Some details are emerging about exactly why Peoria isn’t getting the federal funding it is due to fight its lead poisoning problem:
Peoria officials called HUD multiple times to verify their 2005 application was received and complete, yet no confirmation was given, [U.S. Sen Barack] Obama said. Ultimately, a HUD employee responded no feedback was [...]

Chase Ingersoll sent the following email, and an attached PFD file:
The Motion to Modify is very much in line with what I requested that the Judge hear 10 days ago. I think that you can read into the pleadings that the City is conceding that it is unlikely that the original order applies to [...]

The City of Peoria says the sale of the Grandview Hotel to Chase Ingersoll is a “sham transaction.”
Does the city contend that Jain and Ingersoll schemed to transfer ownership on paper? If so, the plot collapsed almost immediately. Ingersoll had Jain evicted, and did so in a particularly embarassing manner (Ingersoll turned over to cops [...]

Copley News Service has an excellent report on how Gov. Blagojevich uses public money to tape events that make him look good.
or instance, on April 16, the governor, a runner and a fan of Elvis Presley, entered an eight-person team in the 80-mile River to River Relay run from the Mississippi River to the [...]

What am I thankful for?
My family, who drive me nuts sometimes, but provides me with strength and support.
My friends, ditto.
My blog, which keeps me sane.
The Constitution of the United States of America.
Members of the United States Armed Forces, who watch my back and ensure that we have a Constitition.
Drew and Scarlett.
thanksgiving

Read more of the sordid details:

Now on sale at my Cafe Press site:

The Peoria Pundit Black T-Shirt sells for $22.99 (2x and 3x are $3 extra). This is a close-up of the image:

Just in time for Christmas. I’m absolutely sure someone on your list is simply dying for a cool shirt like this.
cafe press,peoria pundit,t shirts

One would get the impression from the questions asked by At-Large Council member Chuck Grayeb that a vote is will he held soon, perhaps next week, on whether or not to fully staff Fire Station 11.
The draft budget now before the council is “revenue neutral.” In other words, it’s balanced without any increase in taxes. [...]

The anonymous Peoria blogger says that she got the info from a source at Kelleher’s, developer Pat Sullivan’s pub on the Riverfront. She speculated that Pat doesn’t want to run against retiring State Sen. George Shadid’s (D-46th District) handpicked replacement, Dave Koehler.
There may be some truth to that assessment.
Polly is wrong, however, in calling Koehler [...]

There’s an interesting debate going on in the comments to this post. As is often the case regarding interesting debates, C.J. Summers is involved. I took him to task for taking offense to Mike Bailey’s column that criticizes those who criticized the Journal Star for running those not so scandalous photos taken at a wet [...]

Mike Bailey is 100 percent right.
Sorry to disappoint my loyal readers, who have come to expect this site to lash out at Bailey and his award-winning (snicker) editorial board at every opportunity.
But Bailey is correct when he defends his newspaper’s front-page article and accompanying photo about the return of wet t-shirt contests to a Peoria [...]

I’ve been hollering for years that the Peoria Police Department needs to be more concerned with getting drugs dealers off the streets than with making convictions (they are NOT the same thing). Judging by this passage, I’m thinking Police Chief Steve Settingsgaard may be on the same wavelength:
Expect to see Settingsgaard go after drug dealers [...]

Journal Star media columnist Steve Tarter reports
on George Gerbner, an “eminent media researcher” from the University of Pennsylvania, who says that people who watch too much television can come down with an ailment called “mean world syndrome” — the belief that the world is a harsher place than it really is:
What Gerbner observed was that, [...]

I’m just now starting to go through today’s Journal Star, and it looks to be a top-drawer effort. Terry Bibo Baker’s column on the fetid sewer that is the Illinois State Police* is an especially good read.
The column covers a lot of stuff, but it focuses on the case of Michale Callahan, a trooper who [...]

Peoria Peon takes at look at library’s reports and makes this observation:
What one should take note of here is that only outreach and the bookmobile show gains.
In other words the only aspect of the library in this category showing gains is those area’s where the library goes to the people, not the other way around.
In [...]