Anonymous,

You must not read the links you post or fully comprehend them.

Check this out from your link.

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

But do typical government workers really make that much less? It depends on the occupation. The following list compares average salaries in the public sector with nationwide averages, based on 2005 data from the Department of Labor's Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Attorney

Government average: $105,577

Nationwide average: $110,520

Financial Manager

Government average: $95,257

Nationwide average: $96,620

Economist

Government average: $89,441

Nationwide average: $80,900

Microbiologist:

Government average: $80,798

Nationwide average: $63,360

Architect

Government average: $80,777

Nationwide average: $68,560

Accountant

Government average: $74,907

Nationwide average: $58,020

Librarian

Government average: $74,630

Nationwide average: $49,110

Human Resources Manager

Government average: $71,232

Nationwide average: $89,950

Nurse

Government average: $60,935

Nationwide average: $56,880

Medical Technician

Government average: $35,526

Nationwide average: $33,170

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

In almost all cases the government employee makes more money or at least nearly as much. And if you read the article carefully the benefits for the government workers were far superior than those for the private sector. Many fold better.

As part of their benefits they get the Big Fat Pension including all the other numerous benefits cited in the article including younger retirement age, more sick days, more vacation days, better health insurance at a lower cost if not free, better life insurance at a lower cost if not free, etc. etc.

Thanks for making my point for me. If we can only get a few more like you on this blog site that can help me with my research.

BTW thanks!

By Anonymous on May 29, 2009 3:38 PM
"Working for the government is about making a difference. The work of government employees impact the lives of Americans everyday. It takes special people to choose public service."

No doubt you are right.

That is not the issue.

The issue is how much do we pay them? How much can we afford to pay them?

I think the problem is we are paying them more than is affordable.

That appears to be obvious from the Joliet article posted by another blogger. That article was really shocking.

I hope we never experience that level of government incompetence in Naperville. But it really appears we are heading in that direction along with many other cities and the State of Illinois.

Working for the government is about making a difference. The work of government employees impact the lives of Americans everyday. It takes special people to choose public service.

Sybil, you'll just never understand.

http://edition.cnn.com/2006/US/Careers/10/11/cb.government/index.html

Keyboard Rambo,

I meant take care of themselves as far as their retirements.

Just like us civilians.

Give them Social Security as as safety net and after they are on their own with their retirement nest eggs as we are.....off the pension bottle.

Just like us civilians.

No more PENSIONS! PERIOD!

Hey KB Rambo - lets take your concept and move it even further - why should there be health insurance - let every one pay their own way for every thing - those who are healthy shouldn't be subsidizing those that are sick. And what about the military - let's do away with having a standing army and navy - if there is a war, every one should just get their guns and go and fight. No exemptions - every man and woman between 17 and 55 should have to shoulder arms and be willing to die for the cause. I'm tired of taking it up the wazooo too! And let's end foreign aid to all countries - keep all the money here at home.

As for taxes, there should be no income tax at all on wages earned by actually working. However, those that profit from the work done by others - like stock speculators - day traders, etc - should have their profits taxed at 90%.

Imagine the average pay of a Joliet city employee is $83,000 and that does not inlcude benefits and pensions.

Is anyone surprised they are heading to a $67 million dollar deficit in 2012? I am not!

The State of Illinois gave the City of Joliet 4 Cash Casinos to help them out. They managed to squander all the money.

This is proof that no matter how much you give government they will find a way to spend it.

Please, my fellow Napervillians, PLEASE don't ever vote for an increase in taxes. Learn from Joliet.

They gave them 4 cash producing boats and they ended up spending the money like drunken sailors. Unfreakingbelievable!

If you allow Naperville Tax increases they will make sure every employee who works for the city is paid the equivalent of a doctor.

Why not, since fire fighters save lives just like neurosurgeons?

I got a great suggestion. Let us pay each fire fighter and paramedic in the City of Naperville $900,000 in annual salary to match neurosurgeons and give them a pension of 75% of that $900,000 or $675,000 per year. Don't they both save lives?

Why are we being so cheap on our fire fighters?

We are such bad taxpayers in Naperville. We are so stingy and cheap towards our fire fighters, police officers and city employees.

We start our fire fighters out of college at about 59,500 dollars and give them a full pension. The highest paid graduates in the country are engineers. They get paid 58,000 and receive no pension. They have to work till age 70 to qualify for a full social security payment which is equal to a small fraction of what a fire fighter receives in pension at age 52.

I guess our engineers are chopped liver. We have no respect for them. The rest of our college graduates are garabage.

I know the Naperville Sun does not see this insanity but I hope everyone else sees this insanity. It is beyond belief.

What lies am I telling? Is the Joliet article one Big Lie? Of course it indicates that 2 city council members have loose bearings since they want to approve higher taxes for higher wages. You would think these 2 yoyos would be looking for ways to decrease taxes in this economy where primary mortgages have now exceeded sub-prime mortages in foreclosure. Do these council members in Joliet have a TV or access to the internet? Have they ever bought a newspayer? Or did they just become CM to collect Big Fat Pensions and don't care a hoots about the taxpayers.

The bottom line is government pay and benefits have gotten so out of control that 4 Cash Casinos could not save Joliet.

Is King Arthur George going to bring his fiefdom some floating casino boats so his pirates can continue spending money like drunken sailors?

I guarantee you any referendum for a tax increase will fail in this town. Therefore, dear City Officials learn to live within your means as we residenrts have learned to live within our means.

We did not come to you for hand-outs when our retirement funds collapsed. So don't dare to come to us to remedy your $61.4 million pension deficit.

Fix it yourself by increasing your God D$am contributions since you are benefiting and not us TAXPAYERS. Hear me again, we the taxpayers are tired of taking it for the wazoooooooo over and over again! Enough wazooooing of the taxpayers. It is really beginning to hurt. A real lot!

@Wanting Reform on May 29, 2009 1:28 AM

I couldn't agree more! Damn socialists always wanting to give it to be up the wazzooooOoooOooOOoo. Tax payer subsidized fire and police is nothing other than SOCIALISM. Why should I have to pay to put the fire in your house out?! Why do I have to pay when someone gets murdered and their family wants to find the person responsible? I swear, everyone wants something for free these days.

If the police and fire want to exist, they need to operate like every other business and either learn how to turn a profit or go bankrupt. I've had it with social services, they've been suckling the teat of society for far too long and my wazzoooOOoooOooooo simply can't take it anymore.

I'm going Galt, who's with me?

Joliet appreciates their employees.

*******************************************************************

Will Joliet consider a tax hike to avert layoffs?

May 28, 2009

By BOB OKON bokon@scn1.com
JOLIET -- The mood at city hall Wednesday was definitely in favor of tax hikes and fee increases as a way to avert layoffs of city workers.

Workers, who packed a special city council meeting cheered as some members of the city council said they were ready to raise taxes and wanted to avoid layoffs.

Informational protesters cross the Jefferson Street bridge Wednesday afternoon in downtown Joliet. The city is negotiating with the unions for concessions in wages and benefits to try to fill a $15 million budget gap

"I'm ready to vote for a tax increase right now," Councilman Warren Dorris declared at one point, inspiring the crowd to a standing ovation.

Just how high taxes might go is uncertain.

Councilman Thomas Giarrante joined Dorris in expressing his willingness to increase taxes.

City staff on Wednesday raised the prospect of a 25 percent increase in the Joliet property tax rate to generate $9 million, still far short of the projected savings needed to avert a $67 million deficit by 2012.

City Manager Thomas Thanas cautioned that the staff was not recommending a 25 percent hike in property taxes.

"This is a menu for us to consider, and that's all it's intended to reflect," Thanas said during a presentation of ways the city could increase revenues.

The menu under consideration also includes:

• a 30 percent increase in water and sewer rates

• increases in the city taxes on gasoline, natural gas usage and electricity

• an increase in the hotel/motel tax

• higher fees for vehicle stickers

• higher parking rates and bigger fines for parking violators

The list went on, and city council members said they want a list of recommendations from staff for tax and fee increases that could be put in place soon.

Budget problems
The special meeting was the first in which the city council talked about how it may look to taxpayers for solutions to its budget woes.
Up to now, the focus has been on layoffs and givebacks on wages and benefits from city workers.

There have been no layoffs yet, although the city has reduced its workforce by 87 positions since last fall by not filling jobs when employees leave and by providing early retirement packages to more senior workers.

Negotiations with the city's unions so far have focused on health insurance.

The unions have agreed to contribute to health insurance premiums for the first time at a rate of $50 per two-week pay period. But the agreement hinges on the city council accepting new union contract proposals that have not been outlined but which Thanas characterized as "pricey."

The concessions on health insurance include other provisions as well. The entire package would save the city $3.5 million a year according to the unions' estimate and $3.1 million according to the city administration's estimate.

Layoff plan
"I truly believe the city employees have done more than their fair share," Ralph Norberg, president of the firefighters' union local told the council.
Norberg urged the council to reject city administration's proposal to lay off as many as 16 firefighters as part of the budget-cutting plan.

A total of 52 city workers, including 10 nonunion employees, could be laid off in a plan presented by the administration.

Contending that layoffs in the fire department would affect public safety, Norberg added, "The layoff of any city employee from any department would adversely affect the citizens of this city."

Union leaders also have expressed reluctance to reduce or freeze scheduled pay increases of 4 percent a year.

The average annual pay of full-time city employees is $83,000, according to the staff presentation that also showed that payroll costs account for 73 percent of city expenses.

The city workforce now totals 970.

Several council members expressed their hopes of avoiding layoffs.

"At all costs, I want to see that there are no layoffs if we can help it," said Councilwoman Jan Quillman.

"No matter how you slice it, City Hall is abusing taxpayer money in unimaginable ways. I have documented so many of these abuses over the last 2.5 years."

I can't believe this person is allowed to keep writing and writing and writing ficticious, acusatory BS on this blogsite. You haven't done anything in the last 2.5 years to reveal all of the "Abuses" happening at city hall. UNFREAKINGBELIEVABLE. You spew hatered towards the good people that keep this city running like clockwork, the people that put their lives on the line everyday to keep people safe and save lives - a city doesn't run itself. It takes PEOPLE to run a city.

City hall is open to the public, you don't have to break in.

By BigMike on May 26, 2009 2:45 PM
Moderator Chris: on May 23, 2009 6:52 PM you said:

I've got a better idea: How about the government stays out of my wallet (as much as possible, at least) and we all take care of ourselves?

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

You nailed it on the head.

Let us see if the police, firemen and all of those politicians can take care of themselves.

It is about time. Time to get off the taxpayer bottle. Formula is becoming to darn expensive.

BigMike,

Thank you for your kind words. I do a lot of research and try to make as much sense as possible.

There are people in this town who do not want the truth be known. They will orchestrate a campaign against anyone who dares speak the truth or tries to hold the establishment accountable.

While I was around in the Napergate Days, I was a silent observer who was not an activist. But I read all the Napergate ads published in the Naperville Sun and the responses to them.

The establishment tried to mock the Napergate Man, tried to discredit him and even tried to run him out of business and out of town. He did too much research and learned too much about this town that no one is suppose to know. He once called it a Stepford Wives town based on that famous movie. In that movie you either conformed to the establishment or they roboted you and forced you to conform.

The Napergate Man just kept plugging along ignoring most probably these same folks on this blog site or their parents who were attacking him. They were so vicious towards him, I would have to say they won the public relations war against him. Little doubt in my mind the Naperville Sun was siding with the Establishment and publishing the propaganda coming out of City Hall at the time as if it was factual evidence. They never gave the Napergate Man any ink. He had to buy his ink by the barrel and pay for it.

Sadly, I don't think he initially had a chance to win the media battle despite the fact he was telling us the truth while city officials were accusing him of telling tales. I guess in the end when the whole mess between the Napergate Man and City Hall was vetted out in the judicial system including 2 appellate courts, the truth was told and he finally won the media battle.

When it was all done and said all the Naperville Sun could do is run an editiorial stating "Let Us Bury the Hatchet" or something along that line. No editorial from the Sun condemning the City of Naperville for wasting 10 million dollars and 10 years pursuing a man who just wanted to keep watch on taxpayer's money including his own.

The situation here reminds me of what happened to him. It is almost identical. You can make sense and you will be attacked viciously.....personally and not your message.

It seems like the Naperville Sun tolerates these personal attacks while claiming it does not like them. Every indication to me is the City of Naperville has the Naperville Sun in its left pocket right where it wants it. Of course, the Naperville Sun will deny this but if you read the newspaper you see nothing but praise for the establishment. Can anyone point one article where the Sun held City Hall accountable for one single incident of impropriety or incompetence? Maybe, I missed it. Can you point any out, BigMike?

It really is difficult to change government and hold it accountable if you don't have the support and cooperation of the local press. The position of the Sun appears we don't see any wrong doing so don't bother us. A smoking bomb is not enough for them.

Maybe if you can break into City Hall and place some bugs and record some conversations about impropriety, that is the only evidence that would motivate the Sun to investigate our City Officials. But if you have it on tape, I would think it is too late for an investgation as the impropriety would have been solved.

No matter how you slice it, City Hall is abusing taxpayer money in unimaginable ways. I have documented so many of these abuses over the last 2.5 years. TB documented a few on another thread recently. Just to give you one example, the $100,000 of taxpayer money we give to the RibFest to pay for our police officers. Can you imagine we give them the money to pay for OUR police officers? They generate over $3.5 million annually and have plenty of money to pay for our police officers. And we the taxapayers have to pay for them not only at regular rates but at overtime rates. No wonder we had an $11.5 million budget deficit necessitating the termination of 43 city employees and positions.

Even city employees are suffering because of the incompetence and improprieties of City Hall. How unfortunate...

Anonymous 5/27/09 4:05pm:

It would be easier to laugh at Taxes if he wasn't making so much sense. Stuff it.

Oh, Taxes, Taxes and Whoever you are today,

Don't you actually get that we're all laughing at you?

Voice of Idiotic Reason,

Continue making fools of yourself one after another. The bloggers who read this blog site can determine who tells the truth and who are the trouble makers.

I met the Area Director of the Tilted Kilt in Woodridge and he told me the Tilted Kilt in Woodridge interviewed 550 servers. The interview is more of a casting event. They call them entertainers since they entertain while serving. And yes 50 of them were hired. You can go see them live 7 days a week. They are dressed to kill just like the girl in the ad you see in the advertising on the Sun internet edition. They also took a full page color ad on the back page of the Naperville Sun announcing their grand opening. I suppose you are so busy attacking me you miss all the great advertising in the Naperville Sun both print and internet editions.

All you have to do is go to the Tilted Kilt and observe for yourself. Get off your d$mn computer and stop being so lazy. They have 2 shifts of entertainers/servers there. One starts at 10am and one starts at about 5pm. They are open 7 days and nights a week. They are extremely busy and even looking to hire a few more good servers above the 50 they hired. All their servers are female. Most of their bartenders are very good looking males wearing Scottish kilts. A few appear to be body builders. It is a great place for men, women and even families with kids before 9pm. After 10pm kids are not allowed. It becomes strictly an adult place where you can have a lot of fun. The employees/entertainers/servers are the friendliest and best looking I have ever seen in any establishment in the United States of America. No exaggeration!

I guess I am giving the Tilted Kilt a lot of free advertising on this blog site which was not my intention, but since they advertise heavily in the Naperville Sun, I doubt Sun Officials mind. I am not here to plug them but to prove my credibility and protect my reputation from the slimes who blog and libel others on this great blog site.

The Tilted Kilt is a great English, Sottish, Irish Bar with excellent food and great looking staff. Men and women both wear kilts in the establishment. They have 25 HD TVs and even carry Ultimate Fighting and most Chicago Sports Teams. They have 8 Satellites and can show 8 different sporting events at the same time on their 25 big screen TVs.

It is a very well managed place and impressive to go to. Much nicer than a Buffalo Wild Wings where you have to put up with kids and rowdies like Noisemaker. It is is also elegantly built with nice large crowning everywhere.

Eat your words voice of reason. Take it up the wazooooo yourself Mr. No Credibility. I proved my credibility and made you look like an idiot....or maybe I should say you made yourself look like an idiot.

It is too bad the Moderator allows you guys to keep bloggin here and making fools of yourself. Maybe he does it deliberately. Maybe he enjoys seeing you make fools of yourselves day and night. He did admit you guys make him laugh. He did not say he was laughing with you. He could be laughing at you...lol...!!!

But keep in mind the Moderator never called you guys intelligent. He once did say I am intelligent. The Moderator usually knows what he is talking about.

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

PS. And for the other blogger who stated I was blogging all weekend, eat your words too. I was having a lot of fun at the Tilted Kilt. On another thread, I was accused of being 2 bloggers I was not. No wonder you guys think I am blogging all the time. I blog an average of one hour a day and I enjoy it. I will continue doing it. Today, due to the mad gang deciding to attack again, I may have to go OT on blogging to shut the gang up again. It never seems to end. One thing certain is the Moderator should know by now who starts this nonsense. It certainly ain't ME. If that is not obvious by now, ask John Q. Public. He seems to know who starts this nonsense.

Anonymous One,
I have provided the first name of the fire fighter on this blog site more than once. I doubt anyone else in that fire dept. has his first name. He is someone I know very well from the health club and bragged about his final promotion before retiring. And he did invite me both to the party at the fire house and another one at a Lisle Banquet Hall to celebrate his retirement and his promotion days before his retirement. It happened about a year ago. If you need documentation put in a call to Lisle-Woodridge FD or file a 7 day Notice to Produce or Freedom of Information Request. I will not because not only do I know but also because I am not taxed by the Lisle-Woodridge Fire District. Those taxpayers have to fend for themselves. I have my hands full with Naperville.

The actuary's first name is Becky and she will provide me with some information that I will publish on this site when she develops it. It is public information and I should have access to her study and that of her colleagues when they are done.

I think the difference between me and most people is I am out there in the real world except for the hour I spend blogging. I do write and type very fast and do not use spell check so I can produce posts very quickly leading losers to believe I blog all day...lol....

I almost watch no TV except for CNBC because it is related to my stock investments and my own retirement which I have to provide for myself without any taxpayer assistance or company assistance. I suspect most people spend at least 30 hours a week watching soap operas and going to sports events. I do more important things like investigate government improprieties, corruption and incompetence.

Unlike our fire fighters and police officers, I pay double into the Social Security System or 12.4%. No one gives me a penny in hand-outs. I don't think it is fair that I have to give the FFs and POs 21.16% in hand-outs so they can retire with Big Fat Pensions at age 51 or 52 at my expense. Why is that so hard to comprehend? It is my opinion and I have every right to push it and promote it. I have a right to ask that our corrupt Pension System be abolished. I am sure Asst. City Manager Robert Marshall would disagree with me but he is double dipping at taxpayer expense. What do you expect...lol?

When I meet a person or know a person I say that.

When I don't know a person like the former Woodridge Police Fund Manager who I learned of through this blog site I say that. I don't pretend I met him. I would love to meet him though and know where he works. His name is Gary Menconi. I mentioned it several times. Did I ever say I know him personally? Common Anonymous One tighten your loose bearings and screws a little better. You are losing it.

It is too bad the 3 Stooges of which you are one can not focus on my messages. Always focusing on discrediting the messenger because apparently your knowledge and real life experiences must be lacking. Your math skills also appear to be lacking not to understand my simple, very simple plain math formulas.

If you study my information you will see it is credible. You will see it is factual. You will see the unbiased experts who are not benefiting from the pension system themselves agree with me.

I did the formula of 72 to state every 12 years at 6% increases taxes will double. My new actuarial friend Becky pulled out her unique calculator and told me it was every 11.89 years. Yes, we were having a cold beer that "never looked so good" at the Tilted Kilt in Woodridge last Friday if you must know some specific details.

I learned about it through all the Tilted Kilt advertising you can see on this site. Now the Naperville Sun can tell the Tilted Kilt our advertising does work. Our number one blogger responded to your ads...lol...

The only reason I limit the details I present here on this blog site is because I like to remain Anonymous. Only a food would not be able to figure out who I was if I gave any more details than I am already giving.

Therefore, I can only spood feed you so much, Anonymous One. If you like noise instead of hard core facts and truth, check with your Stooge Buddy Fed Up with His Own Noise. He is the greatest Noisemaker of all times.

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Ps. It is too bad there is an orchestrated attempted by a few losers on this blog site to attempt to destroy the messenger because they can not debate the sound message. It has not worked in 2.5 years and it will not work. As I said numerous times if you have a strong cause you believe in, no one can destroy you. The same BS that is being orchestrated on me was orchestrated on the Napergate Man. Instead of being destroyed he gained ICONIC STATUS. I am not saying by all means, that I am anything like him, but just trying to make a point that if your message and cause are strong, you can not be DEFEATED.

Anonymous ONE,
Are you suggesting that the Sybil of multiple personalities [or at least multiple nicknames] is MAKING THINGS UP?
For shame, Anonymous ONE, you know that would never happen. I can't believe that you'd even think it! I noticed, for example, on another thread that Ms. Sybil also has a friend who advertised waitresses and hired 50 of them! 50 waitresses? For... what? Who hires 50 waitresses in one go? Not even the Hot Dog Cart guy needs 50 waitresses in one shot.
I know that we're never going to let the Sybil rant away without talking to it/him/her/them but remember, all: Sybil is smarter than you. Sybil knows everyone. Sybil is always right. Last, but surely not least, Sybil loves Keyboard Rambo's Wazzzzzoooooooooo!

I met an actuary who graduated from the University of Illinois with honors while having a cold beer this weekend and she told me she is part of a group studying the Illinois Pension System and it is definitely a disaster in the making that will IMPLODE....the only question is WHEN.

_________________________

I've never seen anyone who has indirectly "met" so many different people who have such inside information. Whether it's this actuary who graduated with "honors" (I suppose this just slipped into the conversation?) or a retirement event at a fire dept. ("It happened recently in the Woodridge-Lisle Fire Dept. and I know the name of the retiree and was invited to the party"). Or the constant stream of government pension experts, always from a different city, who also always point to Naperville's future demise.

I think many of the comments belong on the Drew Peterson blog where hearsay is being discussed? I am not attacking you "blogger", but just questioning your source credibility. Perhaps this is one reason the Sun does not do an in depth article - they could never get away with 3rd party innuendo, i.e. hearsay.

I also can't pass up the language phrasing in the statement, "I met an actuary who graduated from the University of Illinois with honors while having a cold beer". Was the woman having a cold beer during her graduation ceremony?

By Anonymous on May 26, 2009 9:20 PM
Sec. 3‑142. Payment of benefits ‑ funds insufficient.

*******

If, thereafter, there still remain insufficient funds, the beneficiaries shall be paid pro rata from the available funds, but no allowance or order of the board shall be held to create any liability against the municipality, but only against the pension fund.

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

1. If what you are saying is true why has the state ordered municipalities to wipe the pension deficit by 2033.

2. In order to wipe out the pesnion deficit taxpayers will take it up to the wazooooo as police and firefighters are limited to either 9.45% or 9.91% in contributions as this is state regulated and mandated.

3. If what you say is true, why is the City of Naperville charging the taxpapyers 21.16% in matching contributions with plans in the near future to increase it even further.

4. If the taxpayers do not have a liability and responsibility for the pension fund why come after us for so much money every year without exception.

5. Let us hope what you are saying is true. Cut the funding to the pension funds except for what they collect from POs and FFs.

6. Of course that would not be enough for 75% of their highest and final salaries, and the police officers/fire fighters will have to split the small pie they have in their possession. I doubt they will even be able to pay themselves 25% of their salaries in pension benefits without taxpayer help.

It is obvious to me, you are Experienced bloggin under Anonymous. It seems that your bearings have loosened with age based on the extraordinary number of times you forget to insert your moniker.

Sec. 3‑142. Payment of benefits ‑ funds insufficient.

*******

If, thereafter, there still remain insufficient funds, the beneficiaries shall be paid pro rata from the available funds, but no allowance or order of the board shall be held to create any liability against the municipality, but only against the pension fund.

I thought the fat cats down at City Hall were only interested in my sweet WAZZOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO?!?!?!

BigMike,

I agree with the Moderator that you should offer a minimum safety net such as Social Security for those numerous losers in society who would rather drink an extra beer than save an extra dollar.

But I agree with you that pensions reek of an entitlement mentality and not a safety net for security.

1. Pensions pay out many times what Social Security pay out per individual or family. Sometimes up to 4 to 5 times as much if not more.

2. Pensions pay out full benefits as early as age 50-52 after 30 years of employment. In Naperville the pension benefits are 75% of the final and highest pay. There are many known incidents where a retiree is given a raise and promotion at his retirement party. It happened recently in the Woodridge-Lisle Fire Dept. and I know the name of the retiree and was invited to the party. I was repulsed and did not attend.

3. If you retire at 62 the Social Security considers you lazy and looking for some kind of entitlement. They only give you about half your benefits. If you retire at 66 they consider you a little lazy and give you about 2/3 to 3/4ths of your benefits. If you retire at 70 they give you your full benefits which are a fraction of what government employees receive at age 50-52 including those who monitor the SS System for retirees.

4. The police and fire departments consider you a hero if you retire at 51 or 52 and give you your FULL PENSION. Even if you are at your peak of intelligence and can run marathons.

5. Speaking of safety net vs. entitlement, does anyone believe former Captain Robert Marshall is getting a safety net??? He is getting a full pension while gainfully employed with the same city he submitted his resignation to as an Assistant City Manager. He is believed to be collecting a little less than a 100k in pension benefits and a little over 150k in salary from the same taxpayers. He will be qualified to collect a SECOND PENSION from Naperville Taxpayers when he retires after 8 additional years of employment. This is really a magnificent atrocity on the Naperville Taxpayer no matter how you slice, dice or split it. And our corrupt legislatures made this behavior LEGAL. Can you imagine you all voted for such politicians to run your affairs? You should all be outraged at the behavior of your legislatures who pass such laws to benefit themselves and other government employees!

6. If the police and fire fighters made contributions to their pensions and they were able to pay themselves McMansion Pensions out of their own contributions I would have no problem. That is their money and they can do as they please. They are entitled to anything THEIR own money can provide for them.

7. My objection stems from the fact that we the taxpayers seem to be contributing 21.16% per year as a percentage of their salaries. More than double what they contribute. Despite contributing this amount the pension deficit increased last year by $9.7 million and is now %61.4 million. This is a hint that only if we double or even triple our matching contribution will the deficit not increase any further. I do not know what it would take to get rid of the current pension liability of $61.4 million. Not even CM Bob has a clue what it would take.

8. We only have about 33 retirees in the NPD and a similar number in the NFD. At the moment we have a little under 400 employees supporting these 66 retirees and we are having a disaster. As soon as we have 400 retirees being supported by 400 working police and firefighters we will IMPLODE in an unimaginable way.

9. I discovered while doing some research that the Woodridge Police Fund Manager holds the same exact view as I do. We arrived at our conclusions independently. I never met him.

10. I met an actuary who graduated from the University of Illinois with honors while having a cold beer this weekend and she told me she is part of a group studying the Illinois Pension System and it is definitely a disaster in the making that will IMPLODE....the only question is WHEN.

11. If our City Officials and Fund Managers can not see this problem they should all be terminated.

12. What really bothers me about this pension fund system for police officers and fire fighters is we the taxpayers have to guarantee it. If they lose their entire investment in the stock market, in Treasury Bonds, or Municipal Bonds, we the taxpayers are expected to replenish it even if it had a 300 million deficit. If we taxpayers lose our 401ks, we lose them. No one replenishes us! Imagine we can take these losses in our retirement funds and instead of concentrating on rebuilding our personal retirement plans, we have to contribute funds up the wazoooo to first refund the police and fire pensions so they can receive their ENTITLEMENT BENEFITS that have no relevance to security, a safety net or true retirement.

Those are the actual facts my friends. What comes out of City Hall is sugar coated propaganda. Don't believe a word they tell you. They are only interested in protecting their BIG FAT PENSIONS!

Moderator Chris: on May 23, 2009 6:52 PM you said:

"If you abolish the pensions you need to replace them with something. Most people who get a pension don't pay Social Security. You can't just take away their pensions and not give them anything in return."

I will agree with you that you can't morally change the rules on the current generation(s) of retirees. There is a social contract there and nobody wants them to grow old in indigence. However, as it applies to younger workers and those not yet old enough to be in the workforce, I do not subscribe to your philosophy. Collective retirment funding (pensions, social security) has proven to be a bad idea, as referenced by pension/SS funding gaps, skewed playing fields (especially police/firefighters), and the general doggone politicization of the entire process. The system is irreparably broken. To perpetuate it with printed and inflated money is madness. I fear we will go the way of the Roman empire on the current path we're on.

I've got a better idea: How about the government stays out of my wallet (as much as possible, at least) and we all take care of ourselves? Yes that will mean that the successful in life will have more, and the unsuccessful will have less. Yes that means we'll all be just a little bit less average. But to jury-rig it any other way flies in the face of nature. And for you to say "you can't just take away their pensions and not give them anything in return" just reeks of an entitlement mentality.

I'm tired of people in this country wanting to be "given" something.

Huntington Estates Woman,

You are lucky the Moderator allowed you to post your nonsense that has no relevance to the subject matter on the thread which was taxes.

He claims he does not want his blog site to be contaminated with personal attacks and then he allows you to post.

If you are for higher taxes and 100% pensions like California, please explain your postion and try to sell it to the taxpayers.

In California they rejected higher taxes by a landslide and government employees took 18% pay cuts....finally! I guess you could say they smelled the coffee. What makes you think Illinoians would approve higher taxes to feed the broken Pension System that wants to pay city employees 75% of their highest and last pay till death falls upon not only them but their spouse. If their spouse lives to 102, we have to pay up for 50 years at 75% while only collecting 9.45% for 30 years from her husband. A sixth grader knows the math does not work.

Any actuary will tell you the numbers simply do not add up. Not even Warren Buffet has a return on his equities that can justify even half of such a pay-out. It is utter madness. It is total insanity. It is simply unsustainable especially when investing conservatively in low yielding low risk stocks and bonds.

All those behind this Pension Madness be it in City Hall or the State Capital should be given their walking papers without a Big Fat Pension.

TO,
By Huntington Esates Woman on May 25, 2009 6:59 AM

Would you characterize your post as positive and informative?

Top 5 Pink-Slip Capitals
1. Detroit, Mich.
Mass Layoffs: 57
Workers Affected: 14,781

2. Chicago, Ill.
Mass Layoffs: 87
Workers Affected: 13,647

3. Los Angeles, Calif.
Mass Layoffs: 100
Workers Affected: 10,594

4. New York, N.Y.
Mass Layoffs: 61
Workers Affected: 8,688

5. Las Vegas, Nev.
Mass Layoffs: 55
Workers Affected: 8,367

Maybe there is a correlation between high taxes and job loss as one blogger was suggesting.

Florida with no income tax actually had a 1500 job increase the first quarter despite this disastrously dismal economy.

Mr Magee, I am glad you now realize that there is one person who blogs on sunny 80 degree days all day long and has nothing positive to say about anything or anyone. I actually feel sorry for Big Fat Veggie Fest Director who goes under countless names and has conversations with herself using the different blog names. She has been put in her place by the past moderators and now aparently has to be brought to the real world again by yourself. Dont forget, she knows how to read minds, I mean between the lines. (Coo Coo)

By Chris Magee, moderator on May 24, 2009 9:38 PM
We report on news when it happens. If we send a reporter to city hall and say, "Hey, why are you fat cats wasting so much money?" that's not going to get us anywhere. You need concrete information if you want to expose supposed wrongdoing. As far as I know there is no reason to think there is.

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

I think the Naperville Sun, no offense intended, reports the news as City Hall spoon feeds it.

Yes, the fat cats that are wasting money will not tell you they are wasting money. HERE WE FULLY AGREE 100%.

And you are correct, when you do 0 investigate reporting, there is no reason to believe or suspect any wrong doing or waste.

All you stated in a round about way is we at the Naperville Sun think City Hall is going a good job, we think taxes are fair, we do not investigate, we do not care to investigate and we do not care to discover any wrong doing.

We would rather believe that we live in Utopia. They occasionaly hire our reporters, pay them a little more and give them Big Fat Pensions. Why would anyone in the Sun ever dare to investigate the City and risk missing out on an opportunity to be hired and getting a Big Fat Pension and the priviledge of retiring in his/her prime. After all we know all newspapers will be extinct in 10 years so we don't want to burn our bridges to City Hall.

Totally understandable, Moderator. I know exactly what you are implying. I am very good at reading between the lines. Your strategy makes sense but it does not serve the community. That is why we have not had a WATCHDOG on government ever since the Napergate Man apparently resigned. That is why we have runaway locomotive engineers running City Hall.

Experienced,

Let me eat my words, my source was bad. You are correct Illinois gained. I shudda checked first.

http://www.google.com/publicdata?ds=uspopulation&met=population&idim=state:17000&q=illinois+population

By Chris Magee, moderator on May 23, 2009 6:52 PM
I think Naperville has a lot of things neighboring towns don't have, and the bigger the city is the more it has to pay for. Everything Naperville does, it does for 145,000 residents. Everything Lisle does is for 20,000 or whatever. It's not just population, it's land area too. More roads to maintain, more streets to patrol, more fires to guard against, more salt to buy, etc. As I've said before, even if we pay more, I think most of our citizens would gladly pay more to live a better life.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

In my example between McMansion City and Hard Hit City I used an assumption that each city had 1000 homes. Thus each city would have almost the same amount of roads to maintain, the same amount of streets to patrol, the same amount of fires to guard against, the same amount of salt to buy, etc. Hard Hit City may need even more police and fire fighters as Hard Hit Cities usually have more crime and fires.

Thus your argument falls short when talking about essentials. But it may not fall short if you are talking about excesses like the Moser Carillion or the Library Garage 1 million sunk costs on a deck that is not needed. Or wasting 2 million to defend a petty suit filed by DF seeking damages of 135,000. Here we are spending taxpayer money like drunken sailors to preserve the egos of City Officials. Or spending 10 million to defend against a sting opertation by Napergate Man to try to make sure minors don't have access to booze. Here we were defending the ego of the NPD who felt the Napergate Man was stepping on their toes because he ran his own sting operations to sharpen his employees before the NPD could run theirs. Maybe they were pi$$ed off at the Napergate Man because he denied them the fines they could have collected if they could have stung him successfully had he not prepared and trained his employees. So we end up spending 10 million because the NGM would not let us collect a few hundred dollars in fines. Go figure! This is an amazing waste of money, Moderator Chris. This is where the difference between 40 million and 4 million goes to. I don't know how I could be more clear.

Again at a 2% tax rate McMansion City(like Naperville)had 40 million to run a town of 1000 homes according to my analysis in my prior post. Hard Hit City(like Bellwood) only had 4 milllion even with double the tax rate(4%). The street paving, cleaning, snow plowing, policing, fire fighting costs should be similar in both cities. So where does the extra 36 million McMansion City collects go to? Do you really believe, Moderator, that our fire fighters are that much better than Bellwood's? I think they are about equal and even they will tell you so. They all have to meet the same State standards to be fire fighters. They both have to be willing to risk their lives to save others.

I am barfing just like the eloquently spoken Anonymous is barfing about the wasteful habits in our city that result in higher taxes.

I do not understand why as a member of the press you are defending a wasteful city instead of working with the residents to eliminate the wasteful expenses in this city, Moderator Chris. Please hold the drunken sailors in City Hall accountable. They earn Big Fat Pensions so why be soft on them.

It appears to me from your posts, you are more interested in having good relations with City Officials than holding them accountable. Is the Sun afraid the city will stop feeding it propaganda and the Sun will have nothing to publish anymore? I certainly hope not.

This is part of the reason City Officials continue in their drunken sailor ways. Only when the media keeps a good eye on government and holds it accountable will government improve. The Media needs to be the watchdog of government and not the cheerleader of government.

Here in this town it appears the government has the media under its thumb. You can deny this statement all you want, Chris, but the actions of the Naperville Sun speak louder than any words they could muster in a defense.

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

PS. I did not mention the Daily Herald because with a circulation of a little over a 1000 they are almost irrelevant.....in Napervlle they are basically on life support and can not influence anything either way.

Chris Magee wrote:

Pensions, Social Security and growth fueled by issuing permits for new homes are basically giant Ponzi schemes.

This may be true of Social Security, which has always paid out in benefits most or all of what it takes in, but isn't necessarily true of a good pension plan. Employers get into trouble with pensions when they: fail to make adequate contributions to the plan; allow early retirement programs; give employees end-of-career salary bumps; and promise benefit levels that are unsustainable. If these pitfalls are avoided, I don't think there's any reason why a retirement plan shouldn't be able to pay retirees 2/3 to 3/4 of their final salary after 30-40 years of service.

By Anonymous on May 24, 2009 12:57 PM

Why did Illinois lose 700,000 citizens over the last 10 years?

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

I always marvel when people cite stats but fail to give a source. It makes it very difficult to double check when you think something is amiss. For example, the US Census estimates that Illinois has gained 480,000 people over the last nine years. http://www.census.gov/popest/states/files/NST-EST2008-popchg2000-2008.csv

Chris,

One of the concepts in Economics is called Utility and dis-utility.

There is only so much of something that you can enjoy.

For example:

If you love Mars bars, the first one brings you great joy, and perhaps the next ten make you even more joyous.

However as you consume more and more bars you loose you enjoyment as it begins to approach zero with each additional bar.

At some point, your enjoyment goes below zero and if you are force fed additional bars you vomit. Dis-utility achieved.

Many on this site feel like we are being force fed additional government well beyond our enjoyment levels.

I barfed three years ago.

No more government and taxes please its killing me!

Why did Illinois lose 700,000 citizens over the last 10 years? IMHO our businesses are barfing and moving to less government states and countries, the people follow the jobs.

Taxes wrote:

But what the civilians in Cali want to see is a cut of pension benefits from 100% of the higest and final salary to something more reasonable. Maybe 50%. Or even 25%. They also want to see a cut in salaries for government officials and employees....something that just occurred.

So civilians want to see cuts in pension benefits that are completely outrageous in California. You and I know they want their potholes fixed and their streets paved and are willing to pay for that absolute necessity.

Government officials in California caught on quickly. They agreed to or were forced to have their salaries cut 18%. They did not dare tell the taxpayers we will not fix your potholes and keeping our Big Fat Pensions is more important. They are currently considering reducing their pensions.

I honestly don't believe the taxpayers are under any delusion. Govt. officials were under delusion that the taxpayers would support their 100% pension distributions while they lose their jobs and struggle to make ends meet.

Pensions are only a small factor in California's financial crisis.

Moderator Chris,

1. I would like to see pensions abolished and replaced with the Social Security system. Treat everyone equally. If we go down, we all go down together. Having said that the SS system is not going down. Uncle Sam can print money. We will always get our money abeit with inflated dollars. Our employers match the 6.2% we pay into SS with exactly 6.2%. The POs pay 9.45% and we match it with 21.16%. That is ridiculous that we the taxpayer have to contribute so much and still be told we are $61.4 million short....mindboggling if you ask me.

2. I understood your point about McMansions. You may be misunderstanding me.

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

Let us say we have a town with 1000 McMansion Homes. Each is worth 2 million and the tax rate is 2%.

Then we have another town with 1000 Ordinary Homes worth 100k each with double the tax rate of say 4% since you seem to indicate they pay more as a ratio in smaller towns. I tend to think you are right. But there are limits to how high you can tax poor people. I hope you agree with me on that point.

In the first example, McMansion City, $40,000,000 will be collected to pay for government services.

In the second example, Hard Hit City, despite double the tax rate, only $4,000,000 will be collected. Only one tenth as much for government services.

Both cities need police, fire fighters, a Mayor, city council, and other personal. Both cities need to pave and snow plow the streets.

My question is why is McMansion City having a hard time paying for services while collecting 40 million? How is Hard Hit City managing only on one tenth the amount despite double the tax rate on its residents? If we did not double the tax rate in this example, Hard Hit City would be managing on 1/20th the budget of McMansion City.

You have stated, it's still the same amount being paid. You have stated it is still the same cost. I don't agree with those statements.

But I do agree with your statement that the government is going to spend the money. But it is not the same cost.

Basically, governments find a way to spend whatever you give them.....whatever you allow them to collect from you. If you tax rich residents, they will spend 40 million to run the city. If you tax poor residents, they will find a way to run the city with only 4 million.

Both cities have 1000 homes. Both cities have the same amount of kids going to school. The Hard Hit City may even need more police as there usually is more violence in hard hit cities. It may need more fire fighters as it may also have more arsonists.

Allowing Naperville to collect so much in taxes is what has created the drunken sailor syndrome of wasteful spending.

Even in poor towns you need at least 8000 per pupil to school the children per year. In richer towns you may want to spend $9600 and get some better teachers and wash the windows more frequently and wax the floors twice a week instead of once a week. In both the poor town and the rich town there is no Air Conditioning so that is not a differentiating factor last time I checked.

OK, but we are talking about 40 million instead of 4 million. How can McMansion City not make ends meet? How can McMansion City have a budget deficit? How can McMansion city have a pension liability deficit.

And now that we are on the same page, Moderator Chris, explain to me why Naperville had a budget deficit that required laying city employees off and a huge pension deficit, despite being loaded with McMansions that pay huge amounts of taxes?

Moderator Chris,

Your points are well taken.

1. I agree that pensions are a thing of the past. Therefore why is the Naperville Sun not calling for the abolishment of the city and state pension systems.

2. Secondly, I am not certain taxes will go up 11% each year. I do not have a crystal ball. They could go up 6% or 16% next year. They should be going up 0.1% which is the CPI index if our government officials had a clue about properly running a city. From a 20 year historical persspective, I can only tell you my real estate taxes quadrupled from 3000 to 12,000 in 20 years. Roghly a 7% increase in taxes caused this....not an 11%. This is way too much. If it was 11% every year my taxes would be 24,000 and not 12,000 according to the rule of 72. They would have doubled every 6.5 years or about 3 times in 20 years. Thankfully, that was not the case or I would have been gone to Florida, Nevada or Dakota where there is no income tax or N. Carolina where you pay 1500 dollars in real estate taxes on a 300,000 dollar home.

3. Thirdly, I agree with you about the McMansion issue in town. This is really what blows my mind. Here we have a town loaded with 1 million to 4 million dollar homes and yet we have deficits both for the budget and pension. The homeowners in Naperville have 2 or 3 kids that need to be schooled just like homeowners in Cicero living in 100,000 homes. At 2% a 3 million home contributes 60,000 in taxes to governemnt and school. At 2% a 100,000 home in Cicero only contributes 2,000 to government and school. Even at say 3% in Cicero or Bellwood a 100k home would contribute only 3000.

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

With homes contributing up to $80,000 in real estate taxes and not needing services substantially more than Cicero or Bellwood, how in the world do we have these budget and pension deficits in Naperville? Where the H$LL are these McMansion real estate tax dollars going....better schools....better fire fighters???

OK, maybe since we have better schools it cost us 9600 per year to educate a child and maybe in Cicero it only costs 8000. Only Tom Higgins would know the exact numbers for sure. But that does not explain the huge discrepancy between Naperville and Cicero. Just like Naperville has to fix potholes so does Cicero. Just like Naperville has to police so does Bellwood. Just like Naperville needs fire fighters so does Maywood. They provide their services with only 100k homes paying taxes. The last time I checked fire fighters in Maywood put out fires the same way Naperville fire fighters put out a fire. They have hydrants on their city streets just like we do. How much better service can you get for putting out a fire??? Do we have 5 Star Fire Fighters while they have 1 Star Fire fighters? I did not know fire fighters were rated like hotels or restaurants. I thought they were all equally awesome. That they are all qualified. I believe they all are and must meet state qualifications.

I need you to explain, Moderator, if you can, why we have so much financial trouble in this town when we have so many McMansions contributing 40k to 80k in RE taxes per home or roughly 2% of the appraised value.

Your newspaper stated we had an $11.5 million budget deficit before we started chopping heads in City Hall. CM Bob came on here and stated the P and F pension funds had a deficit of $61.4 million. The deficit grew $9.7 million in one year while the city was under orders from the state to begin reducing it. The deficit grew even though we taxpayers contributed 21.16% in matching funds to the PO and FF pensions funds. The deficit grew even though we only have 33 retired NPD officers while 187 were gainfully employed and contributing 9.45% of their salaries to the pension fund.

No one has answered my questions. Everyone beats around the bush and changes the subject. Why is there no one in this City who can address my legitimate concerns? Why is there no reporter in the Naperville Sun who can dig for answers? I have spoken to 3 Council Members and they have not been able to give me straight answers and sometimes no answers. CM Bob comes on here and gives facts but no solutions to our deficits. He does not address the root cause of the problem. The whole thing is mindboggling!

Maybe it is time the Editor of the Naperville Sun had a one on one interview with the new City Manager to see if he is capable of providing STRAIGHT ANSWERS! The right questions need to be asked. The editor must be like a 60 Minutes or 20/20 investigative reporter and not allow the city manager to coat her with sugar and lose her. When the city manager offers her a cup of coffee and asks her how she would like it, she needs to say NO SUGAR PLEASE!

By McGruff on May 22, 2009 6:31 AM
By Taxes, Taxes and more Taxes on May 22, 2009 12:44 PM

Can one of you explain why North Little Rock Ark saw a 10% reduction in home owner's insurance when their insurance rating went from 4 to 2 in 1994?

By Chris Magee, moderator on May 22, 2009 8:07 PM
The city portion appears to be up 10 percent, but it's not that much to begin with.

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

An animal starts as one fertilized cell and doubles and doubles until it can become an elephant or a blue whale. It can soon weigh 6 or 50 tons. Will you say that is not much to begin with?

My taxes for the city were up 11%. That means they will double every 6.5 years at this unacceptable pace. It is an atrocity. Every component of a tax bill is important and must be kept under control. The same as in businesses or in your home. Every third homeowner in this country is struggling with his or her mortgage in these rough economic times. 5 states are already over 10% unemployment including Cali and Mich. which is at 12.9%. That means every 7 to 8th person in Mich. is unemployed. That is really a lot and has devastated Michigan's economy.

If an employee steals 10 dollars and gets away with it, he will try 20 dollars the next time. If he gets away with it he will try 40 dollars. Before you know it he will steal 320 dollars. It is important to nip waste and theft in the bud before they exponentially grow and it is too late. An employee that steals can bankrupt a business....very easily.

You apprently are single, no kids and have no major expenses. If you had 2 kids going to college and working at the Sun, or a pregnant wife and 2 toddlers running around, believe me you would be watching your dollars much better and not saying a 10% increase is not that much to begin with. If colleges go up 10% and then your insurance goes up 10% etc. etc. and your salary is flat or going up only 2 or 3%, you will begin feeling the effects of wasteful governments sooner than later.

We did not have 11% increases in the past. Two decades ago my tax bill was 3000. Now it is 12000. So even at less than 11% it can quadruple in 2 decades. I can afford it because my 30 year mortgage was knocked off in a timely manner....or early manner is more appropriate. But most of my neighbors who have mortgages and kids in college are struggling. The ones who lost jobs and I know many are struggling even worse. And really there are no jobs out there at least for now.

Many of these people in my neighborhood were living way BELOW their MEANS. But exponential increases of many costs over many years have finally taken their toll on them. They love Naperville as I do and should not be asked to leave just because others such as those in City Hall are careless with their hard earned dollars.

The State of Illinios understood at one point that taxpayers have limits of affordability. That is why they have rules governing tax increases. Basically a tax governing body can go up the lower of 5% or the CPI index. The CPI index in the last year was nearly 0.0-0.1%. An increase by the City of Naperville of 11.18% after laying off 43 city employees or terminating open positions, is shameful. It is a sign that trouble is looming and much excess fat exists that is yet undetected in City Hall and its depts. such as Police, Fire, Sanitation and you can name your dept. Our city has declared itself HOME RULE which is a translation that it is now allowing itself to do as it pleases and does not care if the taxpayers take it up the wazoooooo....as long as they get their Big Fat Salaries and Pensions.

Excesses must be nipped in their infancy. They are like cancer. You can not say one cancer cell is not a big deal. It is a big deal. If it is not dealt with it will take over your body and kill you. We have more than one cancer cell in City Hall and it must be dealt with. If it is not, it will lead our city to Chapter 9 or bankruptcy. Some residents think this is far fetched. It is not.

States and cities can not print money to get out of a crisis like the Federal Government. They can not borrow endlessly from China who apparently has reached its limit of tolerance with the USA. States and Cities must resort to the taxpayers unless they make cuts in salary, expenses, and Big Fat Pensions.

California proved it all this week. California was a disaster and we saw the first partial implosion. The Big Implosion is on the horizon. The commercial real estate market has not yet imploded. But it is imploding and when it implodes, it will affect cities and states in Big Ways. As one blogger stated Seven Bridges is just the beginning. We know the landlord imploded and his 22 year $250 million investment went to 0. He was kicked out of his billion dollar Life Style Complex. Moser's attorny can try to sugar coat it to a young and inexperieced Naperville Sun reporter as no big deal, but that does not make it NOT a big deal.

The Sun reporter should call Moser's attorney back and ask him what Moser's equity position in the massive complex is today. He would have to be honest and tell her it is ZERO....ZILCH. We lost everything. We put 25% down, the property declined by greater than 25%, and the banks foreclosed on the property. For layman, this mean the banks took the property away from Moser and his parter the Harris Group. At least all the property that they could not sell to other investors before the bubble collapsed. And there is another bank ready to foreclose on the last large building standing. Trust me! I have inside information.

While Seven Bridges looks 70% occupied, the minute the banks get tired of 3 very large tenants that are 5 months to 14 months behind on their rent, it will be less than 50% occupied.(I do not follow the small tenants in the plaza.) It will become like an eyesore. Anyone take a good look at the Ogden Mall the last 2 decades??? It has been an eyesore. Even stores paying very low rent play musical chairs with other stores also paying very low rent. That plaza in my opinion is a disaster and I would like to see it IMPLODED for a better project. It seems hopeless especially after Dominicks and Walgreens both left for better locations.

When you let any expense get out of control in your personal or business life, that expense could end up being your downfall. No incompetence in government should be accepted. None should be tolerated under any circumstance.

I am sure California did not start giving state employees 100% pensions. It just grew like a cancer. While at the Illinios Secretary of State employees who only get 50% pensions could not believe another state would give 100% pensions. They were fearful of losing their jobs and were grateful to be working for now. Their formula for retirement was 85. Their age plus the number of years worked must total 85 to retire with a 50% pension. Thus if a S of S employee starts at age 25, s/he can retire at age 55 since 55 plus 30 equals 85. If they start at age 19, they can retire at age 52 since 33 plus 52 equals 85. At least that is what I was told few day ago from employees.

Even at 50% pension pay-outs with many of their employees, the state is facing a budget deficit of 7.1 billion. Keep in mind these employees have desk jobs or are working behind the counter. So it puzzles me that they can retire before the civilian population by as many as 18 years and still receive a Big but Slightly Less Fat Pension.

Government jobs are cushy these days and pay extremely well. While one could say go get yourself a government job, there are only so many government jobs to pass around. So 90% or more of us have no choice but to work in the civilian sector and live without a Big Fat Pension!!!

By Chris Magee, moderator on May 22, 2009 10:30 PM
Here's a quote from a story about the California budget:
"The public is under the delusion that they can have everything -- potholes filled, new freeways, a good education system -- but they aren't willing to pay for it ... A lot of critical services are going to be cut and there will be serious consequences," said Jim Hawley of the Elfenworks Center for the Study of Fiduciary Capitalism at St. Mary's College of California.

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

Moderator Chris,
I think the public is willing to pay for potholes to be filled, new necessary freeways, and a good education system. At least I am.

The above is what the government is saying will be lost if you don't give them the tax increases. Do you believe them? The Californians did not believe them and rejected the tax increase they requested.

But what the civilians in Cali want to see is a cut of pension benefits from 100% of the higest and final salary to something more reasonable. Maybe 50%. Or even 25%. They also want to see a cut in salaries for government officials and employees....something that just occurred.

So civilians want to see cuts in pension benefits that are completely outrageous in California. You and I know they want their potholes fixed and their streets paved and are willing to pay for that absolute necessity.

Government officials in California caught on quickly. They agreed to or were forced to have their salaries cut 18%. They did not dare tell the taxpayers we will not fix your potholes and keeping our Big Fat Pensions is more important. They are currently considering reducing their pensions.

I honestly don't believe the taxpayers are under any delusion. Govt. officials were under delusion that the taxpayers would support their 100% pension distributions while they lose their jobs and struggle to make ends meet.

I really think, Moderator, you are buying the government BS hook, line and sinker. I am a little surprised you appear to be siding with government officials over the hard working taxpaying residents.

What kind of pension do you get at the Naperville Sun, Moderator Chris? While I don't know and it is none of my business, I am willing to bet you will get no pension when you retire. So why do you feel an obligation to support the pensions of public officias when they stuck you in the Social Security system while sticking themselves in superior retirement pension plans? Is that fair?

Bloggers,

Nothing is really funny. Cali collapsed a few days ago.

Read the L A Times and see if you think this is all some kind of joke.

I bet our public officials and employees would not be laughing if they were focred to take an 18% cut in salary.

Chris Magee, moderator on May 22, 2009 7:06 PM
Chris Magee, moderator on May 22, 2009 8:07 PM

_______________________

Amen to both points moderator Chris.

Chris are you seriously suggesting you like taking it up the WAZOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO from the fat cats down at city hall?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?

Mod,

Will you gladly pay 11% per year increases in your Naperville taxes for theses services? That's what we got this year. That is insane.

h

The shrinkage of retail back to historic levels in the mid to upper 60% of GDP is well under way. Some 400 malls are in trouble, Seven Bridges in not alone. This will spill into the Insurance Companies who finance a lot of commercial when the bust picks up steam.

WSJ: Recession Turns Malls Into Ghost Towns

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124294047987244803.html

Anonymous,

Your trying to instill fear to justify your fire fighting position and Big Fat Pension. Don't play those games on us.

Maybe we should all be driving Hummer H2s for safety and we would only need one fire station. We could lay 90% of the fire fighters off.

I am sure if we eliminated our $10,000 in Real Estate Taxes most of us could afford a Hummer H2 and the safety that comes with it.

If you guys want to eat our wallets up we can let a non-profit organization like Edward's Hospital take over the ambulance service in town.

Let us stop yelling fire in the middle of a move theater to justify excess waste in the Naperville Fire Department. Most people will not buy that.

There is a risk in life. Maybe we should stop crossing the street and flying airplanes to be 100% safe. Safety has to be balanced with affordability. This "give me stuff" will come to an end in this town just like it came to an end in Cali and Toledo.

We have the option of going to volunteer fire fighters or private fire fighters who will work without demanding a Big Fat Pension.

Enough of this bolony justifying all these excesses at taxpayer expense. Governor Arnold S. stated he finally heard the taxpayers loud and clear.

When will our city officials finally hear us LOUD and CLEAR?

Has anyone ever been involved in a car accident who's commenting here?

I was locally, and it was Naperville firefighters, who do double duty as paramedics, who helped save my life, as they do for countless others yearly I bet. How many people would die or be more seriously injured if we closed down fire houses?

Experienced,

The fire fighters are going to yell fire all the time to keep us frightened from laying some of them off. That is how insurance folks sell you more and more insurance....they instill fear in you.

Maybe people will be a little more careful if they realize having a fire station on every other corner is no longer affordable since firefighters are paid the highest salary coming out of college plus Big Fat Pensions. Maybe if firefighters were not so greedy in their demands we could afford them.

Here are some opinions mentioned in the article you provided a link to.

___________________________________________________________________

Atlanta Fire Chief Kelvin J. Cochran said he believed Atlanta would keep its 2 rating, and said officials would have a chance to correct any deficiencies before a new rating is set.

David Colmans, executive director of Georgia Insurance Information Services, said a change in rating won't automatically mean higher premiums.

____________________________________________________________________

Thus the fear that homeowners premiums will increase 44 million if a few fire stations in Atlanta were shut down are totally exaggerated and for the sole purpose of inducing fear and panic among civilian taxpayers.

While every home has a 1 in 1000 chance or whatever of burning down, a much larger percentage of homes will be foreclosed on due to unaffordable taxes if police and fire fighters continue demanding to be the highest paid college graduates in the country as is the case in Naperville while receiving a Big Fat Pension at age 52.

As more and more businesses and homes are foreclosed on the burden of taxation on the rest of us who are hanging on becomes even more unbearable. Just like the disaster in Cali resulted in an implosion the disaster here will result in the same.

City and State officials are going to have to realize that giving police and fire fighter 75% of their final or highest salary for 40 years after retirement is just impossible. I can not believe our City Manager does not understand the math. I can not believe our City Council does not understand the math. I can not beleive the Finance Manager does not understand the math. Supposedly our City Manager has an MBA with emphasis in accounting and finance so he should understand the math if he wants to understand the math. Even CM Bob appears to be in hiding and afraid of doing the math. Did anyone else notice how he suddenly disappeared when the kitchen caught on fire?

You just can't pay 9.45% of your average 90k salary for 30 years and expect to have a pension of 75% of your final salary of 120,000 for the next 40 years. The numbers simply don't work out.

If the city is investing in very conservative govt bonds earning 2% it takes 36 years to double the contributions of a PO or FF. If they are getting 3% it takes 24 years to double the contributions. Again the formula of 72 that I know Experienced must be familiar with as it appears he is well-educated, skillful, knowledgeable and experienced.

At 9.45% we are collecting about $255,150 from POs or FFs over their 30 year career. If we double it due to conservative investing we are collecting $510,300 directly and indirectly form POs and FFs.

If we had to pay a police officer 75% of his final salary of 120,000 for 40 years, s/he needs $3,600,000 dollars and that does not even factor the cost of living increases for each of the 40 years. Factor those in and we need to come up with approximately 5 million from a "half a million in contribution and return on the contribution" assuming it was invested very conservatively in government bonds and not lost in the two 21st Century market crashes and collapses we had so far.

If anyone knows what I am talking about, Experienced, you know what I am talking about. You have to understand these simple numbers. You have to understand why the pension deficit gets worse each year despite all efforts to improve it. You have to understand why Cali finally IMPLODED.

More so, the Naperville Sun should do an analysis of numbers to shame our City Officials who are not doing their homework while collecting their own Big Fat Pensions. This analysis is not hard to do.

One simply has to understand that if a PO or FF contributes 250k over his 30 years of employment and a good fund manager can double his contribution, but yet he expects 5 million when he retires in pension pay-outs, the taxpayer must come up with 4.5 million difference for each retired PO or FF. This is simply UNAFFORDABLE. It really is IMPOSSIBLE. It is unquestionably INTOLERABLE.

Right now we only have about 33 retired police officers and we have a $61.4 million pension deficit and a pending disaster. What will happen in coming years when we have 187 police officers retired? What will happen when the retirees exceed those employed as has has happened in older cities like Toldeo and companies like GM and Chrysler? You must know what will happen, Experienced. Why continue defending City Officials when you know their stand is INDEFENSIBLE?

Toledo taxapayers would not come up with the additional money required because they were already strectched to the max. They laid half their police dept off and it remains laid off. Cali made massive layoffs that barely put a dent in the problem. They finally reduced politicians and state employees salaries across the board by 18%. Next year according to some newspapers in LA they will need another 18% cut unless the State Legislature finally abolishes these insane 100% pensions Cali was giving out to their employees until death do them apart. Total insanity if you ask me.

It is time Government Employees across the nation were put on Social Security just like the rest of us civilian folks. The government made the system for us civilians but apparently it was not good enough for them....they opted out of it and gave themselves Big Fat Pensions. Can anyone believe this arrogance and cockiness of our government officials? How dare they think they are better than we are? They just raised the price of 1st Class mail by another 2 cents so they can put their executives in Big Fat McMansions. Holy Todedo!

How can anyone in his right mind support this craziness.....unless they work for the government. Assume anyone who comes on here in support of Big Fat Pensions and HIGHER TAXES is working for some government agency and wants to let you have it up the WAZOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!! Tell them your WAZOOOOOOOOO has been sealed shut and is no longer available for further abuse.

By Experienced on May 21, 2009 8:42 PM

Article on the possibility that Atlanta's fire rating would be affected by the closing of fire stations in hard economic times.

Powerful comment filled with ambiguity.

1. Article is published by an agency with a conflict of interest.

2. What is the value of the ISO rating if they have not reviewed the City in 30 years (again, if the article is correct)? Was the current rating based on horse and buggy fire apparatus? Coal boilers to pump the water?

3. Again, even if the rate went down to a 4, there would be no increase in insurance premiums.

In addition to pension costs, police and fire costs are simply too high, clearly people are getting nothing for way too much.

I hope you can all see that the disaster in California finally IMPLODED.

The former Woodridge Pension Fund Manager knows what he is talking about.

I have little doubt that the disaster in Illinois will IMPLODE sooner rather than later.

Article on the possibility that Atlanta's fire rating would be affected by the closing of fire stations in hard economic times.

http://www.insurancejournal.com/news/southeast/2009/02/23/98082.htm

Republican lawmakers also spoke of moving quickly but said they had drawn from the voters' ire a longer-term mission to fashion a drastically more limited and less costly state government. They said they would propose capping the number of days lawmakers spend in Sacramento, reducing pensions for state workers and shifting traditional state jobs to the private sector.

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

The hacking of government began quickly, by the hand of a little-known state panel that sets elected state officials' pay. Citing a need for shared sacrifice, the group decided to reduce those salaries by 18% starting next year.

Otherwise, on a bright, clear morning in the capital, the most certain thing was the dark and angry mood of the voters. They had overwhelmingly rejected a package of ballot measures intended to produce about $6 billion through the middle of next year of additional taxes.

Only a measure to punish elected officials by denying them pay raises in deficit years won approval -- easily.

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

"The people told Sacramento, 'Go and do your work yourself. Don't come to us with your problems,' " Schwarzenegger told reporters in Washington before flying home. "So now we have to recognize that and move forward and make all of the changes through cuts."

There was a sense that the warnings this time, unlike some earlier ones, were real -- that state officials had no options left but to deliver devastating cuts that could force Californians to reconcile the desire for programs they have routinely approved by initiative with an insistence on limiting taxes.

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

For all the naysayers who say it could not happen in Naperville and Illinois keep dreaming. It has to happen and will happen. It is only a matter of time.

Remember what the former Woodridge Pension Fund Manager said. The situation in Illinios is disastrous. It is not a matter of whether it will implode but when. The "when" apparently has arrived for California. I suspect Illinois is next!

Please issue a warning my dear Naperville Sun to our City Officials. Please be on record with your warning. You can always state we told you so when they don't heed your timely warning.

Thanks!

Posted by: friendly advice | May 21, 2009 at 01:10 PM

The state pesnsion plan is a place to start. Why should they get 100% of their salary at retirement, when the rest of us only gets what we pay into our 404 and 401 plans.

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

I guess California's goverment officials are worse than Illinois'.

They finally paid the price yesterday when the taxpapyers told them to take it up the wazoooo and rejected any tax increases.

How wonderful it is to see government officals cut their salaries by 18%.

And speakng of Big Fat Pensions can you imagine those corrupt officials were paying themselves 100% of their salaries when they retired. No wonder the state of California finally failed.

Moderator Chris,

Florida has no sales tax as your correctly pointed out.

One of my neigbors owns a second home in Naples worth substantially more than his home in Naperville. This morning he told me he pays more tax on his home in Naperville than his home in Naples.

If a state is not wasteful, does not have high government salaries and does not have Big Fat Pensions it can have lower sales tax, income tax and real estate tax than a state that is wasteful.

The amount of taxes depends to a great deal on the expenses of local government.

When the new home assessments come out for Dupage next year for the preceding 3 year period, our appraisals could be reduced by 30-40% on our homes. Will we see a reduction in taxes? Of course not! They will increase the rate by 30-40% or more to compensate for the lower appraisals.

The only way taxes are reduced is if government cuts its expenses including salaries and Big Fat Pensions. Government employees in California took an 18% cut across the board. That will not even reduce taxes but it will keep taxes where they are and balance the budget at least for this one year.

If you want to learn about how corrupt and wasteful Illinios and California are watch Lou Dobbs on CNN. Now that he got those 2 border guards released from jail he seems ready to focus on Big Fat Pensions making taxes INTOLERABLE.

Taxes, Taxes and more Taxes

For Illinois qualifying food, drugs, medicines and medical appliances have sales tax of 1% plus local home rule tax depending on the location where purchased. Newspapers and magazines are exempt from sales tax

In Minnesota Food (not including prepared food, some beverages such as soda pop, and other items such as candy) and clothing are exempt from the sales tax. Prescription drugs are also exempt.

unless your ar real John Travolta I have a hard time seeing how Minnesota is such a good deal if you have to pay 5-7% income tax there.

By Please Check your tax facts on May 21, 2009 4:35 PM
For those that said there is no sales tax in Minnesota - check again.

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

I did check my facts and there was no sales tax on clothing, apparel, shoes, food and prescriptions.

Yes, they tax a few items like furniture at 6.5% and it will be rising to 6.875% in July.

But not having sales tax on the items I mentioned above is HUGE...very HUGE. That is 90% of what I spend my money on. In other words my sales tax would be 90% less in Minnesota.

Let us face it Illinois is corrupt and wasting our tax dollars just like California.

Last night Californians defeated a propostion to increase taxes so goverment officials can get fatter and fatter at taxpayer expenses. They told their government officials enough is enough. No more taxes. No more taxes. And no more taxes.

After the defeat the State of California reduced all government employee wages from top to bottom by 18%.

This is what we need to happen in Illinois, the most corrupt state in the United States of America with a 7 billion dollar budget deficit. Allowing Governor Quinn to raise our income taxes 50% is a crime. He should be thrown in jail with Blagoivich and Ryan immediately. He should be jailed with no trial for proposing a 50% increase in income taxes. Or maybe he should be sent to a mental ward to see if his faculties are still functioning.

Again, I appeal to the Naperville Sun to write an article about what happened in California yesterday and warn our state and city government officials to shape up or ship out. No ifs, ors or buts!

For those that said there is no sales tax in Minnesota - check again.

This is directly from the state tax office:

"General sales and use tax rate increases to 6.875% beginning July 1, 2009

The Minnesota state general sales and use tax rate increases from 6.5 percent to 6.875 percent – an increase of 3/8ths of one percent — beginning July 1, 2009."

Source: http://www.taxes.state.mn.us/taxes/sales/tax_information/content/general_rate_increase.shtml

There is no tax on clothing and shoes in Minn. Like Illinois, local governments can add their own sales tax components to the sales tax as well.

I have to absolutely laugh at the idea that closing fire stations at night is any kind of acceptable risk. It is obvious that the people advocating this kind of dangerous idea knows nothing of how fire can devastate a home in a matter of minutes.

A few points to consider:

1. Fires spread rapidly. Time is extremely critical. Ask any fire fighter and they will tell you initial response time is what saves lives.

2. Most fire companies (a single truck or pumper is called a company) usually are made up of 4 firefighters - a driver/operator. an officer or senior fireman and 2 fire fighters. This is a bare minimum for safety and efficiency. Fire fighting is heavy, dangerous, exhausting work. It takes manpower to fight fires. you don't save any money by closing fire houses - only by eliminating fire fighters. if you do that, you put the public at risk and the fire fighters too.

3. Few people die in fires from burns - they die from smoke inhalation. yes smoke detectors are great - but they often malfunction or are not properly maintained. even if they do sound an alarm, often people are trapped by fire and then over come by smoke - this is particularity true of the elderly and the very young. Fire fighters save lives - they do this by going in to burning buildings and bringing people out. To do this you need to get there fast - closing fire houses means longer response times.

4. What about multiple fires at the same time? Not an unheard of situation. Sorry Mrs. Jones, your family died because we had to close the fire house in your neighborhood and the next one was busy with an accident on the highway. We tried to get a fire truck to respond from Bolingbrook but they took 25 minutes to get there.

And before any of you go on about how I am all for the fireman because I get a pension or anything like that - I don't. I was an unpaid volunteer in another state for 12 years. Our town was too small to have anything else.

I am getting tired of all of you idiots from up north trying to invade our calm southern cities such as Mayberry. Stay up north so we do not get infected with your blue state liberal tax and spend mess.

Andy and Barney handle the policing well here, we don't need all the waste you guys have up there. And except for the bootleggers out in the hills (the Feds can deal with them), there is no crime. We have no paid fire fighters, just a volunteer department.

It's not our fault you people are so stupid to let the government take all your money. Hold your wallets, tell them no.

But stay out. Our life is far better than what that Keyboard Rambo guy rambos about.

Keyboard Rambo,

I suppose the majority who voted to defeat the increased taxes Calfornia was propositioning for in a referendum were influenced by the Napergate Man and his cult...lol....your statement borders on idiotic and you have the audacity to call others IDIOTS. (For the record Moderator please note who brought up Napergate....the guy who claims he does not want it to be brought up....lol)

Most people who don't mind higher taxes like you are not idiots but parasitic humans working for the city and state and trying to live off the backs of the hard working residential taxpayers. We have city employees like former Captain Robert Marshall who is LEGALLY double dipping by collecting a pension, collecting a salary and working on a second pension. He is suppose to be a public servant but he ranks in the top 1/2 of 1% in percentile income generated by Naperville residents.

Anyone who is not interesting in lowering taxes is benefitting from these taxes and may have a cushy job in City Hall and collecting a Big Fat Pension....if not he has some loose, very loose bearings upstairs.

Den Dannies seemed to have smelled the coffee and thousands will follow in his footsteps and demand the City of Naperville be held accountable....it will happen sooner than later. It just happened in California.....the people said NO MORE TAXES, NO MORE TAXES, and NO MORE TAXES. We had ENOUGH! Officials got the message and immediately reduced their salaries 18% and the budget was balanced. Kudos to the Californians who are usually one step ahead of the rest of the country.

Despite the fact that almost all the growth has been halted in our city due to the economy and scarcity of land, our development department remains fully staffed. Our inspectors are driving around town aimlessly using up our precious gasloine while wearing and tearing our vehicles. Thank God we don't replace them for them every 54,000 miles as in the past. Why not lay them off....the growth is over. Let them look for jobs in towns that will soon have their poplulation explosions. We had ours and it is done. Plainfield will have a growth explosion when the economy turns...Naperville will not. Maybe a deal can be made to transfer the entire dept. to Plainfield since we really have no use for them, their salaries and their Big Fat Pensions. In the meantime they should be laid off and allowed to collect their Illinios Employment Security Benefits....we paid into it for them....right!

I'll give you a few small, but easily corrected examples of waste. Every year, the city sends someone around to put 4 foot fiberglass poles on the fire hydrants in the fall. (presumably to facilitate finding them in case of heavy snow.) Then, in the spring, they go around and take them off again. Counting drive time, it takes about 15 minutes per hydrant twice a year. Leave them on if they are truly needed.

Selective enforcement of the weed ordinance. I know areas of the city where vacant lots are never mowed and others where the city issues fines for failure to cut them. If the residents complain about a site, respond. Otherwise, leave it alone. ( This was a much bigger issue when the city was wasting money on an international beautiful city contest, enforcement now is a little less intense.)

Community Connections. If I recall correctly, we spend over $50,000 per year in rent, plus phones and utilities and limited staffing. I've been going past this facility many times a day, at different times of day and only rarely - very rarely -- is the facility serving any member of the community. I once tried to file a police report there and it was made abundantly clear to me that I should have gone to the main station, not this one --even though the accident occurred within walking distance of Community Connections.

The test track. When built, auto dealers were reported to provide $250,000 in sales tax revenue annually. Today, we are told that has increased to $400,000 -- despite a 40% reduction in auto sales. I suspect that we really don't know how much sales tax comes from the dealers. Still, we felt we could buy land, design and build this boondoggle to support 12 car dealers. ( I know there are 19 dealers in town, but the city only needed 12 to sign on to decide to build it. Ever see the sprinklers running on the pavement at the test track? Frequently. Ever see a car on the test track -- I have -- a total of 6 cars in the the entire time it's been open. How much property tax revenue is gone forever because of this? How could it ever have been justified except as a monument to our greatness as a city? Perhaps it could be opened up to driver instruction

The carillon -- tougher call since the city let it get started without funding and then had no choice but to finish the project.

Plowing my street when there is one inch of snow. At least 4 times last year. All done by private contractors hired by the city.

The city does a lot of things well, but every organization has room to improve -- I've listened to our staff an enough council meetings to realize many of them believe they, and their departments, are nearly perfect in every respect. Not an attitude that leads to improvements.

Oh I see what you did there, nice work in playing in the pension broken record in to that. :)

I don't mind the taxes in Naperville, I can afford to live in Naperville. I think most residents outside of the Napergate cult and idiots living extravagant lifestyles on credit well outside their means feel the same way. If you can't afford to live in Naperville, there's nothing wrong with that, there's plenty of other places you can move to. I'm sure you could find a realtor inside of 5 minutes on Google to list your house and do all the legwork for you.

Think how much better off you would be if you could just move somewhere that you were finally able to sleep at night, not having to lay there awake in constant terror of future pension funds. I'm sure you could find a nice town in the middle no nowhere with one police officer, two fire fighters (all three with zero benefits, no retirement, and a $20,000 a year salary), and a property tax bill you could pay with the change in your couch cushions. It would be utopia!

Although... what would you do with the hours you would usually spend ranting here?

The fire ratings are plain BS. The insurance companies charge the same for ratings from Class 1 to Class 4. And Taxes, Taxes and more taxes is absolutely correct, no real impact. Ask the Fire Department about the number of calls they make that are REAL emergencies, 90% plus are false alarms.

My house is more energy efficient. Do I send the gas company an extra 30% to make up for what they would have collected were it not efficient like the old days? Of course not. But for fire and police, the standards are from the horse and buggy days. And the ratings are not done by independent organizations, but rather organizations with a biased link.

But interestingly, the blogger asked for a concrete idea and only one of three options are addressed.

We need LESS government, more freedom and capitalism.

Keyboard Rambo,

Your arguments are great.

Why not have a fire station on every corner in town or at least every other corner?

Your defibillator argument is awesome.

It supports 50 fire stations and not just 10. A 4 minute response time is better than a 7 minute response since you can die in those extra 3 minutes.

But if we have a $61.4 million pension fund deficit with only 10 stations who is going to be responsible for the 307 million pension fund deficit if we have 50 stations just in case we get a heart attack.

I suggest each family go buy their own defibrillator. It is much faster than waiting 4 or 5 minutes and it is much cheaper than paying Big Fat Pensions for 40 years for each fire fighter and police officer. Seriously!

We need to learn to think out of the box. Our ways and methods are not working. Californians yesterday rejected a tax increase referendum in order for public officials to continue being wasteful, earning outrageus salaries and receiving their Big Fat Pensions. The taxpayers had enough in California. They said NO!!! That forced California government officials to cut their pay 18% immediately to balance the $21.7 billion budget deficit. That is awesome. It will be happening soon in Illinois. Trust me! Illinios has a 7 billion budget deficit with about a third of the population of California. So our situation is identical and equally severe.

Illinois is considered worse than California when it comes to the pension fund deficit. How long do you think we have left KR before the residents finally wake up and say enough is enough?

The only thing keeping the taxpayers calm is the Naperville Sun appears reluctant to tell the residents the truth as to what lies ahead. They are afraid to rub city officials the wrong way. Until the Naperville Sun holds them accountable they will continue to self destruct themselves into Chapter 9 or bankruptcy. The taxpayers will not pass any referendums for increased taxes. I can assure you of that. My neighbors expressed outrage this morning to me during a morning walk.

And yes as one blogger said, if we repeal home rule our city officials would be limited to the CPI increase of 0.0-0.1 for the last year. I wish a movement would develop to repeal home rule so the drunken sailors running City Hall would sober up and face reality.

You are aware that the fire department responds to more than house fires right?

So often in the case of cardiac problems all people need is to be jump started with a defibrillator. It's not hard to find stories of people who were knocking on death's door and already losing all signs of life in their skin that get zapped and come springing back to life. Hell, when we did CPR training at work this year one of the things the EMT made sure to constantly remind us is the most critical thing in saving a life is not hesitating and responding as quickly as possible as those critical seconds before CPR or a shock is administered you're playing a dangerous game of brain and internal organ damage as oxygen stops circulating through your blood.

Is it really worth the cost savings to think that you could spend the rest of your life drooling on yourself in a mental institution because of brain damage associated with cardiac arrest because the ambulance had to drive from the other side of town instead of around the corner? This of course, even is assuming they make it there in time.

Out of all the things to cut corners on, emergency response services is not one of them. Do yourself a favor, next time you see the firefighters out trying to raise money in their boot, ask them about some of the emergencies they respond to then imagine the consequences of those emergencies without Naperville's excellent response times.

I don't think the trade-off of tax savings to human lives lost is one any compassionate person would honestly consider, and if you think Naperville residents are going to stand idly by as the fire stations outside their neighborhoods are closed to save a couple bucks, you've seriously got another thing coming. Not quite everyone has gone Galt, believe it or not.

My friend showed me his receipts from the Mall of America. There was no sales tax. Zilch....Zero.

The young cashiers indicated to him they beleive there was no sales tax on food, prescriptions, and even gasoline.

So even if Minnesota has a sales tax it seems like it is only applied on 5-10% of the items in the state.

Illinios taxes everything. Cook County has a 10.25% sales tax. If that is not insanity, I do not know what is.

I am sure Mall of America chose Minnesota as it is a destination mall and no sales tax was the icing on the cake to draw people to the largest mall in America.

Our problem in Illinois is governemnt officials are incompetent and than they want a Big Fat Pension to reward their incompetence. Pretty much like many of those companies on Wall Street that lost billions but paid their executive officers millions of dollars of bonuses for their massive incompetence.

Experienced,

I think the proposal to close some fire stations was just in the late evening or early morning hours. At those hours there is little to no traffic and response time may even be better from a fire station twice as far as during rush hour.

I think the proposal was very reasonable.

The problem we have in this state and city is we are stuck in our old ways. We are stuck in the 24 hour firefighter shifts. We are more concerned about the schedule of the fire fighters than our tax dollars.

As one blogger said building material is much less flamable than in the old days. We have battery operated smoke detetor alarms and most of the alarm companies now provide smoke detectors connected to central stations that also have loud sirens. If one has these smoke detectors and alarms, in the rare event of a fire, there will be no bodily injury as they give plenty of notice to evacuate while the fire is tiny or while it may be still in the smoke stage. With such early notification from technology most fires can be put out by stepping on them or hosing them down.

An evaluation needs to be done. Maybe we can keep the stations all open on Friday and Saturday late evenings and early mornings but close some on Sunday when most of the drunks are home trying to sober up by sleeping 24 hours shifts. They are not on the roads causing accidents. And it is pretty quiet till Wednesday evening. So our officials need to do some analysis to see where we can cut costs by closing some fire stations for certain hours.

We can not be stuck in our old ways forever. I doubt insurance rates will be impacted significantly as response time will be excellent at 3am when fire engines can zoom at 80 miles an hour instead of being stuck in rush hour. During rush hour no one is caling for a single fire station to be closed.

By Keyboard Rambo on May 20, 2009 8:51 PM

And, also remember that city fire insurance ratings are based upon projected response time. New fire stations are planned and built to have projected response time within acceptable fire safety standards. If the city closes fire stations and therefore increases projected response times, the fire insurance rating for the city will decrease causing all fire insurance premiums in the city to increase. One has to weigh the savings on the tax costs of operating the closed stations vs. the increased cost to all property owners of the city due to the reduced fire insurance ratings and increased insurance premiums. What may happen is "penny wise; pound foolish".

I hope the fire station you're proposing they close is the one closest to your house and not the one that's closest to my house! In a fire or emergency situation, precious seconds can make the difference between walking away, a serious injury, or worse. Closing fire stations quite honestly is laughable, and I really would hate to think of an emergency taking place where lives were lost because the firemen had to drive from across town instead of the local station.

You want waste, here goes.

1. 30% too many policemen who have time to crack down on underage drinking parties and all the other hard crimes. Too much overtime as well. Include court time in their 40 hour week.

2. At least 40% too many firemen. At least half of the stations should be closed during the evenings. Schedules can be redone to reduce the fire counts. Even with all of the fires, the typical fireman is lucky to fight one fire a month. Staff for the 21st century, not based on the 18th century concepts.

3. Planning and building department. The City is done. Fire 80% of these people if not 100%. The City can contract with private companies to perform the building inspections instead of maintaining full time inspectors.

Is that specific enough?

A few people here are complaining about specific City of Naperville waste. Wasting tax payers hard earned cash. A lot of residents work for the City of Naperville. I for one would like to know what are your specific complaints regarding waste. Where do you see the waste - no more generalizations - real points, list them here. A lot of people read these blogs. Why would resident-employees who themselves pay their own salary waste funds? Just doesn't make sense.

Start listing. No generalizations. Real things that the council can chew on.

Big Fat City Pensions has a great point. It's the city, state, county, schools, etc., and all of those workers. I know state workers who retired early at age 50 (under Ryan's administration) and got pensions equalling 60% of their highest salary and full medical benefits for their wives and children.

Ridiculously high. 9000 a year on real estate. I think half of the administrators in 204 could be ouddahere with no effect. And why are the salaries in 204 so high. Salaries are equal to Chicago with one / one hundredth of the problems and size of student population.

With the Obama administration, soon we will have to pay to get a job. A couple of relevant, random thoughts.

1. People who are concerned about the City of Naperville's wasteful spending, you can correct it. File petitions at the next election to strip home rule authority from the City. They will need to live within the tax cap--0.1% next year.

2. Everybody says that Illinois and its governments cannot file for bankruptcy. Half true. The US Bankruptcy Code allows states to elect whether or not they or their underlying governments can avail themselves of the Code. Illinois opted not to allow governments to do so. California exempted the state, but allowed local government.

However, the Bankruptcy Code was developed to streamline "common law insolvencies" (the former way that insolvent companies addressed their issues). This common law option could still be used to force local governments to truly balance their budgets. And we should start by putting the State of Illinois into receivership.

Imagine the unions freak when a judge writes off their pension since there are not enough tax funds to pay it. It would be about time.

Either the government goes bankrupt or we do.

You big dummy calling us dummies. Really educated and sophisticated. This is how you lose credibility. Period. You can still go back to school and get a masters in public administration, 2 year program if you go full-time. Get yourself a goverment job and quit complaining. If you had a good job you wouldn't have to work until 70. Makes me think you are depending on social security and have NO OTHER MEANS of retirement lined up. Damn baby boomers. It's not my fault that YOU made a poor career choice in your life.

Shu Peterson,

I think you summarized it in a nutshell.

Those dummies on this blog site who want higher taxes don't realize they are chasing jobs away to Texas, Florida, and Nevada.

They don't realize with the loss of all these 725,000 jobs and many more in the pipeline, the Big Fat Pensions will even be more difficult to tolerate and afford by the fewer and fewer willing to remain in the State of Illinios that is ruled by selfish and ignorant politicians....many of whom are CORRUPT and should be jailed with former Governor Ryan.

I can't believe anyone is dumb enough to call for increased taxes instead of decreased spending unless they are benefitting from these increased taxes such as receiving Big Fat Pensions that pay 75% of the final and highest salary from age 52 till death do them or their spouse in.

Assume anyone who blogs about wanting higher taxes is a government employee wanting to rip us off even further. There is no other explanation other than the occassional person with very loose bearings or the person who is trying to be a smarta$$.

In my opinion anyone who wants to retire at age 52 is lazy and does not deserve a Big Fat Pension that will make him even lazier. Let us hold off on paying government employees their pensions till age 70 in hopes they will work like civilians till that young age.

Let us not forget we allowed Robert Marshall to retire while he was running marathons. Was he not fit to contine being a Captain in the Naperville Police Dept? He just took advantage of the stupidity of the state and city, retired, got another job with the city and begin double dipping into taxpayer funds while working on a second pension.

I simply can't believe this is not a front line story in both the Daily Heral and the Naperville Sun. Local newspapers have a duty to educate the public even though it may mean they will outrage and upset the residents. Maybe they get off their butts and demand that City Hall stop wasting our hard earned taxpayer dollars.

Period.

Hey Quinn's 4.5% looks great

....New York (in NYC) 10.489%
....California 9.3%
....Wisconsin 6.75%

On the other hand

....Texas 0.00%
....Florida 0.00%
....Nevada 0.00%

If you want higher income taxes, move to a state that imposes them. However, we all know that people AND JOBS are leaving to states like Texas.

Since 2001, the State of Illinois has lost 725,000 jobs. That is why there is a financial crisis, less people are paying taxes. Go ahead, raise taxes so we can lose even more jobs.

http://shopping.minneapolis.org/

This link indicates there is no sales tax on apparel in Minneapolis.

He spent a day shopping at the Mall of America and stated there was no sales tax on anything he purchased.

Maybe the rest of Minnesota has sales tax on other items.

I don't live in Minnesota and have never been there so I can not be 100% sure.

But at least I found a link that confirms what my buddy said. He was very excited about no sales tax at the Mall of America and spent tons of money.

Minnesota state sales tax will be increasing to 6.875% in July. Local municipalities probably add their piece. The state income tax starts at 5.35% and ends up at 7.85%. Makes Quinn's 4.5% flat tax proposal look good in comparison.

By Anonymous on May 19, 2009 1:47 PM

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

Most questions I ask contain the answers. Bloggers just have to add 2 and 2 to get 4.

Making my comments in question form protects me from any potential libel liability. Trust me I know the answers to most of the questions I ask. I just want every Napervillian to be fully aware and to wake up.

Only large masses of residents protesting will force the city and state to retract their positions on Big Fat Pensions. Those elected to office will not help as they are given a Big Fat Pension the minute they are elected. It becomes a conflict of interest for them to fight their own benefits. They will give you lip service but they are not going to bite the hand that feeds them and in fact feeds them very well.

A friend of mine just came back from Minnesota and he said they had no sales tax in that state on almost everything including food, pharmacy drugs, clothing, gas, etc. They had a field day in Mall of America with no sales tax. They also had no tolls and their roads were in better shape than ours. I asked him how is it all possible and he said probably because the have no Big Fat Pensions and no government waste as we do in Naperville and Illinios.

We need to keep fighting against high taxation and keep the issue in the limelight. Even gaining 2 people a day will increase our demonstrators to 1000 next year on April 15 in front of City Hall. We need to send a message to City Hall that Enough is Enough!

What hubris, Sybil -
"There are a lot of questions that have not been answered about the pension system. I will keep it in the limelight day and night until city officials provide some serious answers. They would like me to go away."

I've no doubt that you would like to believe this is the case, but even you can't really think it's so. If this is something that you actually care about so very much, first, do a little independent research instead of asking the same questions over and over again, and ignoring any information coming from those that have some other input. Second, contact the relevant city officials who can actually answer the questions for you. Take it to a meeting, if it's that vital to you. You know, DO SOMETHING, instead of rambling on here.

"We either fight corruption and incompetence in our state wide pension system or the residents and businesses will move to other states were tax laws and rates are much more resident and business friendly."
*******************************************************************

FINALLY. You FINALLY admit that this is a STATEWIDE issue. Gentleman, mark your calendars.

By Experienced on May 19, 2009 4:19 AM

The answer is that the Police Pension Board will pay what they can out of the pension fund and then the retired police officers will take the loss. That is what the state statute says. I have quoted it before. 40 ILCS 5/3‑142 The city has no liability for the pension board's failure to have enough money to pay the retirees.

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

By Anonymous on May 19, 2009 8:24 AM

Could it be possible that we are able to pay them 75% of their highest and final pay through taxes, higher taxes, more taxes and never ending taxes?

Yes, actually, since it's required by state law.

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

It appears Experienced and Anonymous are contradicting each other. I am not sure who is right but I believe Anonymous may be right.

If he was not right, why is the State ordering the City of Naperville to wipe out the pension fund deficit by 2033?

If he is not right why is the City forcing the taxpayers to contribute 21.16% of salaries towards police and fire pensions.

If he is not right why are the police and fire unions demanding that taxpayer contributions be increased to properly fund these pension deficits and eliminate the $61.4 million pension deficit.

There are a lot of questions that have not been answered about the pension system. I will keep it in the limelight day and night until city officials provide some serious answers. They would like me to go away. But I am persistant and will continue to be persistant as I am fed up of paying for these Big Fat Pensions with my tax dollars.

I feel it is partially my duty to wake up every Napervillian who is sick and tired of high taxation. To let every Napervillian understand the root cause of his or her very high real estate tax bills that just arrived in the mail and are due on June 1, 2009.

We either fight corruption and incompetence in our state wide pension system or the residents and businesses will move to other states were tax laws and rates are much more resident and business friendly.

Many corporations have already left Naperville. Many of those beautiful large buildings along the tollway and Warrenville Rd. you see are EMPTY. Empty office and retail buildings result in higher residential taxes because they are given credits for their vacancies.

For those who ask "those who care about their high tax bills" to leave town, please be careful for what you wish. You may just get it and the consequences that follow....much higher taxes for those who remain!!!

Experienced,

How is it that we can make 5 to 6 million annually and increase our pension deficit by 9.7 million. Something just does not add up.

Are you sure this 5 to 6 million does not include the taxpayer contributions of 21.16% that we taxpayers have been making in matching contributions to the police officers 9.45% contributions?

Are you sure this 9.45% and 21.16% is not part of this 5 to 6 million NET ROI. It is hard to imagine this huge return on investment in a crashing market(2nd worst in history) unless the fund managers knew it was crashing and shorted the whole portfolio. I don't beleive these pension funds are even allowed to short.

And if they are mostly in cash and Treasury Bonds as you or another blogger mentioned, 1 or 2% returns would never generate 6 million unless they had 300,000,000 in investments. 2% of 300,000,000 is 6 million. Do they have 300M in investments, Experienced? I am not sure but I believe the number is way below 80 million. So I have a hunch you are including taxpayer contributions and counting them as NET ROI. I could be wrong. You may be also including police contributions and counting them as NET ROI.

I know you are trying to help but you have yet to provide me links or raw data that would prove the former Woodridge Police Pension Fund Manager wrong. He stated these police pension funds are a disaster and will implode. I believe he knows what he is talking about and I am siding with him until someone can provide evidence to the contrary. He is currently a financial advisor in Lisle.

Sybil, of the never ending name changes says:
Could it be possible that we are able to pay them 75% of their highest and final pay through taxes, higher taxes, more taxes and never ending taxes?

Yes, actually, since it's required by state law.
A change in this area would take a great deal more than getting the Naperville political climate to change, which is hard enough to imagine.
You've been over this and over this and over this on nearly every possible thread on this site. We get it, for some reason you think this is the biggest thing ever, and you simply keep writing the same things, with ever so slightly different wording.
Whatever point it is you think you have to make, you've made it. There is absolutely no point in trying to make it again, unless you have something new to add. Perhaps it's time for a new hobby horse, and I am sure that you can find one.
Of course, maybe you'd rather continue tilting at windmills. Now that I think of it, that's likely, but consider giving it a rest, would you?

By Taxes, Taxes and more Taxes on May 18, 2009 11:55 PM

The answer is that the Police Pension Board will pay what they can out of the pension fund and then the retired police officers will take the loss. That is what the state statute says. I have quoted it before. 40 ILCS 5/3‑142 The city has no liability for the pension board's failure to have enough money to pay the retirees.

As far as there being no or little return on investment from 1997-2009, fiscal 2008 NET ROI was $4,823,000. Fiscal 2009 was project at $6,062,724 as of February. Past years are not assessible on-line.

I do respond. You just don't read what you don't like.

If you would stick with one user name, the rest of us won't have a problem referring to you. I'll make you a deal: you give us one appellation that we can refer to you across the board, and I'll use it. If not, as far as I'm concerned it's DS. You know that when I use it, it refers to you and so do all of the continuing posters.

So, when are you going to become a stringer for the Sun?

Experienced,

Why resort to name calling?

Why not answer some of my questions instead of going in hiding when the questions are a little tough for you?

If a police officer starts at 60k a year and ends up at 120k a year in salary 30 years later he is contributing roughly 9.45% of 90k each year for 30 years to his pension fund.

If a police officer or his or her surviving spouse lives to 92, we are paying him or her 75% of 120,000 plus cost of living increases for 40 years.

If there is no or little return of investment as has been the case from 1997-2009, how can we afford to pay these police officers over 12-15 times what they contributed.

Could it be possible that we are able to pay them 75% of their highest and final pay through taxes, higher taxes, more taxes and never ending taxes?

If not how do you think they are paid, Experienced? Please stop avoiding my questions and answer them for one. I always answer your questions upon demand.

Name calling will not solve our $61.4 million pension deficit that increased by $9.7 million in one year. Soon CM Bob will tell us how much it increased for the fiscal year ending April 30, 2009. I suspect the deficit would have increased more than last year despite calls and orders from the State of Illinois to decrease it. We will see how obedient or disobedient the City of Naperville has been in obeying and heeding State directives.

Fed Up With the Noise,

There is nothing wrong with pushing a young reporter to dig a little deeper and excel in his or her profession.

There is nothing wrong with pushing a newspaper to be a little more investigative in its style.

Personally, I think the Naperville Sun likes the input and criticism it gets from this blog site. I think it digests the constructive criticism and uses it to improve.

I have seen a lot of improvement in the quality of the Naperville Sun since this blog was established. They are gently exposing government.

I do not think the Naperville Sun is running this blog site for the sole pupose of patting itself on the back by only publishing positive comments.

In 3rd world countries newspapers are controlled by government and only publish what the government wants them to publish. Are you suggesting the Naperville Sun be a third world country newspaper?

But I do agree with you that the Naperville Sun does not really like to antagonize local politicians---that appears to be the root of the problem that leads to soft journalistic reporting.

The Sun is only looking to sell papers. Id be surprised if they want to really antagonize the local politicians. As for hiring an experienced investigative reported, why would that reporter want to come here? Wouldn't they already be working for a major city or regional paper?

Taxes, or who ever you are this week - Id be careful about antagonizing the only people who suffer you to be published here. Lose their support and you might find you have no place to spew - I mean publish your writings.

By Taxes, Taxes and more Taxes on May 18, 2009 4:16 PM

I nominate DS. Make him a stringer!

Yes, government spending, increased spending and more spending is the root cause of taxes, higher taxes and more taxes.

I am glad bloggers are finally catching on.

The big question is when will our City Officials catch on?

When will the Naperville Sun finally hold our City Officials responsible and stop letting them sugar coat every problem by taking advantage of young and inexperienced reporters with their constant bolony.

It is time for the Sun to hire an in depth experienced investigative reporter to hold City Hall accountable or to tell their inexperienced reporters to stop being so gullible and regurgitating whatever City Officials feed them.

Both WSJ articles hit the nail on the head, but politicians, and many voters, still don't see the connection between spending and taxes.

Consider the cover of the Naperville Sun, today: another potential source of revenue. Let's see, the lottery was going to solve our problems, then off track betting, then casinos, now video poker.
Keep in mind that all of the gambling has generated huge revenue streams, it's just that the government has found a way to spend it all. Our fiscal problems will not be solved until we confront the spending issue.

Our own councilman Kenn Miller, suggested recently that the council had done a good job by limiting spending increases -- if you ignore the pension costs and other costs over which we have no control. Well, we have, or had control over all of these costs at one time. Those pension benefits were approved by some taxing authority. His comment ignores the simple fact that the increase in taxes is passed on to business and citizens in full. We have to find real money to pay for the entire increase, not just the items over which the council has control. I like councilman Miller and respect his judgment most of the time, but here's an example of sugar coating approval of a budget that requires a tax increase by foisting the responsibility to items beyond his control and pretending that those items don't have a consequence to every taxpayer.

The simplistic advice to "move if you don't like the taxes" is one solution -- in fact, our decision to leave Naperville after 20 plus years is driven in part by taxes and wasteful spending. However, if enough people follow that advice and move, the long-term consequences for the city will be very, very negative.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124259847829628121.html

WSJ

California Reckoning
Tax and spend governance may finally hit the wall.

California politicians (Naperville and Illinois Politicians) have operated for years as if the purpose of government is not to provide reliable public services at low cost, but to feed public employee unions. Sacramento (Springfield, Eagle Street and the School Districts) also needs to rethink its highly progressive antigrowth tax code, where the tax rates are the highest outside of New York City. The Golden State now ranks worst or second worst on most ratings of state business climate. This drives away entrepreneurs and high-income taxpayers, which in turn leads to lower revenues.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124260067214828295.html

WSJ
Soak the Rich, Lose the Rich
Americans know how to use the moving van to escape high taxes.

With states facing nearly $100 billion in combined budget deficits this year, we're seeing more governors than ever proposing the Barack Obama solution to balancing the budget: Soak the rich. Lawmakers in California, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York and Oregon want to raise income tax rates on the top 1% or 2% or 5% of their citizens. New Illinois Gov. Patrick Quinn wants a 50% increase in the income tax rate on the wealthy because this is the "fair" way to close his state's gaping deficit........

..............Here's the problem for states that want to pry more money out of the wallets of rich people. It never works because people, investment capital and businesses are mobile: They can leave tax-unfriendly states and move to tax-friendly states.

FB,

It appears that not only do you have the wrong answer, you don't know what the questions are.

When we had little to no inflation, how is it that the City and School Dist costs spiraled out of control? 203 had shrinking enrollment over this period. 204 may reach their projected enrollment numbers with the massive rental slum that Aurora is going to allow local developers to build on our border.

In the second year of what has been a deflationary depression with declining home, and soon commercial real estate, values coupled with high unemployment and wage and benefit cuts, why would our government and school employees think they should be getting compounding 5-7% pay raises?

Do people move to Naperville because of our government? Or, do they move here because of our high quality job base, formerly moderate taxes and above average families that were attracted here to work?

If massive do it all progressive government attracts economic prosperity, how do you explain the flood of companies and high skill employees flooding out of now bankrupt and soon to be failed California?

You should consider taking your government paycheck and moving to Naperville, then see how many 10% tax increases you want to eat in exchange for the same level of service.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
By Furstenau's Backhand on May 16, 2009 8:08 AM

If you don't like it, move. It's that simple. Just move. Move to a smaller city with crappy resident services and your taxes will be lower.

By Analyze This on May 17, 2009 10:17 PM
I like my taxes! As a matter of fact, they could be a little higher and it wouldn't bother me one bit!

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

Maybe you would also like my taxes since you like taxes and consider paying for them.

You are very unusual to actually "like" your taxes. What else unusual do you also "like?" Maybe you better not tell me.

I like my taxes! As a matter of fact, they could be a little higher and it wouldn't bother me one bit!

Very well said Anonymous!

The pension fund situation is disastrous and will implode just like the former Woodridge Police Pension Fund Manager stated on this blog site.

TO:
By Illinois pension debt worst in nation on May 15, 2009 12:26 PM

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Don't worry, Obama and the Democrats are going to begin bailing out the States that have had insane spending and social programs with new Federal Bailouts.

Socialist Progressive California is first in line for the billions in redistribution from the States that aren't bankrupt from over spending.

If the Democrats and Obama can't wring any more money out of the fiscally conservative states, or private sector employees, they will simply print more money and give it to the States to pay off their pension obligations.

Federal tax receipts continue to collapse, credit has been cut off by China.

Massive inflation is coming, while salaries and benefits continue to decline. WSJ reports that one third of all households have experienced either a lay-off or a salary and benefits cut. On my block we have lay offs, salary cuts, benefits cuts and foreclosures, the problem is real.

The middle class will continue to be ratcheted down at an ever accelerating rate.

Between the increases in spending, elimination of taxes for the bottom half, doubling of the National Debt, transfers of wealth to Unions that backed Obama; the middle class is clearly being targeted for extinction through taxation, regulation and finally inflation.

Welcome to Wiemar Germany!

I don't like Naperville government as much as the next person, but.....

This is pretty simple for all of you. Naperville provides a ton of services and is a good city to live in for several reasons, all of which cost money.

If you don't like it, move. It's that simple. Just move. Move to a smaller city with crappy resident services and your taxes will be lower.

And stop complaining. You people are unbelievable.

By Illinois pension debt worst in nation on May 15, 2009 12:26 PM

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

Thanks for verifying what I have been saying for 2.5 years on this blog site.

Just imagine the state is this broke just trying to pay $1900-3100 in pensions to employees and teachers.

The City of Naperville is trying to pay the police and firefighters from $7,000 to 9,000 in pensions depending on their final and highest salary. That is why they have a 61.4 million deficit that is growing to the tune of nearly 10 million per year.

Let us hope the Naperville Sun unravels this nightmare like they unraveled the Cole-Taylor Bank foreclosing on Moser's Seven Bridges Development. It was really nice to see that article after I tipped them off. It felt good to be a Citizen Journalist for the Naperville Sun. That is after all the stated goal of this blog site.

By Ryan Keith
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Posted May 24, 2008 @ 12:54 PM

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
SPRINGFIELD — In the time it takes you to read this sentence, Illinois taxpayers will be another $200 deeper in debt.

The state’s pension debt will exceed $44 billion this summer, increasing at a rate of about $120 per second, according to Gov. Rod Blagojevich’s administration. The debt already tops $42 billion — enough to give every one of Illinois’ 12.8 million residents a check of $3,300 or buy 937,000 Cadillacs at $45,000 a pop.

The combination of debt in terms of both money and percentage gives Illinois the infamous distinction of having the nation’s worst pension problem, according to an Associated Press review of records and interviews with experts. And there’s no solution in sight.

The staggering debt load for the five pension plans for state employees is a problem that’s remained largely in the shadows for decades. The $42 billion “unfunded liability” — the difference between the systems’ assets and what they owe employees in benefits — also is creating a real problem for state policymakers.

It’s squeezing out money for other valued needs, such as education and health care. It means the state has less money for things like child-care aid and fixing roads and schools, or paying some of the $1 billion it owes to Medicaid health care providers and others.

“Someday, those costs have to be paid,” said Eden Martin, who heads the civic committee of the Commercial Club of Chicago, an economic improvement group. “There is no free lunch anywhere.”

Dating to the 1970s, state lawmakers pushed off the yearly payments they were supposed to make to cover the “normal costs” of pensions, or how much employees earned that year in benefits. These so-called holidays added up, and the debt multiplies over time.

“People didn’t pay attention,” said Rep. Kurt Granberg, a Carlyle Democrat who helped push for a plan to deal with pension payments. “They saw the pension obligations 20, 30 years down the road. It was fiscally irresponsible.”

And the problem is getting worse every second.

At $42 billion, the debt grows by $3.6 billion a year — enough to let nearly 1 million people put $70 worth of gas in their vehicles every week for a year. Enough to cover $1 million ads for 3,600 companies during next year’s Super Bowl.

Like an out-of-control credit card infatuation, or a house mortgage where only a fraction of the cost is paid each year, new pension debt gets piled on top of old.

Here’s what the debt means:

For decades, state employees and teachers have been promised yearly payments when they retire, based on their salaries and years of experience. The average monthly benefit ranges from $1,900 to $3,100 per month, according to estimates from the Illinois Retirement Security Initiative.

The pension funds have invested the cash paid into the systems by employees and state government to build up the coffers, but the value of those investments still falls far short of what’s needed to cover all the benefits earned so far. That’s what causes the $42 billion debt.

Lee Ann Gemmingen, who’s about halfway through her career as a seventh-grade language arts teacher in Belleville, said she is frustrated that the future is uncertain even though every year she and thousands of others like her pay what they’re supposed to contribute toward their retirement.

With no Social Security to fall back on, Gemmingen can’t help but feel uneasy.

“You get that knot in your stomach kind of feeling,” she said. “Am I going to have a pension left? I don’t have anything else there.”

Overall, the Illinois pension systems have about 63 percent of the funding they should to meet their obligations. According to the National Association of State Retirement Administrators, California has an estimated $54 billion debt in its systems, and several states have funding totals under 63 percent.

But taken together, no other state can match Illinois’ problem.

California’s $54 billion debt is larger, but its pension systems are more than 87 percent funded. And states with worse funding percentages have much smaller pension funds — Connecticut’s is the largest at about $14 billion, about one-third of Illinois’ debt.

Experts say the 63 percent funded number is important because many states are at 80 percent or higher; some, such as Florida, are fully funded. The higher the number, the more confident employees can be that their retirement money is safe and will be paid to them.

State pensions will be paid whether the systems are 60 percent funded or 90 percent funded, lawmakers say — the funding percentage only matters if all state employees would retire at once.

“It’s a little bit like saving up for college, except your kid never goes to college,” said Sen. Don Harmon, D-Oak Park.

“We’re always saving up for retirements in 20 or 30 years.”

And not long ago, Illinois was in even worse shape with pensions. Its funds were at 48 percent funded until $10 billion in pension borrowing bumped that up to 61 percent.

A 50-year plan adopted in 1995 has the state on track to be up to 90 percent funding by 2045.

But here’s the rub: The state agreed to pay the pension systems 8.5 percent interest — the estimated return on investments the systems would expect to get if they had all the money they were owed — for essentially borrowing money from the payments they should receive.

That’s 8.5 percent every year. On $20 billion, that’s about $1.8 billion a year. On $42 billion, it’s $3.6 billion. When you add the actual cost of employees’ benefits each year, the state faces nearly a $5 billion payment just to keep the debt from getting bigger.

“We’re falling further behind, not even staying constant, and that’s why we know we’ve passed the point where we have to do something,” said John Filan, Gov. Rod Blagojevich’s top budget adviser.

Many at the Capitol are concerned nothing significant will be done on pensions this year or even next. Lawmakers could be tempted to deal first with more politically popular programs, such as education and health care, and put off pension reform again.

“You don’t get many kudos for paying pension expenses,” Filan said. “There are competing choices.”

You can kiss one in three good bye! Same goes for the tax revenue.

Good thing we exported our high tech and manufacturing to China.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
By Anonymous on May 15, 2009 10:25 AM

How many auto dealers in Naperville will get the same letter from GM that the Chrysler dealers just got?

How many auto dealers in Naperville will get the same letter from GM that the Chrysler dealers just got? This will have a huge impact on local real estate and sales taxes. City Hall gambled by putting too many eggs in one basket with all of the auto dealers. Now even bigger cuts will have to be made at both the schools and at city hall... or they will raise our residential property tax to make up the difference.

Pay attention to this... it is going to be big.

With something like 70% of our property tax bill going straight to the school district is becomes even more evident in a bad economy just how wasteful the school district has been.

Step one should be to merge SD203 and SD204. Combined together we can shed millions of dollars of duplicate overhead costs.

Step two. We need to rethink the whole concept of one principal per school. Just as in the business world when things get tough a manager might need to oversee two plants instead of just one. There is no logical reason a principal can not oversee two schools, especially considering how many assistant principals exist. To further illustrate the point there is a pretty wide fluctuation from large to small sized schools, yet we throw a principal at each school and pretty much pay them all the same regardless of how many students.

Step three. We need to outsource every imaginable support service. The private sector can do every single administrative job cheaper, more efficiently and without the backbreaking pension costs of having these jobs be direct school employees.

addendum on the article:

"The news isn't all bad, however. Legislation passed by the Illinois General Assembly in 1991 stipulates that a tax-funded entity may increase its annual billing rate by 5 percent or the most recent increase in the consumer price index, whichever is less. In 2007, the CPI rose 4.1 percent — the largest spike since the tax cap law went into effect, Dovel said."

The bolded "rate" is correct, but misleading! The rate he mentions is the what we call the total tax levy ($/year) NOT the increase in "rate" which appears on our bill. This quote is from the DuPage supervisor of assessments? Make sure this is what he meant to say.

z-man

A suggestion for the STNG papers and readers of this blog:

See if we can get the tax bill to show the percent increase in the total levy for each taxing body on the bill. Although the "rate" is interesting and should be kept, it does not help us see the truth.

It would give more transparency to the HUGE bill we all get, and it would easily allow us to see if OUR personal increase in tax is greater than the increase in levy. The majority of our anger should be directed at the taxing bodies, not the assessor.

We could figure out when our hostilities should be directed at the assessor if the percent increase in tax for us individually is greater than the percent increase in total levy. That would mean our property has gained more value (or loss less value) compared to all the other assessed property.

????????????????????????????????????

http://www.suburbanchicagonews.com/napervillesun/news/1572430,Taxes-certain-bills-confusing_na051309.article

This article is sad. Journalists seem to have an angle on a story and find mouthpieces to fit it. Here the opening mouthpiece is someone who talks about the neighbors complaints, not their own. Awful journalism.

Then the initial paragraphs about assessments and equalized assessment perpetuates the incorrect reasoning that these are drivers of the tax bill. "But despite declines in property values, property assessments — the basis of property tax bills — aren't going down. " STOP IT!! The basis for property tax bills are the tax levys. Then comparative assessments are used.

Folks, if everyone had their property assessment cut in half at the same time, the tax bill would not change.*

This is very poor reporting. ONLY in the last couple of paragraphs -- long after people have drifted off -- does the truth come out.

Shame on the reporter and editor for this article.

z-man

*sort of...for you nitpickers, I know some tax *rates* are capped, but the concept is the same.

Experienced,

You give good advice sometimes.

Maybe next year we can try to get a few hundred people to protest during the tax levy meeting next Decemeber. Instead of being neutral, why don't you walk your dog or your pet pig or lamb and spread the word to your neighbors. Get them all riled up! People need to be motivated to act. The Sun needs to motivate readers and is currently doing so based on some recent articles. Maybe us bloggers as citizen journalists are finally influencing the Sun editors and writers.

We need to continue educating the taxpayers. We need to continue awaking them. They are finally waking up.

I have stated my taxes went up about 7.5% when you exclude the library and Naper Settlement. That is still too much. I thought they were only going up 5.89% based on conversation with one council member. I have posted that too.

You mentioned the CPI index went up 3.8% last year. I read somewhere in the Naperville Sun it only went up .1%. If the Sun is accurate and I believe they are, this tax increase whatever it may be, is simply OUTRAGEOUS.

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

"For example, it was I who explained why property taxes continue to rise no matter what the appraised value of your property happens to be."(Experienced)

I think I explained that concept many times before you began bloggin a few months ago. I have always warned taxpayers that City Officials will simply increase your tax RATES in order to continue spending like drunken sailors regardless of the value of your home.

In the end government spending determines how bad your taxes will be. The value of your home pretty much only determines your pro rata share in relation to value of other homes in Naperville.

By using the same standard to value homes, an owner of a 400,000 home will not have to pay the same amount of taxes as the owner of a 4 million McMansion. He will only pay about one tenth the amount if the assessor can get it right.

Darn, forgot to do the header again. That last one was obviously mine.

By Tim Hoggins on May 14, 2009 5:40 PM
Tim Hoggins here. I think higher property taxes are great. Based on some comparisons I came up with, the real problem is that we aren't taxed enough

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

Let us hope you are being sarcastic.

Or maybe I should ask how many relatives you have working at City Hall and the School District that are benefitting from the so called higher property taxes you love.

How many of your relatives get Big Fat Pensions???

By Taxes, Taxes and more Taxes on May 14, 2009 4:15 PM

First, let me reiterate again, I am neither an attorney nor a city employee. I am someone who brings experience to these discussions to counter act the falsehoods that are spewed by both sides. For example, it was I who explained why property taxes continue to rise no matter what the appraised value of your property happens to be. In doing so, I skewered taxing bodies for passing levies to maximize dollars rather than to raise only the amounts necessary to operate government. I also pointed out that your use of the 5% maximum increase was too high--even when doing so might have been contrary to putting the best face forward for the city. But, I also pointed out that you were totally incorrect when you said that the city levy was 120% more than it could pass if the city was not a home rule unit of government. It would appear that the city could adopt the same levy whether or not it was a home rule government under the applicable statutes. You must agree because when I asked you for the calculations on your own tax bill to prove me wrong, you couldn't do it. It's not a loophole. It's the way the county clerks do it when they receive the levies from the various taxing bodies. You just don't like it because it doesn't support your false contentions.

Where were you during last December's hearing on the tax levy? If you are so against the current tax levy, why didn't you show up at the annual organized opportunity to speak your mind and let your legislators know first hand what you thought of what was going on? Why is April 15th the day? Showing up on April 15th is four months too late. By the first meeting in December what happened in April is long forgotten. Why not the first council meeting in December when it really counts? Where were your organized showing of tax payers when they might have made a difference? You realize that under state statute if you brought 10,000 to speak at the levy hearing the city could not cut off the number of people who wanted to speak. You could have ground city government to a halt unless the city council heeded your position. 10,000 people at 3 minutes each is 30,000 minutes or 500 hours or almost 21 days. Even the 2000 people you had in April would take 4 full days of hearings. Since the tax levy ordinance has to be adopted in December and filed with the County clerk before the last Tuesday in December, you could have held the city hostage until you the council capitulated. What are your plans for next December? If you could be so monumental in the organization of last April's tax protest, think of how much more monumental you could be at the December levy hearing when it really counts.

Tim Hoggins here. I think higher property taxes are great. Based on some comparisons I came up with, the real problem is that we aren't taxed enough.

Experienced,

Do you think it is OK for City Hall, the police pension and fire pension to be out of control because the library is doing a great job of controlling costs? In my opinion that is INEXCUSABLE.

You are trying to justifiy high taxes with your loophole arguments.

From what I see the bloggers aren't buying your nonsense.

The taxpayers want lower taxes.

They want efficiency and competence in government.

It appears you are a City Attorney trying to justify your high pay and Big Fat Pension. Maybe if your and your colleagues in the legal department handled the Furstenau Case in-house instead of farming it out you could have saved the taxpayers 2 million dollars. That translates to 40 dollars per household. Every little bit helps.

Please stop citing loophole tax laws and tell us how you people in City Hall can reduce our taxes.

It seems most taxpayers finally figured out even if our house appraisals were reduced in half, our taxes would still increase as long as our city officials are spending money like drunken sailors. Our masterful city officials do that by doubling the tax rate and tacking on a little more.

And everyone should remember if city officials keep on their destructive path of 11% tax increases(excluding the library) your taxes will double in 6.5 years. Please continue to be vocal and call your city council. Please attend next years tax protest in front of City Hall on April 15.

Only if we can get 10,000 residents out to protest can we get through to City Officials that we are sick and tired of their shennanigans. The minute you vote a new city council member to office, they give him a Big Fat Pension and he stops representing those who elected him. Yes, the system is as corrupt as corrupt can be starting with all this double dipping taking place shamefully by City Officials.

Taxes are out of control but all of us knows that. Remember that more people than not, voted the referendums. You only have yourself to blame. The schools are the drowning pit but keep on being duped by the school board like you have been.

Remember several things. Many people are hung up on property values relative to the school system and taxes. The whole thing is a Farce. What is your home now worth in this economy ------------ but our taxes continue to skyrocket.

One day this whole tax thing will come to a head and no one will want or be able to afford Naperville. It is just a matter of time.

I hope that all of you who voted for the third high school and the referendums, remember this when you are 60 or 70 years old and you have to sell your home because you can't afford the taxes you won't be a happy camper.

Why are we being taxed on an unrealized gain? Your home is worth nothing until is sells. Also, the law should be changed so that If you don't pay your taxes they can no longer take your home. It will be then and only then that a Tax Revolt could take place and get things back in line.

That would wake a lot of people up and give some real power to the hard working people and main stream America who constantly are getting shafted by governments (local, county) and by the school board.

I wish my taxes were like the amount shown on the front page of today's Sun. That tax bill can't be for a single family home. Has to be for a condo or townhouse. I may be wrong.

Taxes are out of control. Speaking with a representative at the Lisle assessor’s office, I was informed the assessment on my property had no effect on my taxes because, in reality, they look at how much money is required to run government and I’m taxed accordingly. That being the case, we can close the assessors office and layoff 8 people saving the taxpayer thousands of dollars. This is the place to start to reduce spending and manage taxes.

If the teachers and government workers got it so good. Why not stop complainng about it and become one? What's holding you back?

The support and gratitude of all true citizens for the Peoples Government is overwhelming. We are marching forward united towards true social justice and progress!

Our schools are re-making the education of our young to fit the needs of the collectivized State. No longer will filthy-corrupt capitalists, churches, and wealthy land owners supported by the police and military exploit the working masses!

Our Government Leaders and Workers are tireless in their efforts to bring the peoples' money, property and resources together under the control of the Peoples Government for equitable redistribution. All shall be rewarded equally according to their needs.

Today we nationalize the Banks and Auto companies, tomorrow the Medical Systems; and we will assume full control of the peoples power generation and distribution systems.

No longer will the exploiters of the masses drive around in their luxury cars and SUVs, we will all drive the peoples car with no class distinctions!

Individualism and Capitalism are counter-revolutionary, the way forward is collectivism!

The military, police, bankers, property owners and churches must be watched vigilantly as they adjust to the new social order!

We march forward together towards true social justice, we shall not be turned!

No Passaran!

By Taxes, Taxes and more Taxes on May 14, 2009 1:39 AM

What is the increase in your tax bill if you decrease by 2/3 the pension funds line, and combine the city line with the library and the settlement as the statute says? You said that the city "is exceeding the limit by more than 120%", and I would like to see if it actually is. From my additional research it would appear that the IMRF and Fire Pension are about 2/3 of the pension levy (about $5 million each).

Experienced,

Whatever the statutes say or don't say, it is inexcusable that the city taxes were up by 11.18% and the pension taxes were up 10.45% on my real estate tax bill.

If the limitation is the CPI index for non-home rule when it is lower, that is even better. The CPI has been about 0 the last 6 months. Let us see if the City of Naperville can have some spirit and show us a 0% increase next year regardless of what it is allowed to do to screw us. I am simply tired of being screwed year after year. I am sure many other taxpayers had enough of Naperville annual tax increases. Let us not forget some cities like Oak Brook have no real estate taxes. Yes, they have tons of commercial generating sales tax, but we also have tons of commercial generating sales tax. We have 25 car dealers. They have none. We have a nightclub district. They don't have one.

Let us not get into technicalities, Experienced. If the City of Naperville is looking for loopholes to be inefficent and incompetent, they may find them.

The taxpayers want efficiency and competence. Not a city that looks for loopholes to spend taxpayer money like drunken sailors.

sorry Anonymous at 10:57 is me.

By Big Fat City Pensions will get my Tax Refund on May 13, 2009 7:32 PM

The state allows non-home rule towns to increase taxes by a maximum of 5%. Naperville exempted itself BY DECLARING ITSELF HOME RULE and is exceeding the limit by more than 120%. That is simply outrageous and should not be tolerated by the good citizens of Naperville.

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

FIRST, did the City of Naperville DECLARE itself home rule or did the citizens of the State of Illinois grant that status to the City through the ratification of the 1970 Constitution? The answer is that the citizens granted the status to Naperville:

Article VII LOCAL GOVERNMENT

SECTION 6. POWERS OF HOME RULE UNITS
(a) ***** [A]ny municipality which has a population of more than 25,000 are home rule units.

SECOND, let's assume that the City was limited in it's levy by the 5% factor, how does the law calculate the percentage? Is it on the total city levy for all funds? Or, is it just on what the county treasurers list as City of Naperville? And, does it include the line that is listed as City Pensions? Well, 35 ILCS 200/18‑185 states that the limitation DOESN'T include the pension levies for IMRF and Fire Pensions, but does include all other annual levies for corporate and special purposes. And, it wouldn't include levies for projects that would have been subject to referenda if the city were not home rule (i.e., capital budget projects funded through levy).

So, what's that percentage when you add the City, Pension, Library and Settlement lines but subtract the IMRF and Fire Pensions? What about the capital budget items? Is it more or less than 5%? [Actually the limitation is 5% or the CPI whichever is less. For 2008 it was 3.8%.] I can't calculate it because I can't find the breakdown on-line. The tax bills don't help because the pension line is consolidated with non-exempt pension funds.

Can we please stick to one moniker per thread?

School teachers have options in the summer and are not working towards their graduate degrees their whole lives and every summer....unless they are dumb. A summer or two or three and they should have their graduate degree all wrapped up. That gives them 40 summers of almost total freedom assuming they retire at age 65 like most of us civilian employees. If they retire at 52 like police and fire fighters, that would only give them 27 years of summer freedom assuming they spent 3 getting a higher education which benefits them and increases their salary. I am not sure but I think teachers can not retire till 55. So that gives them 30 years of summer fun and 10 full extra years of retirement compared to us civilians who have to take it up the wazoooo till we are 65. And further up the wazooo till age 70 waiting for our full and TINY Social Security Benefits to finally arrive. If we dare retire at age 62, SS sends us half instead of full payments. Not even enough to pay the rent on a studio in Cabrini Green.

Two teachers I know run subdivision pools full time the entire summer. It is a 50 hour plus a week job.

While they are not being lazy, their unique jobs as a teachers allow them to pick up another about $13,000 a year. That is not chump change.

How many other jobs afford you this opportunity?

So when figuring a teacher's salary one must add their earnings from summer jobs which is nothing to laugh about.

If teachers had to do all Ms. Mom is stating, they would not be able to hold on to full time summer jobs. And let us not forget they get Big Fat Pensions when they retire. Something us civilian taxpayers pay for but do not recieve. Ouch!

By blinky on May 13, 2009 1:05 PM
I'm a nitpicker; I hate sloppy math and sloppy reasoning. The average $400,000 home in Naperville is going to pay about $171 per year for city pensions, and more than $3,500 for districts 203 & 204. The pensions aren't the big problem.

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

I am not an expert in the school district and have not studied their spending habits. So I do not know if they are wasteful or not wasteful. A lot more goes in schooling a town than policing a town so school costs should be proportionately higher than say police and their pension costs. Sometimes we don't see a cop or firefighter for a month or more. But our kids are schooled by teachers 8 hours a day 5 days a week and this is costly....very costly. District 203 schools are in a deterioting state. By comparison the Municipal Building looks like a King's Palace and the Police Station looks like a Taj Mahal.

As far as police and fire pensions we are $61.4 million in the hole and it has been getting worse by the year. The last fiscal year ending April 30, 2008 it got $9.7 million worse despite an increase in the stock market We only have 33 retirees in the police department. Yet, we have to pay 21.16% in matching contributions for every dollar a an employed police or fire fighter makes.

Soon we will have 187 police retirees with only an equivalent employed. We may have to match their salaries by 50%-75% or more to make ends meet. If the stock market does not rebound maybe even more.

The pension systems are a disaster for both teachers and city employees. It is corrupt. It should be abolished.

Lou Dobbs said last night on his show on CNN that government employees are now making on average twice what civil employees are making plus they get huge pensions. He ended his show stating the ingredients are there for a REVOLUTION. These Tea Parties we had are just an introduction as to what is too come.

The former Woodridge Police Fund Manager who is a trained financial expert stated the pensions funds are a disaster and will IMPLODE. Pretending the pension fund problem is minor because in dollars it is not as large as schools taxes, will allow it to grow like a monster. It needs to be nipped in the bud.

Currently city of Naperville expenses and pension costs are growing about 11%. That means in 6.5 years they will be twice as high as they are today. That means your tax bill regarding the City of Naperville will double in 6.5 years. Are you all ready for that? I am sure you are all familiar with the rule of 72. That is how I arrived at my computations.

The state allows non-home rule towns to increase taxes by a maximum of 5%. Naperville exempted itself by declaring itself home rule and is exceeding the limit by more than 120%. That is simply outrageous and should not be tolerated by the good citizens of Naperville.

Our city officials are enriching themselves at taxpayer expense. And when they are not enriching themselves they are spending our money like drunken sailors. Don't be in denial and demand your city officials curb their lucious appetite for our tax dollars.

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

PS. A good place to start is to repeal the laws that allow former
City Manager Robert Marshall to collect a near 100k pension while being employed for over 150k. And to add insult to injury he will obtain a second pension from City Hall after working only 8 years. All at taxpayer expense. Wake up taxpayers. Let us see a few thousand of you at our demonstration next April 15 at City Hall. Let us turn these Tea Parties into a national revolution as Lou Dobbs hinted last night on CNN.

PS II. My average home had a pension cost for the city of about 300 dollars. For the local school district about 250 dollars. And for the College of Dupage only 9 cents. Yes, only 9 cents! Last year the College of Dupage was about 7 dollars.

If you read my post, you'll notice I never claimed that teachers were underpaid. Just that most of them put in way more hours than the contractual hours that people like to point out. I actually think teachers nowadays are compensated pretty fairly. Way better than when I started out and was paid $12,000/year. Personally, I have never known anyway who only taught three classes a day and made a 6 figure salary. Any teacher who is full-time, teaching only three classes, probably also has administrative duties. (Where do these people you know teach? It be a nice thing to know if I ever decide to go back to teaching.) I also believe that most administrators are overpaid. I think the salaries that upper level administrators get are crazy.

You'll also notice that I stated that most teachers in grad school are also attending classes during the school year in the evenings and weekends. Grad school is not a summer only thing. If you are enrolled, you take classes all year. I took two classes a semester during the school year, One was usually all day long on Saturdays, and the other would meet 2-3 evenings a week depending on the class.

Does it for the most part allow you to share a schedule with your kids? If you are in the same district as they are. But if you are in a different one, vacations often do not line up the same. Do I think it is a better option for a mom than working in business? Yes, because there is some flexibility in how you structure your time and work in the summer.

The point of my post is that most teachers do not sit around and play all summer long like so many people seem to think. There are things that they do professionally that there is not time to do when they have 25-30 kids to teach every day during the school year. There is not time to create new units, curriculum etc during the year.

I can agree that textbooks don't have to be changed as often as they are. However, that is an issue to take up with textbook companies themselves. They stop publishing them after a certain number of years and after creating new ones or new editions, making it impossible for a district to replace worn out copies. And let's face it, kids do tend to make a mess of those textbooks during a year. Being carried back and forth to school in a backpack takes its toll. I guarantee, that any textbook that was written in the 60s, 70s, or 80s is no longer in print. I would actually be surprised if any from the 90s are. This is how the textbook companies stay in business.

I can also agree that schools are often too expensively built nowadays. I always wonder why the costs vary so much when you compare the cost in 204 to the cost of the new high schools in Plainfield and Oswego. I know that the land costs more, but what makes up the rest of the difference? Are they building that much smaller?

I do believe that many districts waste money. (I can think of some specific examples of waste in each district I worked in.) However, I don't think the salaries that the teachers get are where the waste is. I think those are fair and competitive for the area. I have to confess, I never joined the unions for personal reasons, but did have to pay what is considered "fair share" toward the union. I have stated on other blogs that I am against tenure. I know many other teachers who feel the same way.

My overall property tax bill went down. Only by $25, but we'll take it. I expect it to go down even further next year.

I won't be wasting any of my 'sense'/'cents' splitting hairs and calculating and recalculating about who is getting what. If you don't like it, move, that is if you can sell.

sam on May 13, 2009 3:25 PM
I know it's an emotional issue, but let's be realistic teacher's are not underpaid relative to many other professions

_____________________

Well said Sam, I agree with the jist of your comment. You're right, history and math haven't changed a lot over the years, but the methods to teach them have, but I get your point. Keep in mind that the 70's, 80's and 90's are also considered "History".

For the most part, teaching does allow you to share the same schedule as your kids. It affords you freedom in the summer, along with a pretty nice holiday schedule. Earlier today, WV Mom wrote that teachers spend their summers working on lesson plans, taking classes and attending grad school. How nice it is that they get to do this over summer break, the rest of us do this on nights and weekends after we have finished our 10-12 hour work days.

It appears as though taxpayers are beginning to understand that government spending is what drives tax bills, not assessed valuations or rates. For how many years have our representatives boasted that they cut rates, hoping we'd be overjoyed at the valuations and be happy to pay the increase. Now, more people are beginning to understand the impact of spending. Values don't matter all that matters is spending. How long until 204 needs another referendum to pay for operating a third high school?

Two weeks ago, I watched the council and staff discuss affordable housing for over an hour and only one person was intelligent enough ( or, perhaps, honest enough) to note that property taxes are one of the main reasons seniors can't afford housing in Naperville. We've been here 20 plus years, our home is paid for but our plans are to get out as soon as we can and that decision is driven by two factors: Taxes and congestion. The quality of life here is not what it was and the costs are prohibitive.

(As for teachers, let's not put them all in the same boat. Some do work long hours and give a lot to students. But I also know some earning 6 figure salaries, teaching only 3 classes a day. They aren't spending their nights grading papers - they have over half of their day to do it. And, let's face it, history, English and math, don't change all that much from year to year. Our children could have used our textbooks and lesson plans from the 1960's and learned math and most of history just fine...there simply isn't much change in those subjects. I know it's an emotional issue, but let's be realistic teacher's are not underpaid relative to many other professions)

Its nice to know that a lot of the million dollar homes setting vacant are using the model home exemption,AND PAY NO TAXES

Government pensions meet Vallejo, Ca

I'm a nitpicker; I hate sloppy math and sloppy reasoning. The average $400,000 home in Naperville is going to pay about $171 per year for city pensions, and more than $3,500 for districts 203 & 204. The pensions aren't the big problem. I'm getting ready to retire to Arizona. Total property taxes for a similar value home in the Phoenix suburbs are about $2,000. The quality of education and city services is about the same. So why do we pay so much more? It's not the pensions. It's the union employees throughout government and the school districts, and the school districts' mentality that they have to out do each other with every new building that goes up. Most students won't notice the difference between a $50 million facility and a $150 million facility. They can learn equally well in either. That extra $100 million in architecture is for the gratification of the school boards and the teachers. So if you're going to complain, go after the school districts who are taking the biggest bite out of your paycheck.

I've attempted to get into RibFest for 3 years counting now
even purchased 'advanced' tickets, but still couldn't get in

taxes,
well - as Naperville's infrastructure ages, and more and more
repairs need to be done, vs new construction of roads/subdivisions
I fully expect that the tax levy will have to increase

I remember reading somewhere that the car dealerships in Naperville
provided something like %15 of Naperville's sales tax revenue - needless to say; that's history - the $$ has to come from somewhere

Evidently 203's got enough spare change for LaCrosse, as does the
park district - which seems somewhat contradictory in these recent times.

other than the bobble-head mayor / naperville's finest cheerleader
who's thank-you-very-much attitude wreaks of a yes-man - I don't expect much from the top...

much akin to IL state government

more red light cameras appears to be the answer to our revenue
shortfall - hardly a day goes by when I don't see some serious
'amber alert' (yellow light) creative interpretations

"in my next life; I was thinking about joining the biggest
group of whiners on earth & working 188 days / year, not
including weekends, holidays, and most of the summer..."

While there are some teachers who may whine and work only 188 days a year, they are definitely in the minority. One of the reasons I left teaching when I did was because I had so little time to just be a Mom to my kids. (I chose to stay home while they were in high school.)

The majority of teachers spend their evenings grading papers since there is not time to do that during the school day. Yes teachers get planning time during the day (although it is not much), but that time is used for things that have to be done while in the building, such as preparing materials for classes or calling parents. The majority of teachers spend their summers working on curriculum for the following year, attending workshops, classes, and grad school to become a better teachers, further their knowledge, learn new techniques, and possibly receive additional certifications. Some evenings during the school year are also spent in classes for those same reasons.

So just like every career and job out there, there are some who do the minimum work and whine about it. But the majority work hard and go above and beyond their contractual obligations. 188 days a year, 8 hours a day, is a contractual obligation. It is not indicative of what most teachers put in. During my time as a teacher I worked a minimum of 10 hours a day, usually 11-12 when you added in the time I put in at home. While my kids were doing homework, I was right along side them grading work or doing homework for grad school. In the summer, I spent at least 3 days a week in grad classes (sometimes 5, depending on the structure of the class) and usually worked a few weeks of the summer on a curriculum committee of some sort. During the school year, I attended district classes after school, went to grad school at night for few years, and spent Saturdays in day-long grad classes too.

Personally, I am glad my kids never had a teacher who put in the time you say you would put in as a teacher. Any teacher who only puts in contractual hours, is not a good teacher.

I found this in the Letters to the Editor of the Sun. It verifies I am not the only one who got an 11.18% increase in my Naperville Property Tax Bill. It has nothing to do with the increased assessment of my home which I fought and partially defeated last year, but the drunken sailor spending habits by City Officials of Naperville.

Nice letter, Mr. Richard Kelly. Too bad we can not eliminate home rule, so our drunken sailors would be limited to a 5% increase. A 5% increase for a non-growth town should be more than enough. A 0% increase should even be attainable if our city officials cared one iota abut the residents.

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

Taxing bodies can kill a vibrant city

May Day has evolved from a traditional holiday of springtime joy and renewal, to being co-opted by the Communists with their annual military parades, and now is turning into something more sinister. The day the annual DuPage County real estate tax bill is delivered.
With no surprise on my part, but with increasing shock and indignation, we suffer another 5 percent increase in taxes. The formerly fiscally well managed city of Naperville leads this year's May Pole dance with an 11 percent increase, followed by the Forest Preserve District with 7.6 percent, Naperville Park District with 6.5 percent and District 203 with 5.4 percent.

Yes, the mileage rates have not increased much, but the newly redesigned tax bill only footnotes the hidden 5.9 percent general across the board assessment increase in Lisle Township. The political class will try to confuse us with talks of tax rates and rolling assessment procedures, but I know I must send them the total in dollars.

Perhaps we need to change the local election cycle to after the real estate tax bills are issued so we can have real and more meaningful dialogue and accountability. Just as the Communists learned that they could not have a vibrant society if they consumed all of the income, hopefully our local taxing groups will learn not to kill the vibrant city we call Naperville.

Richard Kelly

Naperville

With swine flu still in circulation, I hope this year only beef ribs are sold.

Obviously you dont understand how swine flu is transmitted. You can not get it from eating pork.

You can not get swine flu from eating pork or pork products. However, you could get it from being in the enormous crowds at any public gathering.

If you dont like pork ribs, dont go to the event.

then again PigFest only donates %15 of its proceeds to
not-for-profit entities... we would all be wiser to run
a PigFest to fund Naperville pensions

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

If you need someone to SECOND your MOTION, I will be happy to do so.

Yes, a massive PigFEST to help plug the pension decifit of the police and firefighters sounds like an awesome idea.

Instead of giving 15% of the 3 million to charity, I would like to see the City of Naperville run the PigFest and give all 3 million to the police and firefighters pension funds.

Let us hope the police can reciprocate and work the PigFEST for free since it would be for their beneift. It would be a little outrageous if they charged us $100,000 in OT while we were trying to raise money to plug their $61.4 million pension deficit. The firefighters should also volunteer their time for the PigFEST since they will also be benefitting.

Anything to help reduce our taxes. I would even attend if one vendors decided to sell beef ribs instead of pig ribs. I hate pigs and anything obtained from them. With swine flu still in circulation, I hope this year only beef ribs are sold.

The above statement exemplifies that people as a whole do not understand the difference between tax assessment, tax levy and tax bill. Property taxes are supposed to be based on the value of your land and the amount of money necessary to run government. The latter is to be spread over the populace pro rata with the value of their property. The assessor’s job is to determine the value of the property so that the county clerk may determine the pro rata share of taxes to be billed to the owner by the county treasurer. The assessed value is to be (outside of Cook County) one third of the market value. What actually happens is that the State Dept. of Revenue issues a per square foot value for classifications of property in the various townships. The value is based upon the last 3 years of sales. The assessors apply that square foot value to each parcel in their township. Because of the 3 year average, township assessors are telling people that they won’t see the affect of the down market until next year.

The governmental body decides in the first quarter of it's fiscal year (prior to the first quarter if it is on the budget plan like the City of Naperville) how much it is going to spend during the year and for what purposes. As part of that process, the governmental body estimates how much revenue is going to come in through property taxes and how much from other sources (feds, sales tax, fees, etc.) For a non-home rule government (all except the city), there is a limit as to how much taxes can be levied against the citizens that is expressed as a tax rate per $100 of assessed value to be applied to all assessed value of all property within the jurisdiction. The statutory limits can be changed in some cases through referenda.

In December, the governmental bodies must tell the County Clerk how much property taxes they want by passing and filing a levy ordinance. This is a dollar figure that represents the amount necessary to run government after all other sources of revenue are considered and keeping in mind maximum tax rates. Most governmental bodies (like school districts) will estimate the maximum that they are allowed to levy considering their maximum tax rate and their projected total assessed value. Therefore, instead of basing taxes on what is needed, they base their tax levy on raising the maximum they can base on the assessed value and maximum tax rates allowed. [Home rule governments like the city can levy as much taxes as they wish with a few exceptions.] This idea of levying to achieve the maximum tax burden on their residents corrupts the system as it is supposed to work. It doesn’t matter if your tax assessment goes up or down due to market pressures; your pro rata share remains the same because government seeks to capitalize on the greatest amount it can receive.

remember the new math your parents didn't understand?

2 x 4 = 8
e.g. %2 tax rate * $400k 'valuation' == $8,000/yr taxes

and you ask yourself; but my home went DOWN in value,
shouldn't my taxes go down

ah, but then again; remember freshman HS algebra
law of commutation

4 x 2 also = 8
i.e. %4 tax rate * $200k 'value' still gets to $8,000/yr

one thing's for certain; never again will anybody fall
for the old line; but those great schools are what keeps
your property value high

in my next life; I was thinking about joining the biggest
group of whiners on earth & working 188 days / year, not
including weekends, holidays, and most of the summer...

Dupage Airport is a side-effect of Aldo Botti,
been on the bills for years...
just like every other line that says pension fund

next time your telephone rings & its the benevolent people
ask them to donate to your pension fund

in the end; making Naperville grow from 50,000 to 150,000
seems to have only cost everybody MORE

then againg PigFest only donates %15 of its proceeds to
not-for-profit entities... we would all be wiser to run
a PigFest to fund Naperville pensions

"City of Naperville not as bad as I thought, still too much though!"

My City of Naperville taxes were up over 11%. My pension fund taxes for City of Naperville employees were up over 10%. Anyway, I think that is not only bad but much too much.

The situation looks dismal for the future.

As the retirees for the City of Naperville increase in number, the pension fund system will not only be a disaster but implode. Those are not my words but the words of the former pension manager of the Woodridge Police Pension Fund. The citizens of Naperville currently match police and fire contributions of 9.45% of their salaries with a more than double contribution of 21.16%. This is not nearly enough as our pension deficit increased from $51.7 million to $61.4 million in one year despite these taxpayer contributions and a positive stock market thru April 30, 2008. The results for the fiscal year ending in 2009 are not in yet. I expect them to be disastrous and take us one step towards the forthcoming implosion.

ABC News announced that engineering graduates had the highest starting annual salary in the nation of $58,000. Second highest were accounting graduates with $48,000. What ABC missed were City of Naperville police and fire college graduates started at over $59,000 last year. Most likely higher this year.

While engineers and accountants do not get a pension and have to work till age 70 to obtain full Social Security Beneifts, police and fire employees of the City of Napervlle can retire at age 51-52 with 75% of their final and highest salary in the form of a pension at mostly taxpayer expense.

Yes, the disaster is on the horizon and it is only an issue of when it will implode and not if it will implode. Again those are not my words but the words of Mr. Gary Menconi, former Woodrige Police Pension Manager.

The school district, 203, is crushing me! Cut 1/2 of the admin. Too many chiefs and wannabe chiefs in this outfit.
What's with the DuPage airport on my tax bill? Yet another boondoggle by Schillerstrom?! County taxes went down but I'm paying more overall because of his bait and switch trick on the RTA bailout. He raised the sales tax across the county to fatten up his bloated government. Did it without any debate at the county level. I will not forget this when he runs for governor.
City of Naperville not as bad as I thought, still too much though!