Mayor’s Row……by Ned Mitchell
Patience is a virtue, every dog has his day, what comes around goes around, behind every cloud is a silver lining and other such sayings came to mind last week as I departed Home Depot in Marion with my ladder in hand. As you know I have been making weekly trips to Marion to buy this ladder, regularly priced at $99.00 but advertised on sale at $59.00, all to no avail. I have been given every excuse imaginable by employees there as to why I cannot have that ladder at the sale price. Anyhow the sale ended last Sunday and I told the wife Sunday afternoon I wanted to make one more trip to Marion to check and see if they had “the ladder.” I reasoned that since the sale was ending that day if I went just before the store closed I might catch them putting some of the ladders that were not available on the shelf.
My hunch paid off! Arriving at about 4:30 pm I immediately went to the ladder section and just as I thought they now had 3 ladders that I had been told at least 5 times previously did not and would not ever exist again. They would never have those ladders again, I was told. Calling a clerk to the site I quizzed her about how could you have these ladders when I had been told many times that would not happen? She did not know the answer to that question but I explained that I had been after that ladder the day it came on sale and was told they were out and no more would ever be available and no rain checks would be issued. I further explained to her that since I came to Marion the first day of the sale and was denied a ladder and a rain check that I should be able to purchase one now at the sale price. She informed me that was not going to happen and furthermore the sale was over. I said, hold on a minute, I just happen to have a sale flyer in my pocket that says this sale price is good through January 8, 2006 and today is January 6. She knew she had been had, her face flushed, and she said I’ll have to get the manager. To which I replied, you go get the manager, I’ll go pull my car around so I can load this ladder. When I came back inside the manager met me, looked at the sale bill, looked at the ladder, then looked at me and said “I guess we’ll have to let him have one.” Not wanting to let a sleeping dog lay, I asked could I have two of them? Absolutely not was his reply as I scooped up my ladder and headed for the check out. Persistence does pay off! Now I have a ladder sitting in the corner of my garage and every time I pass by, I get this big smile on my face. I took on a corporate giant and won! Never mind the fact that I spent more in gas and time running back and forth to Marion, as they say it is the principle of the thing that matters.!
Keno for Kids, Prostitution for police protection, Crack Cocaine for Senior Citizens health care. These are just a few samples of headlines that we might see in the future in Illinois if our politicians don’t find a revenue stream to pay for all of their drunk sailor spending habits. The latest idea, Keno, to pay for school construction has school officials all over the state absolutely frothing at the mouth, wanting a new school so badly they will take money from any source just to get that building built. There is no doubt every one of these buildings need to be replaced. The only problem is how are they going to pay for them? We can’t go to the local taxpayer, they already vote down these ideas almost all of the time. Are we so desperate that we come up with the idea of Keno for Kids to pay for education? Are things that bad in Illinois? Sadly, the answer is yes. Can you imagine going to your local restaurant for lunch and having to put up with Keno screens on every wall and keyboards at every table?
Lets look at the concept though. The governor says we can make an $80 million dollar profit per year from Keno. First of all that is flawed. For us to make that kind of money we would have to take in an additional $365 million dollars in revenue. Nobody in the industry thinks that is possible. So right off the bat we are going to borrow billions of dollars and we are not going to have enough money coming in to pay the loan.
Secondly studies from prestigious universities, University of Illinois, for one, find that almost 40% of Keno money will come from problem gamblers, those addicted to it. The odds of winning a Keno jackpot are 9 million to 1. You stand a 14 times better chance of being killed by fireworks than you do winning this jackpot. The reformer/unreformer says Keno is just an extension of the lottery. We all know what we were told about the lottery being set up for education and we all know where the money goes. Skeptical, you bet, pardon the pun governor, I am! Slot machines in some states are all linked together so every time you play you are betting that you will win the big multi state jackpot there. The only problem is the odds say you have a 17 million to 1 chance that you will. You have a better chance being killed by an asteroid hitting earth!
27 years ago only 7 states had lotteries and only 1 had casinos. Today there are 37 states with lotteries and 28 with casinos. One study from the University of Illinois maintains that gambling in Illinois costs us taxpayers $13,600 per year per problem gambler, or about $180.00 per year for every citizen in Illinois. So, if you have 3 in your household, gambling in Illinois costs you $540.00 out of your pocket and you might not ever enter a casino or buy a lottery ticket. Gambling experts say the economic benefit to the citizens is $70.00 per citizen. Simple math tells us that it costs us $180.00 per citizen and we are taking in $70.00. You figure it out.
Illinois already has over 60 billion, yes billion dollars in debt on the books. Our revenue sources to pay that debt are “iffy” at best. Our politicians in Springfield last year could not make the interest payment of 1.3 billion dollars to their employee pension plan. In just 9 short years, by 2015, that payment will be over 10 billion dollars. Health care costs are drastically on the rise and every other service government provides is going up. If is foolish to borrow money to pay bills. It would be like me and you borrowing money to pay our utility bill. In not too long of a time that will be a huge disaster. Illinois politicians just last year borrowed 2.7 billion dollars just to pay bills. We keep going farther in the hole in this state. We all know the first thing to do when we find ourselves in a hole is to stop digging. It is unfortunate that our politicians don’t see that as they are digging one huge hole for our children and grandchildren in less than 10 years.
Illinois politicians need to get down to business and revamp the tax system in this state and design it so that it will pay for our basic needs, such as education, healthcare, public safety and such. How can that be done, you ask? Ask any local mayor, we do it every day at city hall. We don’t borrow money to pay for employee pensions or employee heath care, we budget it from revenue we have coming in! Simple!
If you want to meet a politician who has a plan to right this fiscal ship in Illinois and to really end “business as usual”, come to the Sesser Opera House this Thursday night and meet Edwin Eisendrath who is a democrat running for governor. He will be there in person at 7:00 pm and you can listen to him and ask him any question that you would like. Sesser is the first deep south city that Eisendrath has chosen to visit. We invited him here because some of us in general and me in particular are fed up with “business as usual” and want some answers. The public is invited, and no, this is not a fund raiser so no politician will pick your pocket if you attend. It is free so make plans to attend.
Give us a call at 625-3611 or 625-5322 or email nedmitchell@verizon.net or www.sesser.org
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