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| Economy |
| Mayor Daley's Budget Eats 75% of a 75 Year rainy Day fund in One Year |
| 2009-12-06 |
| A year ago Mayor Daley rammed though a parking meter deal that was supposed to provide a "rainy day" fund for Chicago for the next 75 years. In September, snags appeared prompting the Chicago Sun Times to write Daley losing confidence in parking meter company. Mayor Daley demanded today that Chicago's embattled parking meter operator synchronize the time on its pay-and-display boxes and void parking tickets tied to time discrepancies. "That's unacceptable. They have to void those tickets," he said. Daley said the latest in a string of operational problems that have marred the transition to private control has prompted him to lose confidence in Chicago Parking Meters LLC. "Slowly but sure, yes," he said. But, the mayor said he is not about to cancel the 75-year, $1.15 billion lease tied to a steep schedule of rate hikes that helped plug a gaping hole in the city's 2009 budget. "See that home over there? Go over there and ask them if they want their real estate taxes increased," the mayor said after a ribbon-cutting at the new Jorge Prieto Math & Science Academy, 2231 N. Central. "We have a rainy day fund. If it wasn't for that, our financial crisis would be worse. ... That was sold at the highest time. You can't even sell a public asset today. You can't sell anything today." The Chicago Sun-Times and NBC5 reported this week that pay-and-display boxes touted as the high-tech solution to over-stuffed and improperly calibrated parking meters have a problem of their own: they're out of synch. A spot check of about 50 newly-installed boxes found the time they show varies from machine-to-machine -- leaving motorists confused about when to return to their vehicles to avoid getting a ticket. Confusion and ticketing were the goals! Times displayed by boxes along Lincoln, Fullerton and Armitage didn't match, even though they're on the same computer server. Political fall-out from the parking meter fiasco is at least partly to blame for a precipitous drop in Daley's approval rating -- to 35 percent, the lowest of his 20-year reign, according to a Chicago Tribune poll. In November, Felix Salmon posted an interesting chart showing just how flawed the lease deal is. Boiled down, what the city of Chicago did was to rush a bill selling the parking-meter concession through the city legislature without allowing lawmakers to give it a detailed reading. The city claimed it got a good deal, basing that claim on a single valuation from its own advisor. But after the fact, a number of analysts, including the Inspector General, have concluded that actually the deal wasn't very good at all. All gov't 'rush jobs' are good deals. Wake up people! Have you learned nothing from our US Congress? Informative chart and balance of the article at the link. |
| Posted by:Besoeker |
| #2 Why don't they say 56years worth? |
| Posted by: Bright Pebbles 2009-12-06 22:04 |
| #1 Just who do you think TAUGHT the current President fiscal responsibility? Do the names Rahm, Desiree, and Roland ring a bell? The 'Chicago Way' goes to Washington and the nation |
| Posted by: Waldemar Gleamp1150 2009-12-06 20:45 |