If you’re some entitlement-addicted special interest or a mindless disciple of tax-borrow-and-spend economists like Paul Krugman, Park Ridge City Hall was not the place to be last night.
That’s because the Park Ridge City Council saved the taxpayers another $120,620 by sustaining 3 of 4 line-item budget vetoes issued by Mayor Dave Schmidt, whom we dubbed “Mayor No” in our 06.08.11 post for his wielding of the previously-moribund mayoral veto to lead a sometimes fractious and unfocused Council further down the road to fiscal sanity and stability.
The only one of Schmidt’s vetoes not sustained was the biggest one: $361,500 budgeted for “Phase I” of what has been labeled the “police facility project” – a project seemingly designed, in significant part, to remedy years (if not a decade or more) of what appears to be gross neglect in basic cleaning, maintenance and repair of the police station. That veto was over-ridden by 5 votes (Alds. Rich DiPietro, Jim Smith, Sal Raspanti, Marty Maloney and Joe Sweeney) to 1 (Ald. Dan Knight), with 1 vote MIA as 6th Ward Ald. Tom Bernick’s previously-reported resignation became official moments before the meeting was convened.
Notwithstanding the inability of any of that project’s supporters to refute Schmidt’s assertion that the City has plenty of available storage and other types of usable space at the old Public Works complex at Elm and Greenwood, the aldermanic majority couldn’t seem to resist Police Chief Task Force member Paul Sheehan’s apples-and-oranges comparison of the project’s $1.2 million cost to the tens of millions spent by Skokie, Glenview and other suburbs on brand new cop shops; or Task Force member Ralph Cincinelli’s fear of losing a $40,000 state grant as justification for spending $1.2 million on the project.
If neither one of those arguments sounds all that convincing, join the club. We’re chalking it up as further proof that, to a hammer, everything looks like a nail.
From that point on, however, the rest of Schmidt’s vetoes were sustained, starting with the $69,375 line item for across-the-board raises for non-union employee payable out of the General Fund (with Knight, Maloney and Smith voting to sustain v. Sweeney, DiPietro and Raspanti voting to over-ride) and continuing with the $1,745 line item for across-the-board raises for non-union employees payable out of the Water Fund (with only Raspanti voting to over-ride).
The Council’s rejection of these raises is significant on two levels. First, as noted by Ald. Knight, they are the product of “lazy” management because they are virtually indiscriminate and fail to reward performance or productivity. Second, they effectively serve as a gold-plated invitation to demands by unionized employees for similar, non-merit based raises – while at the same time undercutting the City’s ability to credibly argue that it can’t afford such raises for union employees.
The third and final veto-sustaining vote was for the $49,500 line-item donation to private corporation Center of Concern (with Knight, Maloney, Raspanti and Smith voting to sustain v. DiPietro and Sweeney voting to over-ride).
As has become S.O.P whenever Center of Concern makes a trip to the public trough, it was well-represented at last night’s meeting. Both its current and former directors, John McNabola and Mary Schurder, spoke in favor of continuing the annual handout CofC has enjoyed for as long as anyone can remember, even though it never has provided any meaningful accounting of exactly how many of those tax dollars go for what particular services to which particular Park Ridge residents.
Additional turns at the podium were taken by CofC Board members Rudy Smolka and former ald. Sue Beaumont, while former alds. John Kerin (also a CofC Board member) and Dawn Disher (CofC Finance & Development Dir.) lent moral support from their seats until getting up and leaving in barely-concealed disgust after the Council majority rejected their requests and sustained Schmidt’s veto.
Even former Park Ridge mayor Howard “Let’s Make A Deal” Frimark added his faux-eminence to the CofC cause, although his remarks were limited to some stage-whispered aspersions cast on Schmidt’s character as he departed the Council chambers with the rest of the CofC migration – once again displaying the classless-act he’s always been.
But the most notable element of the CofC funding debate was provided by Ald. Maloney, whose succinct and pointed analysis of the policy and procedural shortcomings in the way the current and previous Councils have been funding CofC and other private community groups over the years was nothing less than a tour de force, deserving of a viewing whenever the meeting video is posted on the City’s website.
Maloney’s comments seemed to confirm that Schmidt’s veto of the CofC funding would be sustained, which moved CofC’s premier apologist and cheerleader on the Council, DiPietro, to suddenly claim that CofC was willing to sign a contract with the City for the provision of its services – something we’ve been advocating for some time and which Maloney cited in his comments. DiPietro’s credibility on this point, however, was compromised by the fact that none of the pro-CofC speakers, including its current and former directors, said one word about any such “contract” when they had addressed the Council earlier.
So that portion of the meeting ended with the total savings to the taxpayers, compliments of the Council-sustained Schmidt vetoes, being a tidy $120,620. Not bad for government work.
Frankly, we would much prefer if basic fiscal responsibility didn’t have to be imposed by mayoral veto. Unfortunately, a lack of fiscal discipline and foresight by past Councils, combined with some unsound and costly decisions like the Uptown TIF, has left the City behind the financial 8-ball despite all the recent expense-cutting and improved management efficiencies. And this current Council, although decidedly better than its predecessors, still can’t be counted on for a consistent approach to the City’s continuing and prospective financial challenges – as evidenced by its original budget votes that necessitated Schmidt’s vetoes, and by its over-ride of the cop shop project veto.
Whether the City will be able to turn the corner on those challenges just by cutting expenses further, without significant tax increases, appears unlikely due to that Uptown TIF albatross, whose debt service requirements are scheduled to hang even heavier around the City’s neck for the next several years.
But by aggressively reducing existing non-essential services and foregoing the implementation of new ones, this City administration is building a bond of credibility and trust with taxpayers whose goodwill and pocketbooks have been taken for granted far too long.
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16 comments so far
When are you going to discuss the recent decision of the library board pertaining to the potential (and now actual) veto of the non-union raises?
EDITOR’S NOTE: What is there to discuss?
Great news. Let the C of C do some fundraising of their own, like the vast majority of local nonprofits and charities. And now that the Youth Campus is shutting down maybe they can target their donors, who have shown a willingness to open their pocketbooks in the past.
EDITOR’S NOTE: A private not-for-profit doing private fundraising rather than feeding at the public trough? Works for us.
I was very pleased to read your comments about Alderman Maloney. I have a lot of respect for his ideas and opinions. Thus far in his term, I think he is doing an excellent job representing his ward, and the interest of all of Park Ridge residents as Alderman.
EDITOR’S NOTE: As always, we calls ’em as we sees ’em.
Will there be raises at the library despite the veto?
EDITOR’S NOTE: The Library’s budget is separate and apart from the City’s, so the City Council’s action on non-union employee pay raises does not (to our knowledge) have any legal effect on what the Library Board can do.
I’m a fairly new resident and I’m sickened that these charities just look the gift horse in the mouth. To just sit there and expect the city to chip in year after year, give me a break. Let them have a fundraiser/raffle, do a 5k run. Maybe the city can waive any permit fees associated with it. . In times like these with all the cutbacks they need to bark up another tree.
EDITOR’S NOTE: Exactly.
I am well aware that the library doesn’t have to abide by the mayor’s veto. My question is, will the library be giving its non-union employees an across the board raise this year?
EDITOR’S NOTE: That will depend on what the Library Board decides.
Hasn’t the library board already had that discussion?
EDITOR’S NOTE: The Library Board minutes are posted on the Library’s website. Take a look.
So they just saved enough money to pay of Mr. Hock.
EDITOR’S NOTE: That would be one way of looking at it. Or, as the mayor noted, if the search for a replacement takes 6-7 months, the savings would cover Hock’s severance payment.
But maybe that’s a question you should pose to Alds. Sweeney and DiPietro, as they are the two remaining aldermen who voted to give Hock that severance payment as part of his new contract 18 months or so ago.
Kudo’s to Alderman Knight as well.. I live in the fifth ward and continue to be please with his fiscal responsibility.
Somebody please tell Frimark to just go away. My budget can’t afford him as mayor again..
EDITOR’S NOTE: We have, but he doesn’t like us and won’t listen.
I never thought I would see the day when city government would be managed in a responsible way. Do you think Center of Concern will make a real effort at private fundraising?
EDITOR’S NOTE: Neither did we, but the fiscally irresponsible whiners are already starting to work to defeat Schmidt next April.
As for CofC, we doubt it. The whole culture over there is directed to getting government handouts, not earning money the old fashioned way by private fundraising.
I voted for Howard Frimark in 2005 but changed to Schmidt in 2009 because I was dissatisfied with Frimark. I am so pleased with how Schmidt is running the city and am so glad I changed my vote and hope he runs for reelection. He is doing what he said he would do and that makes him different from every other officeholder I know of. I hope everyone realizes how lucky we are to have a mayor who tells the truth and is not out for himself but out for all of us and for the good of teh city’s future.
The most recent posted library minutes are from February 21st. I doubt I would find the answer to my question anyway, since it was probably discussed in the “executive session” on April 17th.
EDITOR’S NOTE: The “executive session” on April 17th was for the evaluation of the Library Director.
Seeing and reading about all these changes, I can’t help but wonder how much of the stuff that is getting all this attention now (various expenses, essential services, employees earning their compensation, budget deficits, the TIF problems, etc.) was simply neglected by previous mayors and councils, and also by the media?
EDITOR’S NOTE: We’ve never had anything remotely close to this level of transparency in City government, so it’s a darn good bet that your suspicions are correct – at least the time Ron Wietecha became mayor in 1991.
Wietecha, with what chaff remained from Marty Butler’s once-great Homeowners Party, seem to have ignored or concealed anything that was unpleasant, embarrassing or problematic. And until he abandoned his office in 2003, his rubber-stamp Homeowners alderpuppets walked and talked the party line, which encouraged the local media to sleepwalk through its coverage of City gov’t.
Not until Schmidt became 1st Ward alderman in 2007 and began blowing the whistle on then-mayor Frimark’s finagling (including in closed-sessions) did we finally start getting some meaningful transparency out of City Hall. And that has jumped in quantum leaps since Schmidt became mayor with things like the timely posting of comprehensive Council meeting packages on the City’s website, videotaping and televising of meetings, and the production of meaningful and understandable financial information and analyses by Finance Director Allison Stutts.
But, of course, there are a lot of special interest types who would love to take us back to the dark old days of yore, where they could get their tax dollars and special deals without question.
Read the Trib Local or the Daily Herald and you’ll see other suburbs in financial trouble similar to Park Ridge. But none of them have a “Mayor No” making tough decisions and ticking off special interests in order to correct the problems. So I’m giving a big “Yes!” to “Mayor No.”
EDITOR’S NOTE: Your observation is why we get a little irritated with lazy aldermen and City staffers whose automatic default response to any difficult policy or procedural question is to ask or state what other suburbs are doing – as if any of them are governing particularly successfully or well.
Why is the mayor getting all the credit? I realize you are a supporter of his and that he’s done a better job than Frimark, but last time I checked there were 7 (now 6) aldermen who are the ones actually making the tough decisions resulting in changes, not the mayor.
EDITOR’S NOTE: No, most of those aldermen have consistently avoided making “the tough decisions” – which is why Schmidt has had to veto their “easy” decisions and then hope that he can get the 3-vote minority support needed to sustain his vetoes. As we said in this post, it’s not an optimal way to govern, but it is what the law provides; and it’s the best we can hope for with the current Council – which is a big improvement over its predecessor, especially now that Bernick has hung up his spikes.
In watching the video from 5/7, I was surprised to see the mayor, who’s historically been extremely supportive of the WFs project, back pedaling a bit with a room full of NIMBY residents. Was he just playing to the audience or is he now changing his mind on supporting this project?
EDITOR’S NOTE: Chapter and verse, please, because we didn’t see or hear any “back pedaling” Monday night and can’t imagine the tape revealing anything different.
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