Holy crap! “Greatest generation”, my ass. Unadulterated greed is all this is. The PRPD better turn this deal down and send these folks packing. Go away and stay away Seniors, Inc..

Even the seniors just want more, more, and more. I assume you’ll hear from some of them that they’re entitled to the Senior Center because they paid taxes for so many years, conveniently forgetting all the free education and all the other benefits they (and their kids and grandkids) already received for those taxes.

If it is a manageable $70,000 buyout, and let’s say in good faith that the capital improvements were made for $330,000; the total buyout would be $400,000.

Why not pay the $400,000 and the Park District could use the facility for whatever it wanted?

If the Park District were going to purchase a facility like that, I am guessing it would be appraised at a much higher value.

Isn’t it a steal for the Park District to buy the property outright?

What am I misunderstanding?

EDITOR’S NOTE: Perhaps the fact that the Park District already owns the building? The reason the Park District should have to pay another $330,000 to Seniors Inc. after Seniors Inc. has already cost the Park District millions? The fact that buildings like this have minimal market value because they tend not to be usable for anything else without major rehab costs? That’s just for starters.

Thank you, thank you, thank you, PubDog.
The cherry on top of this sick sundae is the actively hostile sense of entitlement this private club’s members present to the board and anyone else who disagrees with their position. Anyone who has unresolved parental guilt trip issues will fold like a wet cardboard box. Let’s hope the PRPD is healthy enough to just say no.
By the way, the total membership is in the 800s, and of those, more than 200 are not residents.

We will all be seniors someday.

You can place a monetary value on what the subsidy is, but can you place a value on what the senior center means to seniors?

We have all seen the waste of money that govenment has spent over the years (i.e. the pork at the federal level), is it truly a waste to subsidize the senior center at the local level.

If the senior center were not there, where would these folks go?

Haven’t the seniors paid taxes over decades? In the 1970’s weren’t the taxes were much higher than they are currently? If they paid more taxes in the past, than we are paying currently in taxes, haven’t they already made the sacrifice / payment? Meaning tax rates were in the 50-60% range back in the 1970’s, and now they are in the 35-40% range. Haven’t they already paid for their benefit, and government has mismanaged those tax dollars?

Lastly, are you sure it isn’t penny wise to cut services, but pound foolish to cut services because their is a societal benefit that reduces health care costs and such?

Who negotiated this deal?

Is this because Ray ‘O’ left that someone else negotiated this deal?

Where do the candidates and the Commissioners that are up for election stand on this issue?

Go, Dog, Go!

Great post Pub Dog. I hope that the voters are aware of this.

Let’s see, you are against subsidizing seniors for $200,000 per year.

If there are 10,000 citizens that pay taxes in Park Ridge, that equates to $20 per person.

Man, $20 per person is a lot of money for only 200 people that use the facility. That’s a $1.68 per month per person. I don’t think you can buy a cup of coffee at Starbucks for $1.68.

I guess $20 is a lot of money to sacrifice to help seniors.

Maybe you would rather spend the money on a nice dinner out with the family. Wait, $20 would only get you a fast food meal.

You could use the $20 to go to the movies and have popcorn and soda. Well, if you go to the early show, and have a small popcorn and there is only two of you.

You could use the $20 to pay fines for overdue books. You seem pretty bright, so I would guess you don’t have any overdue books.

You could use the $20 to donate to a charity. Of course 40% of that would be for admin and who knows what could be bought for the $12 remaining.

Yeah, $200,000 is a huge subsidy. I bet the healthcare bill and mental health bill would be a lot higher than $200,000 that you would end up paying in insurance premuims if you closed the senior center.

Your libertarian views are sorely lacking a reality based focus.

EDITOR’S NOTE: This isn’t about “subsidizing seniors”: it’s about subsidizing the social lives of seniors. Or, more accurately, the social lives of one particular group of seniors that accounts for only about 15% of all Park Ridge “seniors” (i.e., residents over 55 years old)

So we ask you: What’s so special about this particular group of seniors that entitles them to have their social lives subsidized by the taxpayers to the tune of $200,000 annually?

2:55 pm –

The comment at 1:13 pretty much answers your argument, except the part where you seem to be talking about income taxes instead of the property taxes that go toward the Park District’s senior subsidies.

If you can’t measure it, you can’t manage it. Where’s your proof that $200,000 in Senior Center subsidies saves us $200,000 or more in health care costs?

2:55pm…

Can’t you do any better than that?

… where would the seniors go?
… haven’t the seniors paid enough?
… their is a societal benefit that reduces health care costs and such?

“We will all be seniors one day” is about the only thing you got right.

Really, and trying to be as objective as possible, you don’t deserve anything simply by virtue of reaching an old age. If the standard for getting the kind of hand outs PW uncovers here is being old then we have a BIG problem as the baby boomers continue to age. But I digress… simply put, it doesn’t work the way you want it to.

If you want to be very frustrated, read the views of the Seniors on the same topic:

http://butterlyonseniorissues.blogspot.com/

In reading the comments I think nobody has mentioned this yet. I think seniors do deserve something, respect. I think that the senior center is underutilized by seniors in this community. I think that the way we treat our seniors and our youngsters speaks volumes about the values of our community. I think that the Park District should not subsidize the short fall of the senior center. The Park District should try to find programs that could maximize the use of the Senior Center when not in use by Seniors.

I think that first we should cut the subsidy for seniors. We should also raise the age of social security benefits to 80 years old. Social security was never intended to be the long term benefit that seniors rely on. Medicare age needs to be increased to 75. There are to many baby boomers that are going to wipe out the healthcare system. We need to privatize the airports. We need to reduce education expenditures by the federal government. We need to have mandatory military enrollment. That’s why I support the tea party. They understand the difficult decisions that need to be made, and made now and not deferred. We have got to stop relying on the handouts of the government to both individuals and to businesses.

EDITOR’S NOTE: This blog is intended to address Park Ridge issues. If you want to discuss national or world issues, there are plenty of other blogs to choose from. But if you were actually trying to make an obtuse point, you failed – because $200,000 a year for a Senior Center used by 15% of this community’s seniors is not comparable to raising Medicare age to 75.

Please stay on topic or move on.

637…Good one!
I am over 50 and I have no illusion about the handouts you seem to think are “fair” to seniors. Get a clue.

Ray O negotiated this deal.

6:27 pm, I agree with you that additional programming of the Senior Center might generate enough revenues to reduce the big subsidy. But why doesn’t anybody push for a $200 annual membership fee. 1000 members X $200 = problem solved.

The Park District’s kids sports programs charge about $100 per kid per season for things like soccer and baseball, and those seasons last only 3-4 months. That’s $200 for 6-8 months of 2-3 day a week activity for kids, while the seniors would be getting 12 months of 5 day a week activity for their $200.

$200 a year for Senior Center membership would be a bargain.

I have a problem. Let’s just assume there were no problem with the Seniors. I don’t understand how you guys can sit back and be double taxed in the form of (fees). Obviously, Anonymous on 01.27.11 8:02 pm thinks it OK for Park District’s kids sports programs to charge about $100 per kid per season for things like soccer and baseball, and those seasons last only 3-4 months. For what? When I was a kid we had Little League Baseball. We played in Public Parks. We played football in the Fall – for free (taxpayer subsidized). Since when is any part taxpayer-funded entity a “profit center”?

EDITOR’S NOTE: If you are talking about playing in organized youth baseball and football leagues for free, then you were being subsidized by the taxpayers – albeit when government was smaller, provided fewer benefits, and was less expensive than it is today.

As for “any part taxpayer-funded entity [being] a ‘profit center,’” we don’t understand what you are getting at. Until a government-operated program or activity is covering all of its costs (including, in the case of Park District-sponsored kids sports activities, a reasonable charge for the wear, tear and upkeep of the fields of play), there is no “profit.”

802… Genius!

706pm

You mean Ray O negotiated this deal with one foot out the door as he was negotiating his exit and start with the SCPD. Not sure I trust his judgement on this give the circumstances. Ray’s replacement ought to have a say on this.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Kind of like the City Council members who want to give City Mgr. Hock a new deal as they’re walking out the door. Must have something to do with giving away other people’s money.

“………. albeit when government was smaller, provided fewer benefits, and was less expensive than it is today”.

I will grant you we do not know the exact time period in which this guy grew up but I am not sure what the hell you are talking about?? Government being smaller?? Most (in fact I would argue virtaully all) of what we receive in government services, “entitlement” programs etc have been around for a long time. None of these expenses are new on the radar. THey have simply been completely botched!!! As an example on a state level, we all bitch about the pensions but these are not new. Our elelcted officials simply did not make payments and ignored the obvious issue until it became so freakin’ big.

As for youth leagues being subsidized….the entire damn PD is subsidized!!!! As you yourself said…..”there is no “profit”. You simply pick one part of it you do not like…..seniors. As I have stated before, there are many other pieces of the PD puzzle that one could use the same argument. I you were true to your supposed convictions you would be arguing for getting rid of the entire PD. It is using all the taxpayers money to subsidize a special “club” for a selected few in our city.

EDITOR’S NOTE: The enactment of LBJ’s “Great Society” programs jump-started an exponential growth in “government” at all levels due to new “entitlements” and “mandates” – and that growth continued pretty much unabated until this current recession began to cause more people to re-think the role and cost of government.

The pensions “we all bitch about” definitely have been around awhile, but not for the increasing number of unionized public employees, the ever-increasing benefit levels, and the ever-increasing longevity-based durations of the current system. Those benefits were given away so readily by our craven politicians specifically because they were deferred benefits that didn’t trigger the kind of scrutiny and outrage that increases in salaries would incur, which is also why those same politicians balanced their budgets by deferring contributions to those pension funds.

As for our “picking on” seniors, we aren’t. We are picking on that roughly 15% of seniors who belong to Seniors Inc. and who apparently consider themselves so special as to be entitled to $200K a year in taxpayer subsidies for their own semi-private club that – unlike the rest of the Park District facilities – is effectively limited to a certain age group. We definitely are not picking on the roughly 6,000+ seniors in town who, we suspect, have never set foot in the Senior Center and never intend to.

Yes PW, yes indeed.

Is there a model out there where the senior center is profitable or at breakeven that would work in Park Ridge? Is it as simple as raising fees?

EDITOR’S NOTE: What kind of “model” would you like? In fiscal year 2009, the Senior Center lost $192,933 on $298,715 of total revenue and $491,648 of expenses, $200,409 of which were for salaries and wages. Raising fees to $200/member (54 cents a day) would do it. So would selling naming rights for $200K/yr., or getting a $200K annual grant from the Gates Foundation.

This is an interesting discussion that has taken place on the comment board.

As a Park Ridge Park District Commissioner, I can tell you factually that when Ray presented the contract back in the Fall, the concensus was that the deal was not in the best interest of the Park District and we asked Ray to renegotiate, especially regarding the subsidy.

At the last meeting that Ray was at, he presented the renegotiated contract at a very high level. There was not time to go into the details of the renegotiated contract because it was ‘hot off the presses’, and we did not get a chance to read it before hand (if I remember correctly).

Now that we, the Commissioners, have read the contract, I know at least 4 of us (maybe more) have lots of questions. Some of the questions regard point of clarification. Other questions have to do with the financial issues.

I don’t know how the vote will turn out on this issue. I also don’t know if it is prudent for the Commissioners to vote on something where the Executive Director that negotiated the deal is no longer at the District. It may make sense to leave the contract alone until a new Executive Director is in place. I don’t know if my fellow Commissioners feel that this is a viable option either.

However, in my opinion, if there is no Executive Director in place, and the Commissioners where to vote no, it places everything in limbo and creates a headache for everyone involved.

The views expressed above are soley the views of one Commissioner. How other Commissioners feel about the issue or will vote is not known by me.

Very Truly – PRPD Commissioner

EDITOR’S NOTE: Thanks, Commish.

The situation at the Park Board with the Seniors Inc. contract seems like the flip side of what’s going on at the City with the City Manager contract. At least one Commissioner who has been critical of the new Seniors Inc. contract is leaving the Board, and two others who might be leaning against the contract are up for re-election. So the balance of power may be changing in favor of the contract if a vote is deferred. At the City, five of those supporting the City Manager’s contract are leaving the Council, so the balance of power may be changing against that contract if Mayor Schmidt’s veto is sustained and the matter deferred.

I am a member of the Senior Services Board and would like to state that I appreciate the comments of the Park Board commissioner above. The Senior Services Board would like to meet with the Park District Board to go over its concerns and questions about the proposed agreement, and hopes that the Park Board commissioners will agree to do so. We can’t imagine any good reason why they would not choose to do so.

The relationship between the Park District and Senior Services is a long and complicated one, and is not easily described, especially in a blog of this nature. In fact, I can state with complete conviction that Public Watchdog’s interpretation of the proposed contract is wrong on a number of counts, and misleading in many others. Readers here are not getting the complete picture. For example, not once does PW mention that Senior Services paid the Park District approximately $100,000 during 2010 as part of it’s current contractual agreement with the Park District, which began in 2006. I believe Senior Services paid at least that amount for each of the prior 4 years as well, and has been paying the Park District for many years under this cooperative arrangement, in addition to making many capital and other improvements to the senior center building. Also, PW has described some provisions in the proposed contract as new, when in fact they are actually carryover’s from the existing contract. Perhaps PW should ask the Park Board commissioner or other person who supplied them with the draft agreement to rustle up the existing agreement for comparison’s sake.

Most importantly, I would ask people interested in this issue to come to the next Park Board meeting, where it is likely that the issue will arise. You need to hear both sides before making a determination. You are not getting both sides here, and I think you should make your own determination, based on all the facts, whether Senior Services, a non-profit organization that exists solely to support seniors and the Park District, is greedy, shameless or clueless– all terms that have been attributed to it on this blog. I believe that there are no “bad guys” in this situation, only bad information that is making it look that way.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Needless to say, we take issue with your contentions and/or suggestions that we are providing “bad information” – assuming that by “bad information” you mean inaccurate information rather than the accurate-but-unpleasant information some folks consider as “bad.”

Your complaint that “not once does PW mention that Senior Services paid the Park District approximately $100,000 during 2010 as part of it’s current contractual agreement with the Park District” and also made other payments to the Park District is valid, as far as it goes – because, frankly, the essential purpose of our post is that the taxpayers are paying a hefty subsidy to fund a semi-private club for about 800 Park Ridge seniors. And a review of Seniors Inc.’s IRS Form 990-EZ for 2008 (the last such report posted for Seniors Inc. on Guidestar) shows only one $100,000+ expense number, $113,217, for “Meetings, Trips, Activities and Classes” – not any kind of donation or annual fee paid to the District.

The following figures, from the Park District’s financial reports, disclose the net losses generated by the Senior Center for each year since 2005 that constitute the amount of taxpayer subsidy being provided:

2010: $169,000
2009: $192,000
2008: $173,000
2007: $167,911
2006: $153,902
2005: $137,199

If you dispute these figures, please provide your data with back-up documentation and we will publish it.

As for our inclusion of the 1987 letter agreement and amendment instead of a more recent contractual document, all we can say is that it was Seniors Inc.’s own attorney/negotiator, Jack Owens, who apparently chose to make those two documents (rather than any more recent contract) exhibits to the proposed new contract. You may wish to ask Mr. Owens why he didn’t “rustle up the existing agreement for comparison’s sake” and attach it, instead of those older contract documents, to the new contract?

You describe the relationship between Seniors Inc. and the Park District as being a “complicated” one – a term which we have found is often a special interest’s (or a politician’s) euphemism for “we don’t want to explain it because you won’t see it our way if we do.” But if Seniors Inc. needs an entire post – up to 600 words – to explain this “complicated” relationship, we’ll give it to you: Just submit it to us and we’ll publish it, although you can expect that we will add our own comments where we deem appropriate.

Finally, we don’t consider Seniors Inc. to be representative of all Park Ridge seniors, the vast majority of whom have not belonged, do not currently belong, and likely will never belong, to the Senior Center. Nor do we think the Seniors Inc. folks are “bad guys” (or gals): we just don’t think you’re “special” enough to be entitled to a semi-private club and a $200,000/yr taxpayer subsidy.

If I start a semi-private club, can I get $200,000 per year from the Park District for the benefit of my friends?

Yeah, the question is ludicrous, isn’t it? But if I don’t deserve it, why do the seniors believe that they deserve it?

EDITOR’S NOTE: Yes, it is; you don’t deserve it; and we don’t have the foggiest.

This site continues to attack the senior center tand the Oakton Pool because of the subsidy provided to both. But nothing is ever mentioned about the subsidy to Park Ridge Baseball Softball who has exclusive rights to use the baseball fields over any other Park Ridge baseball organization. The baseball organization pays only $10 per player to use the fields during the long baseball season that runs from April through late July/early August. That $10 per player is supposed to cover the cost of taking care of the fields, the dirt for the infield, the cost of the equipment to groom and mow the fields and the personnel costs of the PRPD employees that provide the labor.

The same person has been in charge of PR baseball softball for more than 3 decades and he also served as a commissioner of the PRPD board many years ago. Why has the $10 not been increased as the cost of maintaining the fields has increased over the years?

I am sure if someone at PWD took the time to do the math they would find a huge subsidy is being provided to PR baseball/softball, and likely the soccer and football programs as well. But PWD would rather continually attack the senior center. If you don’t like this subsidy, why do you not go after all subsidies?

EDITOR’S NOTE: We have looked at the Park District’s numbers and we can’t find a subsidy for the Park District’s sports affiliates that comes anywhere near the $160,000 average annual subsidy for the Senior Center, even after a pro-ration to reflect the 2,000+ participants in those sports v. the approx. 1,000 Senior Center members.

And unlike Seniors Inc.’s situation with the Senior Center, Park Ridge Baseball Softball does not have “exclusive rights” to use the baseball fields: it only has priority rights during its seasons. The principal baseball season for most teams ends around Father’s Day, not “late July/early August” – although there is a separate Fall baseball season that also generates field maintenance fees.

Park Ridge Soccer also has has two seasons, but Falcon Football has only one season. And each of those three Park District affiliates consumes only about one-third of the usable field time during their respective seasons, which means that approx. 2/3 of the field maintenance expense benefits the general public that uses those fields when the affiliates do not.

If you can provide the numbers to show the existence and amount of the sports affiliates’ subsidies (if any), we will gladly re-visit this situation.

You are wrong about the baseball/softball season-it ends much later than Father’s Day. For any family with kids who play baseball/softball and tries to take a summer vacation they can attest to that.

Once the regular season is over there are playoffs, the best of the rest and the all-star weekends. Add to that the fact that the PRBS travel teams-there are 2 at most of the age levels for boys baseball-also use the PRPD maintained fields, your assertions about the amount of time the usable baseball/softball fields are occupied by PR baseball/softball teams is too low. And the PRBS program does have the right of first refusal on the use of the fields.

How much does the PRPD spend each year to maintain the fields? The cost has gone up since you last served on the PRPD board, PWD. Salaries, benefits, equipment cost and maintenance, supplies etc. This is much more than the roughly $10 per about 1700 participants or $17000 that PRBS pays to the PRPD to have use of the fields which are maintained by the PRPD.

My point to you PWD is that you are speak so strongly against subsidies that it is hypocritical of you to pick and choose which ones to throw your rhetoric at. Letting PRBS use the baseball/softball fields owned and maintained by the publicly funded PRPD for only $10 per participant per season is also a subsidy and one PWD should rally against just as much as you rail against the subsidy to the senior center.

EDITOR’S NOTE: As we said before, none of the sports affiliates have exclusive use of the fields, and we cannot find numbers to support your contention that PRBS and the other sports affiliates are subsidized at anything like the $160,000/yr. average that the 800-1,000 member Seniors Inc. has received in each of the past 6 years.

Another difference is that neither PRBS nor the soccer affiliate has tried to pull the “reimbursement” shot Seniors Inc. is trying to pull with the PRRPD, even though PRBS has provided a number of “capital” improvements – in the form of backstops and scoreboards – while the soccer affiliate provided over $250,000 for the Emerson fields.

Until you you can produce numbers to support your position, you’re spitting in the wind.

Oh, there is a difference. The improvements that Soccer and Baseball (for-profit entities, I believe) make are self-serving, that is, they make the thing that they’ve improved more usable to them. For example, if Park Ridge Baseball puts in a new baseball diamond or scoreboard, they have actually protected that bit of park district space for their own use– how else can a baseball field be used other than as a baseball field? What risk is there that the Park District will want to take that field back and pay the cost to turn it into something else? Almost none. Soccer has done that at Emerson as well.

The improvements that Senior Services has made to the senior center building, on the other hand, make that building better for many uses. Senior Services paid for a large addition on the building and added a full stage and sound system. They paid for the installation of central air conditioning, they paid to have the washrooms updated, they replaced the doors to the building, among many other things. Those improvements make that park district owned building better and more usable overall, not just to seniors. The likelihood that the Park District might want to use that building for other things, in part because of the improvements paid for by Senior Services, is great. (Dog training classes are in fact run in the addition, and have been for many years.) So from Senior Services perspective, it makes good sense to try to ensure that if the Park District does decide to end its relationship with Senior Services and take back the building for non-senior activities (as it has always had a right to do under the agreement), that the Park District reimburse it for part of the substantial improvements that Senior Services put into the building. Senior Services has a greater need to protect their investment than the other affiliates, because there is a greater risk that the Park District will want to reclaim the building for other uses and take the improvements with them.

This is not some new “reimbursement shot” that Senior Services is trying to pull– reimbursement has been part of the agreement between them for many years, and the Park District agreed to it in an arms-length transaction.

It is hard to understand how the Park District can lay the responsibility for the “subsidy” on Senior Services. This is a park district building with park district activities run in it, staffed by park district employees. All the decisions about the building, its programs and its staff, are made by the Park District. Senior Services has no control over any of that. Senior Services pays the Park District every year (($100,000 last year), raises money to help defray costs of the senior center, and works with the district to pay for capital improvements that might be needed at the center. Under the contract, there is preferential use of the building for senior programming, generally during the day. That’s it. Sort of like the priority baseball has over its fields during its season. The Park District is able to plan whatever kind of programming it wants in the building, it can cut costs and staff where it sees fit, it can market that building for many different uses. If there is a subsidy, it is not the fault of Senior Services, isn’t it squarely the fault of the District itself?

Isn’t this post about the Senior Center. To those of you bitching about baseball, soccer and football, when you start your own blog have at it. If these sports related issues are so important to you why don’t you do something about it? Anyway, here, why not stay on topic?

EDITOR’S NOTE: Because Senior Inc.’s position on the proposed Senior Center contract is so untenable, even Senior Inc.’s cheerleaders realize it – and are simply trying a “There goes Elvis” distraction strategy by pointing at the Park District’s sports affiliates.

Anonymous @ 1231 —

“The improvements that Senior Services has made to the senior center building, on the other hand, make that building better for many uses”

Yes…for seniors only, as Seniors are the only ones that SSI want to use the building.

SSI has historically been able to bully the Park District about the use of that facility. They have dictated the availability of the building and said no to classes that the District has wanted to run there.

The reimbursement clause is patently wrong and just bad for taxpayers (who pay for the entire thing). It should never have been allowed to stand in any agreement, and now that all agreements have expired, I for one hope the District holds firm and does not allow that clause to sneak into any new agreement.

Anonymous @ 12:31:

“The improvements that Soccer and Baseball (for-profit entities, I believe) make are self-serving, that is, they make the thing that they’ve improved more usable to them.”

You believe wrong. Soccer and Baseball are non-for profit entities, but don’t let the facts get in the way of your conjecture.

Anonymous @ 12:50:

You don’t have a firm grasp of the reality of the situation.

SSI bullies the Park District into restricting classes there and telling the Park District when and where they can program.

The agreement also has/had provisions that addressed staffing and requirement surrounding that. Who else tells the District how to staff?

This is the first year that SSI has been unable to control the Director of the District. Let’s hope that whoever is hired to replace the old director is not afraid to ruffle the feathers or SSI, as Jim Lange was.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Perhaps “bullies” is a bit strong, since the Park District has always been bend-over-backwards accommodating to Seniors Inc. when it came to how the Senior Center was operated.

I do think the comment posted at 12:50 AM raises an interesting issue: IF Senior Services were to be disbanded and all direct subsidies were discontinued, how much current Park Board expenditures would be escapable? All of this assumes that other existing Park District programs remain untouched.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Because Seniors Inc. is a private corporation, the Park District cannot “disband” it. All the Park District can do is indirectly regulate its operation via the Park District’s control over the Senior Center itself, the staffing, and the programming.

We are unaware of any “direct subidies” going to Seniors Inc. The subsidies are in the form of taxpayers funding the deficits run up in the operation of the Senior Center for the benefit of its “members.”

Public Watchdog, you are wrong when you say that SSI bullies the Park District into programming. I have been on the SSI board for many years and we have not ever been asked by the Park District to make any programming decisions.

EDITOR’S NOTE: We didn’t use the term “bullies” – a commentator did. We said we thought that word was too strong.

I think it’s time for the seniors to abandon the Center. Tell the whiners on this blog that they can have the “club house”. They can stop crying to daddy now!

Citizens of Park Ridge think they’re “North Shore” by the airport. They whine when the planes fly over their house. They whine when the Park District wants to place a cell tower in their back yard, they whine when local church(s) want to provide Park Ridge homeless comfort and now they whine over the senior center clubhouse.

North Shore want-a-be community, my ass!

EDITOR’S NOTE: We can’t speak for commentators to this post, but our beef with the Senior Center clubhouse is that it has sucked almost $1 million out of the taxpayers’ pockets in just the past six years, and it has done so for the benefit of approximately 800 Park Ridge “members” who constitute only a small fraction of all the seniors in Park Ridge – all while those “members” pay $35 in annual membership dues (up from $22 just a few years ago) and now want to lock the Park District’s taxpayers into an expensive “poison pill” buy-out.

Was it not also the Park Ridge Park Board that agreed to the “poison pill”? Your term, not mine. And as this was a two-party agreement, are you now saying that the people’s representatives at the Park District were incompetent and therefore screwed up? The payback clause was barrier to the type of heavy-handed board activity being displayed by this Board as we speak. It is the only club in the Seniors bag – it is their only protection from Park District bullying, and recent bullying there has been.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Yes, we are saying the “people’s representatives” over at the Park District (along with paid staff) “screwed up” in effectively giving away almost $1 million to approximately 800-1,000 Senior Center members from 2005-2010. The Senior Center is an even bigger financial white elephant/black hole than Oakton Pool (albeit, if only because Oakton is only open 3 months). And while the Park District has been spineless in dealing with the Senior Center members and Seniors Inc., the latter have been positively shameless not only in demanding and accepting those subsidies, but also in now seeking to lock in a sweetheart deal to the detriment of the taxpayers.

But at least we have developed a better understanding of why the other 85% of Park Ridge seniors want nothing to do with the Senior Center or Seniors Inc.

11:38am…
That’s a very reasoned approach to debating the issue at hand. Did you learn that skill in a Senior Center class offering you took?

Anon:12:46

Thank you!

Actually, I learned that at New Trier! I know how North Shore communities take care of their elder citizens. Glad I don’t live in Park Ridge.

EDITOR’S NOTE: That makes two of us.

I’ll rephrase my question: IF Seniors Inc ceased to exist and nothing else changed, How much money would the Park District save? Even if the exact number can’t be ascertained, surely there is a ball park figure that could be calculated. If there is no savings to be had, then this conversation has no meaning.

EDITOR’S NOTE: We’re still not sure we understand your question. The operation of the Senior Center has produced an annual deficit of from $137,000 to $192,000 during the past six years. Seniors Inc. is a private corporation, so its continued existence is not directly tied to either the Park District or the Senior Center.

Look, the honest truth is that Senior Services has decreased the deficit that the Park District has run the senior center at, because Senior Services actually gives money to the Park District– probably at least $500,000 over the past 6 years. And that’s not even taking into account capital improvements Senior Services has made to the building itself.

Senior Services does NOT dictate what is done in that building other than run senior activities during the day. And so what about that? Those are the hours that senior centers generally operate!

The Park District controls the senior center programming and staff. Why is Senior Services being blamed for the deficits that the building runs? Preferential use of that building during the day by seniors is NOT causing this deficit. The contract is not causing the deficit. The contract DECREASES the deficit.

If District 64 ran a deficit for the year, would this blog blame ELF for that deficit?

This has become absurd.

EDITOR’S NOTE: We agree that “[t]his has become absurd.” But will entertain this absurdity a tad more by asking you to explain exactly what it is that actually causes the Senior Center deficit – if it’s not the cost of the operation of that facility by 800-1,000 seniors under the auspices of Seniors Inc.?

There’s one other big difference between monies and improvements contributed by Senior Services club and, say,k Soccer, besides the obvious one that the sports affiliate does not try to restrict use of the field at other times, while Senior Services has made it very clear that nobody, nohow, can so much as go potty on “their” premises. Even more significant, only the Senior Services club has demanded, and gotten, a clause that said they had to be reimbursed for the improvements they made if the agreement ended. Gee, I wonder if Soccer could demand the hundreds of thousands of dollars back that THEY have invested in making useable fields? And next time you rent an office, be sure to make a lot of costly attached improvements there, like installing cabinetry or carpeting or chandeliers — and then try to take them with you or get reimbursed for them by your landlord. Good luck with that! It’s long established that any installed improvement made to premises owned by another STAYS there and you don’t get reimbursed for it. It’s long established everywhere — except in the sacred cow country of the Senior Center, where Guilt-Tripping Reigns Supreme Uber Alles.

Anon at 8:05 Please support your contention that “Senior Services has made it very clear that nobody, nohow, can so much as go potty on “their” premises.” I’ve seen a few dogs actually go potty on the premises, by the way.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Glad you were there to bear witness to those events. There’s a new post, let’s move onto that topic.