply be reporting the news after the fact to the taxpaying residents which is the duty of any newspaper worth its weight in paper!!!
Let us hope some non-establishment folks run for the city council seats.
I would like to see the Napergate Man come out of retirement and endorse some non-establishment folks who care for the well being of all Napervillians as opposed to a few well connected establishment folks.
To have existing council members and planning commissioners running for all the seats would amount to STATUS QUO rule! The plan commissioners voted to close OXFORD ROAD....can you imagine closing a road that has been around for decades for no reason. They want to commercialize 75th St east of Washington even though the residents spoke up against commercialization in 2000 and 2008 in the majority.
We have plenty of commercial vacancies in town and basically we would be creating empty eye sore plazas...is this what we need in this town!
I am puzzled why there is such a lack of interest in running for these city council positions.
When I retire my corporate job in Chicago, I have every intention of running for city council. My health benefits expires with my retirement. It would be nice to have some health benefits and since I will not be receiving any pension from my corporation, it would be nice to have $10,000 dollars supplementing my Social Security Benefits.
I hope others see the benefits of being a city council member and run this year since I am unable to due to the stresss and time contraints of my corporate responsibilities. I don't want to short change the residents since I know I would not have an adequate amount of time to do the job the residents and taxpayers deserve!
Settle the Furstenau Lawsuit - that will save $1 million in litigation expense. See if he will still take an apology and $10k for his attorney's fees.
I agree with the hiring freeze as a start. However, in my opinion, there needs to be a change in attitude. It's evident in two examples: one from the Sun which cited reduced sales tax and transfer tax revenue. No mention of higher spending as a contributing factor. Government tends to look only at revenue, not costs. Private businesses are responding by cutting costs, not holding them and looking for more revenue.
The second: One position not being filled is "video production specialist" What business does the city have in video production? I'm only guessing, but we like to do a lot of PR work ( e.g. enter contests for landscaping and we produce videos for entry.) Is this really critical? Was it ever needed? How about a sunset provision for some positions and how about a cost/benefit analysis?
Final example: everyone should recall the county's "dire" financial condition that led to threats to reduce spending on public safety , police and courts. Hundreds of layoffs were predicted. Now, we have the magical quarter point increase in sales tax and all those positions are safe and the budget is up 10% over last year. No private business could do this. A 10% increase in spending -- why? because they can.
Let's get really good at reviewing why our budget is the size it is. Let's have independent review of department budgets. Let's not assume that every function performed last year is needed next year. Let's limit the increases in spending to something close to the inflation rate. If departments can justify additional needs, they can be addressed on case by case basis. permitted and then
I'm afraid that this is the state of government today. Give them money and they will find a way to spend all of it and then some. If my company was run that way, we've have closed a long time ago.
Sam,
Good post!
The first thing we need to do is to eliminate home rule. At that point we would be dealing with trying to trim 5% increases which is the maximum state rule allows in our REAL ESTATE annual bills.
With home rule, we are dealing with fighting limitless increases in City Hall and by public officials. There is no CEILING! They can do what they want as you pointed out....such as increase sales tax and save unnecessary jobs that are not needed.
I am shocked at the lack of interest in our elections. Many people did not like the Napergate Man but he really woke everyone up at election time and was able to energize a very sleepy town.
With his retirement, the town went back to sleep! Look at the interest on the election thread...negligible!
In the Napergate Days, election forums would be overflowing to hear what the candidates were saying. Candidates knew every word uttered was put under a microscope of sorts!
I think it falls on the shoulders of the Naperville Sun to energize the sleepy folks in this town. The Napergate Man did it with INK!
The Naperville Sun could also do it with INK! The right words need to be said to ring an alarm in the brains of those sleepy folks in this town. Let us try to ring their bells before it is too late.
No one rung the bells of those executives at Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, Lehman Bros. or AIG Insurance. They all collapsed and to a great extent the sleepy stockholders walked off with little to nothing.
Let us hope the residents of Naperville wake up and save this town from those officials who don't even know what cost cutting means...those officials who have never laid anyone off...those officials who only care about being gainfully employed and their retirement pensions....those officials who think the solution is always higher taxation!!!
I just visited Baird and Warner's Web Site. I was shocked to see all those multi-million dollars McMansions that are sitting unsold. Builders are really struggling in this town and I do not expect them to keep paying those 40k to 60k taxes on these vacant homes for much longer. One builder just sold his own McMansion that he has lived in for 12 years so he could better afford to support his vacant homes on the market as a way of avoiding bankruptcy! Unfortunately, he is not a Wehrli so a bail out was not in the cards for him. I bet he wishes the City of Naperville would buy the homes he built during the bubble for COST and get him on his feet again! The rumors in his subdivision is he is on the verge of filing bankruptcy! Even though rumors, considering the real estate climate we are in, they seem believable. He specialized in McMansions and only built McMansions. Many were built on expensive land acquired by demolishing old homes near downtown such as on Hillside Rd.
I sense the bubble bursting soon in Naperville! Does anyone feel the same way???
I can't believe the guy that said, "health care a child of the Fed. Govt. how do you figure?" You must have had your head buried in the sand for the last 40+ years. Go back and check the facts online. When did health care start to skyrocket? After 1965? When did the Fed. govt. get into health care in a big way? 1965, check. How did the feds. reimburse health care cost until about 1981? On a cost plus basis. If you don't know what that means, then you cannot engage in a meaningful debate on healthcare. Which Fed. Govt. program is in the worst shape of all, Medicare and Medicaid. Where is the biggest fraud in the Fed. govt.? Medicare and Medicaid. The Feds. have screwed up health care so bad it's not even funny. Why do you think college tuition increases so much every year? Do you actually think parents can pay up 9-10% increases every year? No, the problem lies with Sallie Mae. Student loans are the only debt you cannot wipe out in bankruptcy. What incentive do you think schools have to cut cost when the feds. keep loaning out more and more money to students that cannot escape the debt? What two areas of our economy seem to constantly escape price destruction? Health Care and Education. It's a no brainer.
Sam
Could a video production assistant be the person in charge of producing live coverage of governmental meetings originating from city hall? If you eliminate the position, will city council meetings no longer be available except to those who can physically attend?
Dear, A.A.
You truly are a donkey's behind. What do you think a number of councilman do for a living besides working for the city. Councilman are paid about $11,000 a year for their service. This service includes anywhere from 600-1200 hours to keep up on city business. This means that many are involved in other businesses that are very affected by economic conditions.
A.A. you seem to have an answer for everything in this town. Maybe you can give some input to why there was such poor attendance at last Thursday "get together" regarding the capital bill and how it relates to rte 59.
I suggest you get off your rear end and go out and meet with our city's elected officials before you go on another rant!!!!!!!!!!!!
Anonymous, that's an interesting point of view you have, but correlation does not imply causation. Health care is mostly a private industry in this country, so please explain what Medicare and Medicaid have done to drive up costs for those of us with private insurance.
And why in the world is it a BAD thing that bankruptcy won't wipe out student loan debt? Do you really think it would be a good thing to return to the days when many students would declare bankruptcy right out of college so they could get rid of their debt? How would THAT serve to keep college costs down?
SSS Donkey's Ass,
I am sure you know how many hours city council members work. Some do work hard and some never even read their 500-1000 page packets.
Many people are not interested in government because they feel government does as it so pleases.
Many people showed up in support of Furstenau and the city council ignored every word every speaker uttered. When government does not listen to the majority, the majority stops showing up.
Residents have been fighting hard to keep 75th St. east of Washington residential. Not for one year but for 10 years. It appears the city council gives lip service and proceeds to do what it always planned to do....commercialize for their buddies and friends in the ole' boys network!!!
Commisions were set up to perform feasibility studies. They used data that suits them and the results they want.
Watch and see how the city council will approve commercializatin of 75th and Wehrli possibly in the next meeting. Next, they will commercialize 75th and Naper BLVD.
They do as they want and please....participation gets residents nowhere with the current city council.
I RECOMMEND WE ALL GET OUT AND VOTE. Donkeys have no place on this blog site. Thank you!
A hanful of residents oppsed to Walgreens at 75th and Wehrli does not make a majority AA. As a matter of fact, one of the neighboring residents even stated in a letter to the editor in the Sun that only 50% of his neighbors opposed the development. 50% does not make a majority dear. Also, last time I looked, 75th and Naper was commercial.
RJ,
You must be a new resident.
This is not a new issue. Zoning on 75th St. and Hobson was a huge Napergate issue in the late 90s and early 2000s. Many Napergate ads rallied the majority of the residents and the city council voted in 1998 to keep Wehrli and 75th St along with Naper and 75th(SW corner) residential as the master plan called for.
Yes, there are 2 beautiful plaza north of 75th St. on Naper Blvd. Huge plazas in the range of 200,000 sq. ft. anchored by a Jewel and a Domincks. They have always had vacancies in the last 20 years without exception. Anywhere between 7% to 20% vacancies. If anyone wants to open a business, they can right in those plazas!
Dominicks and Osco both have pharmacies. What is the point of putting Walgreens 300 yards east? Dominicks closed down in the Ogden Mall. Do we need to close down another Dominicks due to extreme competition and have a 75,000 square foot vacancy? The old K-Mart on Ogden near the car dealers remains vacant for nearly 10 years despite an asking price of only 7 dollars per square foot in annual rent. Building new plazas in a town in which growth stopped means creating vacancies in old plazas. Is this what you want, RJ?
Ever checked out the NE corner of Aurora and Rt 59 for vacancies. You will lose count very quickly. Developers are not always the smartest guys around. They need government to control them. Look at what happened on Wall Street without government regulation. All the big houses got themselves in trouble and have been bailed out by other businesses when only slightly in trouble and by Uncle Sam when heavily in trouble such as AIG, Fannie Mae, Fredie Mac and Bear Stearns. The average taxpayer will have to come up with about $2500 dollar for this bail-out which is currently 700 billion with no end in sight.
When new plazas are built that are not needed, vacancies develop in both the new plazas and the old plazas. The landlords go to the County and get tax reductions on these vacancies. You and I have to pay when this happens in increased taxes on our real estate home tax bills. Is this what you want, RJ?
I am really surprised CM Furstenau flip flopped on his position on commercialization of 75th St. He was once staunchly in the camp of the Napergatians who always supported him and were against this encroahing commercialization. I am not sure they are aware he flip flopped. I would like to see him go back to his old position of anti-commercialization of 75th St east of Washington and especially south of 75th Street.
Look at the traffic on 75th St. without the commercialization. Imagine the traffic after the commercialization!
One resident stating that only 50% of her neighbors are opposed does not make it fact. She supports the commercialization so of course she is going to downplay the opposition. I suspect the oppostion is greater than 80% and use to be 90% or more in the Napergate Days.
Unfortunately due to the decline in the Naperville Sun and the discontinuance of the Napergate Ads, residents just are not as informed in the past as to what is happening in their town.
As you know we only found out about the $5.1 million deficit in the operating budget last week. The hundreds of Napergatians on this blog site warned us this was coming. How is it they saw this deficit coming but our politicians and city staff did not see it coming, until the numbers were finally crunched.
I see so much negative coming our way. City Manager Marshall admitted revenue does not look good for next year either. Yet, we are suppose to hire 12 more firemen at nearly 60k each with ungodly benefits and build them a 2.2 million fire station and buy them a $788,000 state of the art ladder fire engine. This fire house and its employees alone will increase the deficit from 5.1 million to well over 6 or 6.5 million dollars even if you amortize and depreciate the fire house and fire engines.
Anyway, let us see what happens. Most people don't act but react when it is too late. I suspect Naperville Taxpayers will try to absorb as much as they can but will one day explode when they can absorb no more. I think City Officials know that and are trying to do something in the line of band-aiding. At least they woke up before the residents woke up. So I will give them credit.
But band-aids on cuts that need surgery do not work. The bleeding will continue until the employment level udergoes real and swift surgical cutting and cleansing. Good luck to our City Officials!!!
Eric:
You could be correct about the video production specialist, but I thought that city council meetings broadcast over local access cable were provided by the cable carrier as part of their franchise fee.
I could be completely wrong...thanks for pointing out the possibility.
On the other hand, the position is vacant and the meeting are being broadcast...
AA wrote;
"One resident stating that only 50% of her neighbors are opposed does not make it fact. She supports the commercialization so of course she is going to downplay the opposition."
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Actually AA, it was a he, and he is against development and wondered why he and his neighbors didn't get their way. You know,if you would quit guessing at things and spoke more of the truth instead of convoluted rhetoric, maybe more than a handful would take you seriously.
From the Naperville Sun
http://www.suburbanchicagonews.com/napervillesun/news/opinions/letters/1138923,6_4_NA02_LETTERS_S1.article
September 2, 2008
People have no control over their neighborhood
One big topic in my neighborhood is the idea of a new strip mall being built at 75th Street and Wehrli Road. I was very glad last year when the builders permits got rejected, but about a month ago, he got one of them approved.
Building the Walgreens and Starbucks would be a waste, because two other grocery stores are less then a mile from the building site! Also, local businesses, such as the neighborhood's own Corner Pantry, would be run out of business because of cheaper prices just down the street. The plans also includes possibly building a Jiffy Lube. I couldn't disagree any more about this part of the plan; while we're making Wehrli a new Washington, why don't we make the neighborhood polluted?
I can prove that I am not the only one strongly against this idea. Last time I checked, more than half of my neighborhood is against this idea.
The first three words in the Preamble are "We the People;" well, I find it very interesting how we the people have no control over our own neighborhood.
Brett Borchardt
Naperville
We the People only counts for the majority, and that includes all of Naperville. Nothing in the constitution says We the vocal Minority.
RJ, I'm confused, and I bet AA is, too. This is what you wrote on September 23, 2008 at 8:42 PM:
"A hanful of residents oppsed to Walgreens at 75th and Wehrli does not make a majority AA. As a matter of fact, one of the neighboring residents even stated in a letter to the editor in the Sun that only 50% of his neighbors opposed the development. 50% does not make a majority dear."
And here is what the letter actually said:
"Last time I checked, more than half of my neighborhood is against this idea."
So it sounds like most of the people who, presumably, live close to that intersection are opposed to the development. Is your point that this local majority is not necessarily in agreement with the majority in Naperville?
John Q. Public,
I never saw the letter to the editor. I was responding to RJ assuming and presuming he had credibility. Apparently he twisted the words of the writer and and then accused me of convulted rhetoric.
Incredible!
All I know about RJ is that he was one of 5 bloggers under massive attack by the Napergatians for his lack of credibility. Now I understand what they were talking about.
Enough people take me seriously on this blog site as I am a serious no nonsense man who is not here to play games. I am not looking for personal recognition as I use an Anonymous name.
I am only here to attempt to reduce my taxes and those of all Napervillians by demanding government reduce waste and costs. That is my only agenda.
It is sad that RJ felt the need to attack me over believing him. I like to trust what I see from other bloggers unless I have reason to believe it is false or inaccurate. I am not a newspaper that can check every fact before I write. If I did, I would never have time to write or work my full time job in downtown Chicago!
Having said that most of my writings relies on my personal research, personal observations and what I read in the Naperville Sun. I have been reading the Sun long enough to know it is not the National Enquirer. They try to be accurate and unbiased. They make mistakes. But they own up to their mistakes and correct them especially under the leadership of Host Ted as Editor in Chief.
If someone can point out I made a mistake, I would be happy to correct it and apologize for my error. I feel a need to be a little aggressive on this blog site to shake things up a bit and get more people invovled in local politics. My hope is that I can be very aggressive while maintaining my credibility.
I hope RJ feels the same and stops playing silly games that he initiates with inaccurate quotes. How ridiculous!
Does anyone else feel flatulent, because something stinks about the city council and their spending?
Who the heck voted for these people?
"And Marshall commended the Naperville Fire Department for developing a plan in which it would staff Fire Station No. 10, which will open next fall, with existing personnel. Marshall said the city's 2009-2010 budget called for the hiring of 12 new firefighters at a total cost of about $1 million." Sun Article Today.
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Host Ted,
This is a very good plan. It was suggested and advised by Another Anonymous right on this blog site a few weeks ago.
City Manager should be commending Another Anonymous who thought of developing this plan instead of the NFD who wanted to hire 12 new firefighters until the tightening screws were brought forward by the taxpayers, by the bloggers and by the city council!
Well, at least you know the City of Naperville is reading your blog site as we all suspected, Host Ted. Stealing some great ideas without giving credit, though, is classless!
They need to learn to give proper credit where proper credit is due!
This plan was documented in detail and clearly by Another Anonymous first, right here on Ted's Threads!
I am surprised a City Manager who collects a huge salary and a huge pension while working on a second pension can't give credit where credit is due.
Finally, since Bob Marshall is collecting 85k from Naperville taxpayers in pension funds for supposedly being retired, he should agree to reduce his additional salary to one dollar from $170,000 in these tough economic times and make some personal sacrifices. Asking your troops to make sacrifices when you are not, is not the true hallmark of good leadership. It is selffish leadership. It is poor leadership. It is why no one sees fit to promote him from interm to permanent! At least the city council got this one right unitl of course now!
Mayor Bloomberg of New York City showed some class by agreeing to work for an annual salary of one dollar despite not collecting a pension. Don't tell me he is a millionaire. I know that! So is Bob Marshall a MILLIONAIRE!
Michelle,
Nice review of the old blogs.
The idea of using the existing firemen to fill the postions of the new Fire Station was the idea of Another Anonymous.
It prevents fire fighter layoffs while providing them employment where they are needed.
I doubt City Manager Marshall could have thought of that on his own.
I am sure he reads Ted's Blogs!
And I believe as you do that he should give back his pension or salary if he is truly concerned about Naperville. Laying employees off while he double dips is unconsionable! He should be setting an example.