Mayor’s Row………..by Ned Mitchell
One of the hardest jobs in the world is to be right all of the time and a resident know it all about everything. Some folks have difficulty attaining this status but others like yours truly seem to be born with the ability to be right all of the time and to know it all. Of course around my house the wife points out my lack of knowledge or ability to be wrong more than I am right on a frequent basis. It is good to have those around us who can point out those minor little errors and keep us on the straight path to being perfect and right all of the time about everything we do or say. Now that I have your attention a recent spouting off of the mouth of mine brought a visitor to Sesser.
We are hosting the Southern Illinois Music Festival’s performance of Mozart’s Don Giovanni Opera this week in Sesser. The production will take place at the historic Sesser Opera House Thursday evening, June 29th at 7:30 pm. I had sent out a press release and proudly proclaimed that as far as we could tell this will be the first live opera performed in the famed Opera House. I thought that was rather catchy, an Opera House that had never had an opera. Along comes Julia Hennig, an accomplished pianist from Herrin last week to purchase tickets to the opera. In our conversation Julia commented about the article she had read and disclosed what she thought was a glitch in the story, my story of all things.
Julia grew up in Herrin and has made music a big part of her life. She left the area but has returned to live in retirement. She mentioned to me that her mother had told her of an opera performance in Sesser by famed opera singer Madame Schumann-Heink, the great German opera singer. Of course in all of my great knowledge I had no idea who Schumann-Heink was and had never heard of her. Julia further revealed that Schumann-Heink had entertained World War I troops in the United States and that she probably performed in Sesser in the 1920’s. A quick Google search on my computer told the story of Schumann-Heink and I did find where she performed in St. Louis quite a lot.
Was I wrong in saying we had never had an opera at the Sesser Opera House? At least one person thinks so! Did Charlie Gauldoni and his investors in the Opera House get Madame Schumann-Heink in Sesser to perform? Unfortunately we have found virtually no records concerning early performers at this historic building. We know the building was constructed in 1914 as an Opera House and that many Vaudeville acts were booked as well as silent movies but we have no specifics. My conversation with Julia sparked the interest though and now I am on the quest of tracking done this piece of lore about the historic Sesser Opera House. I am constantly having to tell the wife “I just hate it when I am wrong” but this is one instance where I would be happy to say “I was wrong!” If you have any knowledge of any performers at the Opera House, give us a call and fill us in on the details.
Memorandums of understanding are being revealed in a subtle way from Springfield. In case you do not know these came into being after the reformer/unreformer got elected and reneged on promises he had made to state legislators for projects, sometimes called pork, that would go to their districts or to causes they were trying to promote. Sometimes legislators had friends who needed these and other times they were for worthwhile projects. These projects come about at budget time. Two years ago there were $30 million dollars of these things and now there are $70 million. One has to figure in inflation so I assume that is where the extra $40 million dollars comes in to play and that it had nothing to do with buying legislator’s votes for the budget.
Anyhow two years ago legislators passed the budget with all democrats voting for the budget along with a few republicans. Legislators are rewarded for their votes by projects. You know the old “you scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours” theory. When the budget is shy a few votes the back scratching gets rather furious at times and hold out legislators get more projects the longer they hold out with their vote. Up until two years ago these were verbal agreements. That meant they could not be tracked down by the media and if a legislator did not issue a press release touting a certain project for their district, nobody would even know about the money being spent other than those directly involved. It seems as though the reformer/unreformer, you know Mr. no more business as usual, forgot to make good on a lot of these projects and legislators who had told constituents they were getting the cash, found out their cash went somewhere else.
Now legislators make the Governor sign a Memorandum of Understanding where his word is backed up by a signed written contract. Two years ago these memorandums had the legislator’s name on them. We all thought that was great and the media loved it. They could readily tell who was wasting the tax payer’s money and where it was going. That has all gone by the wayside in today’s world, now the legislator’s names are no longer listed. The memorandum today only lists in very vague terms where this $70 million dollars will be spent.
During my brief stint in the State Senate I was given $2 million dollars to dole out in the 59th District. Great I thought, there are a lot of needs in Southern Illinois and I set about to hand this out. I had already lost the primary election so I was free to hand out the money where I thought it would do the most good. I picked out several libraries for grants, municipal government buildings and other such worthy causes. I thought it would be a good idea to require recipients to spend the money on long term capital projects and not cars and salaries. That was my only stipulation. I fell for the same trap as legislators did two years ago. Some folks are still waiting on the grants that I had promised and because I did not have it in writing from the Governor at the time, some of those grants were never delivered. We certainly can’t say our legislators are not getting smarter. They now require the Governor to put his John Henry on a piece of paper, no more handshakes, winks, nods, or pats on the back, sign here Governor. Its’ not that we don’t trust you, but we don’t trust you! One would think the opposition party, in Illinois that would be the republicans were the ones to come up with this idea. No, it is the democrats in Illinois who do not trust this guy and they created the Memorandums of Understanding just to keep everyone on the up and up. Too funny!
Some additional transportation money was added to the budget to fund some new Amtrak lines. Right now there are two daily trains between Carbondale and Chicago but a third one will soon be added. SIU President Glenn Poshard has wisely suggested the name of The Saluki for this train to go along with The Illini, The City of New Orleans, and other famous train names. One wise guy however has suggested we name the new train The Blagojevich saying that is the only way we will get him to travel outside Chicago and visit folks in Southern Illinois. Hey, I didn’t say it, someone else did and I was only repeating it. We hope you have a great week!
Don’t forget all the festivities at Rend Lake this weekend. There will be a craft fair, food booths and lots of things for kids to do at the Visitor’s Center. This will all be capped off with a huge fireworks display Sunday night at 9:30. See you there!
If you need us give us a call at 625-3611 or 625-5322. Write us at nedmitchell@verizon.net or www.sesser.org or P. O. Box 517, Sesser, Illinois 62884 or pay us a personal visit. Sesser is a small town so we are not hard to find!
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