Coming soon! Another city budget exercise! Evanston residents get to say how they’d split 100 bucks among different city services! Cool new online tool!
The jaded Ponzi has his answers mapped out already.
Cartoon: Budget exercise
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Wally’s Love of PowerPoint
If only Wally was as good at running Evanston as he is at PowerPoint presentations, then the city would be better managed. City operations are suffering. Morale is miserable. More professionals are leaving. Maybe, Wally is creating another budget crisis to divert attention from the messes created by him.
Wally’s performance
Before you condemn Wally, recall that he came in with the mess already there. The pension funds were already chronically underfunded — even after the police fund sued. Couple that with earlier mismanagement, a financial downturn a state government that is late in paying its bills, etc. Get real.
There is a lot of lack of respondabiltiy here
There are a lot more individuals to blame in town for the mess we are in with our taxes than just Wally.
Recently the High School went and approved an early retirement program – you would think these people would learn from the city. In District 65 the geniuses are talking about building a new school – when in a few years they may be $30 million dollars in the RED.
Wally is not totally accountable for the mess we are in the Mayor and the council own a big piece. I don't think Wally would have hired the lobbying firm ( which he recently terminated the contract on after spending $80,000 ) and the lobbyist if the Mayor and some council members were not so interested in running down to springfield all the time.
Wally needs more "council" so to speak if he is going to do the right things for the taxpayers.
The cartoon – expresses that – over the next few months we are going to have more useless citizens meetings on the budget and vote online for how to spend the money. The staff needs to present the real cuts, that are need here – in the major departments and stop pretending cutting a few small programs is going to solve anything.
Ofcourse at the last meeting Wally did the right thing by presenting the options on injecting 800 additional elm trees – unforunately staff did not present it clearly and the council was too confused to deal with it, so nothing intelligent came of options.
refudiate the lack of respondability
The cartoon – expresses that – over the next few months we are going to have more useless citizens meetings on the budget and vote online for how to spend the money. The staff needs to present the real cuts, that are need here – in the major departments and stop pretending cutting a few small programs is going to solve anything.
I am glad that 'Ponzi', who appears at just about every public meeting to give comments, is now admitting that most of these citizen meetings are useless. I am also pleased to see that Ponzi, who repeatedly harps on minor budget issues like aldermen's health benefits or lawsuits about tree stumps, is now admitting that it is necessary to focus on the major budget items instead of nitpicking over individual line items.
re: Wally’s Performance
I think an open, honest, and civil discussion of Wally's performance is good for Evanston. This is my assessment.
Wally did assume a tough situation. Wally has also made the situation far worse. He handled the Library and Fire Union very badly. He saddled the City with a useless layer of bureaucracy (311).
He has not addressed the breakdowns in services provided by the departments.
He has not removed any department directors. City departments deliver good service only after the problems are pointed out and fixes are demanded.
Other communities are recovering from the recession. By Wally's admission, Evanston is heading into more turmoil.