Eight police cars with lights on, four without and a fire truck just blasted down NE Adams in Averyville and turned off on a side street near the Hardee’s Restaurant near the intersection with U.S. Router 150.This is from an eyewitness in the area. So something is going on.
Posts Tagged ‘peoria’
Eight police cars with lights on, four w…
Thursday, May 14th, 2009
Liveblogging tonight
Tuesday, April 21st, 2009I’ll be at tonight’s meeting of the Peoria City Council. The meeting starts (allegedly) at 6:15 p.m. Here is the agenda.
I’ll be livingblogging with my little Dell Mini laptop.
And I think I owe C.,J. a pizza afterwards. I hope he isn’t stuck babysitting his kids tonight.
Media: Jenny Li joins the dark side
Thursday, August 7th, 2008
WEEK announced at last night’s 10 p.m. newscast that weekend anchor/producer Jenny Li was leaving the station to work in public relations for State Farm Insurance in Bloomington.
What’s good for Jenny — better pay and better hours, no doubt — is bed news for news consumers. I’ll miss seeing her around the press table at Peoria City Hall.
And I’ll never forget watching her and another reporter arguing over whose turn it was to interview General Parker before the start of a City Council meeting.
Local: Blogger Bash was off the wall
Tuesday, July 29th, 2008I’m not even going to try to name all the bloggers and others who attended. Lot of conversation. Lots of hugging. Lots of liquid refreshment. And the Cubs won 7-1 over the Brewers.
We even talked some shop.
Look for photos on some of the blogs. I’ll link to ‘em when the photos get posted.
Local: Three shootings
Sunday, May 18th, 2008Via WMBD:
Three victims went to the hospital after a Sunday morning shooting in Peoria. It happened at the Southern Valley 66 on Western Avenue. Authorities say soon after a victim went to the hospital with a gun shot wound to the stomach, two more people showed up with bullet wounds. Police won’t say if the three victims are connected, they are still investigating. The conditions of the three victims are unknown.
Nothing yet on PJStar, WEEK, HOINews.
Local: More havok on Peoria’s streets
Wednesday, April 30th, 2008From a press release:
Beginning Monday, May 5th, Allen Road will be reduced to one lane of traffic in the vicinity of Northmoor Road for approximately two weeks.Â
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Starting with the northbound inside lane the week of May 5th, and the outside southbound lane the week of May 12th, the contractor will be installing the left and right turn lanes into the Mandalay subdivision. Be cautious of trucks entering and exiting Allen Road during this construction. Please plan an alternate route to avoid delays.Â
Local: And thus, the Comcast suckage begins
Monday, April 28th, 2008Internet service went down at Peoria Pundit World Headquarters today. After confirming that this was not the case of an unpaid bill (not THIS time), I contacted Comcast technical support.
Some background: While others may disagree with me, During past several years, I found Insight technical support to be friendly and well-trained. It wasn’t perfect (as their tech support telephone menu could be a little off-putting).
But we don’t have Insight any more. We have Comcast now, which doesn’t have a reputation for decent technical support.
This was the second time I called these people for help. The first time was when I tried to install a Vonage wireless router. At that time, they quickly washed their hands of me send sent me to Linksys, the makers of the router, and they were just about as worthless as worthless could be.
But this time, Comcast bore full responsibility for solving the problem. And I was less than impressed. It took three phone calls. The first time, my cell phone cut out. I think. OK, that was my fault. The second time, the tech support person knew nothing about Macs, so she tried to palm me off on her Level 2 support, but disconnected me during the transfer. Strike 1
Finally, the third person managed to get me connected. But not before she TWICE tried to get me to hang up and go to the Comcast Website to learn how to reset my modem, clear my cookies, cache, etc. THAT wasn’t the issue, so I asked the nice young lady to let me speak with her supervisor. Strike 2
Heh. THAT prompted her to do some actual troubleshooting, such as finding the MAC address for my cable modem, which for some reason didn’t match the address in their system. It took seven minutes on hold (no doubt ruining her talk time stats for the day) but they managed to get me connected again.
I have no idea what caused the problem. I’m tempted to think it was related to the switch from Insight to Comcast, but on the other hand, I was online for months without any problems.
Local: Kellar parents concerned about shortened school day
Thursday, April 24th, 2008Parents of children attending Keller Primary School are upset at changes that will give their kids less time in school and fewer teachers to teach music, science and computer skills.
One set of parents spoke to me today and complained at length about many of the issues they and other parents at Kellar have with District 150.
The issue that has them worried the most was discovering that the district was shortening the school day at all district primary schools by some 45 minutes. The district also is planning to do away with at least two of the four part-time teachers they employ at the school. Two of the teachers handle state-mandated physical education and music, while the other two teach art and computers. As they understand it, the part-timer who handles P.E. is safe. This means existing full time teachers will have to pick up the other three, if in fact these subjects will still be taught at all.
While the school day is being shortened, the teachers’ contract remains the same, so they will have the same work hours, but they will lose a 45-minute preparation period in the middle of the day. The shorter day apparently means the only break the children will get will be during the lunch recess.
Both these parents say they believe the decision was made by the school administration without input from the school principals, and that the parents and the community isn’t being given enough time to ask questions and provide input.
They say the board is scheduled to vote on these changes at they May 5 meeting. These parents are working to organize opposition to the changes. I reminded them that organized opposition from neighborhood groups in the Near North Side and the East Bluff forced District 150 to change it’s plans regarding Glen Oak School. I would also advise then to team up with parent organizations at other primary schools.
I’ll have more information in the future.
Local: New airport terminal plans unveiled
Tuesday, April 22nd, 2008The Metropolitan Airport Authority of Peoria on Wednesday will see renderings of the proposed $60 million terminal planned for 2010, the Journal Star is reporting this evening. The new building will be built just west of the current terminal and preparation work is expected to take place this summer.
The existing terminal opened in May 1959 and has been expanded several times since. An expansion project begun in 1968 added the underground baggage claim area and the upper level to the main building. The concourse opened in November 1970, and was extended east in 1998 and again in 2001 to accommodate additional service. The first jetway, for TWA, was installed in 1984. Two more jetways, for Ozark Airlines and United Air Lines, were installed in 1986. Subsequent concourse extensions have added two more jetways for a total of five. The original three jetways were replaced in 2006.
The current terminal has eight gates, six of which are in use (the other two can accommodate only smaller commuter planes). The new facility will have nine gates, all jetway-capable, with room for expansion.
Comments on the JS website have generally been negative toward construction of the new facility. These comments are rooted in opposition to runaway government spending on unnecessary projects. While I can understand these sentiments, I don’t agree with them. The existing terminal is old and would need extensive renovation anyway. But such would serve to disrupt efficient airline operations so a new terminal was deemed a better alternative.
The Greater Peoria Regional Airport’s success the past several years is something we can be proud of, and much of the credit goes to Executive Director Ken Spirito, whose energetic and never-ending quest for more service has paid off for local air travelers.
Local? Rebuilding alleys? Hardly
Monday, April 14th, 2008I took the following email from Peoria City Hall:
Today, Public Works crews began grinding alleys. This is done so they can put material into the alley to build them up. The next step will be to seal coat the alleys. The work will not be completed until early Summer.
I would hardly call this “rebuilding alleys,” which was the headline atop this press release. Other cities take great pains to make sure alleys are kept clean, in good repair and well-lit. In Peoria, well-maintained alleys are a rarity.
Local: The cause of Peoria anti-business climate is …
Monday, April 14th, 2008… Peorians.
We want it both ways.
We scream and yell about how Peoria makes it hard to do business.
But we scream and yell even louder whenever anyone wants to do business in our neighborhood. Heaven forbid, there might be a car parked where I want to park! There might be some urban youth-type person walking down by block after dark. And the City Council better not do anything that might generate car traffic on my street!
I’d love to unload a ton of bile and venom onto whatever city employees who screwed the pooch and told the owners of the teen club Adrenaline that there was nothing stopping them from locating the business at 7620 N. University St., even through it was well within the 500 feet of residences, a violation of the city’s almost unique teen dance club ordinance.
But methinks the owners maybe should done a little more homework than just rely on some drone at Peoria City Hall, especially since it’s a given that so few of them are really aware of all the Peoria’s many, many, many rules and regulations. It’s shame it has to be this way, but that’s a reality of doing business in Peoria.
Both sides in this dispute are going to try to get together and come up with a new ordinance rather than the somewhat clunky and unspecific ordinance change proposed last week.
But folks, as I’ve said before and will no doubt say again, it doesn’t really help to tinker with the rules. There’s no substitute for electing people who have the testicular fortitude to cast votes that make sense from a free-market point of view, rather than just pander to the not-in-my-backyard voter.
And here’s another warning for people who live in Peoria’s neighborhoods: You can’t expend older neighborhoods to survive by making it hard for people do conduct commerce in the city. The more businesses leave, the more of the tax burden falls on homeowners and the faster. And someone explain to me how empty storefronts are a sign of a healthy neighborhood.
Local: So, you want to dis-incentivize gang membership?
Sunday, April 13th, 2008Freakonomics has an interesting post in reaction to state of New York passing a law making it illegal to recruit anyone into a gang. Success is 100 percent guaranteed because, as you know, the last thing people who are engaging in an ongoing, multi-generational criminal enterprise want to is break the law. End sarcasm.
From the post:
In the never-ending fight by city officials and legislators to combat gangs, this is one of the latest efforts to outmaneuver gang members. Other similar initiatives have included: city ordinances that limit two or more gang members from hanging out in public space; school codes that ban the use of hats, clothing, and colors that signify gang membership; and public housing authorities that evict leaseholders who allow gang members (or any other so-called “criminalâ€) to live inside the housing unit.
These laws rarely lead to reductions in gang membership, gang violence, or gang crime. In fact, police officers I know find these ordinances and statutes a waste of time. Cops would much rather “control and contain†gang activity. Most officers who work in inner cities understand that you cannot eliminate gang activity entirely — arrest two gang members and you will find a dozen others waiting in line to take their places. Police know that gang members have great knowledge about local crimes, so they rely on a trade off: keep gangs isolated to particular areas, don’t let their criminal activities spill over into other spaces, and use high-ranking gang members for information.
My two cents: I’m not sure I completely approve. First, the tactics mentioned in the first paragraph were not, I believe, ever designed or promoted as a single magic-bullet cure for gang activity. To borrow an overused anology, they might be considered a tool in the tool belt.
Secondly, the police mentioned in the second paragraph seem to be advocating writing off entire neighborhoods as acknowledged gang territory in exchange for keeping uninfected neighborhoods free.
Feh.
Peorians who live in older neighborhoods have told me of encounters with police officers who tell them if they want to live in a neighborhood free of crime to move. To be fair, this was years ago, and everything I’ve seen or heard about current Police Chief Steve Settingsgaard suggests he discourages this attitude.
I like some of the suggestions offered by gang members, which includes tossing overly violent knuckleheads in jail (they cause problems for the gangs’ core business: drug sales) and public shaming. An outreach worker advocated taxing the gang-bangers and simply confiscating half of their cash. Sounds good, but as often as not, the person whose cash is gonna get “taxed” will be some dishwasher who just cashed his paycheck and happens to be walking home from work in one of the neighborhoods in which the gang has been contained.
If America really wanted to take away one of the incentives to joining a gang, take away the source of their profits by repealing anti drug laws.
But aside from that, my feeling is that there is no magic-bullet cure for gangs and gang-related crime. I don’t begrudge cities for trying some of the ideas mentioned above. Likewise, the efforts underway in Peoria such as covering entire neighborhoods with cameras might work, or they might not. Anything is worth a try, as long as it doesn’t take away too many resources from basic police protection.
There’s no substitute for having enough well-trained, fully-equipped police officers. The next step is making sure that these officers are being tasked with the job of really fighting crime and not just concentrating on conviction rates and bringing in revenue with tickets.
Local: City willing to risk another lawsuit to protect Big Al’s from competition?
Tuesday, March 25th, 2008How completely bizarre.
For a little less than five years, the official position of the City of Peoria is that Elliott’s cannot and must not have a liquor license. Because a tiny non-stripper corner of the joint was too close to an apartment complex.
This decision allowed the place to operate as a liquor-free strip joint where anyone above the age of 18 can pay to have naked women sit on his lap and/or rub her boobs in his face.
This separated Elliott’s from Big Al’s in downtown Peoria, which limited such activities to those 21 and above, thanks to its 4 a.m. liquor license. So now that the courts have essentially told cities that it can’t push around strip joints and that it must issue Elliott’s a liquor license, the city is poised to deny them the kind of liquor license that would allow them to stay open as long as Big Al’s. Why? Because the city doesn’t want anyone looking at boobies until they are 21.
None of this is rational. The Class B license is designed for restaurants that also serve liquor. Well, guess what folks: Elliott’s serves food. This isn’t some joint with a microwave and a pizza oven behind the bar. It’s got a full restaurant with a full menu.
When a restaurant applies for a liquor license, the license they get should be the one designed for restaurants that serve booze. Forcing them to take a lesser license because it also offers legal adult entertainment strikes me as spoiling for another court fight that’s just as likely to be decided on free speech grounds as the last one. Remember: The city cannot argue that it seriously wants to protect 18- to 20-year-old adults from naked woman because it allowed that to happen for five years.
So why the continued effort by the city to screw over Elliott’s? Consider that Big Al’s is much more popularly politically. It is generally accepted amongst the movers and shakers that Peoria would not get what convention business it does get without Big Al’s as a draw.
This isn’t about protecting grown-ups below age 21 from seeing boobs. This is about protecting one business at the expense of another.
No doubt Elliott’s license request will be turned down tonight. The Peoria City Council has proven itself completely willing to throw taxpayer cash down the toilet by trying to defend positions in court that it cannot win, and no doubt will do so again. It’s something to consider if you are a voter who wants to be represented by grown-ups who treat voters like grown-ups instead of those who want to pander to those with a narrow mind-set.
Today’s News: No surprises
Thursday, March 20th, 2008Links via the Journal Star:
- To the surprise of no one, OSF Health Plans has been old. The new owner will be Humana Inc. This sale was mentioned back when the city was deciding who employees’ health care provider would be. The decision to pick OSF over rival Methodist saved the city millions of dollars. Employees seemed to prefer Methodist, not that I blame them. But if Methodist wants to steal the contract back, let them make a better offer.
- Pam Adams also doesn’t think much of the criticism being leveled at Barack Obama because of his former pastor’s rhetoric. And she scoffs at the idea that Obama got where he is today because he’s black. To be sure, he’s getting some votes from black people because he’s black. But he got here because he’s smart and one hell of a speaker.
- I’m trying to think of another word for Jim Stowell’s plan to make community service mandatory for Peoria Scholol District 150 students. Oh, yeah: “slavery.” Please. I was a member of the Key Club and other student organizatiosn and did my share of stuff for charity. I would have done none of it had “community service” been required.
- A crane accident killed a Keystone employee.
- Don’t worry, Rolling Acres residents, most murders will continue to happen in Peoria’s ghetto neighborhoods. Now, who is going to assure residents of neighborhoods south of Forrest Hill?
- Two judges have swapped assignments because one of them is involved in a lawsuit here in Peoria over whether bad tires caused the death of his son, who happened to be driving drunk at the time. This is the same judge who was being talked up as a potential candidate for Congress.
- Here are some Peoria County indictments, including a pair who allegedly stole money from an elderly neighbor. See if your friends, family, neighbors or co-workers are on the list.
- Stopping short of a complete withdrawal, Congressional candidate Colleen Callahan wants a time line for an orderly withdrawal from Iraq. Basically, she wants Iraqis made responsible for Iraq. Unlike opponent Aaron Schock, who opposes a time line, Callahan has actually been to Iraq. Maybe Schock gets his advice on Iraq from the same people he gets advice on nuclear disarmament.
- I, too, share a reluctance to turn Constitution Park over to condo development. I think once land has been set aside as a park, it needs to remain just that: Green space that’s open to everyone. Now, if they want to rip out Taft Homes and replace it with condos, more power to them. All subsidized public housing has done is institutionalize poverty and make it more expensive for working people to afford a place to live. If public housing was about alleviating homelessness, they would let homeless people move into PHA properties.
PeoriaPunditRadio: On the air! (closed)
Sunday, March 16th, 2008(The show is over now. Listen here.)
If you see this post at the top of the blog, then I’m on the air (click to listen), right now. Call (347) 326-9459 to join the conversation. It starts at 6 p.m. and ends at 7:30 p.m. (Central)
Here are some of the topics and some associated links:
Litter:
- Peoria Litter Committee,
- It’s time to clean up Peoria.
- Fast food tax is a trashy way to fight litter.
- 757 6407.
- No sympathy for litter bugs.
Fibber McGee and Molly:
Recent political stuff:
Thanks for listening.
Post mortem: I thought the show went well. Paul Wilkinson of the Altamont Part Neighborhood Association called in and stayed on the air almost an hour. He provided lots of insight and background on the subject of the day, litter and the c city’s erffort to clean it up.
Of course, there were a few glitches. I ended the show a bit early. And I neglected to hit the MUTE button on the switchboard while the radio shows were playing. God knows what listeners heard while Fibber and Molly were making bad puns.
It’s also apparent that the show works best when I’m interviewing someone, rather than just spouting off. I’ll need to make more of an effort to get guests and multiple callers. As the show goes on, more people will know about it and will listen in while it’s live.
I do intend to have more old time radio programs, and not just Fibber and Molly.
Billy Dennis is a former reporter and editor at small daily and weekly newspapers in Illinois and Missouri. He comments on media, news and politics. He also owns and operates 
