The first of the final two mayoral debates – the only two opportunities for Mayor Dave Schmidt and challenger Larry Ryles to confront each other with their respective ideas and opinions about how the City of Park Ridge should be run for the next four years – kicks off at noon today.

Because Ryles dodged the first scheduled debate – at the town hall meeting at the Park Ridge Senior Center on February 7 – and because the format for last week’s Park Ridge Republican Women’s event was a candidates’ forum rather than a debate, the candidates will need to cover a lot of ground at today’s luncheon debate at the Park Ridge Country Club hosted by the Chamber of Commerce (lunch begins at 11:30 a.m.) and tomorrow night’s debate at City Hall hosted by the League of Women Voters (7:00 p.m.).

Mayor Schmidt has a clearly-defined, thoroughly-explained and fully-transparent record of accomplishments, most of which involve pulling the City out of the economic and financial tailspin that it had been in since Ron Wietecha spent 99% of his waking hours – and millions of our tax dollars – unsuccessfully battling O’Hare Airport.  Four years ago Schmidt, in no uncertain terms, said what he would try to do if elected.  And, for the most part, he’s done just that.

Challenger Ryles, on the other hand, has been running a vague, warm & fuzzy, stealth-like campaign more befitting a candidate for student council president than mayor – as was evident from his performance at last Thursday night’s Republican Women’s forum.  He has studiously avoided Council meetings and, to our knowledge, has not shared any of his ideas or opinions about City governance with those elected officials during Council deliberations, when any such ideas and opinions might have been able to influence the decision-making process.

That’s why we have run an occasional feature titled “WWRD…” – What Would Ryles Do – concerning various City issues: on 09.05.12, 11.26.12, 11.28.12, 01.31.13 and 02.12.13, for example.

So as a public service we’ve come up with some questions for candidate Ryles which the folks who will be attending these two debates can ask if they don’t have questions of their own:

• On your website you state: “When elected Mayor on April 9, 2013, I will immediately take the lead on limiting future tax levy increases to a rate that is less than the annual inflation rate.”

Q:       Do you endorse the 2.15% tax levy increase recently passed by the Council? 

Q:       If not, what percentage levy increase would you have endorsed if you were mayor; and what expenditures would you have cut to reach it?

Q:       Why did you not attend the Council meetings at which the levy was discussed to share your thoughts and ideas on the subject?

• On your website you criticize Mayor Schmidt for raising the property tax levy by a cumulative 155% of the rate of inflation over the past 4 years.

Q:       Isn’t that 155% of the rate of inflation a lower rate of levy increase than achieved over any 4-year period by any of the three previous mayors who have endorsed you?

Q:       Isn’t the average property tax increase, in real dollars, less during Schmidt’s 4 years in office than during any 4-year period under the three previous mayors?

• On your website you promise that, if elected, you will assess “each planned expenditure by determining whether the expenditure will improve the lives of our Park Ridge residents.”

Q:       Which three City expenditures during the current fiscal year would you have cut based on your quality-of-life standard; and how much would you have saved with each such cut?

Q:       What three expenditures would you add, and in what amounts? 

• On your website you state that each step of your budget process will always start with the question:” Is this the morally correct thing to do.”

Q:       Name five expenditures during the current fiscal year that you believe are not “the morally correct thing to do”; and have you ever asked the Council, in person at one of its meetings, to stop doing any of those morally incorrect things?

Q:       How is it “moral” for you to accept a $1,000 campaign contribution from a union representing certain City employees whose sole goal is to get more money from Park Ridge taxpayers for no additional, or better, work? 

Q:       How “moral” is it for you to criticize various actions by the mayor and the City Council on specific issues, but not even show up at the meetings when those issues are discussed to voice those criticisms and share your views? 

Q:       Do you consider it “moral” for the City to divert large amounts of tax dollars taken involuntarily from taxpayers in order to “incentivize”/bribe businesses to locate or remain here?  If so, do you consider it “moral” for the City to give such funds to certain businesses but not to other competing businesses who already are here?

Q:       Do you consider it “moral” for the City to divert significant amounts of tax dollars taken involuntarily from taxpayers in order to give those funds to private “community group” corporations who have been unsuccessful in obtaining voluntary contributions from those same taxpayers?

• On your website you state that “[w]hen elected Mayor on April 9, 2013, [you] will immediately take the lead in improving the process the city uses to collect all past, present and future fees and fines owed to Park Ridge” by “better management oversight of its revenue streams….”

Q:       What specific elements of “management oversight” will you implement?

Q:       What exactly would you do to collect on more than 2,200 tickets and violations that you acknowledge “have no name or address attached for collection purposes”?

• On your website you state that “[w]hen elected, [you] will take the lead in reaching out to retailers, both local and national brands, and will convince them to bring their stores to Park Ridge.”

Q:       What are the three most important “national brands” retailers you will convince to bring their stores to Park Ridge, and what exactly will you do to get them here?

Q:       What are the three most important “local brands” retailers you will convince to bring their stores to Park Ridge, and what exactly will you do to get them here?

Q:       What are the five most important factors that distinguish Park Ridge from neighboring communities and make it attractive to business; and why haven’t those factors already attracted the “local and national brands” you intend to bring here?

Q:       If Park Ridge is such a “strategic location…for the 5.2 million shoppers of Cook County,” what specific reasons can you give to explain why retailers aren’t flocking here already?

Q:      What three specific things would you do to “keep the business home”?  To “bring new business home”? 

Q:      What three specific things would you do to “market our great city to our own residents”? 

• On your website you talk about a number of “leadership principles” you put into practice during your 24 year military career and your 18 years in the insurance industry.

Q:       Under Park Ridge’s city manager-form of government, in what specific ways does the mayor’s roll and job duties reflect those of your rank of Command Sergeant Major?

Q:       In what specific ways is being mayor of a city with a city manager-form of government similar to being an insurance agent or agency manager?

Q:       In what specific ways do you consider your “character” superior to Mayor Schmidt’s?

Q:       In what specific ways do you consider your “competence” superior to Mayor Schmidt’s?

Q:       What five “smart people” will you surround yourself with if you become mayor?

Q:       If you had been mayor these past four years, would you have retained Jim Hock as city manager? 

Q:       Are there any “yes” people currently in City government whom you would like to “shuck”?  And, if so, who are they?

• On you website you state that “[w]hen elected Mayor on April 9, 2013, [you] will immediately take the lead in investing in our emergency health services….”

Q:       Do you believe our residents are currently at risk because the City has yet to purchase replacement cardiac monitors/defibrillators?  If so, do you believe Fire Chief Mike Zywanski was lying when he recently assured the Council that the current monitors/defibrillators do not pose any health risk to residents?

Q:       What five other community health and/or safety purchases would you take the lead in making during your first year in office, what are their costs, and how would you fund them?

• On your website you state that, “[w]hen it comes to purchasing priorities with available funds, [you] will never put resident safety second to anything!!!”

Q:       Considering that the City is currently finalizing a contract with the public works employees’ union (which just contributed $1,000 to your campaign) that will increase the cost of the public works services the City is “purchasing,” do you oppose such cost increases until the City purchases replacement monitors/defibrillators?  If not, why not?

Q:       Do you support all of the wage and benefit increases given to unionized and non-unionized City employees over the past four years?  If not, would you have advocated for higher or lower wage and/or benefit increases?

Q:       How can you justify your support for building a new police out-building and bike storage corral when that money could fully fund the monitors/defibrillators?

Q:       Which of Mayor Schmidt’s vetoes, if any, do you support?  To the extent the Council sustained those vetoes, do you believe the Council was wrong in doing so?

Q:       Considering how vocal you are in criticizing Mayor Schmidt’s positions on City finances, do you favor the type of fiscal management demonstrated under Mayor Frimark?  Under Mayor Marous?

Q:       Which of the three (3) Kane McKenna suggestions for reducing the continuing multi-million dollar deficit from the Uptown TIF, if any, do you recommend the City choose to deal with that problem?

And that’s just for starters.

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