Saturday, April 28, 2007

Slick budget maneuver planned?

There is speculation that the mayor will attempt to approve the budget for the upcoming fiscal year at the last meeting of the current city council, rather than at the first meeting of the new city council, as has always been done in the past. The two public meetings will be held back to back on Tuesday, May 1 at 10:00 a.m.

Some aldermen and aldermen-elect are said to have questions about the size and composition of the budget as proposed by the mayor.

Why should the new city council be hamstrung by a budget approved the the old city council? The new city council will have to live with this budget and they should be the given the opportunity to consider and vote on it.

Read about Tax Increment Financing (TIF)

27 comments:

Anonymous said...

No different than Coal City giving 8% raises and the police chief getting $10K boost and letting the new Mayor figure out how to pay for it. Dickie needs that new building now to get his name on it before the next election. Then somebody else can firgure out how to pay for it.

Anonymous said...

rehabilitation or renovation of EXISTING public or private buildings. Now you would think our high priced chicago style city attorney would let our alderman know before they buy the drapes that they might be breaking the rules.

Anonymous said...

sledge, you need to check out www.illinois-tif.com/ and also all the alderman need to read and understand this material. Instead of having Brian Fenney and the mayor put the city of Morris in more hot water.

Anonymous said...

why can't the newly elected council immediately undo the lame ducks' budget???

Anonymous said...

sledge, things are going to be really boring around here when Brian leaves tuesday.

Anonymous said...

What is the problem with Mike Farrell and the MDH that they cannot take the time to look into how the Morris mayor is planning to finance the city hall building. That man is the most inept person with a pencil.

Anonymous said...

Tricky Dickie strikes again

Anonymous said...

The city is robbing the school districts by using TIF money to build the new city Taj-Ma hall. This is not what TIF money was intended for.

Anonymous said...

Dick does not want the new aldermen to have any say in the new budget. He knows that it takes only a simple majority vote to approve a budget, but a 2/3 vote to modify a budget. There is no reason why the budget has to be considered on May 1, except that the mayor knows the new aldermen will question it.

Anonymous said...

TIF money is to be used for industial parks and sewers etc, these are projects that bring revenue back to the schools and more sales tax back to the city.

Anonymous said...

how long have we been asking for something to be done with the old paper mill site? this is what tif money was intended for. this area is ignored time and time again. too bad it was not located where the old center school was. i'm sure someone would pay attention then.

Anonymous said...

It is not speculation. The budget is on the agenda for the meeting to be held before seating the new alderman. This stunt is a new low, even for Dickie.

Anonymous said...

police departments cost around 300 dollars a square foot. city halls cost around 100 dollars a square foot. The alderman could buid a 10,000 square new city hall across the street for a little over a million dollars and then renovate the old city hall into more police department for another 500 hundred thousand and be done with the whole thing, but hey that makes to much sense. A million and a half instead of 11 million. It makes you wonder about how they run their own personal finances.

Anonymous said...

Brian is going to leave the council tuesday for the rest of the alderman to clean up his boondoggles like this city hall finance scheme.

Anonymous said...

When are these alderman going to figure out that they really run the city and not the mayor. NOTHING can be done that they do not want to happen. I'm tired of seeingon this site its the mayor's fault, bullshit its the alderman. I think some of them get a little intimidated by it all. Your job is not easy but you are in control of millions of taxpayer dollars. Please spend like it was your own.

Anonymous said...

The agenda is not gospel. an alderman can make a motion to wait for new council to be seated.

Anonymous said...

The 1999 amendment to the TIF law prohibits using TIF money to build municipal buildings. This money was diverted from our schools to revitalize blighted areas and generate new property taxes. Raiding the TIF money to build a lavish city hall does neither. This sort of conduct by our city is why property tax bills are so high, and why our schools are so strapped. And they know full well that what they are doing is wrong. Shame on all of you in city hall.

Anonymous said...

Our high-priced city attorney is paid $257,000 a year. Surely he knows that it is illegal to divert $9,000,000 from TIF funds to build a new city hall.

Anonymous said...

The Federal Industrial Park site needs to be the priority for TIF. Revitalizing this eyesore is exactly the type of thing that TIF was intended for. It was not intended for building cushy new offices for politicians. The city hall plans need to be scaled back.

Anonymous said...

If the budget is approvd tomorrow by the outgoing city council - can the city hall portion of that budget be limited or revised by the newly-elected city council? Or, if the budget is approved tomorrow, the new city hall is locked in and we are stuck paying the $9 million for a facility that should cost 1/9th the price.

Anonymous said...

Attention Morris Residents: It is time to revolt. Hire a credible attorney that can undo all the wrongs and get things back on track. Someone should be held accountable

Anonymous said...

When are the aldermen going to start doing their job and stand up to the mayor's B.S.?

Positive Morron said...

http://positivemorron.blogspot.com/

Anonymous said...

You guys can't blame the mayor any more. The republican alderman have a super-majority of votes. Any b.s. that happens now is because the aldermen let it happen.

Anonymous said...

Is it a conflict of interest for the city attorney to represent someone in court for a DUI arrest by a city cop? Does anyone know the answer to this?

Anonymous said...

I'd guess not. The cops lawyer representing the city would be the States Attorney. Sheldon and company. Of course it smacks of poor judgement, but we're talking about lawyers; so poor judgement and lawyers would be an oxymoron.

Anonymous said...

How about removing the moron blog post, unless you are willing to tango?