Wednesday, April 11, 2012
Alderman Perez calls on Peru coucil to consider "Strategic Planning" to improve our city
Alderman Rodney Perez initiated a discussion at Monday's council meeting focusing on the idea of creating a "Strategic Planning" process intended to develop goals for the future success of the city of Peru. Alderman Perez is attempting to encourage other elected officials to create a program similar to the recently created CAVS Program (Creating a Visionary School) which was started recently by L-P High School administrators and school board members. L-P leaders have reached out to the community at large for input and participation in planning for the future of the school. L-P has the right idea and it appears that Rodney Perez wants to duplicate that effort of engaging the citizens of Peru as "stakeholders" in the future of their community. After explaining the idea to the other aldermen and asking for consideration and discussion at the next council meeting Alderman Perez's idea got zero feedback from the other aldermen and only Mayor Harl acknowledged the subject could be discussed in the future. I have always been a pro-ponent of the potential benefits of a "joint effort" between city officials and the public because I know our city has an untapped wealth of knowledge and experience in so many areas. The L-P / CAVS Program has developed sub-committees consisting of school administrators, faculty, employees, and local citizens who are working together to plan for the future of the school. I will remain hopeful this progressive initiative from Rodney Perez will convince other elected officials to get on board and support the idea. However, as a member of the Infrastructure Committee it has become very clear to me and the other non-elected members of our committee that our efforts and advice are neither welcome or appreciated by a majority of elected officials in Peru. Because of the current attitude of many on the council, Alderman Perez will have a very difficult time garnering much support for what is becoming a very common and successful tool for governing bodies all across the country. The most critical factor needed for this program to be successful will be the complete support and endorsement of a majority of elected officials who are secure enough in their own ability to lead and delegate authority in order to welcome "outsiders" and not feel threatened by the advice and input of the citizens of Peru. My personal experience while attempting to contribute to my city is that we are just not there yet.
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29 comments:
Steve, These are called political campaigns and another flavor of the day for a Alderman looking for more public exposure. And back to your committee! What are these valuable committee recommendations that your Mayor won't support or these critical efforts that have been wasted by the city? And why did council members choose to quit coming to your infrastructure meetings? Is it possible or probable that your infrastructure committee initiatives were from a personal perspective and did not concur with the majority or even slight minority or those other committee members? Could that be why many committee members felt that their efforts were wasted, including those elected or appointed?
Steve, BOO HOO HOO. Are we complaining about the lack of city direction? Every four years citizens around the USA get a vote in the direction of the city. If your running a school or large organization then its important to provide what those business majors call Stategic planning. If your running a government like Obama, Quinn and even Harl you call that direction. If your unhappy about the direction then you have a complaint. Your complaint should be directed to your elected official. If you or Ald. Rod are unhappy about the direction of the city don't subject our residents to your games. Let Harl run the City and if you don't like it you have a election in 2013.
Steve , i was just wondering how much money the city spends on fuel a month ? The reason is employs ( parttime ) takeing home city trucks and city mowers . I think we could save lots of money if they drove their own cars . Like Rodney i'm trying to think ahead , but no one i talk to about this seems to care or is afraid to tip the apple cart . Yhanks for your time .
Many believe that your advice is welcome in all aspects of the infrastructure committee. However advice vs demands are two seperate issues. Steve, you tend to mix up advice and your personal agenda or your Mayor's agenda. Committee members became quickly aware of agenda's and felt they were being used to sway public opinion. Don't fool us again with another one of your (Rodney) plans.
Steve,
Thanks for mentioning L-P High Schools "Strategic Planning Process".
I had the honor to serve as co-chair for the " Community Engagement" sub-committee.
The process consisted of three groups:
1. Board of Ed: Strategic Planning Committee
2.The Core Team: 11-L-P staff members,12-Community Leaders (Citizens), 2-Students, and 2- Board Members.
3.Sub-Committees: Technology,Finance,Community Engagement, Grounds,
Each sub-committee broke off into their groups to come up with: a mission,Goals,and Action statements.
The "Strategic Planning Committee"(BOE)would give final approval of all goals and actions the sub-committees agreed upon.
The Board of Educations desired outcome was to develop a 3-5 year blueprint for the school district's future.
Strategic Planning is a way to help an organization,or community operate more effectively,and efficiently by helping guide the allocation of resources in order to achieve wide goals.
Kudo's to the L-P leadership for taking such a pro-active move forward!
As a community we must work together to create a vision for the future by setting short, and long term goals.I'm confident the mayor and council will see a "strategic plan" as a move in the right direction for the entire City of Peru.
The recommendation I would make to the Mayor and council would be to call a special meeting (in place of a regular city council meeting) to discuss implementing a "Strategic Action Plan" with our desired outcome of a 5-10 year blueprint for the city's future.
The beginning stages of implementing a successful strategic process would be to gather a meeting of: city leaders (council),budget director,department supervisors,director of economic development,director of parks,and president of the downtown business committee.
The Mayor would set the vision of the future, and the above named city leaders would work towards a consensus of how the process moves forward.
Community engagement would play a key-role with bringing ideas to the council(committee)for mayor and council approval.
Asking ourselves questions such as:
*What major challenges are facing the City of Peru?
*What would make Peru more livable?
*What's the vision I want to have of Peru by the year 2022?
*ETC.
By asking ourselves a few basic questions..we could come up with a large list of opportunities, and goals.
For starters, we must keep the citizens of Peru informed.
I believe for little cost to the city we could "Live Stream" our council meetings, then post them to our city webpage for public viewing. If we start dieting now we could lose the 10-15 pounds the camera would put on us so there would be no need to be camera shy;-)
Thanks,
Rodney
Sounds like Alderman Perez is finally onto something. I had a feeling sooner or later he would throw something out there that would be worth listening to. Every business or entity needs to set goals and have a plan to meet those goals. I like it!!!! Just stay on track of this idea and make the rest of the alderman follow. There is nothing bad about what is proposed here. I'm all for watching meetings on the Internet too.
@ 3:48 , I heard from the source that City Superintendants were caught numerous times using city vehicles and city equipment for their own personal use and were even photographed in the act and the proof was taken to the Mayor and he blew it off ! Building Inspectors are using the city vehicle to shop on the clock and such . How can we expect to have money for what us citizens want when a select few use our tax dollars and city rescources for their own personal gain . And then to top it off OUR MAYOR does nothing !! Harl needs to go !! We need someone with a vision for our town other than raising campaign funds and dinners and isn't afraid to manage his leaders !!
To 2:36,3:20,& 3:40 - Are you guys the first volunteers to step up and serve on a Strategic Planning group? Judging by your kind and thoughtful comments, Peru could sure benefit from your positive attitudes and team-building skills.
I'll bet one or more of you are motivational speakers in real life.
You are an inspiration to young and old alike.
I'll bet you guys are officers in the local MENSA Chapter.
The mayor would set the vision for the future? And follow a blueprint for his plan. And we the residents would follow the plan. Sound pretty convincing, keep reading those there books about managing a city! I guess you may want to include not having employees take home city equipement.
Peru Horticuturist has a nice article in the paper about plants blooming early this spring. I think its great that a city has a professional on staff. Keep up the good work!
S-T-A-T-E-G-E-R-I-S-E another one of the words of the day. If the city managers can't get a handle on day to day task, how well will they do with stategerising!
11:22 Are you friggin joking? Peru doesn't have a horticulturist! The weed beds, oh I mean ex-flower beds, would be a total disgrace if it were not for the efforts of a few aldermen/alderwoman that went out on their personal time to clean them up. Veterans park is horrible!! There use to be dead trees everywhere. Nothing is trimmed or edged. Does the man even know what a shovel is? Oh yea, he did buy some. Expensive, stainless steel ones if I am not mistaken. Where are they. Left out on the ground all winter? Taking road trips out of town on overtime pay?? How sweet for his pocket book. I can't believe a city would ever promote takings its citizens out of town to spend sales tax dollars. Buying, building, and maintaining a green house and STILL buying plants from another nursery?? Whoever is in charge of this man should be fired right along side of the "wanna be gardener". Beyond, and i mean BEYOND, pathetic management of this whole disaster!!!
2:41 PM
Thank you, you are absolutely 100% correct but nothing is being done to keep our city looking like it should. Just a few days ago I mentioned to Ald. Ankiewicz and Clerk Bartley that they should remove the work HORTICULTURIST from all minutes and information put out by the city. I believe their answer was a laugh and something about that word being in his union contract.
Progressive cities have Horticulturist. Mayor Harl wants to keep progress in Peru. Most like the way Peru plants flowers and has a greenhouse. It saves money when you have a greenhouse. Taking trips out of town only helps Peru residents. Not everybody has to fill potholes. Mayor Harl is a experienced leader and understands Peru. Leave the Horticulturist position alone, there are alot of other wastes of money. We have a Mayor in charge and its time to support his staff direction.
Can the horticulture specialist perform weddings at the city greenhouse? Alot of major cities have those specialist on staff. The city is looking alot better since Mayor Harl took over and having a specialist helps a great deal.
AMEN 2:41. YOU HIT THE PROVERBIAL NAIL ON THE HEAD!!!
4:04 PM
Your comment qualifies for the "laugh of the day:
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder and we in Peru are not seeing beauty in any of our parks or in our downtown.
I honestly don't know what you are looking at to make that comment but please wake up.
4:04 You are absolutely right. Cities can save money by utilizing their green houses to plant and grow their flowers and shrubs. The problem with Peru's green house is that is not what it is used for. If you've ever seen any of the disbursement sheets you would see how much we spend and purchase from many green houses and lawn places. And please, let us know where these beautiful flower beds are located. All I see are flowers intermingled among the weeds.
Veterans Park is a disgrace to Peru!! Trees are leaning being held up by bungie cords. Dead grass and bare spots everywhere. Alderman Perez if you are going to suggest a goal and plan for the city of Peru and need citizen input I would highly recommend all new department head supervisors. And not from within. Peru will never move where you expect it to until every head is terminated. Starting with public works, electric, building and zoning, and I would even toss out your community developer. To do this we citizens need to start by electing new council( replace the old) and perhaps even the mayor, he has no will to lead his supervisors. There is your strategy plan. 100% guaranteed to work.
Please give me one figure and only one figure. What is the total cost to Peru for the horticulturalist, greenhouse, all equipment and expenses for a entire year.
Please give me one answer and only one answer is this entire program worth it - yes or no.
More than two years ago a gentleman expressed his thoughts of Peru having a horticulturalist at a city council meeting that they were paying over $45,000 per year and still nothing was done about it and hasn't been done about it.
If I said that I believe he is a union member, would that answer your question? It doesn't matter what he doesn't do or what he does do?
Last year there were numerous hanging baskets in the green house but he was not making them to hang in our city.
AS FOR THE HANGING BASKETS, LOOK AT SOME OF HIS RELATIVES HOMES. HE WAS HIRED BY THE LAST SPW WHO IS HIS UNCLE. DOES THAT TELL YOU WHY HE HAS THE JOB/??? THIS IS LONGEST HE EVER WORKED AT ONE PLACE. SHOULD I SAY WORKED?
Because he is a union member does not answer the questions. If a person is not doing their occupation properly and they have been consulted and proper documentation has been taken and kept it will be difficult for this person to keep his job. Don't fall into the trap of believing that a person cannot be dismissed because he is a union member, this alibi is a age old band aid for those who do not want to manage or don't know how to manage. For example if a person was building hanging baskets for private use without managements ok he could be dismissed if he had managements ok to build baskets for other than city usage management should be fired.
It would be interesting to see the cities job analysis and a job description for this specific occupation. Do they have one?
This whole topic once again indicates to me a lack of leadership. Is anyone in this city accountable to any one? It seems as though some of our highly paid employees have to be taken by the hand and told what to do next. Will someone please take charge!
Anon 8:55 We are sure that the Mayor has no direct interest in protecting union employees. That is not the problem. The Mayor has the ability if he desires to replace any department supervisor. If he is using Ald. Perez through this planning program, he will be wasting residents time and money. Maybe there is no problem. Maybe he has a new super in mind? Just make the call.
From the Recreation Commission Minutes of 3-13-12.
Regarding the prospect of a new Girls' Softball Field, a West Field at Veteran's Park, Ray made a motion to contract Chamlin and Associates to shoot grade for the new diamond and to have a conceptual plan for the whole Veterans Park Complex completed for a cost $3000. This will take us to the development stage. The motion was seconded by Tom Stuart and motion carried. Ray will have drawings copied for the board members and City officials. Next meeting will be held on 4/10/2012.
We have a volunteer citizen committee spending $3000 of your tax money again.
$3000 must be the magic figure. Remember it was $3000 for the Bicycle path to nowhere and $3000 for pickle ball equipment that they are still trying to figure out how to distribute to the residents who wish to use it.
Its your money and you don't get a chance to let the city know how you want it spent.
10:15 PM, April 12, 2012
Delete
Are residents even aware that pickle ball equipment is available (or should I say supposed to be available) to them? Are they aware that their tax dollar purchased this equipment before a public use plan was implemented?
Hey...just heard that a New Jersey Mayor saved a woman from a burning building. Hmmm... Would the wonderful mayor of Peru do something as heroic as that? Is the Fire Dept capable of saving a person caught within a burning building? My god, what has that city come to...you folks can't even rely on a "flower-planter-dude"? What can the city of Peru provide...besides what appears to be a small group of people (some of the bloggers) that truly care about what use to be an envious city...sorry Peru, your past title of leader of the valley is slipping right between your fingers. More vacant buildings than an old ghost town!!
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