Mayor’s Row…………by Ned Mitchell

            Aren’t you happy that the Thanksgiving break is over for newspaper hacks like me?  After all most of us talked about sentimental things during the holiday and now that we have a few days before Christmas we can all have a chance to bash the governor!  Before this guy came along I sometimes had to spend a lot of time thinking about what subject might interest readers enough to keep their attention all the way to the end of the column.  Not anymore!  The reformer/unreformer pulls so many bone headed stunts that subject matter is never a problem.  Now it is a matter of deciding just which one of his major blunders to talk about first.

            Last week I made the prediction that nothing would get done in the 17^th special session that the governor had called and sure enough, nothing happened other than we witnessed a vast amount of money being wasted.  Money that could have gone to many worthwhile projects but didn’t.

             Chicago television station announced last week they were going to do a special news segment on their evening news about the governor’s work ethic or lack thereof.  They had been filming the governor playing in the yard at home, jogging, and other such activities all with the governor’s security details knowledge.  They spent about two weeks filming for this special story.  They made note of how often the governor actually went to work which as it turns out was rare.  He almost never made it to the office in Chicago and going to Springfield is almost out of the question.  They noted anywhere from six or eight state police officers providing security for a guy who never leaves the house except in rare instances.

            Then the day before the news story was to break the television station began airing promotional items about the story.  It was a major media story by a major television station.  One would think this guy would have enough sense to at least appear like he is working and not goofing off in front of the camera.  The day of the story the television station is promoting this news segment about every 30 minutes during their broadcast day.  They stirred up a lot of interest in not only their viewing audience but all over the state.  I watched the news cast on computer that evening.  Let me say here and now it is pretty hard to shock me when it comes to this governor but I have to admit I was shocked at the stupidity displayed by the chief executive on this matter.

            It so happens that the day this story was to break the great reformer/unreformer had called a special session of the state legislature to deal with the mass transit bail out for the Chicago area.  Legislators and the governor were all in Chicago with the governor blabbering all day long about how a solution was near.  The legislature was working overtime and a vote was finally taken in the evening.  Where was the governor when the vote was about to be taken?  He had hopped on a state plane and flew to Chicago to watch a hockey game leaving the legislators in town.  What happened was that the bailout plan that had been promoted by the governor went down in flames as even the republican sponsors of the bill would not support it.  Oh, it gets better; the governor spent $5,800 of mine and your tax money to fly to Chicago for a hockey game.

            Now to add insult to injury those nosy reporters have been asking questions about where the $27 million dollars came from that the governor mysteriously found laying around to pay for the last mass transit bailout.  When the buses and trains were about to stop in Chicago the governor jumped in with a cash payment of $27 million dollars to stop that from happening.  Hey, a guy has got to do what a guy has got to do and folks in Chicago need to be able to get to work and back so most everyone went along with this plan.

            In the last few days major news outlets have let the cat out of the bag on this move.  It is now known that the $27 million dollars was actually money that had been budgeted for projects all over the state.  Over $10 million dollars of this money was set aside to develop the coal industry in Illinois.  One has to wonder if part of that $10 million dollars could have been spent to keep the Monterey Coal Company in the central part of the state in business.  They are locking the door at the end of the year and another 350 coal miners are out of work in this state.  Millions of dollars in construction projects such as road work and bridges were also among those to take a hit in this scheme.  We will soon find out which projects have been eliminated.

            Where are all of our legislators and union honchos in this mess?  They are strangely silent except when they chant in unison like a bunch of robots “we must have a capital plan; we must have a capital plan”.  Where on earth is leadership in this mess?  It is obvious to even a casual observer that no matter what projects are planned and no matter how much money is budgeted for these projects, if the governor decides he needs to spend the money on health care or mass transit, he just spends it.

            One newspaper I read has now determined that our state legislature is borderline incompetent and is incapable of resolving budgetary issues without proposing more gambling.  The newspaper goes on to say that Illinois officials are actually addicted to gambling!  To have our legislators and governor to think that gambling has no consequences or cost involved is ridiculous.  Gambling to raise money has a tremendous cost to society and what we need are individual legislators who will stand in the gap and offer serious solutions to funding mass transit, education and the beloved “Illinois Works” capital plan.  We need legislators who will simply not roll over and continue to vote for Emil Jones as President of the Senate and Mike Madigan as Speaker of the House.

            The thing that truly amazes me as a 30 political observer is that many incumbents running for re-election don’t seem to be too concerned about what you and I think.  I think that a lot of folks are getting fed up with the lack of fundamental good sense coming out of Springfield.  Even though the governor is not up for re-election a lot of state senators and representatives are and it could be that voters will take their frustrations out on these guys.  A lot of folks I talk to are gearing up to send a message that some of these politicians need to be fired and that change needs to happen.  We’ll see how that plays out in the near future.

            Make plans to attend a free Christmas concert at the historic Sesser Opera House on Monday, December 10^th.  The concert will be performed by the 50 member Southern Illinois Concert Band and will start at 7:00 pm.  Come early and enjoy a delicious Christmas buffet in the Opera House Café.