PeoriaStory

Farmers market soon

PEORIA --The winter farmers market is starting up again on Thursdays at the Methodist Atrium Building, 900 Main St.

Hours are 3 p.m. to 6 p.m. March 3, 17, 31, April 14, 28 and May 12. Farmers set up in the building lobby.

Lyndon Hartz of Hartz Produce in Wyoming said people can expect at least half a dozen area farmers with a full array of local winter greens, meat and eggs.

For the first market, Lyndon expects to have spinach, mustard greens, lettuces, purple turnips, mizuna, tatsoi and eggs. Other vendors will have other selections.

This is a good event -- good food and good for the environment.  Yum.

Agribusiness lobby fights against clean water

 

 Peoria -- Like dirty water? No? Then here's an important news release from Environment Illinois. Read it and weep:

New Report Finds Millions Spent on Campaign Contributions and Lobbying to Continue Polluting

Springfield, IL—Big agribusiness interests are among the largest roadblocks to clean water in the United States, according to a new report by Environment Illinois Research & Policy Center. The report, “Growing Influence: The Political Power of Agribusiness and the Fouling of America’s Waterways,” released today, analyzes campaign contributions and lobbying expenditures from agribusiness interests—and describes how companies are using their political influence to oppose clean water protections.

"When Wall Street runs the farm, pollution runs off into our environment," said Max Muller, program director with Environment Illinois. "Giant agricultural companies are throwing around millions of dollars to fight to continue polluting our rivers, lakes, and streams."

The report's analysis of campaign contributions and lobbying expenditures found the following:

• Over the past decade, ten large agribusiness interests gave $35 million to congressional candidates. They were led by the American Farm Bureau, which gave $16 million.
• Agribusiness interests gave more than $120 million to state-level candidates, party committees and ballot measures during the same period.
• In Illinois, agricultural interests have donated more than $6 million to state level political campaigns since 2000—including more than $360,000 in contributions to gubernatorial candidates in 2010.

The political influence of big agribusiness is bolstered by an army of lobbyists:

• From 2005 to 2010, the 10 leading agribusiness interests spent $127 million lobbying Congress and federal agencies, fielding 159 lobbyists in 2010.
• Monsanto and the American Farm Bureau led the pack, fielding 80 lobbyists in Washington, D.C., in 2010.
• In Illinois, the Illinois Agricultural Association (the state’s Farm Bureau affiliate) maintains a stable of 20 registered lobbyists working to influence legislative policy and administrative decision-making. The organization spent $3.3 million on government affairs in 2008 alone, out of a total budget of around $40 million.

Pollution from agriculture contributes to poor water quality here in Illinois and throughout the country. Too many of Illinois’s waterways are so polluted that they are unsafe for fishing or swimming or cannot maintain healthy populations of wildlife.

"Water is precious," said Illinois Environmental Council executive director Jennifer Walling. "We cannot afford to do nothing while polluted runoff damages our cherished lakes and rivers."

Big Agribusiness interests—including lobbyists from Monsanto, Cargill, Land O'Lakes and Perdue—blocked a 2010 effort to restore Clean Water Act Protections to all American waterways. Without those protections, more than half of Illinois's streams, and 150,000 acres of wetlands—including feeder waters for 1.7 million Illinoisan's drinking water supplies—are now at risk from agribusiness interests and other polluters being able to pollute them with impunity.

Archer Daniels Midland (ADM), the Midwest's largest corn processor, is headquartered in Decatur, Illinois. ADM has driven policy changes that have made corn the dominant crop in the Midwest, increasing the use of heavy chemical fertilizers and pesticides–much of which washes into the Mississippi River. Nutrient pollution from this fertilizer is the leading cause of the Massachusetts-sized dead zone that develops in the Gulf of Mexico every year. ADM spent $1.3 million on Congressional candidates in the last decade and $6.9 million on lobbying over the past six years.

Agribusiness political pressure is one reason why Illinois currently has one of the Midwest's least protective regulatory regimes for limiting pollution from Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs)—also called factory farms.

In September, 40,000 fish were killed along ten miles of the Sangamon River and a tributary. The suspected culprit, one of Illinois's largest factory farms, was applying liquid cow manure and lagoon solids to nearby fields without a permit. Asked about the frequency of similar such fish kills in Illinois, an Illinois EPA official told a reporter, "I would say they happen several times a year, almost once a month."

Agribusiness interests have used their clout to support a host of Illinois bills and regulatory initiatives designed to further weaken factory farm clean water protections, including bills to:

• Eliminate public hearings on new construction at all but the very largest factory farms.
• Make it illegal for anyone to take a photo of a factory farm, which would make it far more difficult for concerned citizens to document environmental violations they see.
• Block so-called "nuisance" lawsuits—which have sometimes been citizens’ only legal recourse against factory farms polluting their air and water.

Agribusiness interests' political clout also extends to state agencies:  Residents of rural Jo Daviess County have expressed strong concern about a proposed 11,000-cow dairy farm, which would pollute the Apple River with contamination from the 90 million gallons of manure it would spread on nearby fields every year. 

The Jo Daviess County Board voted overwhelmingly to reject the megadairy, but the Illinois Department of Agriculture overruled that decision. In the ensuing court battle, the Farm Bureau has paid the megadairy owner's legal fees.

“Illinois’s lax laws have made our state a safe-haven for polluters, which create more waste and more problems” said Karen Hudson, a member of Illinois Citizens for Clean Air and Water, a group which has successfully petitioned U.S. EPA regarding inadequacies in Illinois's Clean Water Act program for CAFOs. “My grandkids deserve clean drinking water.”

"Throughout our region, people's lives and livelihoods depend on having both clean water and bountiful farms." said Muller, "To ensure that both will be part of our future, it's critical to strengthen Illinois's protections for clean water and reduce agricultural pollution—and our policymakers must stand for clean water even if that means standing up to the agribusinesses lobby."

###

Read the full report.

Environment Illinois is a citizen-funded environmental advocacy organization working for a cleaner, greener, healthier future in Illinois.

Big pro-union rally in Peoria

PEORIA -- Perhaps 1,000 people crowded into the plaza at the Peoria County Courthouse on Feb. 24 to show solidarity with those fighting for collective bargaining in Wisconsin and elsewhere.

The 5 p.m. rally -- which had little local publicity aside from emails and other internet messages and word-of-mouth, but nary a mention in the Peoria Journal Star --  featured interesting signs, chants, and several speakers. 

Photo by Al Harkrader

They were some of the top union leaders in Peoria along with state Sen. Dave Koehler. The speeches were brief, as the weather was cold and gray.

A few of the speakers expressed thanks that Gov. Pat Quinn was reelected in Nov., since he supports union rights.

Meanwhile, Peorian Michael Perillo, who has been to Madison, Wisc., wrote this account of his visit there:

I just returned earlier today from Madison's capitol building, where I had spent the night on the cold, hard, marble floors with hundreds of Wisconsin protesters.

When I walked into the capitol building after the evening rally, moving closer to the rotunda at the center, with thousands of others for a common cause, and hearing everyone chant and yell in unison "Solidarity Forever," I realized more so than ever that this was a force that is dearly needed right now in all of us.

Watching it on the news or trying to describe it will not come close to experiencing it yourself. Being surrounded by peaceful protesters, young and old, men, women and children who are sincere and willing to put themselves on the line to make a difference is powerful.

There was one woman whom I interviewed who put it best:

"To see what is going on here everyday, I almost cry because I know I'm not alone in the fight and we're showing them. We're showing them union power and what people can do when they stand united and work together. We're going to beat this thing[...]they [Scott Walker and cronies] have sparked a response in the labor movement that we haven't been able to do ourselves...they have put the 'move' back in labor movement" -30-

 Michael's vivid story reminds us of the urgency of this movement.  It must not fail!

Update 2/25/11: Here's another account of what's going on in Madison.

-- Elaine Hopkins

Update 2/25/2011:  I posted this comment on the PJStar website today, in response to an editorial about a proposal in the Illinois General Assembly to cut back public notices posted in newspapers:

Here's a recipe for tyranny: 
1. Stop telling the public about what is really going on in government.  Don't announce meetings where people can conveniently learn about them, and communicate to the public only through press releases on the government's hard-to-find and navigate websites.

2. Deprive workers and retirees of the wages and pensions they need to maintain middle class lifestyles, so they can't afford access to the computers, phones and websites to get information about the government.

Everything nowadays connects:  the oligarchy seems determined to reduce the USA to a clone of Latin America -- a few rich and masses of poor.

And though the PJS editorial above is spot on about this issue -- if it ain't broke don't fix it is appropriate here -- the PJS is also complicit in the downward spiral of this nation.

It didn't even bother to cover the Feb. 24 pro-labor rally which attracted more than 1,000 people downtown to express solidarity with the groups in Wisconsin and elsewhere.  It also didn't run an advance story on this rally -- hoping, I guess, to depress turnout.

When a newspaper becomes irrelevant to its public, it is in peril!  Maybe that's why the legislature feels emboldened to stiff it.  -- E.H.

 

UPDATE II, 2/25/2011: There's a big solidarity rally at noon on Sat. Feb. 26 at the Illinois State Capital, East Side, Capital Steps, in Springfield. Will the news media ignore this one?  

Comment, 2/26/2011 from Ed Dentino:

I have not seen the print edition of the PJStar yet.   It is remarkable and interesting that no story was reported about the court house demonstration.   I have lost track of the the owner's and cast of news writers even though I see the paper most days.   I recall the Copley's seemed to affect the political endorsements even though  they were absentee owners.

It is just amazing what the GOPers have been advocating in some states and in the U.S. Congress. 

Peace Corps meeting and the softball questions

PEORIA -- On Feb. 23, Bradley University hosted a meeting on the Peace Corps.  Here is an article by Peorian Bert Raabe about the event, which included Cong. Aaron Schock who recently voted against its appropriation. 

 

On Tuesday afternoon, February 23, the Director of the Peace Corps came to Bradley University to talk about opportunities in the Peace Corps.  As a former Peace corps volunteer, I was informed of the event.  Along with the director, Aaron Williams, there were three other panel members; Congressman Aaron Schock, William Lane from Caterpillar, Inc., and Brad McMillan from Bradley who served as moderator.

Director Williams gave his story of being in the Peace Corps and how it changed and enriched his life.  He talked about different projects and volunteers that are doing important work around the world.  He stressed how important it is to have Americans at the level of the people in these countries for both the volunteer and the people.

William Lane from Caterpillar talked about the importance of international development and good relations between the U.S. and countries needing CAT products.  Peaceful relations with developing countries are critical to CAT’s growth.  He stated that the Peace Corps prepares these countries for the “common goal” of CAT and the Peace Corps.  Mr. Lane talked at more length than any other panelist.

Aaron Schock said he was a friend of the Peace Corps and admired the work it does.  However, he has recently voted for budget cuts for Peace Corps funding.  He did not mention that in his address.

Cards were passed around for questions for the panel.  McMillan edited the questions so they were mostly softballs.  Another returned volunteer submitted one to Schock about how he voted but that one never got past McMillan.  I am sure several others were cast aside as well.  There was one direct question that got through asking if the Peace Corps budget was in danger of cuts.  This one did not ask about how Schock voted so I guess that was the best way to get to that issue.  Williams answered that one by stating that “we have friends in Congress.”   Schock did not comment on that question even though he is a member of Congress. 

William Lane commented on several questions, many of the “What should I major in?” variety.  He did advocate for ending the sanctions against Cuba.  He told an interesting story about a trip to Honduras he made where he met women who grew cucumbers for the American market.  He made it sound like a good partnership could be formed between Peace Corps and CAT in facilitating exports from developing countries.  As a former volunteer myself, I felt that the job of the Peace Corps volunteer was to work in the best interest of the people.  All Peace Corps groups have a mission, but we were also instructed to pay attention to “felt needs” in the host country. If CAT wants to get into the development game, they could form their own corps and pay a great deal more than Peace Corps does. 

Congressman Schock has developed a habit of coming to the district and taking credit for programs he has voted against.  He has been called on this on national news but he continues to do it to the point that it has become accepted.  He will keep doing it.  He is in a position now that if he does not vote to totally kill a program, he is a “friend” of the program.  The Tea Party congresspeople would defund programs like the Peace Corps. 

The latest news is that Congress has decided to cut Peace Corps funding by $69 million to a figure of $331 million.  Compared to other spending, this is small change.  Under Bush, we lost $6 billion in cash in Iraq.  Lost it and the government felt no need to explain.  Contrary to popular belief, young people in this generation are eager to volunteer to do meaningful work in the country and the world.  It is something we should facilitate.     -30- 

 

Wisconsin solidarity rally on Thursday

PEORIA -- A rally to support pro-labor demonstrators in Madison, Wisc. has been scheduled for 5 p.m. on Thursday, Feb. 24 at the Peoria County Courthouse.

"Support our friends in Wisconsin as well as women, children and seniors that are under attack across the nation," the flier reads.

The event was announced at the Feb. 21 Peoria County Democrats Presidents' Day Dinner, where the featured speakers were Lt. Gov. Sheila Simon and US Sen. Dick Durbin.

Durbin said he is touring the Illinois Congressional districts represented by Republicans to tell the public how their members of Congress are voting in Washington.

Peoria's Congress member Aaron Schock voted against a $10 million grant program that would have gone toward redevelopment of the warehouse district and riverfront, Durbin said.

Schock also voted against $6 million in stimulus funds that have paid for Peoria's new airport terminal, he said.

"All we have to do is tell truth (about) who stands on the side of the millions out of work," Durbin said.

"We're watching closely" what the Republicans do, and "we're standing behind this president to put people back to work," he added.

Both Simon and Durbin expressed solidarity with the Wisconsin protestors. "These are battles we never thought we would have to fight again," Simon said.

The Wisconsin situation is "not acceptable to me or (Illinois) Gov. (Pat) Quinn," she added.

 -- Elaine Hopkins

Homeless marathon

PEORIA --The new FM station at Illinois Central College, WAZU at 90.7 FM will join over 125 radio stations across the United States to broadcast the fourteenth annual Homelessness Radio Marathon featuring voices and stories from homeless people in Kansas City and around the United States.

The Marathon begins at 6 p.m. on Wed., Feb. 23 and runs until 8 a.m. on Thus., Feb. 24.

The Marathon theme this year is “Why not do the right thing?”  The program will hear from and discuss the perspectives of people who are, have been, or are at risk of becoming homeless.  The program hopes to show the causes and depth of homelessness in Kansas City and the United States.

For more information on this interesting broadcast see the website. 

 

On Wisconsin....

PEORIA -- To counter the many lies -- lies? let's tell it straight! -- in the mainstream media about the Wisconsin revolt against corporate greed, here are stories that tell the truth -- the documented truth, about what is really happening there:

The governor and his friends: high pay for cronies, tax cuts for corporations: 

http://blog.buzzflash.com/node/12372

Koch brothers funding governor. 

http://www.alternet.org/story/149965/wisconsin_is_a_battleground_against_the_billionaire_kochs%27_plan_to_break_labor%27s_back?page=entire

http://www.truth-out.org/scott-walker-runs-koch-money67916

New York Times agrees.  http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/22/us/22koch.html?src=ISMR_HP_LO_MST_FB

Wisconsin government workers make less than others in Wisconsin:

http://host.madison.com/wsj/news/local/govt-and-politics/article_d4093848-3c92-11e0-ac18-001cc4c03286.html

 

The right wing game plan:

http://www.truth-out.org/what-conservatives-really-want67907

Spliting the working people in the US (divide and conquer):

http://www.readersupportednews.org/opinion2/277-75/5003-the-republican-strategy

Labor's last stand: http://www.readersupportednews.org/off-site-news-section/52-52/5000-labors-last-stand

 

And while we're at it, lies about Social Security and the deficit:

http://www.alternet.org/story/149967/why_are_some_pundits_and_politicans_hell-bent_on_underminig_social_security%2C_in_spite_of_its_success_and_strength?akid=6550.40608.owcoTT&rd=1&t=18

 

Yes, the links above are an eye-full.  Read them and weep for our supposed democracy. On the other hand, this information is not secret.  People who know it must tell others and vote accordingly. Otherwise we're all Wisconsin.  Or worse.

Working people did not cause the Great Recession, Wall Street did, yet it's never been more prosperous, while employees everywhere are paying the price. 

Everytime you hear talk about deficits, ask about taxing the rich!  That's the real solution to fiscal problems in the USA. If the Tea Party had any brains they would seize on this issue. Oh, I forgot -- they're funded by the corporate rich, who want to steal from the rest of us. That leaves the rest of us to stand up and demand change!

 -- Elaine Hopkins 

 Update, 2/21/2011:  Watch out for disinformation campaigns, dirty tricks: 

http://www.alternet.org/newsandviews/article/480448/tea_party_leader_hatches_diabolical_plan_to_infiltrate_and_embarrass_union_protesters_in_wi_and_other_states/#paragraph2

 

Peoria on state 'watch list' for gutting its historic preservation rules

PEORIA -- The Peoria City Council may have violated a 1991 agreement with the state when it voted recently to gut its historic preservation ordinance. The agreement made Peoria eligible to receive grants for historic preservation.

The Illinois Historic Preservation Agency, in a Feb. 16 letter to the city, notes that the agreement allowed the city to receive grant funds from the National Historic Preservation Act.  The recent changes may have violated the agreement, it says.

The letter states "it would be difficult to identify any cities in Illinois which have sustainable, successful historic preservation programs with owner consent requirements in their ordinances."

It suggests that Peoria study ordinances in the city of Chicago, "a place which has found significant financial and cultural benefits through effective historic preservation." 

The letter states that the agency will be watching Peoria for the next year, to see what occurs.

Here's a terrific story from the PJStar on this issue.

Meanwhile fallout from the council's action continues, with the following commentary from preservationist Dan Callahan.  It is published here with his permission, and will appear in the March isue of the Moss Bradley Messenger, a neighborhood newsletter.

Callahan writes:

A Tale of Two Cities

  

The best of times.  Our near record snowfall is melting.  The days are growing long enough for the sun to effect that.  The water is draining clear and sparkling on its way out.  There is a promise of a new season, hidden growth seems just about to burst out of the ground.

That joyful expectation, however, is contrasted against a cold and sad reality.  The city council has put a gun to the preservation community and fired multiple shots directly at us.

There is blood mixed with the snowmelt.

After decades of serving this city so well, with heritage neighborhoods ringing the city core and serving as a lifeline to it, the Historic Preservation Commission has been effectively neutered.  The lopsided February 8 council vote shows how we've become two cities, one urban and one not.  It's that clear cut.  If you live here, you understand this all too well.

On that Tuesday night, we were ambushed, and the wounds from this are life threatening.  Look for more senseless demolitions---from the Near North Side to the Center Bluff to right here on Malvern Lane. 

 

It seems that our experiment in New Urbanism has been abandoned.

 

The question might be "Why did I think it could have been different here (in Peoria)?"  What optimism made a guy like me think that?

My personal journey may give some hints.  Four decades ago, I began the study of architecture.  I was immediately amazed at how much of what I was learning about its history was represented in my home town. Everything from Italianate mansions to 19 th century iron storefronts to works of modern masters like Frank Lloyd Wright right here. 

"Wow," I thought.  "I come from some place special." 

It got even more exciting for me when I spent a year in Europe. There I saw how really great cities were waking up to the treasure that waited to be discovered and revitalized. Paris' Marais district was coming alive after decades of neglect, becoming one of the most vibrant places in that city and even the world. 

Countries that had been torn apart in global depression and world war were binding together committed to healing their societies and making  their cities liveable.  At work in every one of these---preservation. 

The 'Back to the City' movement was making models of US cities from Boston to Portland.  Again, the common thread was sensitively preserving the historical best these places had and working with it. 

Fast forward to the late seventies: I chose Peoria and one of its historic districts as my home. Effective and flourishing historic preservation was the selling point that brought me home.  Of all places, I chose Peoria.

  

Why was I so filled with optimism?  I thought this town offered so much.  An incredible inventory of architecture spanning its venerable history.  "The first permanent settlement west of the Alleghenies" it was said.  And a mechanism, its preservation ordinance that, since the seventies, has kept that inventory alive.  Now that is endangered.  The worst of times. 

 

Paris came to its senses and stopped planning urban renewal in the Marais.  Instead, it embraced preservation.  It realized its potential.

Peoria has already lost much of what it had when I came back here in the seventies.  Some say as much as half, if not more. 

Will we sacrifice even more in the guise of 'property rights'?    Let us not forget the forty years of work that has gone on before us. 

These could still end up being 'the best of times.'   But we've got to get the City Council to understand.  We can and we will.  Or worse times will soon be on their way.  As surely as the spring thaw. -30-

 

 

Let's hope Callahan is right about educating city officials before the entire city has become one giant parking lot.

 -- Elaine Hopkins

 In addition, here is the letter the Historic Preservation Agency sent to the city of Peoria:

Download ILHistPresAgency

City/County cooperation on going: Urich

PEORIA -- The newly hired Peoria city manager Patrick Urich, who has been Peoria County's manager for a decade, explained the many facets of city/county cooperation to the February 19 meeting of the Greater Peoria League of Women Voters. 

There's a lot of it, and there could be more, Urich said. It ranges from joint ownership of the Peoria City/County Landfill, which will soon be expanded, and Springdale Cemetery, jointly supported by the city, county and Peoria Park District, to joint purchases of fuel and electricity.

Springdale, a unique and historic cemetery in the heart of Peoria, is an area of concern for the local governments since it requires annual subsidies.  A referendum to establish a tax for a cemetery district may be in the offing, he said. 

A county-wide public safety radio system is being planned, he said, a $14 million project.

Bel-Wood Nursing Home, owned by the county, is planning a new building in West Peoria, where its site will have room for city buildings, he said.

Bel-Wood is also financially challenged, since it receives only $105 per patient per day from state Medicaid funds, but has costs of $170 a day, he said. The state owes Bel-Wood $2.1 million, and has not paid it though new federal legislation requires timely payments, he added.

Urich's talk included financial information and new facts from the 2010 census. The county has a $170 million budget this year, expects revenues of $169.9 million, and will make up the deficit with reserves, he said.

Property taxes supply only 16 percent of its revenue.  The rest comes from sales and other taxes, fees and grants.  The expenses go mostly to pay people -- 68 percent.  "It's labor intensive," he said.  Twenty percent of that goes for public safety and 10 percent for highway work.

Sales taxes come mainly from Peoria, at 82 percent, rather than retailers in the county. That's to be expected since Peoria is a regional center. Ten percent of the sales tax revenue comes from people who live outside the county.

(And here's a fact buried in a Feb. 19 Peoria Journal Star story on the census: the Peoria area is the second largest metropolitan area in Illinois.)

The median household income in Peoria is $36,397, compared with $49,634 in the county, according to Urich's statistics.  Peoria has an 18.8 percent poverty level, with 15 percent in the county.

Actual consolidation of city and county offices is problematic, Urich said, as many barriers, from state law to local sentiment and vested interests work against it. "There are pros and cons," he said. "It's better to focus on how governments can work more closely together."

There may be no financial savings when unionized work forces are merged, Urich said, because the historical pattern is for personnel to get better benefits. 

Urich said various committees are exploring consolidation and cooperation, many behind closed doors since they are not subject to the state's Open Meetings Act. That prompted comments on greater transparency. 

My take: there is no reason why these committees, including one called PASS Forward Committee, could not be open to all and invite the media to attend.  Unless they have something to hide, or prefer to meet secretly to consolidate their own power and influence.

Urich said the Peoria County Board meetings are now carried live on the county website, and available as a podcast.  Asked what that cost the county, Urich replied "nothing," since the equipment is already available and the technicians attend board meetings anyway.

Are you listening, Peoria District 150 School Board?

 -- Elaine Hopkins

 

Urich to speak at League meeting

PEORIA -- The League of Women Voters of Greater Peoria will hear the newly named Peoria city manager Patrick Urich speak on city/county cooperation, at its February meeting at 9 a.m. on Saturday, Feb. 19 in the community room at Schnucks Supermarket, 4800 N. University, Peoria.

Urich has been the Peoria County manager for several years, and was recently named the Peoria city manager. He’ll talk about saving tax dollars with more city/county cooperation and other local government issues.   

This is an opportunity for potential League members and the public to learn more about local government and ask questions.

An optional light breakfast can be purchased from Schnucks beginning at 8:30 a.m., and coffee will be provided.   The event is free and open to the public.