Local legislators' wish list

RECALL at the local level! The city of Naperville just passed a resolution supporting this and the only council member who didn't support it was Furstenau. He is exactly why we need recall. He places his personal gain in front of us taxpayers... time to throw him out of office. Waiting until his term is up is way too long to wait on this clown!

If you want to recall elected officials, let us recall our city council for subsidizing the parking for the Promenade Expansion to the tune of $15,600,000 dollars not including the cost of the land based on some reasonable assumptions.

Basically, the Promenade Expansion is paying a measely $400,000 dollars for parking. A parking spot in the proposed library deck costs $40,000 dollars without factoring in the cost of land. Thus we have a potentially 100,000 sq. ft. building that needs approximately 400 spots only paying for 10. The taxapayers will be paying for the other 390 spots in full to the tune of $15,600,000.

If you want all the documentation and full analysis, please go to the State of the City thread or here is the link to it and read my post:

http://blogs.suburbanchicagonews.com/newsblog/2009/01/state_of_the_city.html

SHELDON!!
You're off your med's again. Downtown merchant's arn't out to get get you...
Where would taxpayers be without the revenue stram created by the downtown young boy?

11-2E-4: PAYMENT IN LIEU OF PROVIDING PARKING:

1.For properties that will be granted the ability to develop with a floor area ratio greater than that allowed by right through the underlying zoning district, the property will be required to pay a fee equal to the cost per parking space for each parking space required for the additional development.

2.The "per parking space fee" will be determined by the actual "per parking space" construction costs associated with the city's most recent public parking structure. This fee will be adjusted for inflation to account for the anticipated cost of future development of a parking space. The adjusted cost will be based on the latest information from the ENR (engineering news record) to determine the true anticipated cost per parking space. These fees will be paid to the city of Naperville prior to the issuance of a building permit.

3.Any payments received by the city through this payment in lieu provision will be reserved by the city in an escrow account (trust and agency fund #618) for future downtown improvements. (Naperville Ord. 02-47, 3-19-2002)

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Moderator Chris and Councilman Bob,

I really think the City Council was taken advantage by the Brestal Law Firm or whichever Law Firm represented Dwight Yakley in the Promenade Addition.

The library deck will cost about 40k a parking spot without factoring in the price of the land.

Even if you go with the Van Buren addition it cost $9,007,950 for 317 parking spots to build not including the cost of land. This is a little less than 30,000 dollars a parking spot.

If the Promenade Expansion is contributing 400,000 even at the old rate and not the new anticipated rate, it is only contributing for the cost of 13.33 parking spots. How is this possible for a 3 story building that may have 100,000 sq. ft. of retail and office space. A Hugo's Type Restaurant with 4500 sq. ft. of retail space according to city ordinances requires 10 spots per 1000 sq.ft or 45 parking spots.

I am sorry but anyway you slice this Promenade Expansion, the taxpayers are subsidizing it with their hard earned tax dollars. I think it is very unfortunate that our city council would allow the taxpayers to subsidize a wealthy developer to the tune of 15-20 million dollars in parking subsidies.

I can only pray and hope the stormwater for these Promenade Buildings were also not subsidized. Once the word gets out we are subsidizing a man worth a 100 million, everyone will want a subsidy from the City of Naperville for any development built in this town. If we continue on this path of subsidies, we will eventually have to file for bankruptcy. Here we are a city with an operating deficit of $11 million and we are subsidizing mult-millionaires. Honestly, I am shocked with the behavior of our city officials and city council members. I would at the least expect more DUE DILIGENCE before giving hard earned taxpayer money away to multi-millionaires.....especially in this depressed economy. The worst since 1929-1933 depression.

We are beginning to resemble the US Government. They bailed out Wall Street firms and in turn the firms took the billions and gave it out to their executives in end of the year bonuses. What a joke? Does Naperville want to be a joke too?

Totally support Kirk with the recall move,provided it meets scrutiny of reformillinoisnow.org commission. Any new legislation should be viewed and re-viewed very carefully by non-combine experts in the field. We have a opportunity in the Sucker state,this has never happened before. The COMBINE lost the gov. chair$$$ checkout reformillinoisnow.org next meeting feb 5th.

Moderator Chris,

I think I exposed something very serious with the Promenade Expansion subsidization of parking. A very costly subsidization worth up to 20 million and sold for 400,000 to a very wealthy, able and viable man. He bought his parking for 2.5 cents on the dollar. Can you imagine that, Moderator Chris?

I would like to ask you if you are going to EXPOSE this impropriety in your print edition where 16,800 readers can read about it. As you know this Blog Site may only have 100 bloggers and not nearly as influential as your established, reputable and very well read newspaper.

Let us see what the reaction of the residents would be if they find out the DOWNTOWN is being subsidized to this HUGE EXTENT by the residential taxpayer.

If your reporters are very busy, I would be happy to write the article and give you full powers to edit the article in any way you please or seem fit. I could write the article in 15 minutes. A good and experienced reporter should be able to write it in 10 minutes using the information I obtained from your archives and the City of Naperville web site that I have already posted on your Blog Site. If you want me to provide the links from the city's web site, I would be happy to do it for you.

The pain of the subsidization of the DOWNTOWN has become unbearbale to my neighbors, my friends, non-downtown businesses and just about everyone who lives in Naperville including myself and family. I believe you live in Naperville, Host Chris, therefore you are also subsidizing multi-millionaire Dwight Yakely with 400 dollars of your hard earned tax dollars. Why are you not angry?

Host Ted who lived in Joliet seemed angrier than you at times about residential taxes even though they did not effect him. He was sympathetic to us Naperville taxpayers.

Please help us out! Only if you expose alleged improprieties and corruption at City Hall will they ever stop. Even the ordinaces written to heavily favor the downtown landlords are broken and violated as soon as they are written. Can you imagine they reduced the Promenade Expansion in-lieu-of parking fee from $1,200,000 to $400,000 and it was not even reported in the NAPERVILLE SUN to the best of my knowledge and recollection.

I hope Councilman Bob follows through on this story and provides additional evidence of wrongful subsidization. On the other hand, Dwight Yakely appears to be a good friend of CM Bob and he may choose to recuse himself from this unconsionable and unimaginable fiasco. Thus the burden might fall on the Sun if it truly wants to be an investigative watchdog newspaper. Of course, the Sun has a right to choose to be a tabloid paper. But you can not be both. It is my understanding from previous Sun officials that the Sun does not want to be the local tabloid. Correct me if I am wrong!

Your deafening silence on this very important issue that involves all Napervillians is disturbing me. Please let us hear from you or someone at the Sun. My thanks in advance to you, Moderator Chris.

I will pass your idea on to my editor. If she thinks there's something to the story then I'm sure we'll look into it.

Moderator Chris,

Thanks for your consideration in passing it on to the Editor. I believe she will think there's something to the story when she looks into it. I believe the Naperville Sun will generate a lot of goodwill with its readers and Naperville taxpayers as they develop a better understanding as to how their hard earned tax dollars are being squandered on the very rich, famous and very well-connected in this town.

Hopefully, Councilman Bob can prove to be a great source to your editor or editor. He seems aching to break away from the well entrenched establishment practices that is making this town more and more unaffordable to live in such as for that retired veteran who posted on another thread. My heart goes out to this veteran and I hope we can keep him in Naperville. HE FOUGHT HARD FOR OUR FREEDOM AND WE NEED TO FIGHT HARD TO KEEP NAPERVILLE AFFORDABLE FOR HIM AND EVERYONE ELSE WHO LIVES IN THIS TOWN.

If we subsidized Dwight Yakley and the Promenade Expansion for a 50% reduction from 25 million for parking requirements to 12.5 million, I would not be complaining. I understand there are benefits such as sales tax revenue from his future tenants. But to subsidize this parking to the tune of 24.6 million dollars is UNCONSCIONABLE! It screams CORRUPTION! It is a SCAM JOB on the TAXPAYER! Each and every residential taxpayer is contributing $492 dollars to subsidize the parking for this ONE PROJECT and this ONE WEALTHY DEVELOPER assuming 50,000 homes in Naperville.

We have already contributed similar large amounts for his first 2 projects which include the Barnes and Nobles Building and the Main Promenade. If the project finances were not viable as he alleges, he could not come back and build a new building every few years. Did the city council review his financial statements to check on the viability of his former projects? I will bet you any amount of money they did no DUE DILIGENCE and simply took the word of his well connected infamous attorney.

Again, my heart felt thanks to you Moderator, for caring to pass it on to the Editor. I can only pray and hope she decides to do a story as this fiasco borders on outrageousness of fiscal accountability and responsibility by our City Officials.

• Recall Amendment inc US Sen. and Reps: A+

• Transparency in Springfield: A+

• Prisoner and felony arrest DNA Database: A+

• RT 59 Expansion: C- unimaginative

• Register all Gang Bangers in the same data base as child sex offenders, single parent 13 year olds are their target recruiting market, sex and alcohol are typical inducements: ?

Note: USA today reported a few days ago that 80% of all crime in the USA is committed by gang members, now numbering between 900K and 1MM on approx a 5-10% growth rate nationally.

• Pass legislation similar to California's allowing citizen referendums just like California's: ?

Note: Currently it is almost impossible to get citizen referendums on the ballot in Illinois, in the restaurant business this would be called "you eat it the way we serve it", which is what Illinoisans have been eating for a very long time.

By Naperville Sun editors on February 2, 2009 2:48 PM
I will pass your idea on to my editor. If she thinks there's something to the story then I'm sure we'll look into it.

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By Naperville Sun editors on February 2, 2009 11:31 PM
I was reading your posts more carefully to determine if I think there's a story there and I just don't see it.

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Moderator Chris,

I feel I am getting a mixed message. Did you make a final decision that there is no story regarding the Promenade Expansion needing 310 parking spots and only paying for 10?

Or is that just your opinion and the Editor will make the final decision?

I feel very strongly you have a great story when a developer is subsidized to the tune of 14.6 million dollars by the residential homeowners for his parking needs. I really think you should let the taxpayers decide if we have an issue or not here by running the story. I provided hard core facts obtained from the Sun Archives, Council Minutes, CM Bob and the City of Naperville Web Site.

I hope you encourage the Editor to do a story. It will be a SHOCKING STORY. Thank you.

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

PS: If you want to increase subscriptions and readership, you need to be hard hitting and expose improprieties at City Hall when you see them. I was around in those old days when your newspaper had 22,000 circulation with half the current population and I believe a main reason for your very high circulation were those Napergate ads that were exposing what the Naperville Sun was unwilling to expose. If your paper is hurting as has been suggested, maybe it needs to change course and stop using kid gloves on City Officials who abuse taxpayer money. Only when you nice folks in the Sun put on the boxer gloves will you see your circulation reverse course and readership increase. Most tabloid papers eventually fail as readers get bored. I would hate to see that happen to the Naperville Sun since I have been reading the Naperville Sun for decades and decades.

No, I don't think there's anything worth pursuing in this story. I don't think your numbers are correct. As you yourself noted, no one else seems to see a problem either. I think you believe what you say but I think you are wrong.

Moderator Chris,
I think no one else sees a problem here because there is no one blogging on this issue but you and I. As much as I enjoy blogging, your blog site needs a larger pool of bloggers and viewers who have time to be deeply involved in city issues.

There really is a BIG STORY here. You would be wise to run this story and tie it into the blog site and you will see all H$LL break loose as this is a HUGE STORY milking the residential taxpayers while they are trying to make ends meet.

My numbers are accurate. CM Bob who we all trust states this 62,095 Promenade Expansion is paying only $400,000 for fees-in-lieu of parking. The Naperville Sun reported that the library deck will cost $19,900,000 to build and will provide roughly 500 parking spots. That is a cost of 40k per parking spot.

This developer, Moderator Chris, is being allowed to pay for only 10 parking spots when he needs 310 parking spots. It is OUTRAGEOUS! It is UNCONSIONABLE! It is MINDBOGGLING!

He is being subsidized to the hilt with taxpayer money.

While you think this is a non story, when this story gets out, it will BLOW UP IN THE FACE OF THE NAPERVILLE SUN.

City Officials are living on borrowed time with their horrific policies and actions. No one is checking on them. If and when the Napergate Man or someone like him comes around, this town can be EXPOSED in unimaginable ways. Who knows maybe one of the council candidates running for election will decide to take on the city and expose DEVELOPER SUBSIDIES at taxpayer expense. I am sure he will win if he does his homework and shows some bravery.

I am sure when Original Joe comes back from his vacation he will understand what I am talking about. He seems to think "out of the box" and does not appear to be constrained to what city officials feed us.

Chris I hope you're ready to get EGG ALL OVER YOUR FACE as you pass up the STORY OF THE CENTURY here! Can you PLEASE release a special edition of the Sun that is nothing but parking lot and Israel outrage? The squeaky wheel needs some grease!

How about a story on blog-induced psychosis?

Councilman Bob,

You mentioned the Barnes and Nobles building also owned by Dwight Yakely only had to pay 100,000 in-lieu-of-parking requirements.

Since it cost 40k for a parking spot in downtown Naperville Parking Decks this amounts to only 2.5 parking spots for this very busy and magnificent building. Even if a parking spot only cost 20k when this structure was built, that would be only 5 parking spots equivalents.

It just seems this developer and his very well connected and famous attorney are taking advantage of Naperville taxpayers. I think that is unfair and unjust.

Please raise this issue with the City Council.

The Naperville Sun is on record stating they don't see a problem. Maybe I will write a letter to the local Chicago Tribune reporter to see if he/she sees the problem as I am seeing it, if the Sun does not reconsider. Sometimes a second opinion is needed and a good idea just like when seeking medical advice.

I am still hoping the Naperville Sun rethinks their position and sees the problem that is as large as the ocean is deep. I guess in this world sometimes you only see what you want to see and you develop blindness to what you don't want to see.

We are talking about a massive fleecing of the residential taxpayers to overly subsidize well connected developers. How is this not a story?

I watched the city council meeting tonight. It was interesting how they are debating every employment position due to an $11.5 million budget deficit. I guess 40 or 50 employees lost their jobs or will lose their jobs shortly.

All this could have been avoided if City Staff and the City Council charged the Promenade Expansion the proper amount for its parking. That being 15 million dollars instead of 400,000 dollars. If this developer paid this $14.6 million he owes in lieu of 300 parking spots he did NOT provide, we would have a $3.1 million budget excess instead of a deficit of $11.5 million.

If the developer had paid up his fair share, no employee in the city would have lost their job. There are laid off city employees struggling to feed their families, while our City Staff and City Council help the rich get richer in this town at their expense. I am sure no big shots in the city got laid off. Just the hardworking employees at the front line who provide all our services to us.

Well, hopefully the rest of the city employees will wake up before the sleepy Naperville residents wake up. If they don't wake up and allow their bosses to continue subsidizing well connected wealthy developers, they will also lose their jobs in this severe economic crisis.

Promenade Building being Subsidized and City Employees Paying the Price sound much like the same person. They also both sound like Eggs on their Faces, a certain Anonymous poster, and the now silent BHO. The message gets discarded with the games and craziness.

If this makes you so outraged, why didn't you go speak at the city council meeting? I really think you are missing a vital step in raising awareness about something... that step being action beyond whining anonymously on the internet.

You could have spoke to the council during the public forum. Anyone can. All you have to do is write your name on a piece of paper. You could have then asked all of these questions directly to the council instead of begging Chris to launch some kind of investigation or hoping Councilman Bob responds to one of your rants.

40 or 50 people losing their job and a 300 parking spaces have you so worked up that you post constantly here, often late at night, in every thread, responding to yourself if no one responds to you, and yet you can't be bothered to walk up to the podium at a city council meeting?

Amazing.

I must admit, this fits the Napergate manifesto perfectly. Rant and rave anonymously all day and night online, do nothing but whine, and most importantly, cross your fingers someone else does something about it.

I'd really like to hear your excuse as to why you have time to watch city council meetings (and post here endlessly), but lack the guts to do anything beyond post on a blog few people read under the guise of several snarky names. This of course is assuming you actually care this deeply about these 300 parking spots, and haven't just moved on to a new gimmick to troll with after your anti-Israel flame-bait lost its luster in the other thread.

Actually, someone should look at the parking deal for the building that replaced the lamp store across the street from Walgreens on Main St.

A few days after the City Council gave them their parking spaces virtually for free, the owners of the building (If I recall correctly this was including our most famous law firm) sold the building at a substantial and extraordinary profit.

This proves the direct connection between gifted parking spaces and wealth transfer from the taxpayers to developers approved by the City Council and recommended by City Staff.

If memory serves me correctly, this one could be valued at 50 spaces at $40,000 each. Someone really should do the homework on these.

To avoid the appearance of conflict of interest, I wonder if the editor should get an outside council or ombudsman to render a judgment on whether this issue is worthy of investigation and print.

50x40,000=2,000,000 wealth transfer.

Anon,

I was not aware of the transaction you posted. Can you provide more details? However, I don't doubt you.

I believe the Brestal Law Firm is very well connected and gets its clients subsidies at the expense of the residential taxpayers. Eventually, this will all blow up. Unfortunately, this blog site no longer has the viewers it once had so the City is not running for cover yet....but they will eventually run for cover.

I don't read the Tribune, but I am trying to find the name of the reporter who covers Naperville. Maybe, he would look into it since the Sun seems to think there is no problem with the Promenade Expansion paying for 10 parking spots when it needs 310 spots. It really is mindboggling the extent we are subsidizing. The Promenade Expansion and Dwight Yakely stiffed the taxpayers out of 14.6 million dollars. How in the world could this not be the story of the year? Evidence indicates he probably stiffed us on his 2 other magnificent buildings downtown with the legal assistance of his buddies at City Hall. The cronies at City Hall wrote ordinances that would allow him to stiff us. And when he was not happy with these generous ordinaces his lawyer got the City Council to stiff us to the tune of an additional 67% for his parking fees. Amazing Grace! How can anyone in this town tolerate this? It is beyond comprehension.

His buildings are beautiful and enhance the downtown undoubtedly. They are obviously viable and profitable buildings when you factor out depreciation which is a cash flow generator without disclosing profit. His buildings undoubtedly have positive cash flow. If his buildings were not viable he would have not built a second or third and maybe he even owns a 4th or 5th building that I do not know about. God Bless the man. But if we are paying for his parking requirements, he is not playing fair and square. He is enriching himself at our expense.....taxpayer expense!

Did Mr. Yakely do anything criminally wrong?

Absolutely not! He just took advantage of an incompetent City who gives away the barn and the horses for nothing. He took advantage of an incompetent city council who blindly rubber stamps anything Mr. Brestal puts before them. He took advantage of a sleeping press in town which is unwilling to hold anyone accoutable for the squandering of taxpayer money.

I am not going to fight this battle by myself. I am no Napergate Man willing to spend hundreds of thousand of my personal money to expose corruption and improprieties in City Hall. I will spread the word. I will let my alarm go off and hope the residents wake up. But if my fellow taxpayers will not join me, I will just pay my additional 300 dollars this year that will appear on my real estate tax bill to Dwight Yakely and the Promenade Expasnion. Apparently, Moderator Chris is going to pay his 300 dollar to Dwight Yakley. And the editor of the Sun if she lives in Naperville is also going to pay her 300 dollars to Dwight Yakley. The man is worth over 100 million dollars because each of us is willing to give him 300 dollars or whatever amount every time he builds a structure downtown.

Even Councilman Bob came on here and admitted we subsidized the Promenade Expansion to the tune of 67% for its parking needs? Why? Because it has some benefit to the City. Every shopping center built anywhere in Naperville has benefits to the City. Why not pay for the parking of every landlord and business in town and really bankrupt the residential taxpayers? Why not, Councilman Bob?

Hopefully when a few more taxpayers wake up and read this blog site, the Naperville Sun will decide to hold the City of Naperville accountable for squandering taxpayer money to the clients of the very well connected Brestal Law Firm over nearly 30 years. Our hard earned tax funds are not Niagra Falls and are drying up.

Why should the editors hire anyone to render any sort of judgment on where the issue is worthy of investigation and print? If the editors don't feel it will sell enough newspapers to make it a financially intelligent decision, they won't do it. If the multi faceted blogger thinks that laws have been broken, perhaps they should contact the Attorney General's office or the Dupage County Prosecutor about the issue.

Anon

50 X 40,000 = 2,000,000 is WEALTH TRANSFER

300 X 40,000 = 12,000,000 is WEALTH TRANSFER

Both do not factor in the cost of land which is additional WEALTH TRANSFER.

How many transactions do we not know about that are also WEALTH TRANSFER?

CM Bob slipped up and admitted the Barnes and Nobles Building only paid a 100k fee for parking. That amounts to 2.5 parking spots at today's rate structure. That is a joke. When was the last time anyone ever saw less than 50 people at Barnes and Nobles. I assume 20 come in each car. And what about the 20 employees. Do they land in helicopters on the Chicago Ave Deck and not need parking?

Please Moderator Chris investigate this story as ANON suggested. As he stated get an outside council to give you an opinion on this story. Check with Sun-Times officials who specialize in Chicago corruption. Our city officials are 10 times worse than Blagojevich. Where is US Attorny Partrick Fitzgerald when you need him to investigate corruption? Maybe I should give one of his assistants a buzz and tip them off about these improprieties if the Sun won't do its duty to the residents of this great city. I am thinking about it. CEO Pamela Davis was not afraid to rat corruption out. Why should I or anyone else be afraid to rat alleged corruption out in City Hall?

This is a HUGE STORY. It is a fleecing of the Naperville Taxpayers.

It is a story worthy of CBS 60 minutes or ABC 20-20.

Has the editor rendered an opinion yet, Moderator Chris?

Keep in mind all my data came from the Sun Archives, CM Bob, City Council Minutes and the Naperville Web Site. Not one person has refuted my information.

Not even CM Bob who appears to be hiding after stating this was an issue worth discussing or debating. I guess his buddies at City Hall got a hold of him and told him he better muzzle up....he better hush up. That he is slipping too much. Well it is a little too late as he let the rabbit out of the hat when he slipped. I don't see him coming back any time soon to slip again until he buys some weather tested boots and fastens those boot staps very tightly.

Loose lips sink ships. CM Bob's loose lips may have given us a once in a lifetime opportunity to sink the city ship. Now let us wake up my fellow residents and do our duties before this ship sinks us.

Yes, I told her. No, we don't find this story interesting. People pitch story ideas all the time. Sometimes we decide to write about them, sometimes we don't. We aren't interested in this. Accept it.

Ugh, Fed Up With The Noise... do you have any idea how difficult contacting someone would be for our dear friend Anonymous? I mean, he'd have to reach for his phone, dial some numbers, hold it up to his ear, decide which character of his he is going to play, then speak to whoever answers...

Why bother doing that when you can just belt out a lengthy diatribe about the good ol' boys club running the city and rolling the taxpayer over the coals then post it on a blog only a hand full of people read?

If he contacted anyone and actually got something done... what would he do with all his time having nothing to complain about?

I accept your verdict but it saddens me.

At least you are letting us blog about it and maybe the right person will see it who has the power to do something.

Maybe there is a prosecutor who lives in town who reads this blog site.

Maybe a Tribune reporter reads your blogs site.

I will remain hopeful and pray we get the break we need to expose improprieites in City Hall.

Sometimes persistence can pay off.

I would really like to hear Original Joe's opinion on the matter as he seems to be a brilliant no nonsense person.

YOU have the power to do something. You choose to complain here instead. If anything you are saying is true, contact the Attorney General or the County Prosecutor. Speak at a city council meeting. Make some phone calls. Send some emails.

Once again you've chosen quite possibly the most ineffective way to get anything done about "causes" which you allegedly so passionately care about. Can you seriously not come up with something more proactive to do about this "problem" of yours than just post on a blog site a few people read and keep your fingers crossed someone does something about it?

Seriously?

300 parking spots are keeping you up at night, but you can't muster the motivation to do anything other than hope someone else does something? What planet are you from where this is how they teach you how to solve problems?

My mind is blown.

Promenade Building being Subsidized on February 4, 2009 2:28 PM
Please Moderator Chris investigate this story as ANON suggested. As he stated get an outside council to give you an opinion on this story. Check with Sun-Times officials who specialize in Chicago corruption. Our city officials are 10 times worse than Blagojevich. Where is US Attorny Partrick Fitzgerald when you need him to investigate corruption? Maybe I should give one of his assistants a buzz and tip them off about these improprieties if the Sun won't do its duty to the residents of this great city. I am thinking about it. CEO Pamela Davis was not afraid to rat corruption out. Why should I or anyone else be afraid to rat alleged corruption out in City Hall?

This is a HUGE STORY. It is a fleecing of the Naperville Taxpayers.

_________________________

"Anonymous", back when you were pretending to be all of the Napergatians, and then when you were BHO, Caroline, "Anonymous" and now with the "clever" catch phrases, you never did anything other than write and complain about what everyone else should do. You then proceeded to criticize them for not following your wishes.

You challenged the moderator to prove you were not the entire Napergate group and he called your bluff and proved you were at least 50 people. Later, you thanked and commended him for allowing you to state your opinion, and now you are back to criticizing him and threatening to bring this "groundbreaking story" to someone else. I really don't understand why he puts up with you other than to say he's a more tolerant moderator than I would be.

Once this topic falls off the main page you will move on to the next topic as you always do, and start all over again with unfounded accusations and calls for action by anyone other than yourself.

Keyboard Rambo,

Not only is your mind blown....your mind is fried...your wires are crossed....your bearings are loose.

I have learned a lot on this blog site. This matter may or may not be illegal. But one thing for sure, it is a fleecing of the taxpayers.

If it is a legal fleecing of the taxpayers, publicity is needed to throw those in office out of office. To do this you need media help or someone with deep pockets like the Napergate Man to inform the voters and taxpayers. Since I don't have the big bucks to publicise this case, I have to wait and hope someone comes along with big bucks since the local media is unwilling to EXPOSE the fleecing of the taxpayers.

You can not go public with a case like this until you have all the facts straight. This blog site helps me accumulate the facts. CM Bob has been very helpful. The Naperville Sun archives have been helpful. The City Web Site has been very helpful. Watching the city council meetings have been very helpful. Anon has been very helpful. I am arming myself for the day when I choose to do what I believe will be helpful to expose city improprieties that may be legal or illegal.

The problem we have here is those who are allegedly corrupt made rules and laws to support and protect their corruption. It is hard to bust their corruption because they legalized it. Who writes the ordinaces in this town? You guessed it. The city council! Who is giving the Promenade Expansion all these breaks? You guessed it the city council! I know you don't like this word, but we have a conspiracy here and conspiracies are hard to bust. But they can be broken and exposed. Anon earlier today provided some information to show there is a pattern of abuse and not an isolated incident of abuse.

I am working towards a goal, Keyboard Rambo. I managed to write 3 letters in less than an hour earlier today while trading stocks. I am not consumed by this blog site as you state. I am using it to learn and gather information in my spare time. I am sorry you need an hour to write your one sentence blogs. But when you mind has been blown as you stated sometimes those are the consequences. You should be thankful you can still put together a sentence with your loose bearings and fried wires.

What purpose do you have on this blog site? I have ignored you for a while now in an attempt to stay focused. You keep coming back looking for a battle with me or anyone else by simply attacking the messenger. You are obviously a trouble maker looking for a rise or high or something. You have no agenda or purpose in this world.

I am glad you know your mind is blown. Someone should have blown it up a long time ago. It is useless and serves no purpose on this earth. Now please get a life instead of devoting your time to personal attacks.

The moderator is obviously a witness as to who starts these nonsensical attacks. Unfortunately, he will let you run your mouth for a while and then tell you to shut up like he did last time. Is that where you want to take this? Do you want him to tell you to shut up again like a little kid? Why don't you grow up and stop acting like an immature dumb fool on this blog site? Focus on the issues as the Moderator has told you repeatedly. Do you not recall him telling you 2 weeks ago that this blog site is not about me? Are you that dense that you can not remember what you were told 2 weeks ago?

If you do not want this to escalate as you have indicated in the past, Moderator Chris, why don't you please shut this idiot up early this time. He is nothing but an ignorant psycho.....a real loser.....a sicko....a mental midget!

I was actually able to go about five days without having to step in and halt fighting. It was nice. I knew it couldn't last. Just lay off now before you all get worked up again.

Please point out any personal attack that I made in this thread. Suggesting you do something instead of complaining here is considered a "personal attack" now? ...And I'm the one with "loose bearings".

Thanks for the laugh. :D

Keyboard Rambo,
The moderator said let us drop it, so let us drop it.

Councilman Bob,

You are known for your credibility and transparency on this blog site. We need your help with some answers.

This Promenade Expansion is 62,095 and needs approximately 310 parking spots according to the city codes I read on the Naperville Web Site.

My understanding is it cost $40,000 to build each parking spot not counting the cost of land. Can you please explain how City Staff and the City Council let this developer off the hook for only 400k or only 10 parking spots instead of 310.

This is a serious fleecing of the Naperville taxpayers to the tune of $14.6 million dollars, CM Bob, when you factor in the cost of land.

I do not believe it was your intention to fleece the taxpayers. I believe the City Staff mislead you and possibly some of your fellow council members. I believe the Brestal Law Firm also pulled one on you guys. Apparently, the message delivered in person to the City Council by the Napergate Man about Mr. Brestal was forgotten in the last decade.

Every taxpayer in town will be paying an average of 300 dollars extra on his or her real estate tax bill due to actions, you were mislead into supporting, CM Bob.

I think a committee needs to be set up to investigate how City Staff and the City Council gave Dwight Yakely what amounts to 300 parking spots free of charge. As you and I know the man is very wealthy and did not need a taxpayer subsidy.

Do you really believe he was not going to build this expansion if you did not reduce his subsidy even further? He had bought every house on the corner for top dollar in order to acquire the land. He was going to build whether you gave him the last 66.6667% subsidy or not. He was going nowhere. He is very viable and his project is even more viable. His prior 2 buildings were massive successes. Last time I drove by his buildings I only saw one vacancy. How could he possibly be not viable, the project not be viable or needing any taxpayer help? Basically, Bill Brestal bluffed you guys and you took the bait hook, line and sinker.

This nonsense of subsidizing the rich and connected must stop. Today, President Obama limited pay of CEOs to $500,000 if they applied for government help. He took the air out of the golden parachute deals that come with retirement. He demanded CEOs not buy or fly corporate jets if they are receiving Federal Aid. Kudos to him! It is ridiculous to think he runs this country for a 400k salary and some CEOs were making 20-100 million dollars in annual salaries and bonuses. The Home Depot CEO got a 200 million parachute upon being dumped for poor performance. That era is hopefully over.

I hope the City Council wakes up and also realizes this is a new era. Business as usual will not be tolerated. You and your fellow council members are living on borrowed time with your horrific actions of subsidizing the wealthy, connected and famous in this town. It has to stop before it escalates any further. Explanations have to be given to the residents, voters and taxpayers regarding your hand-outs to the rich and famous, of our hard earned tax dollars.

Many people are struggling in this town. They are not going to be happy paying an extra 300 dollars on their tax bill to Mr. Dwight Yakely just because the City Council members like him and consider him an ethical and moral man. I am sure he is. But that is no justification to give him our tax money to subsidize his parking spots that he needs to pay for in full.....all $14.6 million that he owes the taxpayers on this Promenade Expansion.

Maybe if he paid up on this last building we can forgive him for the debt he owes us for the Barnes and Nobles Building and the Original Promenade Building. Since this last building has not even had its foundation laid yet, we should have some leverage over him. Let us use the leverage and force him to pay up for his required PARKING SPOTS.

I hope the city can show further cuts like in pensions, etc. I was disgusted to learn the following information recently. The supposed stimulus plan should require governments to cut at least as much as companies are cutting costs today. One area of serious need for cutting is the government pension plans - now more attracitve than company plans. Wake up people!

Note the following article from http://www.championnews.net/index.php

No Recession for State Retirees - $100,000 Pensions Up 27% In 2008 To 3,195
Posted: January 29, 2009

By Bill Zettler

While most Illinois taxpayers' retirement wealth decreased markedly in 2008, retired Illinois public employees had no such problem. In fact almost all of them received increases of 3% this year even though pension investments cratered.

In fact the TRS (Teachers Retirement System) reported investment losses of $14 BILLION between June 2007 and November 2008. Of course that $14 billion is meaningless to public employees because they are liable for exactly none, zero, nada of the loss. All $14 billion has to be made up by the taxpayers through higher taxes.

Before this market crash we had estimated that Illinois taxpayers were on the hook for about $1 Trillion, or about $200,000 per Illinois household, over the next 37 years assuming a 6.5% investment return and health insurance increases of 9% per year (see here).

Now that number has to be bumped up to at least $1.2 trillion or $240,000 per household. So your retirement INCOME is going to go DOWN while your retirement TAXES are going to go UP. Public employees retirement only goes up, it can never go down no matter how bad the economic times.

The top two pensions in 2008 were over $379,000 and $368,000, giving Illinois the dubious distinction of having two retired public employees with pensions over $1,000/day.

That means these two former state employees receive a DAILY pension approximately equal to the average MONTHLY Social Security payment of $1,054. To give you an idea of what that pension is worth think about it this way: in order to receive $379,800 in interest each year you would have to buy a CD worth at least $7 million.

In 2008 the State of Illinois continued to make tens of thousands of pension millionaires out of retired public employees with the taxpayer picking up the tab. Here are some more disturbing pension facts:

In 2008 at least 3,195 former public employees had pensions of over $100,000, up 27% from 2007's 2,535. Here is the Top 100 list.
Four had pensions of over $300,000 and 40 had pensions of over $200,000.
In 2008, 56 former public employees had pensions greater than President Clinton. That is up a stunning 70% from 2007.

For the first time the average pension of the Top 100 exceeds $200,000.

For the first time you need a pension of at least $171,000 to even make it into the Top 100.

94 of the 100 were University or K-12 employees meaning they probably spent the majority of their careers working 9 months a year with tenure.

$100,000/yr public pensions is one of Illinois few growth industries. Since 2002 they have been growing at 25% per year. Based upon current growth rates we will be paying for over 10,000 $100,000 pensions by 2012.

Only one was a former politician, Arthur Berman.

Over 535 state pensions had MONTHLY payments greater than average Social Security ANNUAL payment of $12,648.

Breakdown by pension fund:
K-12 Teachers (TRS) = 1,250
University Teachers (SURS) = 1,235
State Employees (SERS) = 505
Municipal Employees (IMRF) = 91
Chicago Teachers (CTPF) = 114

Another way to look at it is the top pension is 30 times the amount the average Social Security recipient receives and 12 times the median wage of the average full time Illinois worker ($32,864).

Why do average people, most of whom do not have enough money for their own retirement, have to pay taxes to buy the equivalent of a $7 million CD for one public employee?

If these former Illinois Public employees had been on Social Security and a 401K program during their working years (like the rest of us) taxpayer liability for state employees retirement would be zero as opposed to $1.2 TRILLION taxpayers will have to pay in taxes over the next 37 years for public employee pensions and health insurance. That's $1.2 TRILLION ($240,000 per Illinois household) they will not have available for their own retirement.

Both fairness and finance demand pension reform in Illinois.

Wishing for more Expense Cuts,

Thanks for posting that article. I hope our city officials see it.

I think we have a pension deficit of $61.5 just for our police and firefighters. The city is doing nothing just like the state.

Maybe they will read the great article you posted and wake up.

Everyone should be on Social Security....both public and private employees. Let us get rid of this 1.2 trillion pension deficit nightmare.

It sucks when I will have 240k less in retirement money while public employees get more money despite the collapse in the value of their pension funds. I will not only have less money because I have to pay 240,000 to public employees retirement pensions, but also because the value of my 401k has been reduced to nearly half. It is like taking it on both chins.

The taxpayers are completely asleep and I have been trying to wake them up for nearly 3 years on this blog site but I can barely hear a pulse. I hope they wake up before we all go on life support.

If the Naperville Sun does not want to tackle the issue of subsidization of parking spots for weathly developers, I certainly hope they take on the issue that you just brought to the forefront.

I think the residents in this town are sleeping because the Naperville Sun is not doing anything to wake them up. The media can be powerful and can be a shaker and baker if it so chooses. Or it can hibernate with the sleepy residents and wake up when it is too late.

We slept while the CEOs of our national companies took our economy into a serious depression. I hope we don't continue sleeping while our City Officials take us to the cleaners for what little we have left in our bank accounts.

Moderator Chris,

Many people don't realize the power of the media.

As you know Obama had screwed up for a moment and was nominating tax cheat after tax cheat for his cabinet.

Suddenly the New York Times runs a scathing editorial calling him out for trying to nominate tax cheats to be approved by the Senate for his cabinet.

Within hours Tom Dashcle and another lady withdrew their nominations. The New York Times simply had to wake Obama up and remind him he ran for Change and Betterment. He was making a fool out of himself nominating cabinet members who could not file their federal taxes properly. He came to his senses and said, "I screwed up."

I think the Sun needs to wake the City of Naperville officials up once in a while. They need some tough love from you guys at the Sun. If they don't get it, they will destroy this beautiful town. Most local officials become corrupted if they are not watched and exposed by the local media. It is very common nationwide. Whey public officials are given too much rope, they always end up hanging themselves with that rope. The Sun is currently giving our City Officials way too much rope.

You can see how the State Officials got greedy and destroyed the pension system. Yes, Moderator Chris, it will cost you 240,000 dollars of your retirement money to support State and Public officials who screwed everything up. If you were 50 something instead of 20 something this would bother you more. The way things are proceeding, you will be lucky to get Social Security when you retire. All your savings will go to pay State and Public Official pensions that will cost you personally as well as everyone esle $240,000.

Right now the City is destroying the future of our children by saddling them with pension and parking costs they can not afford. At some time you are going to have to let City Officials know you are watching them and care. Once they know you guys at the Sun are watching them they will shape up.

As long as they believe you guys are insignificant and do not have the courage to call them out, they will continue to act like drunken sailors with our tax money.

Even if the Sun does nothing, the residents will eventually wake up when they can not afford their real estate tax bills. I expect a lot more to wake up come April when their real estate tax bills come in higher than last year despite the fall in the price of their homes by 30%. Most residents don't understand the complex intricacies of how the system works. But they usually wake up when they find their wallets are empty.

Councilman Bob,

I implore you, if you do respond to this ridiculous thread, please choose your words wisely. All of these long-winded rants and conspiracy theories are being posted by the same person who will scrutinize every word of whatever you post and find more meaning reading between the lines than a book club of bored house wives discussing the latest Dan Brown novel.

Before this, it was Israel ruining the world, now 300 parking spaces are ruining Naperville.

My goodness, I haven't been here for a while, even to read and now I remember why I stay away, nothing has changed, only the names have been changed to pacify the infamous and continue the psychosis.

I do like what KR says about actual action for change and problem solving rather than empty words without action. Thinking people will pick up your cause and staff and do your legwork for that cause simply because you sit at a computer and blog about what, in your opinion, people should do for YOUR cause will get you nowhere and will not further your cause. This creates an empty shell of existence and a whining attitude. Holding signs on a bridge for people to read while driving by does not create change like going to council meetings and such, allowing you to voice your concerns to those that have the ability to create policy and change policy in the real world and can bring about change for your cause. Watching a council meeting on television and then blogging complaints about it here will not communicate your thoughts and wishes to those that can bring about change. Adding value to society requires physical effort and real interaction with others to create a real product or action of value, not just empty words that no one pays attention to.

Talk the talk or walk the walk. The walk talks louder than the talk talks.

Is the same person commenting on here as multiples again? I hate reading people debate themselves.

Criminals usually start out small, or already have a wake behind them, the first time they are arrested. By all means collect the DNA at arrest.

Police followed know burglars, in a City 30 years ago, to see what they did and how they did it before arresting them. The burglars averaged between 10-15 home break-ins a day. Frequently the burglars were armed with handguns or large hunting knives.

CONTROVERSIAL MEASURE WOULD REQUIRE DNA SAMPLING AT ARREST

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/politics/2008704869_dna04m0.html

AnnE.,

The fleecing of the taxpayers is not my cause. It is the cause of every taxpayer in town.

I have exposed that City Staff and City Council subsidized one very wealthy developer named Dwight Yakley to the tune of 14.6 million dollars on only one of his 3 projects. He is building the Promenade Expansion which is 62,095 sq. ft. and was only required to have 10 parking spots or pay for 10 in lieu of not providing them. That is not only ludicrous but outrageous.

One parking spot in downtown costs 40,000 dollars to build not counting the ridiculous price of land. Dwight Yakley was only required to provide 10 parking spots instead of the 310 his large building demanded. He paid $400,000 for fees-in-lieu-of-parking. He should have paid $12,400,000 plus the cost of the land needed to build these parking spots in the form of a parking deck.

Because he was subsidized for 14.6 million dollars, each and every homeowner in Naperville got screwed about 300 dollars. Thus, this is not my cause but the cause of every Napervillian. I have done my share of exposing it. It is the duty of the 50,000 homeowners in town to wake up and protect their fleecing to the tune of 300 dollars by City Officials and City Councilmen in order to benefit an individual they like who used a very well connected attorney who has fleeced taxpayers in the past with his distorted facts and fiction.

As I said before, I am no Napergate Man willing to spend hundreds of thousands of my personal money(assuming I had it) to educate Naperville Residents. If the residents do not want to wake up, I will just pay my additional 300 dollars on my real estate tax bill like everyone else and move on. However, I was hoping the Naperville Sun would wake up the sleepy folks in Naperville. Unfortuantely, it chose not to. At least for now. I believe at some point they may change their minds. I have a right to hope.

In the meantime AnnE. you can be a fool and subsidize this mulit-millionaire with 300 dollars of your hard earned money. That is your perogative to be a fool and not care about your money. Of course when you make 150 dollars per hour for editing and copying, you may not think 300 dollars is a lot of money. But many unemployed residents may be offended that they have to susidize a wealthy developer worth over a 100 million.

If the Naperville residents would be told the truth and understood it, they would all be on my side. Unfortunately, the truth is being hidden from them by our local media who is afraid to challenge the establishment while in denial.

Most local media would rather have a cozy relationship with those in power than put them under the microscope. It has been this way for decades.

The regional media like the Chicago Sun Times and Chicago Tribune have always been willing to take on the City of Chicago and the State of Illinios and done a very good job.

The New York Times and Washington Post have done a good job keeping an eye on the Federal Governemnt. They exposed all the tax cheats Obama was putting in his cabinet and forced them to withdraw.

Unfortunately local media, not only in Naperville, but nationwide is pretty much spineless in tackling local officials. Local officals do what they please knowing they are not being monitored.

A decade or two ago, the Napergate Man blindsided the city and exposed tons of improprieties and corruption in his long series of Napergate ads. The city could not refute any of his allegations as they appeared mostly true. He took them to courts and even exposed them for running a Kangaroo Court in City Hall. The story is long and I will not even attempt to summarize it.

Right now with no one watching, the City Council has returned to its old ways of taking care of rich and well connected developers through the infamous Brestal Law Firm.

You guys can do all you want in trying to discredit me. You will never be successful in disputing the hard core facts. The Promenade Expansion that needed 310 parking spots was only required to provide 10 parking spots. It was a major fleecing of the taxpayer to the tune of $14.6 million based on facts from City Hall. I did not have to fabricate anything....just expose the facts.

Another individual posted a similar story on this thread. He verified that another developer fleeced the taxpayers for 50 parking spots in downtown Naperville across from the Walgreen's. I believe him but I am not familiar with that case so I have refrained from discussing it.

CM Bob came on here and admitted they only charged the Barnes and Noble Building 100,000 dollars for parking-in-lieu. Anyone with a half a brain knows that this is not adequate parking for a buildig of this size. It has been documented that 100,000 dollars in downtown buys 2.5 parking spots without counting the horrific cost of land.

It is ridiculous AnnE. that you come on here acting like a genious and have no clue that the Naperville Residents are being fleeced up and down the wazoo. If you want your wazoo fleeced that is fine. I am going to fight as hard as I can to make sure City Officials and City Council Members do not fleece my wazoo.

Promenade Building being Subsidized, or whatever you're going by today-

Do you know anything about the commercial development process? There's a lot more to it than just mixing concrete and laying some bricks. Generally speaking, developers behind projects as large as the Main Street Promenade will have multiple potential building sites in case things fall through with zoning, codes, other ordinances, the price of land, and a million other things.

For instance, during the real estate and building boom a few years ago I invested a large sum of money in a development group that was building a small complex of professional office buildings. We originally intended to build in Naperville, but it ended up being more cost effective to build in North Aurora in part because of how the city was willing to bend over backwards for us to build there. At the end of the project, we all made money, and North Aurora secured a couple dozen new businesses to pay taxes.

Downtown Naperville could have been one of many potential sites to build a multi-million dollar commercial building, and the city offering them reduced parking fees could have been what tipped the scale in our favor over Oakbrook, Wheaton, or any number of other potential build locations. As much as you want to believe the city did this because Naperville is run by a good ol' boys club full of pipe-smoking, top hat wearing fat cats patting each other on the back as they "fleece" the taxpayers... think again.

In a roundabout way, the city invested in luring the developer to build the Main Street Promenade here. If Naperville was competing with other cities for a large-scale commercial development project, they made a wise business decision in sweetening the deal for the development company who was bringing tens of thousands of square feet of retail space to the downtown area. What does tens of thousands of square feet of commercial space generate for the city?

Tax revenue, and potentially lots of it.

I'm willing to bet the investment the city made in forgoing the cost of the 300 parking spots will quickly be paid back (if it hasn't already) with the tax revenue generated from Chase, Hugo's Frog Bar, Coldwater Creek, and all the other businesses that have found a new home here. In 10, 20, 30, or more years do you really think the waived parking fees will even hold a candle to the money generated by taxing these new businesses? Do you really think it would have been a better idea for the city to tell these businesses to take a hike and go build somewhere else instead of giving a little to gain a large and secure source of revenue for the foreseeable future?

The problem is you're not looking at the bigger picture. For someone who claims to know so much about the stock market and investing you should be able to grasp the concept of what the city is doing here. ...Unless of course you were making that up too.

How about this. We ask our elected leaders to increase taxes on us so we can pay for parking insread of the SALES TAX that is generated by a vibrant downtown paying for parking and other things! Or would you rather be living in a town with a dead downtown that provides NO sales tax revenue and a government that is required to depend solely on real estate taxes for it's only income? No thanks. School district is already sticking it to me this way and boy are they gonna be hurting when all our home values tank over the next few years.
.
.
I'm okay with the city doing what they can to attract and maintain business in town. With the development comes...JOBS! How many unemployed bloggers would welcome a job right about now?
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Without any of this foresight we'd be ...Rockford.

So Anonymous [et all]...what are you actually doing about the fleecing of Naperville, besides watching the council meeting on television and whining and complaining about it here? Tired of talking to yourself on the "What Will the New Year Bring" thread?

Funny how you so quickly got riled up and defensive, when no [names] were mentioned in my post! A skunk smells his own hole first kind of thing?

Buh Bye kids, it's the weekend for me!

Promenade Building being Subsidized:

Here you go again wit the conspiracy theories.
In your posting on February 5, 2009 3:25 PM, you said the following:

"If the Naperville residents would be told the truth and understood it, they would all be on my side. Unfortunately, the truth is being hidden from them by our local media who is afraid to challenge the establishment while in denial."

"Most local media would rather have a cozy relationship with those in power than put them under the microscope. It has been this way for decades."

Now the local media is being hidden by the Naperville Sun or some other local media outlet? is this all apart of the secret cabal headed up by the shadow government and the uber wealthy that control all things in Naperville? I am sure there must be some big shots working at City Hall that are spying for the puppet masters that run every thing. If I were you I'd be very careful about posting here any longer. By now they must know who you are - after all, they are all powerful and their influence reaches every where. They are probably tracking your IP address now so that the black helicopters can drop over your home tonight while you are blogging at 2AM. Auditors are probably already getting ready to track your online stock trading, the NSA is likely monitoring your telephone calls and the ASPCA may have started an investigation of your dog. And by the way, the Mossad is watching and waiting.

Yeah, Anne E. I don't get it. Telling him to tone it down and people might take him seriously apparently counts as a "personal attack" and is worthy of him administering a "tongue lashing".

I think I'm beginning to understand why Anonymous likes posting here so much. No one in the real world would ever tolerate or entertain this type of "debate".

Keyboard Rambo,

Thanks for focusing on the message for a change.(By Keyboard Rambo on February 5, 2009 3:59 PM)

You mention Oak Brook. Oak Brook does not subsidize its developers. Oak Brook actually has no residential real estate tax(last time I checked). Retail and office subsidize the residential dwellings in that town. So, your example does not hold water. Maybe we should learn a thing or two from Oak Brook which has no real estate taxes for its residents.

I think it is important to work with deveolpers. But we can not give them the kitchen sink at the expense of the residential taxapayers. If these projects were paying their way, we would not have an $11.5 million operating budget deficit. We would not have a $61.5 million pension deficit.

To subsidize a local developer to the tune of $14.6 million dollars in parking for ONE PROJECT is giving him the kitchen sink and the bathtub of every homeowner in Naperville. That is not fair!

Dwight Yakley is a Naperville Resident who to the best of my knowledge only develops in Naperville. He had bought all the homes on the corner for top dollar before he even approached the city council for parking subsidies. He was not going anywhere but Naperville. He bluffed us into the massive subsidization of his very viable project.

He is building the Promenade Expasnion. He is not building the North Aurora Expansion or the Oak Brook Expansion. It is an addition to his existing building and he can not simply go to another town. In my opinion he would have certainly built whether we charged him $1.2 million or $400k for his parking-in-lieu-fees.

The $1.2 million parking fee we initially presented him only paid for 30 parking spots instead of 310. We already offered him an unbelievable deal that was heavily subsidized. Are we going to allow him to bluff us about viability and believe him? Yes, he is a shrewd negotiator who took advantage of our City Staff and City Council by reducing his parking requirement to 10 spots. Can anyone imagine 10 spots for a 61,095 sq. ft. 3 story building. That tiny sushi shop next to Jilly's is requred to have 10 parking spots if it is 1000 sq.ft. The city made the laws...not me. I am only asking the city to stick to its ordinances and treat all developers equally. Treating connected developers that use the Brestal Law Firm better than unconnected developers smacks of cronyism.

A heavily subsidized downtown does not generate revenue for this city. It is almost indisputed in cirlces through this town, that the downtown is subsidized to a great extent by the residential homeowners. I don't mind helping a little. But this is getting ridiculous.

Dwight Yakley has come back for thirds....not seconds. He would not be becoming back for more if he was not viable or his projects are not viable. He is creaming the taxpayers and then creaming his tenants by charging them 50 dollars a square foot while he avoids paying his fair and pro rata share for his parking needs and requirements.

Developers go to where there is demand for their projects. If there is demand, they will build without massive subsidies. If there is a true need for massive subsidies than maybe the market is saying the project is not needed for now. There are many vacancies currently in downtown. By subsidizing this developer, the owners of the properties with the vacancies in the downtown are being screwed....screwed royally may I add.

Is it fair that developers build on Ogden Ave or 75th St. without subsidies for parking, while the well connected landlords downtown build with ridiculous subsidies? Aren't they both providing sales tax and employment to our town? Why is one better than the other?

Allowing a developer to build the Barnes and Nobles structure with only 2.5 spots crosses all line of subsidization and sanity. Allowing him to come back and build the Promenade Expansion with only 10 parking spots also crosses all lines of reasonable subsidization and sanity.

These 2 buildings require a parking deck with approximately 600 spots. The cost of such a parking structure is nearly 30 million if you factor in 6 million for a few acres of land in downtown Naperville. There is no way under any circumstances we the taxpayers should be subsidizing one developer to the tune of 30 million dollars. I am sure we also probably subsidized his huge Main Promenade Building for parking to the tune of another 20 million. Hopefully, CM Bob will come on and give us the exact number for this building as he did for the other 2 buildings owned by Dwight Yakley. One has to give him credit for his honesty and transparency.

My guess is we have given Dwight Yakley over 50 million in free parking. With 50,000 homes in town, that means each one of us has given him 1000 dollars of our personal money so he can enrich himself. This smacks of unfairness and is a fleecing of the Naperville Taxpayer.

Once the word gets out, I have little doubt that the majority of the taxpayers will be behind me. Right now it is being kept a top secret by the print edition of the Naperville Sun.

I don't think you even read my post.

"By anonymous on February 5, 2009 3:59 PM

How about this. We ask our elected leaders to increase taxes on us so we can pay for parking insread of the SALES TAX that is generated by a vibrant downtown paying for parking and other things! Or would you rather be living in a town with a dead downtown that provides NO sales tax revenue and a government that is required to depend solely on real estate taxes for it's only income?"

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Eeeer Um, I hate to tell you this but the downtown consumes more tax money than it generates.

I don't have the exact number, but the downtown may account for a couple of thousand direct jobs. While all jobs have dignity, most of the Downtown ones are not likely to pay enough to afford a home in Naperville.

In the effort to get any business going there is a need for seed or venture capital, the Downtown is way past the point where the city should be putting in more then it gets out in tax revenue. Increasing the wealth of a few individuals may be the job of government, but it is not supposed to be.

By Anonymous on February 5, 2009 7:29 PM
"By anonymous on February 5, 2009 3:59 PM

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Eeeer Um, I hate to tell you this but the downtown consumes more tax money than it generates.

I don't have the exact number, but the downtown may account for a couple of thousand direct jobs. While all jobs have dignity, most of the Downtown ones are not likely to pay enough to afford a home in Naperville.

In the effort to get any business going there is a need for seed or venture capital, the Downtown is way past the point where the city should be putting in more then it gets out in tax revenue. Increasing the wealth of a few individuals may be the job of government, but it is not supposed to be.

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

Anonymous,

Very well said. I always felt I was not pushing forward conspiracy theories. I am simply pushing forward facts and those who seem to be in opposition are either naive or in cohoots with those being enriched by government.

By Anon on February 4, 2009 9:02 AM also seems to think there is a wealth transfer to certain connected individuals by government.

Maybe if a few more people can come on this blog site and express what they have seen, we can get the Naperville Sun to do a minor investigation of this wealth transfer of residential taxpayer money to the well connected establishment folks in town through the government they control.

And let us not forget the Napergate Man exposed this wealth transfer in the 90s to the residents in Naperville through his series of Napergate ads that reached 44. Yes, he succeeded in slowing it down but with his retirement, establishment folks returned to full throttle in enriching themselves at the expense of the hard working residential taxpayers.

If as you say Anonymous the downtown consumes more tax money than it generates, that means this $50 million in parking lot subsidies we gave to ONE WELL-CONNECTED DEVELOPER will never be paid back to the taxpayers. I believe you are right!

We may have lost our kitchen sinks and bathtubs to this one developer permanently. We will never see them again. I assure you of that.

Keyboard Rambo,
I read your post twice. I comprehended what you were saying.

I responded that your analysis is flawed based on factual evidence.

If as Anonymous is stating downtown consumes more tax mony than it generates, these subsidized parking spots will never be paid for. I believe even city officials are aware that the downtown consumes more than it provides in tax money.

Are you aware that we have an $11.5 million operating deficit? Are you aware that we had one last year before the economy collapsed?

Are you aware that we accumulated over $30 million in pension deficits when the Dow Jones BOOMED from 7500 after 911 to 14,100 in October of 2007? Are you aware that this pension deficit now stands at $61.5 million.

The facts indicate nothing is being paid for. We are getting further and further in the hole.

The reason is we are transferring the people's money to the well connected establishment folks in town instead of using it to take care of city business. If we did not transfer 50 million dollars to Dwight Yakley in parking subsidization for his 3 buildings, we would have a $38.5 million positive budget instead of being $11.5 million in the hole.

What don't you understand my friend? You can babble all you want but the facts speak for themselves and they are loud and clear. Hearsay will get you nowhere on this blog site. You will be called out as you are at this moment by 3 individuals in one day. And trust me many more will come and call you out.

Hopefully the Sun will write an article on this subject and tie it to this blog site. You will see how outraged the community will be.

I have a lot of faith in the Moderator and have confidence as he learns he will do the right thing and hold our City Officials and City Council Members accountable and responsible for the mess they have created in this town. The mess existed before the economy collapsed so let us not use the economy as an excuse.

I personally think CM Bob has found this kitchen too hot to deal with. I know he will be back but he has to prepare himself much better. Hopefully when he returns he can tell us how much the Main Promenade Building contributed in parking-in-lieu-fees. My ears are wide open. I will be holding onto my seat tightly until I hear.

If there is nothing wrong with what our city is doing, I expect CM Bob to be back defending our city. If he never returns, that could be a sign he ran for cover. Or maybe his buddies at City Hall told him you better lay low for a while. Only time will tell. I hope he returns. I have nothing but the utmost respect for him even though I may seriously disagree with him. One thing I can say for CM Bob is he would not be deliberately involved in enriching the establishment. I think he got conned and bluffed into voting against the taxpayers' best interest. Hopefully, it will be the last time he is mislead in such a manner.

PBS/Barack/Caroline, et al: You can change your name all you want but you always stick out like a sore thumb with your wacky conspiracy theories, half-baked facts, long winded novellas, name calling and insults, and even your embarrassing attempt at manipulating the moderator. Are you somehow going to tie Israel in to Naperville's parking 'issue' or is that last week's news? And with all due respect, are you supposed to be on meds?

Another Anonymous,

I am not on meds. I am extremely healthy. I work out every night between 930pm till 1130pm and that is why you won't find me blogging at that time. You will find me at Lifetime Fitness if you would like to meet me.

I have only seen a doctor once in the last 20 years from a torn muscle I got in a soccer game. The only medication I have ever taken in the last 30 years was a pain killer here and there for sports injuries.

Are you on meds? How many times have you seen a psychiatrist in the last 20 years? Once, twice or more???

I am here complaining about a developer who built a structure that needed 310 parking spots and was granted a waiver for 300 spots. This cost the taxpayers 14.6 million dollars. This is a fact....not a conspiracy.

Now really what is psychotic about questioning this issue that concerns every taxpayer in town. Every residential taxpayer is transferring 300 dollars of his personal wealth to Dwight Yakely, the developer of the Promenade Expansion, who happens to already be worth over a 100 million. And we the taxpayers just gave him another 14.6 million dollars of our money while having an $11.5 million deficit. That in my opionion is INSANITY!

This is a serious issue. It is obvious to me that none of you guys listen, hear or read. I dig up facts from the Sun and City Archives. I can back what I say. I give exact numbers and calculations. Links when necessary.

None of you guys attacking me seem to have a clue as to what is going on in this town. Seriously!

I do not attack anyone. I am always attacked first.

Show me where I ever attacked you AA! I don't know who you are, don't recognize your handle, and here you are asking me about meds. And pretty soon you will whine to the Moderator that I attacked you first....lol!!!

It is disappointing to me that the Moderator does not clearly see that I am the one being attacked for expressing my views. Today AnnE. came out of nowhere and attacked me.

I think these attacks are stupid and immature. If the Moderator does not want to stop them, that is fine with me. I can obviously handle myself even if attacked by a 100 losers. The only thing I would like is an acknowledgement from the Moderator that I do not start them. I usually let bloggers go for 5 days before I finally counter-attack.

I think we can have a much nicer blog site and possibly attract candidates and city officials to blog with us, if the Moderator would stop these nonsensical attacks that are always started by others.

Yes, the moderator has asked bloggers to refrain from attacks. They listen for 5 days and suddenly forget what the Moderator said.

There is a clear cut guilty party here, Moderator Chris. It is not me. I am trying to expose improprieties in City Hall. Two other people came on this site and agreed with me today. If the blog site had many more viewers, many more would agree with me.

It seems like the Moderator is siding with the majority possibly as a way to appease the majority and keep them blogging. I think he is making a mistake because this majority that is into personal attacks are chasing legitimate bloggers away who like to discuss and debate issues in a civil and mature manner.

Why would anyone want to come on this blog site and expose some improprieties at City Hall if 25 people are going to call him or her a pyscho? Sometimes I wonder if these 25 bloggers are City Officals trying to protect themselves and those who they enrich at taxpayer expense. They definately are making every attempt possible to smother and drown my message but failing miserably as I am much more persistent and determined than the whole herd combined.

I think you need to urge your bloggers, Moderator Chris, to debate and discuss my message and not ME. Ask them to refute my facts with facts instead of pyscho babble. Have them show me where I am providing misinformation. I could provide a link to everything I document on this blog site. What could this herd of attacking wolves provide?

NOTHING!

I get really tired of the constant discussion of who started it, who is crazy, what their motives are, etc. Who cares? You people don't have to like each other on here, but there's no point in this constant back and forth. No one wants to read it except the few people typing it. I often approve comments if there's an actual point somewhere in the other stuff, but soon I might have to start a zero tolerance policy. If that happens there's going to be a lot fewer posts approved. So I urge everyone, and yes, that means everyone, to take the high road. And let's not all reply to this post saying "the other guy is the one doing it, etc." I'm not interested. Goodnight. I'll see you at 11 a.m.

By Keyboard Rambo on February 5, 2009 3:59 PM
Promenade Building being Subsidized

Do you know anything about the commercial development process? There's a lot more to it than just mixing concrete and laying some bricks.

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Keyboard Rambo,

Since you have been involved in the commercial development procress researching Naperville and and building in North Aurora with a large sume of money, could you please shed some light on what an acre of land in downtown Naperville costs now and before the real estate bubble burst.

If possible give us an estimate for land across the street from the Promenade Building and another estimate for the Library Parking Lot.

I am not expert but my guess is an acre of land in downtown Naperville is in the millions.....at least 2 million.

If anyone else knows, please feel free to contribute. It would help me figure out the true cost of ONE parking spot in downtown Naperville. We know it is 40,000 dollars per parking spot based on city budgets for the library deck not including the cost of land. That estimate is a year or two old so it could be higher now due to inflatiion.

Thanks

I led a team that built a parking garage 2 years ago. This garage held 289 cars on three levels - all below grade (underground)- a much more expensive type of structure than an elevated parking deck. It was built on a highly constricted, difficult to access work site, using union labor in an eastern city that has higher construction costs than Chicago (approx 10-12% differential). The cost of that parking garage was approximately $43,000 per space. Due to the configuration of the garage, because of access restrictions, etc, the garage design was not as space efficient as it could have been, leading to higher costs as well (10-15%). The fact that the garage was underground probably increased costs by at least an additional 20% (increased excavation, sheeting and shoring, waterproofing, ventilation, and structural costs). When factoring the geographical differences and design inefficiencies into the cost, a similar sized garage, built in the Naperville area, could likely have been constructed for approx. $28,000 to $33,000 per space. This does not include land or engineering costs. Inflation over the 2 years at 3.5% per year would bring those numbers up to roughly $30,000 to $35,000 per space. Given the current economic climate and excess capacity in the heavy construction industry due to the recession, I would not think inflation would be a major cost factor at this time.

Councilman Bob,

The Promenade Expansion Building is 62,095 sq. ft.

The Promenade Main Building appears to be about 120,000 sq. ft.

The Barnes and Nobles Building appears to be about 68,000 sq. ft.

Together these buildings total nearly 250,000 sq. ft.

At 5 parking spots per 1000 sq. ft. required according to city code, these 3 buildings owned by Dwight Yakley need roughly 1250 parking spots.

At a cost of 40,000 dollars to build each parking spot plus an addtional 10,000 dollars for land for each parking spot, a parking spot roughly costs 50,000 dollars.

Altogether these buildings require $62,500,000 of parking costs.

We know Dwight Yakley paid $100,000 for parking at the Barnes and Nobles Building. We know he paid $400,000 for Parking at the Promenade Expansion. We don't know what he paid for parking in the Main Promenade Building but let us assume he was feeling generous and offered us $1,000,000 for that builiding in-lieu of providing parking spots.

We have a shortfall of $61,000,000 dollars for the parking needs for his 3 buildings. Do City Staff understand they gave this man $61,000,000 of taxpayer money? What formula are they using to compute the cost of parking? Why are they not using the numbers they provide publicly to the Naperville Sun for the cost to build the Library Deck?

As 2 other bloggers noted this appears to be a serious transfer of wealth from the struggling residential homeowner to an extremely wealthy developer on projects that were viable whether we subsidized him or not.

I intend on attending Election Forums and making this a major issue in this campaign by asking the candidates if they are going to continue supporting this horrendous transfer of wealth from the residents to the well-connected developers who use the establishment friendly Brestal Law Firm.

Based on roughly 50,000 homeowners in town, each homeowners has transferred $1220 dollar of his or her wealth to Dwight Yakley. Is that fair? Is that just?

Are his downtown buidlings returning this $61,000,000 of subsidization to the taxpayers in any form? My understanding is the downtown is receiving more tax revenue than it provides to the tax base. The downtown appears to be operating at a major loss despite the fact that we offered these huge subsidies to help build the downtown area.

While the downtown continues to drain the taxpayers, Dwight Yakley does not appear to be operating at a loss. He in my opinion appears to operating in a very profitable manner while we subsidize him. Instead of returning the money we subsidized him for his parking needs to the taxpayers, he decided to build a third building with the subsidy money we gave him. Not a building for the taxpayers but another one for himself while complaining about "viability" through the infamous Brestal Law Firm.

I really think, Councilman Bob, we have a very serious problem in this town with these BUSINESS AS USUAL tactics employed by top city officials. City employees are now paying the price. 46 employees have lost their jobs and more are about to lose their jobs. City residents are receiving below par service due to the unfortunate lay-offs of these employees. Police and fire pension funds are extremely underfunded to the tune of $61.5 million just for City of Naperville employees.

This can all be traced to the squandering of our money on downtown developers who are very well-connected to city officials and city council men. The people in elected office are not representing the residents in these city council meetings. They are representing the developers and the Brestal Law Firm.

The older residents in town were warned by the Napergate Man who ran 44 full page ads in the Naperville Sun to disclose these improprieties in the 1990s. We did not listen to him. Look at where we are now. It is our fault, the residents' faults, for not showing up in large numbers in City Chambers to challenge these subsidies. In his days, he would take 300 or 400 residents to Chambers and challenge the city council. He provided a watch dog service to this community and kept them under some kind of check. Who is checking on them now? No one! Certainly not the Naperville Sun, Daily Herald or Chicago Tribune who are struggling to stay alive in these dire economic conditions.

Why are we not challenging the City Council in large numbers? Why are we allowing the City Council to fleece us of our hard earned dollars? Why are residents willing to go into foreclosure without at least showing up to a City Council meeting and complaining about the high real estate tax bill that contributed to the foreclosure?

When a town develops its retail and office space properly, residents benefit down the road. They don't get taxed up the wazoo year after year after initially subsidizing the developers. When I tried to buy a home in Oak Brook a few years back, I asked the realtor about the real estate tax for the city. I was told there was NO real estate tax due to a viable retail and office base. And our city officials have the audacity to brag about our "low" taxes in town when other towns have no city real estate taxes on their Dupage Real Estate Tax Bills.

In Naperville there is no viable retail/office base except for the developers pocket book. They do extremely well while the taxpayers take it on both chins year after year.

I remember the Napergate Man getting in the face of the Mr. Bill Brestal during a break in a City Council Meeting many years ago and telling him the only thing he cares about is his WALLET. Mr Brestal was infuriated by the comment of the Napergate Man and said he loves Naperville and this is not about his wallet. Decades later the Napergate Man's comment ring loud in my ears. It should ring loud in every Naperville resident's ears.

Each and every Napervillian is beeing fleeced by one developer and his 3 known projects to the tune of $1220 on his/her real estate tax bill. Are you all going to remain sleeping and accept this injustice until the Sheriff comes to your home and evicts you because you can no longer afford your outrageous real estate tax bill? It is time to act my friends. We must seek CHANGE before it is too late.

The fleecing of the Naperville Taxpayers needs to stop immediately. It needs to be halted ASAP.

Thank you!

We've heard a lot about what each spot costs, but nothing about how much revenue each spot generates. Take the total # of spots available and divide it into the total revenue of the downtown district and that gets you a revenue per parking spot number. Also keep in mind that each spot is an ongoing annuity, i.e. the initial outlay of capital is a certain amount ($40K? I don't know), but each spot lasts for how many years with minimum maintenance so the 40K needs to be divided into the expected life time of the spot.

Take the amortized cost per spot (40K outlay / # of years usable) and divide this into the revenue to get a number - I would bet this number is positive meaning the spot generates more return than the initial cost? just a thought.

The typical useful life of a well constructed parking deck is 30+ years. Allowing for $250 per year per space for long term maintenance over that 30 year period, this would add $7500 to the "cost" of the space - putting the actualized cost of the space at somewhere between $35,000 and $40,000 dollars - or approximately $1200 to $1400 per year. If you average that cost at $1300 per year, this would then translate into $3.57, in excess of the operating expenses, per day per space in revenue to the community that would need to be generated to break even on each parking space space.

Been There_Built a Few and Anonymous,

Thank you both for your very respectful and enlightening comments.

One thing you are both forgetting is the interest cost of these parking spots over 30 years. Keep in mind since the City of Naperville only charged Dwight Yakley probably $1.5 million for 1250 parking spots that cost $62.5 million to build, they are required to borrow the money on the open market assuming they can in this tough economy.

General Electric and Goldman Sacks were able to borrow money from Warren Buffet at 10% annual interest rate last month. This month he loaned Harley-Davidson money at 15%. As we all know banks are not loaning money. They may loan some money to someone who does not need it...but that is about it.

Assuming the City of Naperville can borrow money at 10% from somewhere since banks are not loaning, the interest expense for this $61,000,000 cost for parking spots will be $131,714,717 over 30 years. This in essence more than triples the cost of each parking spot from roughly $40,000 to well over $125,000.

The city does not have any money. They are $11.5 million in the hole with the operating budget and $61.5 million in the hole with the pension funds. I doubt anyone would even loan them money. Not even Warren Buffet would be a fool to loan the City of Naperville any money due to its dire financial situation which borders on near bankruptcy.

Been There_Built a Few calculations seem very reasonable. They make sense but do not factor in the cost of land or the cost of interest since the City of Naperville does not have the money to buid these parking spots. One more reason they should have forced the developers to come up with the money. IF THEY CAN COME UP WITH MONEY TO BUILD 36 MILLION DOLLAR BUILDINGS, THEY CAN COME UP WITH THE MONEY FOR THE RESPECTIVE AND NECESSARY PARKING REQUIREMENTS.

These situations are very complex and always more costly than initially expected. As you may recall the Toll Authority promised us after a certain number of years the Toll Road will be paid for and the tolls would be eliminated. Guess what! They were doubled because maintenance was horrifically expensive and we all know they will never be eliminated. I believe these garages will have maintenance costs far exceeding what "Been There" has forcasted due to the devaluation of the dollar and certainty of inflation.

Maybe the city got screwed on the cost of parking spots, since "Been There" seems to know they can be built for around 30k a parking spot. Since they had plans of building a parking garage at the library for $19.9 million with 500 parking spots they pretty much agreed to pay 40k per spot not including the price of the land.

I suggest they contact "Been There" to see if he can build parking spots for 30k instead of 40k. That would save us a cool 5 million dollars. We need to save every penny we can. Did the City of NAPERVILLE not get the best bids possible to build this library parking deck? Why did they not get a bid from "Been There?" I am guessing he is a local guy or he would not be on this blog site. He seems to be a professional who knows what he is talking about. if nothing else, he can point City Officials in the right direction since he has been there and built a few.

Anyway one cuts it, this is truly a mess that the taxpayers are getting screwed on. Since I did not factor in interest cost, my estimate of $1220 that each taxpayer had to pay to developer Dwight Yakley was very low.

It is about 3 times my original estimate or about $3700 per homeowner. Thus the taxpayers are getting fleeced much more than I orginally thought. I do not believe the revenue that the downtown generates could ever pay for the cost and interest expense of these parking spots. I am almost POSITIVE.

I believe it could pay for their maintenance including repairs, lights, video cameras, elevators, etc. but never the original cost to build and interest expense.

Let us not forget that the revenue collected from downtown has to be used for many other things besides maintaining parking spots. Streets and sidewalks need to be repaired. Light poles need to be maintained. Snowplowing needs to be paid for. Christmas lights have to be put up. Someone has to pay for those 12 police officers who patrol downtown from May 1 to Sept 30 each year that in many cases are being paid OT rates approaching 75 dollars per hour. None of this is free and has to paid from sales tax revenue also.

No matter how you slice, dice or spin it the downtown is being subdized beyond levels of acceptability. We have an $11.5 million deficit mostly because of the downtown and the subsidization of the developers. Even last year when the economy was good we had a $5.1 million operating deficit if my memory is holding out. Please correct me Moderator Chris if I am wrong on this one since my memory seems to be blanking out on last year's budget.

I love the downtown. I think it looks beautiful. But the developers who were making money hands over fists should be paying for their own developments and respective parking in full. The taxpayers should not be subsidizing to this level. The subdization of one developer to the tune of nearly 193 million dollars for parking requirements is UNCONSIONABLE.

Again I plead with the Naperville Sun to run a story on this PARKING FIASCO. Let us wake up the residents and tell them what is going on. Let us see how they respond.

I am personally outraged. Even more so that I now added the cost of interest expense to the subsidized 1250 parking spots to ONE DEVELOPER. JUST ONE DEVELOPER! What about the rest of the developers? How much did we give them? One blogger claims we gave $2 million to the Northern Buidling developer. I have no personal knowledge on that case but if true, this is yet another travesty of justice. Another fleecing of the taxpayers if you will.

Main Street in downtown Naperville should be renamed Wall Street in order that we properly honor those who fleeced the residential taxpayers of their hard earned tax dollars.

The Promenade Buidlings should be named the Bernie Madoff Buildings as they seem like a ponzi scheme pulled on the City of Naperville and its 143,000 residents. The odds of getting a return from these buildings is as good as the odds of obtaining a return from Mr. Madoff if you invested your money with him. We have all been taken!

Good night! Thank you!

Seems to me that the numbers being discussed by Promenade Building being Subsidized are a bit skewed. Typically, funding for capital improvements such as parking garages, etc built by cities is raised through the sale of municipal bonds. These instruments typically have interest rates in the 4.5-6% range and are often tax free to the purchasers - making them an attractive investment.

Assuming a hypothetical 240 car garage was to be built at a cost of $40,000 per space (this includes construction, legal and engineering costs, the "cost of the garage would be approx. $9.6 Million. (Yes - I know that does not include land cost - this model assumes the city already owns the land and is not purchasing it). But assuming the city chose to use a standard 20 year mortgage to pay for the loan, At a 5% interest rate over a 20 year period, the interest paid on this garage would be approx, $5.6 Million - I used a pretty standard mortgage calculator to come up with the numbers. Extrapolating that to cover the 1200 parking spots in question would bring the interest to $28 Mil - a far cry from the $131 Million mentioned - but still a lot of money.

As for the cost of maintenance, I stand by my numbers. Even if you increase the cost at an annualized rate of 3% per year, over the 30 years, the cost per space per day increases to approx $8.70.

You dont seem to know how building incentives work for large buildings or buisness everyting the guy before posted about citys sweetining the deal to bring big builders to town is 100% correct they do this all the time in Chicago to get large Corp headquartes to build here in 50 year the Tax generated will make whatever incentive builders get look like chumpchange again this is very common no one is getting ripped off you just don't seem to understand the build process before posting again look up tax revenue generated then compare cost of parking it will be insignificant compared to long term tax income

Been There_Built a Few,

Well at least you acknowledge despite your experience of being there and building a few, you forgot to include the incredible interest cost related to these parking spots. You also acknowledge your were not factoring in the cost of the land. Even if the city does own the land which it does, there is an opportunity cost to that land. If it was not building a deck on that valuable land, it could sell that land for millions to another developer. Even to a developer who decides to build a private parking garage that he would charge fees for.

You never answered the initial question I posed, which is what you think 2 acres of land would cost in the downtown area near the Promenade? Please estimate if you don't have personal knowledge as you seem very well informed and very capable of a rough estimate.

I agree with you that underground parking is more expensive to build than overground parking. But there is no extra cost of land involved in underground parking while there is a huge cost of the land needed for overground parking. Thus overground is probably more expensive when you factor in the cost of land. BTW, that is why developers choose to build underground.....because it ends up cheaper due to the high cost of land in prime areas such as downtowns.

In ordinary times a healthy city can float bonds for 5-6% as you stated. But these are not ordinary times and the City of Naperville is not healthy financially. When Dwight Yakley was given his subsidization, money was not availabe at 5-6%. It was not available at all. It certainly would not be availabe to a city with an $11.5 million operating deficit combined with a $61.5 millon pension deficit on the verge of probable bankruptcy like many California cities who in fact already have filed for bankruptcy to get out of their unaffordable labor contracts and municipal bond obligations. Investors are not stupid and will not loan their money to a city in trouble. If they want their money in tax-free municipal bonds they will invest in cities with positive cash flows....not negative. Would you loan the City of Naperville money and risk losing your life savings if the City decided to file bankrupty as many cities nationwide have done. My guess is you would not as you appear to be a very intelligent and brilliant person who is very knowledgable especially compared to most people who have appeared on this particular thread to give their 2 cents worth.

I fully respect that you are attacking my facts and numbers instead of me personally. Something that rarely happens on this blog site. It is this kind of exchange that will bring us to the truth. It is the kind of exchange that will bring accurate numbers that the taxpayers can use in evaluating who their next batch of council members should be in the upcoming election.

Since the best that a very successful and established 105 year old company named Harley-Davidson can do in this economic climate is borrow money at 15% from Warren Buffet, I stand by my 10% interest estimate which is 5% better than H-D received. I gave the City of Naperville the best rate that General Electric and Goldman Sachs could obtain in this environment. Neither has the kind of deficits or financial problems that the City of Naperville has. General Electric and Harley-Davidson remain profitable and even paying dividends. I just received my dividend check on 12/30/08 from Harley-Davidson so I am sure of that. If they had a deficit or cash flow problem, they could not pay a full dividend as they just did.

In summary, with all due respect to you, I stick with my assessment that the best the City of Naperville can do in this environment is a 10% interest rate on building the necessary parking spots which will cost the residents $131,714,717 over 30 years in addition to the $61,000,000 original investment outlay. That INTEREST CHARGE by the way is an exact number obtained from a loan calulator. Usually I just use my brain calculator for estimates, but this one time I use a COMPUTER CALCULATOR to be certain I was accurate.

Anyway, again, thank for your respectable, enlightening and insightful debate and discussion. Let us continue it so we can have a better understanding of how much the Naperville Taxpayers are being FLEECED by this one developer, due to city officials and city councilmen being asleep behind the wheel!

What is certain is the Naperville Taxpayers are being FLEECED. What is not certain is to what extent they are being FLEECED. Let us find out!

Promenade Building being Subsidized:

I am not sure how to answer you - as you don't seem to be willing to understand any other perspective. I am not going to debate you or try to explain myself to you. It appears you have made up your mind and have already discounted what I have had to say. I disagree with your logic and your thought process. That's fine - we do not have to agree. It appears you have made up your mind that that the powers that be in Naperville City Hall are either stupid or evil or both. There si no point to me participating in this discussion any further. Good luck to you.

By Promenade Building being Subsidized on February 7, 2009 11:42 PM

Bob the Builder,

I fully understand how the revenue system works. Trying to pay back $192,714,717 is no easy task.

First, you need to understand that when a retailer sells an item for $100 he collects 7.25% in our town. Out of this 7.25% only 1% or $1.00 is for the City of Naperville. This $1.00 has to do many things which I listed in previous posts. One I forgot to list is sweep the sidewalks in front of the downtown buildings at taxpayers expense. I just saw them sweeping tonight so it reminded me. The city does everything for the downtown businesses except wipe their butts and blow their noses.

They shovel their sidewalks. They move the snow from the downtown in trucks to other areas. They provide Christmas lights. They repair light poles. They fix potholes. They repair sidewalks. They provide 12 cops between May 1 to Sept 30. The list never ends. The 1% collected in the normal taxation could never pay for all these expenses that landlords and businesses outside the downtown don't receive.

The city unlike yourself realized that at some point. They began charging 1.5% to restaurants, bars, lounges, and nightclubs to help with these massive garage expenses. I do not know if regular businesses in the downtown have to pay this 1.5% but I certainly hope they do.

In order for the parking spots needed by Dwight Yakley to be paid for from this special sales tax, you would need about $12.5 billion in sales. Do you think relevant sales tax in the downtown from only his 3 buildings would come anywhere close to that over 30 years?

We will soon have 1,000,000 sq. ft. of retail space downtown. If each sq. ft. generated $200 per year, this would be 200 million in sales. The 1.5% on this money from sales tax if it applied to all retail sales and just not restaurants would amount to 3 million dollars per year. Over 30 years, we would have 90 million dollars. The parking spots that Mr. Dwight Yakely's 3 buildings alone need cost nearly $193,000,000. All the parking spots for all the downtown would cost 4 times that much or $772,000,000. Dwight Yakley's buildings provide one fourth of the retail and office space downtown or approximately 250,000 sq. ft.

Thus we will have revenue of 90 million assuming every retailer downtown pays this 1.5% in sales tax against a cost of $772,000,000 in the next 30 years. Now, Been There-Built a Few claims that each parking spot needs 7500 dollars of maintenance. We need 5000 parking spots for 1,000,000 sq. ft. of space. Thus we need an additional $37,500,000 to maintain these parking spaces. And after 30 years when these garages fall apart we have to rebuild them all over again. Is Dwight Yakley going to help us build them again in 30 years? His buildings should last 100 years easily.

In total we need $809,500,000 to pay for these garages while we will be generating 90 million or less than 11% of the cost over the next 30 years.

For argument's sake, say let us say the retailers downtown can generate $400 dollar per square foot per year which is very high and usually only accomplished by top notch grocery stores, Wal-Marts and Targets. At that point we would have $180,000,000 to pay for this $809,500,000 parking garage cost. We still have a shortfall of $629,500,000 in revenue for the next 30 years. Who is paying for this? You guessed it the residential taxpayers and the businesses outside of the downtown area. Is this fair?

Why does a Jewel or Wal-Mart outside of the downtown provide their own parking while downtown multi-millionaire connected developers do not? Shopping centers outside the downtown buy land for a half a million to a million dollars to provide parking to accomodate their needs. They use their own money to blacktop their parking lots, stripe and then finally sealcoat them.

These out of downtown retailers are very beneificial to the taxpayers and pay their own way. We don't subsidize them and we don't have to subsidize them. They are happy to be here making money and we are pleased with the 1% sales tax revenue they generate for our tax base. They are a net profit to us. The downtown connected landlords are a massive net loss to us. Why are we SUBSIDIZING them? And if we need to SUBSIDIZE them, does it have to be to this MASSIVE EXTENT?

As I said before, I love downtown Naperville. I just do not like a developer bluffing our City Staff and City Council into believing his projects would not be viable if we did not build and pay for 95% of his parking needs. This is the problem I am having. This is what is causing the fleecing of every Naperville Residential Taxapyer.

I am outraged. I believe all the information I am providing which I have researched thoroughly will bear any scrutiny.

I challenge Councilman Bob to debate me. I would love to hear his side of the story. I would love for him to explain how in his infinite wisdom he would allow Dwight Yakley on his last building only to pay for parking in lieu of spots to the the tune of $400,000 which can only buy 10 parking spots without factoring in interest, maintenance or land. His Promenade Expansion Building required 310 spots according to city code to accomodate its 62,095 sq. ft. size. I am sorry if the facts upset you, "Been There....Built a Few" but they are the facts. If you disagree, provide your facts but don't run away from a debate when you are CHECKMATED! I have not ignored what you said. I have incorporated your estimates into my calculations and the situation of subsidization became worse. Thank you so much for informing me there is a $7500 cost to maintain each parking lot over 30 years. I was not aware and initially gave the City a break for this expensive expenditure.

Dwight Yakely should have been required to build underground parking for his massive buildings especially the 2 Promenades which sit on an entire city block. We would not have to build an ugly parking deck in front of the libary if he had developed underground parking for his building. Why was he exempted? So what if it is expensive. It is his responsibility and he has plenty of money. Are we asking him for some of that 50 dollar per square foot he generates in rent that he deposits in his personal or business account. No, it is his and we are not asking him for any piece of his revenue. He pockets that money. The real estate tax he is charged is a 100% pass through based on a pro-rate formula to his tenants and he does not pay a penny of it. Not a single penny. What is not viable for him on his buildings? I say City Staff and the City Council were taken for a ride by Mr. Yakley and Mr. Brestal. A roller coaster ride. They got our city officials so dizzy, they could not think straight and then got them to sign the dotted line allowing them to FLEECE the Naperville Taxpayer.....legally may I add. Amazing Grace!!!

So why do we have to give him our revenue in the form of our hard earned real estate tax? Why do we have to subsidize him and allow him to accumulate millions of dollar on our backs?

His buildings as I said earlier should be named the Bernie Madoff Buildings. It is a ponzi scheme on the taxpayers legalized by our City Staff and City Council either knowingly or unknowingly...wittingly or unwittingly.

Yes, I have some common sense and can see through this massive ponzi scheme. Does anyone in the City have a graduate degree? I guess our new City Manager has a graduate degree with emphasis in Accounting and Finance and maybe he will stop these ponzi schemes played on the taxpayer with their hard earned money.

Like I said earlier, I am more than willing to give the new City Manager a chance to clean up this mess. But he needs to clean it up quickly and stop the subsidization of downtown in this horrific manner or he will bring bankruptcy to the city. It will fall on his shoulders. The puck will stop at him and he needs to understand that. He has got his work cut out for him. He needs to be our leader and do the right thing as the City Council will rubber stamp anything for anyone who is CONNECTED. Most of them don't read their 500 page packets and try to get out of their bi-weekly city council meetings in less than an hour if they can. They don't care about the taxpayers. I don't know why they chose to be City Council members if they won't rise up to the challeges and get the JOB DONE RIGHT!

Our city officials have been hit by a runaway train and they have not figured what hit them yet. The budget deficit will not be overcome by laying off 46 hard working city employees. It will only be overcome when the city stops subsidizing developers like Dwight Yakley to the tune of $227,000,000 for his parking needs. I added the $7500 dollars to maintain each spot suggested by "Been There....Built a Few" as I believe he is correct. That is why my figure increased from $193,000,000.

While, you seem well intentioned, "Bob the Builder", you are providing no evidence of any kind to support your position that these parking spots will generate enough revenue to support themselves. Before the 1.5% special tax which only started recently, the taxpayers were being beat royally. Now they are just taking it on both chins and in the midsection.

No matter which way you cut it, the NAPERVILLE TAXPAYERS are being fleeced by the Bernie Madoff Buildings. I stand by my position and challenge anyone to prove me wrong with facts, data and real numbers. Empty words don't prove anything!

In summary the retailers need to provide sales of $1800 per square foot on an annual basis assuming one million sq. ft of space in the downtown, in order to pay for this horrendous parking deck expense. I have never heard of a group of retailers even in the busiest of malls ever attaining $500 per sq. ft. in annual sales. Considering half the space downtown is office and not retail, the retailers need to generate $3600 per sq. ft. which makes it a further impossibility. And if the non-restaurant/bars are not subject to this 1.5% sales tax we have a total DISASTER.

Bankruptcy, my fellow bloggers, will be looming down the road. Sorry to have to be the bearer of bad news. But the hard core facts are the hard core facts. Let us hope City Officials and our City Council wake up before the clock hits 11:59pm.

Good night and thank you again for reading my posts!

Our city officials have been hit by a runaway train and they have not figured what hit them yet. The budget deficit will not be overcome by laying off 46 hard working city employees. It will only be overcome when the city stops subsidizing developers like Dwight Yakley to the tune of $227,000,000 for his parking needs. I added the $7500 dollars to maintain each spot suggested by "Been There....Built a Few" as I believe he is correct. That is why my figure increased from $193,000,000.

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Moderator Chris,
I attempted to make a correction on my previous post that contained the above paragraph but it was sent by my laptop without the correction and without my permisssion. The $227,000,000 above should only be $202,375,000 as Dwight Yakley only owns 250,000 sq.ft. or roughly one fourth of the retail/office space in downtown Naperville. He can not be responsible for the entire $37,500,000 to maintain 5000 parking spots needed for 1 million sq. ft. over a 30 year period. Thus his share for maintenance is only $9,375,000 and when you add it to the his cost of $193,000,000 for 1250 parking spots REQUIRED by his 3 buildings, you arrive at $202,375,000 and not $227,000,000.

Yes, we are subsidizing developer Dwight Yakley for $202,375,000 dollars from our residential real estate taxes after giving him credit for paying $1,500,000 in fees-in-lieu-of parking of which I am only certain he paid $500,000 for 2 buildings and gave him credit on a 3rd building of $1 million since I did not have exact information. Based on the tiny amounts he paid for his other 2 buildings, I was very generous in the million dollar credit I awarded him. I doubt he paid have that amount for his 3rd building. He paid $100,000 for his Barnes and Nobles Building for parking fees-in-lieu and $400,000 for his Promenade Expansion Building. Those are exact numbers obtained from CM Bob who is not only known for his unusual transparency but also his remarkable credibility and impeccable reputation.

This basically means if we have 50,000 residential dwellers in town the average homeowner is giving Dwight Yakley $4047.5 over 30 years to subsidize his parking needs because he whined before the city council that his buildings would not be viable without the taxpayers subsidizing him for $202,375,000 dollars. Maybe we should all go whine before the city council and see if we can have the $4047.50 that they fleeced from us and our children returned to us. Just a thought!

My proof is 22 years working my way up the corporate ladder of a commercial development company, I would say that makes me slightly more qualified than someone who stumbled across some numbers they don't understand but by all means just disregard whvat I said just like been there built a few posted you refuse to listen to anyone

Hopefully one day you will figure out on your own that parking requirements are only a guideline that is negotiated based on the needs of the building and what the project brings to the city so far you have three people on here telling you how it works who have industry experience who you choose to ignore

I think you are just trying to start trouble on here

It may be time for everyone to move out of Naperville immediately. It may be the last chance to get out before the imminent financial disaster becomes common knowledge, causing housing values to reach zero. As the esteemed "Promenade Building Being Subsidized" has pointed out, the City of Naperville is doomed to bankruptcy. Perhaps it is time to call in the prosecutors to have charges raised against the developers and the city council members for their participation in the fleecing of the taxpayers that "PBBS" has gathered so much proof on. Thanks to PBBS for your hours of research on behalf of the unknowing public. It is so reassuring that someone of your "CHARACTERS" is out there making sure that the "TRUTH" is being heard. I hope you will continue to regale us with your wisdom and insight - thanks again "PBBS" - or could we simply shorten your name a bit to "BS"?

How does a laptop send a post with out the poster's permission? is the laptop now an independent entity with a mind of it's own?

Moderator,
I revised the below post and deleted an entire sentence that you probably found objectionable. I also made 4 other changes to soften the letter. Please reconsider it. Thank you! Fortunately, it was not deleted.

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Bob the Builder,

You remind me of Joe the Plumber. You know everything but you can't prove one thing. You do not want to debate. I provided exact numbers based on $200 a sq. ft. in retail sales per year, $400 a sq. ft., $1800 sq. ft. and even $3600 sq. ft. to prove that revenue generated from structures being built can not absorb the cost of the parking decks downtown.

All you do is pound your chest like Joe the Plumber and brag about who you are without revealing your identity. If you are going to allege to be someone with expertise, than prove it. Show us your EXPERTISE.

Let me tell you something, Joe the Plumber, I mean Bob the Builder, I met with Ms. Patti Roberts for over an hour recently. Ms. Roberts is the Executive Director of the Downtown Naperville Alliance. One of her duties is to lobby council members for more and more parking. She lobbied extensively for the library parking deck and won a 6-3 council vote despite massive opposition by the residents.

Ms. Patti Roberts has an office on the 3rd floor of the Promenade Building. A very nice and extremely intelligent lady. Her office is cluttered with books, computers, magazines about parking decks, architectural plans and you name it. There was barely enough room for me to sit in her very cluttered office due to her massive research material.

We discussed the parking issues of our downtown. We discussed the affordability of parking decks. We discussed how they are being paid for.

In the end she looked me in the face and said, yes the residents are heavily subsidizing the downtown and especially the parking decks. She admitted to me this new 1.5% sales tax for parking can only pay for a fraction of the true cost to build the decks.

She is the expert on parking and development in downtown. She lobbies the city council for the needs of the downtown developers.

I am sorry Bob the Builder but your knowledge appears very limited. All you can say, I know and believe me. You don't know and with all due respect I doubt much of what you say. You have not done your research. You are just talking like Joe the Plumber.

Why don't you go visit Executive Director Patti Roberts as I did? Why don't you ask for her research on parking which is extensive? She will print out anything you need or request. She will give you any brochure she has. She will give you any amount of time you need to learn and become educated.

BTW she was my source for the downtown having roughly 1 million square feet of retail and office space. I don't make numbers up. I have sources for my numbers from reputable organizations such as the Downtown Naperville Alliance.

Again her office is located in the middle of the Main Promenade Building on the 3rd floor. You may learn something. And hopefully you will come back as distinguished reporter Bob the Builder as Joe the Plumber came back from Israel as a distinguished war reporter.

You and Joe the Plumber appear to be twins. Your 15 minutes of fame are OVER! Joe the Plumber does not realize his time is UP and is running for President of the United States in 2012. What are you plans, Bob the Builder?

How can you honestly complain to Chris about being called "ridiculous" then turn around and tell someone who is contributing their experience to the thread that they're twins with Joe the Plumber.

There is no "debate" to be had here. You are right. Everyone else is wrong.

Bob the Builder, Been There - Built a Few, Councilman Bob, you're wasting your time here. You cannot "debate" with an anonymous troll on a blog site who demands people prove their experience while he goes around acting as resident expert on every subject known to man because he found some numbers on a web site and wasted the time of the DNA's director.

Keyboard Rambo,

You never have a point to make about the message.

You have no facts, no numbers, no analysis no nothing.

Always attacking the messenger.

You sound like a broken keyboard.

And I think my analysis comparing Bob the Builder with Joe the Plumber is right on TARGET. If you read his post, he also attacked me personally even though I only RESPECTFULLY DISAGREED with him.

Basically, what it boils down is that none of you can refute my numbers, calculations, and analysis, so you take the low road and attack me personally. That has been your pattern repeatedly. Just a bit too obvious.

You ask bloggers to go out there and do research. Meet important people with knowledge. One does that and you complain. You are simply here stirring trouble. You have nothing to offer. All you do is call blogger's names. Now you call me a troll. I will not lower myself and respond this one time. Consider yourself lucky and don't complain and whine if I go into full thrust next time.

Where did he "personally attack" you? Here, let's go through his post line by line.

My proof is 22 years working my way up the corporate ladder of a commercial development company, I would say that makes me slightly more qualified than someone who stumbled across some numbers they don't understand but by all means just disregard whvat I said just like been there built a few posted you refuse to listen to anyone

Hopefully one day you will figure out on your own that parking requirements are only a guideline that is negotiated based on the needs of the building and what the project brings to the city so far you have three people on here telling you how it works who have industry experience who you choose to ignore

I think you are just trying to start trouble on here

If you could assist me in finding the "personal attack" in this post as well, I'd appreciate it.

I am in total agreement with KR. If I may be perfectly blunt, you seem to create your own drama. If you expect to be treated with respect and civility, then it should be a two-way street. Yet you continue to belittle anyone whose opinion differs from yours and you flip between attempts to manipulate or brown-nose the host. When the host requests you to stay on topic or denies your pleas for the Sun to take your cues for articles or investigations, then it would be respectful and proper to drop the off topic or drop the topic you wish investigated. Instead, you ignore, continue and hurtle insults. When other posters contradict your views, or try to point the requests or treatments out to you, you turn around and whine to the host. You can't have it both ways. Don't dish it out if you can't take it. Put on your big boy underpants when you come here to post if you want to be taken seriously and treated with respect.
I apologize for my lack of tact.

Councilman Bob,
I hope Councilman Bob you don't forget us. I reposted on this thread since the other one was archived since I initially made my request for information.

Thanks again.

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Is there any chance we can get an update on this library deck? I heard and read that certain councilmen had a change of heart and want to halt it for now or cancel it permanently.

I also understand that there are certain council members like Dick Furstenau who do not want it halted due to $1 million in sunk costs.

Furthermore, it appears we are paying $40,000 to build each parking spot not including interest, land, and maintenance. A builder of parking garages who has blogged on this site in recent days, states these parking spots can be built for $30,000 each. He has actually built some parking garages in the past.

If this is the case, can you please give us an explanation as to why City Staff contracted to build the parking deck for $40,000 a parking spot instead of $30,000 a spot? If we have 500 parking spots at this library deck we are speaking of a $5 million difference. This is a significant differnce that can cut the budget deficit in half. If considering the savings on interest it can wipe out the entire budget deficit.

Why is the city not being more aggressive in obtaining competitive bids that could save the taxpayers significant money?

I hope we can obtain some answers from City Staff and you can publish them for us to all read. Your time to obtain some answers for the taxpayers is much appreciated.

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Apparently Councilman Bob doesn't feel obligated to respond to the conspiracy theorists. Good for him!

Fed Up With the Noise,

Last I checked Councilman Bob had not appointed you as his official or unofficial spokesperson.

Councilman Bob has always kept his promises and responded when he said he would. I am sure when City Staff give him the answers he is looking for he will pass them on. He has always been transparent.

Asking a question regarding potential cost savings on a parking deck has absolutely nothing to do with conspiracies except in your mind.

Last time I checked, I never said I was speaking for Councilman Bob. I simply made an observation and a comment.