The Carbondale Observer

The Carbondale city council, acting in its capacity as the liquor control commission, granted Kevin Kirkwood a class A-2 liquor license for his Icebox Bar and Grill at last night’s meeting. The license was controversial because a party held last year at the former Spotlight Grill, which operated at the same address, ended in a fight in which a Carbondale resident was murdered.  Read the rest of this entry »

The Southern Illinoisan had an article Tuesday on potential changes to the Illinois police and fire department pension system:

The Illinois House of Representatives could vote this week on the changes, which include increasing the retirement age from 50 to 55 and requiring employees to be on the job for 30 years before being eligible for their full pensions.

It also caps the salary that public employees could use to calculate their retirement at $106,800 starting next year. (This amount would increase annually by half of the Consumer Price Index.)

The Illinois senate passed a version of the changes, which would apply to new hires, earlier this year. Pension contributions are controversial because the municipal costs are mandated by the state. Municipalities must raise the money themselves.

This year’s increase will cost Carbondale $810,730, and current revenues are not expected to cover the increase. At last week’s meeting, the city council discussed options to meet the rising pension costs for public safety employees. City staff recommended levying a property tax to cover the increase. The city has abated its portion of the property tax since 2002.

Councilman and mayoral candidate Joel Fritzler suggested raising the sales tax 1/4 percent instead of levying a property tax. Fritzler pointed out that property taxes in Jackson County are higher than taxes in Williamson County, while our sales tax is 1/4 percent lower than Marion’s. Fritzler also said that many people from outside the community work and shop in Carbondale, using city services. A sales tax would collect revenue from these people.

Outgoing Councilwoman Pohlmann spoke in favor of the property tax. Pohlmann said the property tax is more stable than the sales tax and the revenue is available sooner.

City council candidate Don Monty spoke against service and personnel cuts during the citizen’s comments. Monty, a former assistant city manager, said he remembers going line by line through past budgets and making cuts. He said all the fat has been cut from the budget and further cuts would be devastating to city services. Monty also favors the property tax over the sales tax.

I can see both sides of this, but I lean slightly toward the property tax. I realize that Jackson County property taxes are higher than those of neighboring counties, but (as Fritzler and Pohlmann pointed out) this is the result of the other taxing bodies in the county. Significantly reducing property taxes would require action from those bodies.

According to Mayor Cole, the additional property tax levy will come to roughly $73 on a $100,000 home. That’s not a lot of money, and it will support the city’s pension obligations. That said, a 1/4 percent sales tax increase also wouldn’t be too great a burden.

Long term, pension reform is necessary. Unfortunately, Illinois state government is dysfunctional and genuine reform seems unlikely unless a pension crisis forces changes. At least in theory, voters could force legislative action, but municipal fire and police pensions aren’t the kind of issue that excites voters.

Comments are welcome.

Last week I wrote a post about Lance Jack’s resignation from city council and I promised to follow up with more information.  This morning I wrote a post looking at whether granting Jack a liquor license violated local law.  This is part two, in which I look at state law.

Before we get into state law, let’s start with a quote from city councilman and mayoral candidate Joel Fritzler in the original Southern Illinoisan article about the Fat Patties liquor license and Jack’s resignation:

“My feeling before was, if I were to vote for it, I would be an accessory to violating state and local law,” Fritzler said.

Now we’ll take a look at state law.  Read the rest of this entry »

In last week’s post about Lance Jack’s resignation from the city council, I promised to do some more research and write a follow up. I’ve spent some time wading through state and local liquor laws and I have some additional information to report.

It is going to take a lot of space to cover this, so I am going to split this into multiple posts.  This is part one, in which I look at local law.

Before we get into the law, let’s start with a quote from city councilman and mayoral candidate Joel Fritzler in the original Southern Illinoisan article about the Fat Patties liquor license and Jack’s resignation:

“My feeling before was, if I were to vote for it, I would be an accessory to violating state and local law,” Fritzler said.

This is somewhat complicated, so I’ll go through it step by step.  First, Carbondale is unique among Illinois cities in that all members of the city council are also members of the local liquor control commission. In comparable cities, the mayor is the sole liquor commissioner.

A few years ago Brad Cole and Lance Jack tried to amend the local liquor ordinance to bring it in line with state law, but the angry reaction of some townspeople resulted in the measure being withdrawn.  If the change had passed, the entire Fat Patties liquor license controversy could have been avoided.

The change did not pass, however, so Jack was a member of both the city council and the liquor control commission when he applied for his liquor license for Fat Patties.  Both the city code and state law address this situation.  Read the rest of this entry »

Elections for Carbondale mayor and city council are coming up in April 2011 and several candidates have already announced they’re running.  Joel Fritzler, George Maroney, Sam Goldman, and Brent Ritzel have all announced their candidacies for mayor.  As far as I know, there have been no formal announcements for city council, but a few people are rumored to be running.

Frizler should be considered a real contender.  He has been on city council since 2005 and was the top vote getter in the 2009 elections.  In recent years, he has been sharply critical of current mayor Brad Cole, who is not running for reelection.

George Maroney’s chances are tough to gauge.  He was CEO of Southern Illinois Healthcare, which is one of the region’s largest employers.  SIH grew during his tenure so it seems reasonable to assume he’s capable of executive leadership.  Judging by some of his letters to the editor, he is pretty conservative, so he may inherit some of Cole’s voters.  On the other hand, he’s never run for office so there is no way to judge his potential political base or campaign skills.

Sam Goldman has served on the SIU Board of Trustees and as Chancellor.  During Goldman’s tenure as chancellor, enrollment continued to decline at SIU.  Goldman is popular in the community and could be competitive.  He is retired, so he would have plenty of time to devote to serving as mayor.

Ritzel seems to be the outlier in this group.  He is head of the effort to rehabilitate the Buckminster Fuller Dome Home on Cherry St., and is business manager for the Holistic Wellness Institute.  About a year ago he was promoting a clean energy manufacturing project in Herrin.  I don’t know quite how to judge Ritzel’s prospects, so I’m going to save that for a future post.

Some other names have been mentioned including former Building and Services Manager Tom Grant, Councilman Steven Haynes, and former Community Relations Officer Marilyn James.  We’ll see if any of them officially announce candidacies.

***CORRECTED: I received an email alerting me that I had misspelled Brent Ritzel’s name in an earlier version of this article.  The spelling has been corrected.  I apologize for the error.***