This blog is maintained for the sole purpose of allowing the people of Peru and those interested in the cities of the Illinois Valley to express their views.
“It doesn’t take a majority to win, just a tireless minority that will keep starting brush fires in the mind and hearts of their fellow men.” Samuel Adams
Wednesday, January 18, 2012
Road Program and Cost 2012
24 comments:
Anonymous
said...
Does anyone else feel that doing a block here and a block there in 4 different wards a waste of time and money? Surely it's much more costly to redo roads this way than it would be to do a continuous surface no matter what ward it's in. I thought that was the purpose of the infrastructure committee - to repair roads not blocks. Will this be implemented anytime in the near future?
11:23 a.m. - Please be advised the aldermen select the roads to be addressed in their particular wards. It is not a function of the Infrastructure Committee to make those decisions. I suggest you ask your aldemen why it is the way it is.
I understand that totally Steve. My question is why are we continuing to do it in this manner? Couldn't that be something the Infrastructure Committee could propose and present to full council? I think everybody thought that was your committees goal. I know I did.
It is not the purpose of the infrastructure committee to repair roads not blocks. It is the purpose of the 1/2% increase in sales tax to update the roads. It was intended that a contractor could come into Peru and do a straight line job with a limitation of equipment mobilization because of letting out larger bids. The city consulting engineer was asked at a city council meeting in front of the present entire council for a explanation of how Morris does their city streets. He emphasized that Morris gives out larger bids for specific areas rather than many small segment bids. These larger bids in straight line concentrated areas result in a comparative cost of 60% to 70% of what Peru pays for the same product. I reemphasize that all of the above has been presented at a city council meeting. I also emphasize that a private citizen can question the city council on their reasoning as well as the Infrastructure Committee.
The question of doing patch work repairs was brought up in the infrastructure committee meetings. It appears that some things are sacred and the alderman having the ability to pick and chose which blocks they want repaired in their ward is one of those hands off items. If you look at the information from when the vote was taken to borrow against the sales tax, you will see that each ward was to be given a dollar amount to cover their ward's street repair desires for the year, plus the normal Motor fuel Tax money that they work with.
Have the aldermen ever taken a vote on this issue? I think it would be interesting to see how many of them actually feel a block here and a block there is beneficial to their ward and their re-election. I would hope they would have the best interest of the entire city of Peru on their agenda and not just their ward. I believe it is truly more cost effective and beneficial to do entire stretches of road then pieces. It would be interesting to see this issue discussed at full council.
Doesn't anyone see the advantage of taking the over $800,000 from each of the wards and putting it toward an entire road? Band-aids don't work. It would be nice to hear our aldermen discuss the pros and cons of doing our roads in this manner. I really cannot believe they would all favor this block by block attempt at improving our city roadways.
If the average life cycle of asphalt is 8-10 years all the roads under this program will need to be redone in that time frame. Where is the 5 year road building program? Being on the infrastructure committee I have brought this up more than once. I also proposed a 5 year program using the money as it came in. At the end of 5 years there would be a balance of +- 4.5 million. This plan was not approved. When I presented the program I stated it could be amended to meet any situation. A contractual engineer will be very benefical to the committee hopefully the whole committee will listen to his opinions and use his resources. I am the only one that was against the loan. The more butt joints you have the more the problems. If you people must sign anonymous then show up at a meeting and voice your opinion what do you have to lose. A question not asked is an answer not given.
Mike: What do you think were the reasons for the committee to totally object to your plan? I personally think "it" makes more sense especially during these hard economic times. Would have liked to see a little more open discussion at full council regarding the pros and cons of your proposal.
The council in a very heated exchange voted 5-4 to borrow the money for the road project. The minority voted to utilize the tax after the money was received. This would also enable the city to have a fund for those emergency repairs. And also be able to have a much larger project that would allow a the newly hired engineer to review. We will soon see if the borrowing and spending strategy will prevail for Peru.
You ALL need to review the minutes of the infrastructure meetings from the City of Peru website. Starting with Oct.10th. The committee went from conservative spending, to do it all with the loan. Read them carefully and take notes. Also the mayor did not indicate he was going to use money from the sales tax increase to help fund the north area project until the night of the regular council meeting. Thus if all was to be done the loan was needed. So basically the first year's sales tax was already spent.
Mike, Personally I felt it was all predetermined and the Mayor was using the Infrastructure committee members as a means of getting his loan through and the projects out for bid. I have not been to many of the Infrastructure committee meetings but enough to feel that dissension always seems to be overruled. Also that some members are too quiet and some are leaving early or not coming at all. Has there ever actually been a vote taken on any topic?
4:40 PM I was referring to a bank for the loan for the road program and that is how Peoria got into the conversation. The Mayor had evidently made mention of a Peoria bank giving a good rate for a loan.
I am not quite sure what you mean, Lois. Any entity, whether it be an individual, business or government needs some sort of "asset" when leveraging money.
I realize that Justin but the word "leverage" is new to many people and I am sure they have no idea of what the Mayor or the committee mean they are doing. Even I will admit to that to some degree. I know you are good at things like that so can I persuade you to write up a brief explanation for the rest of the people.
Leveraging the money is no different than pulling future revenue forward, which is no different than when you are buying a house. Not too many people have $100,000 cash now, so when they get a 30 year mortgage they are pulling 30 years worth of future revenue forward to the present day. Currently entire country has been presented with a very favorable borrowing terms, with the Federal Reserve pledging to keep interest rates low(our cost of borrowing), as well as a high level of competition due to the limited number of jobs out there. The ONLY reason why I supported this plan was because the cost of borrowing is going to be offset by the saving the city will incur from bidding out such a large project. Bigger the project, the greater the savings (no different than buying something in bulk at Sam's Club for example). The Federal Reserve Chairman, Ben Bernanke, has pledged to keep interest rates low for two years, so as time goes by this option will become more and more unlikely. All we did was take advantage of a favorable scenario that was presented to us.
I'm just not sure what Chamlins two cents is. He surly is not doing the work so why are we paying him for an estimate. if i were going to pave my drive shouldn't a contractor price it. Im sure Chamlins two cents is alot more than we think it is.
24 comments:
Does anyone else feel that doing a block here and a block there in 4 different wards a waste of time and money? Surely it's much more costly to redo roads this way than it would be to do a continuous surface no matter what ward it's in. I thought that was the purpose of the infrastructure committee - to repair roads not blocks. Will this be implemented anytime in the near future?
11:23 a.m. - Please be advised the aldermen select the roads to be addressed in their particular wards. It is not a function of the Infrastructure Committee to make those decisions. I suggest you ask your aldemen why it is the way it is.
Its stupid the way they do it now.
I understand that totally Steve. My question is why are we continuing to do it in this manner? Couldn't that be something the Infrastructure Committee could propose and present to full council? I think everybody thought that was your committees goal. I know I did.
It is not the purpose of the infrastructure committee to repair roads not blocks.
It is the purpose of the 1/2% increase in sales tax to update the roads. It was intended that a contractor could come into Peru and do a straight line job with a limitation of equipment mobilization because of letting out larger bids.
The city consulting engineer was asked at a city council meeting in front of the present entire council for a explanation of how Morris does their city streets. He emphasized that Morris gives out larger bids for specific areas rather than many small segment bids. These larger bids in straight line concentrated areas result in a comparative cost of 60% to 70% of what Peru pays for the same product.
I reemphasize that all of the above has been presented at a city council meeting. I also emphasize that a private citizen can question the city council on their reasoning as well as the Infrastructure Committee.
The question of doing patch work repairs was brought up in the infrastructure committee meetings. It appears that some things are sacred and the alderman having the ability to pick and chose which blocks they want repaired in their ward is one of those hands off items. If you look at the information from when the vote was taken to borrow against the sales tax, you will see that each ward was to be given a dollar amount to cover their ward's street repair desires for the year, plus the normal Motor fuel Tax money that they work with.
Have the aldermen ever taken a vote on this issue? I think it would be interesting to see how many of them actually feel a block here and a block there is beneficial to their ward and their re-election. I would hope they would have the best interest of the entire city of Peru on their agenda and not just their ward. I believe it is truly more cost effective and beneficial to do entire stretches of road then pieces. It would be interesting to see this issue discussed at full council.
Doesn't anyone see the advantage of taking the over $800,000 from each of the wards and putting it toward an entire road? Band-aids don't work. It would be nice to hear our aldermen discuss the pros and cons of doing our roads in this manner. I really cannot believe they would all favor this block by block attempt at improving our city roadways.
If the average life cycle of asphalt is 8-10 years all the roads under this program will need to be redone in that time frame. Where is the 5 year road building program? Being on the infrastructure committee I have brought this up more than once. I also proposed a 5 year program using the money as it came in. At the end of 5 years there would be a balance of +- 4.5 million. This plan was not approved. When I presented the program I stated it could be amended to meet any situation. A contractual engineer will be very benefical to the committee hopefully the whole committee will listen to his opinions and use his resources. I am the only one that was against the loan. The more butt joints you have the more the problems. If you people must sign anonymous then show up at a meeting and voice your opinion what do you have to lose. A question not asked is an answer not given.
Mike: What do you think were the reasons for the committee to totally object to your plan? I personally think "it" makes more sense especially during these hard economic times. Would have liked to see a little more open discussion at full council regarding the pros and cons of your proposal.
The council in a very heated exchange voted 5-4 to borrow the money for the road project. The minority voted to utilize the tax after the money was received. This would also enable the city to have a fund for those emergency repairs. And also be able to have a much larger project that would allow a the newly hired engineer to review. We will soon see if the borrowing and spending strategy will prevail for Peru.
Have we been approved for the loan? If so, with which bank? The last I heard it was possibly a bank in Peoria (not a local one as was indicated).
The news claimed it would be borrowed locally with a low interest rate.
You ALL need to review the minutes of the infrastructure meetings from the City of Peru website. Starting with Oct.10th. The committee went from conservative spending, to do it all with the loan. Read them carefully and take notes. Also the mayor did not indicate he was going to use money from the sales tax increase to help fund the north area project until the night of the regular council meeting. Thus if all was to be done the loan was needed. So basically the first year's sales tax was already spent.
2:57 PM
I believe the Mayor thinks Peoria is local.
3:05PM
Mike,
Personally I felt it was all predetermined and the Mayor was using the Infrastructure committee members as a means of getting his loan through and the projects out for bid. I have not been to many of the Infrastructure committee meetings but enough to feel that dissension always seems to be overruled. Also that some members are too quiet and some are leaving early or not coming at all.
Has there ever actually been a vote taken on any topic?
Wrong- Local 150 is the Mayor's local.
4:40 PM
I was referring to a bank for the loan for the road program and that is how Peoria got into the conversation. The Mayor had evidently made mention of a Peoria bank giving a good rate for a loan.
A vote was taken on whether or not we were supportive of leveraging the money.
Justin, is that like putting the cities assets up as leverage against a loan?
I am not quite sure what you mean, Lois. Any entity, whether it be an individual, business or government needs some sort of "asset" when leveraging money.
I realize that Justin but the word "leverage" is new to many people and I am sure they have no idea of what the Mayor or the committee mean they are doing. Even I will admit to that to some degree.
I know you are good at things like that so can I persuade you to write up a brief explanation for the rest of the people.
Leveraging the money is no different than pulling future revenue forward, which is no different than when you are buying a house. Not too many people have $100,000 cash now, so when they get a 30 year mortgage they are pulling 30 years worth of future revenue forward to the present day. Currently entire country has been presented with a very favorable borrowing terms, with the Federal Reserve pledging to keep interest rates low(our cost of borrowing), as well as a high level of competition due to the limited number of jobs out there. The ONLY reason why I supported this plan was because the cost of borrowing is going to be offset by the saving the city will incur from bidding out such a large project. Bigger the project, the greater the savings (no different than buying something in bulk at Sam's Club for example). The Federal Reserve Chairman, Ben Bernanke, has pledged to keep interest rates low for two years, so as time goes by this option will become more and more unlikely. All we did was take advantage of a favorable scenario that was presented to us.
I'm just not sure what Chamlins two cents is. He surly is not doing the work so why are we paying him for an estimate. if i were going to pave my drive shouldn't a contractor price it. Im sure Chamlins two cents is alot more than we think it is.
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