No Promise

The people have spoken and there will be no Promise! Over 60% of the voters said no. In the second ward, Bill Edmond won by almost 100 votes.

Even with the last minute smear on Mark Nelson, the meltdown of the Mayor, signs stolen or defaced, and a lot more money spent by the pro side, it appears the Promise is not in our future. I’ve heard there were over 15,000 votes cast in the Promise vote. A big thank you to everyone who voted.

Comments are always welcome.

Vote and cars

Today most of us will vote on the Promise issue. I’ve made no secret about my thoughts on that, but if you didn’t vote early please go and vote today. I can’t think of a single issue that will be more important. I’ll be a little busy today, but I’ll check in when I get a chance.

Let’s do a dry doughnut here and talk about cars. Our son sent me a couple of links to some neat sites so I thought why not share them. The first is a neat
Utube
video about old school hot rods and chicks. I had nothing to do with the title and the only thing racy is the motors. If you think old school is cool, you should check it out. It even has background music.

The other link is called rat rod stuff. If you want to know more about rat rods, look at pictures of rat rods, or buy or sell a rat rod, this is the place. There were about 2 pages full of rats for sale with full descriptions, along with parts, t-shirts, and more.

Later I’ll try to post on how the voting went. Just as a side note, I probably shocked a couple of barbers today and got an honest to God haircut. Yes, my ears are showing again and my hair don’t get in my face while I’m cruisin’. Downside is it feels colder outside, but I should get used to it. I’ll see how my experiment works out tomorrow.
Comments are always welcome.

Another stolen sign

The wife and I just got back from voting on the Promise issue. I was surprised it took us longer to find a parking spot than it did to do the early voting. A gentleman is once again missing his no-Promise sign. He wrote a letter to the Editor and emailed it to the QC Times. The Editor claimed it couldn’t be printed because of deadlines and schedules so I told him I would post it here. Since I haven’t heard back to get his permission, just call him “Missing his sign”. Here’s his letter-

Freedom of Speech

It’s sad day in America when you wake up to find another one of your
yard signs has been stolen.

One can understand these actions in the heat of a political campaign,
but the “Promise” referendum is hardly one of the magnitude of a
National election.

If the proponents of the “Promise” program are so confident of their
proposal to the citizens of Davenport, then they should not have to
resort to having gangs of teenagers riding through our neighborhoods, in pickup trucks, stealing the “AGAINST PROMISE” signs.

Are these the same teenagers that want our tax dollars to fund their
College Education?

I remember the kids that worked in my restaurants, nights and weekends, to save their money to go to college. These were the kids that knew hard work brought success,and didn’t have the time to ride around town looking for trouble.

Maybe the parents of these kids should look at themselves in the mirror, and ask if THEY are teaching their children, that in a “Free Society”, people have the right of free speech and expression!

Comments are always welcome.

Sign problems again

We’ve been informed once again of the thefts of smaller No Promise signs and the attempted thefts of the larger signs. Friday night three boys were seen stealing the smaller No Promise signs in the northeast section of our city. We’re told a total af 15 signs have stolen.

While out driving this morning we noticed someone defaced the large No Promise sign on Brady just north of Central Park. Let’s stop this nonsense. It is getting to point that someone is out a lot of money. We hope the kids doing this are caught and prosecuted. When you go on someone else’s property to steal or deface something on that lot, you are breaking the law.

We only have a few days until the election, we hope these punks have gotten this out of their system. If not, we hope they are arrested, tried, and convicted. Are these the kids the Promise is supposed to help?
Comments are always welcome.

A few things

Broadcaster Paul Harvey died today. We’ve enjoyed his take on things
for many years. Even though he is gone I’m sure we’ll hear the Rest of the Story.

On another note, when the stimulus bill passed it did so without the cash for clunkers bill in it. The SEMA Action Network sprang into action and stopped the bill. I am proud to say that I am a member of this group.
This is the at least the third time SAN has worked to successfully defeat this bill. We hope it is the last.

We have the vote on the Promise coming up Tuesday. If you haven’t voted early, please vote on Tuesday.
Comments are always welcome.

Say what?

We recieved the mailer from the Friends of Davenport Promise. The glossy front hass a nice picture of high school graduates with captions about how the Promise will allow them to go to St. Ambrose, Scott Community College, Capri, the University of Iowa, and an undisclosed nursing school. Having an inquiring mind, I thought I’d find out just how much it actually cost to attend some of these colleges.

From the St. Ambrose website I located the cost page and this is what it provided for undergraduate costs.
Tuition and fees- $21,610
Housing per semester-$1,800
Meals per semester- $2,025
Plus textbooks and supplies.

The University of Iowa website broke it down like this for in-state students-
Tuition and fees- $6,824
Room and board- $8,004
Books and supplies-$1,090
Personal expenses- $2,630
Transportation- $890
For a grand total of $19,438 per year.

The Scott Community College website broke it down like this for a computer course for in-state students-
Tuition and fees- $6,528
Books and supplies-$1,500
This comes to a grand total of $8,068 per year.

Would these kids on the front of the card be smiling if they knew this? Each site I visited had at least one webpage devoted to student aid. Scott Community College claimed there are no less than 3 federal loans, a pell grant, and several scholarships available to students. I wonder what recieving money from the Promise would do to the grants for students from lower income families.

The last paragraph on the flip side says: “The Cost? Great news, nothing new! There will be NO tax increase. If the Promise vote passes, up to 30% of the existing one cent City sales tax will be used to fund the program. The remainder of the penny will go towards supporting police and fire and our infrastructure needs.”

I don’t like the sound of that. I thought it WAS 30%, not up to 30% for the Promise. I also thought we were voting on 30% for the Promise, 10% for public safety, and the remainder to be used as it always had. Am I wrong? Are the Friends of Davenport Promise wrong? Has somebody shuffled the numbers without telling us what we’re voting on? Inquiring minds do want to know.
Comments are always welcome.

One more time

We are another day closer to voting on the Davenport Promise. I still can’t see why people think this is a good program. The proposal has so many red flags in it someone should call the National Guard.

I don’t like using tax monies meant for another purpose to fund it. If this really is the best thing since sliced bread; why aren’t private monies rolling in to fund it? And where are the funds going to come from to cover the 40% reduction for the original use?

Something else I don’t like that is mentioned often is a statement that the citizens of Davenport are getting older and poorer. As an older citizens of this burg who has been paying taxes for years I get offended. Excuse me for living! We are not poorer but we do pay taxes and spend our money here. Is the city going to pass a law that says nobody over 60 can live here unless they own a bank?

And to those who can’t figure out why our schools are losing students; can you say 75% graduation rate? I’ve noticed at some of the informational meetings that some have said these numbers are misleading. Well then; does that mean that the schools in surrounding areas also have a higher graduation rate than the study shows, or just us?

Adding public safety to the Promise appears to be nothing more than an attempt to make us who vote against it feel guilty. But, the mayor has been saying that the monies for public safety will go into a general fund. If it goes into the general fund, will any of it ever trickle down to public safety?

Those who back this program say the administration of the Promise will be funded with private donations. But our mayor went to Washington, DC, to beg for money for the administration of the Promise. And don’t forget kids, Ken Croken said that it would be four years before any adjustments could be made to the program.He felt it could be a learning curve, but at what cost?

Then we have statements that this program will bring families with children to our city. To quote a city leader “if you put lipstick on a pig, it’s still a pig.” That same city leader is now claiming “if the Promise passes, taxes will go down”. I’ve been saying for some time, find out why people aren’t moving here and fix it. Don’t expect a program backed by flawed studies to improve a problem it wasn’t
intended to fix.

Lastly is something my Dad told me years ago when I wanted my first car. He told me that while he could afford to buy me a car, he wouldn’t. He told me that if I worked and bought it with my own money I’d appreciate more. At 15 I thought he just enjoyed ruining my life. Later I saw the wisdom of his words.

Tuesday we will go to vote and by Wednesday most of us will be talking about another subject. Regarless of what position you have on this issue, you should vote on Tuesday. If you don’t vote your position, you have no right to bitch later on. Please vote on Tuesday if you haven’t already.
Comments are always welcome.

Dogs, writers, knees, and the vote

There’s a few things I want to mention before I get really busy. The
first is that the dogs have found a good home and are still together.
A friend of the dogs family said the response was amazing.

The Midwest Writing Center will honor the 11 best writers in a recent
contest. Writers were given 24 hours to write a fiction or non-fiction
story, or a poem. They were given one sentence to start with. “Why do they always have to be red?” Davenports own Keith Meyer came in second in the fiction division. Congratulations.

There will be a celebration tonight at the Bucktown Center starting at 7 pm. The Bucktown is located at 225 East 2nd. Street in Davenport. The winners are scheduled to read their winning entry in the “Iron Pen Contest”. The galleries will be open, there will be a chili cook-off and free libations.
Sounds like a good time, I wish I could make it.

Next week is going to be hectic as the wife is having knee replacement surgery on Tuesday. I don’t like hospitals and I especially don’t like hospitals at 6 am. If my posting is a little a sparse next week, bear with me.

Lastly, the vote on the Promise is just around the corner. If you haven’t yet made up your mind on how you are going to vote, please get informed. On Tuesday the polls will open and I hope everyone votes.
Comments are always welcome

More Promise

The Promise vote is almost here and there seems to be a meeting every night discussing the issues. According to the QC Times there were even a handful of people at the last meeting who were undecided. We hope they get enough information before they vote to make up their minds.

I recieved another email that involves Genesis. I am told that the CEO Doug Copper posted on the Genesis employee blog. I don’t know the url of the blog, or the length of the post, but the unanymous concerned citizen was bothered by one papragraph and sent it along. The paragraph from the CEO to the employees goes as follows:
On March 3, Davenport voters will go to the polls in the “Davenport Promise” referendum. If passed, this program will reallocate existing sales tax revenues to attract more people and jobs to Davenport. This will increase our patient volumes significantly and strengthen our staff recruitment efforts dramatically.

While this makes it sound like he really has the best interests of our city in mind, we have to wonder. If he is such a supporter of our fine city, why is he having a huge new house built in Pleasant Valley?

Chicago police have made an arrest in the shooting last friday of three teenagers. It is not known yet if more shooters were involved with the drive-by shooting. If you want to read the latest on the story go to
the story.
Comments are always welcome.

Some thoughts

The Davenport Promise is the issue of the day. Todays QC Times ran another large article on the program complete with charts. To me the article was pretty much a pep rally to vote for the Promise. This is fine since the paper has made it known from the beginning they think it’s a good idea. Since myself and others disagree, I’ll point out a few reasons why I’m against it.

Before I get to that, the people behind Promise Davenport have put their final report on their webpage. Also on the website is
a link to the No More Promises group. If you’ve read the article in the Times and would like to see what these groups are saying, it’s worth a look.

I’ve said all along I believe that public monies should not be used for this program. Especially at the expense of property tax relief and other areas. Then of course we have the administration end of the program which may or may not be paid for with public monies.
Will the administration be paid for privately or with stimulus money?

We also have the fact that the program is basically welfare in that it costs many for the good of a few. Add to that the fact that the less wealthy members of our city may actually lose grants if they take the money to help them through school, and it just doesn’t make sense.

There is also the fact that assessed values would go up which would mean an increase in taxes, and that this program could actually hurt the city’s bond rating. Public Safety was also tacked on this I feel to make those who oppose the program appear to against public safety monies. Such is not the case, and I believe even if the Promise
is passed it won’t equate to more police and fire.

At the 5th Ward meeting, Mr. Croken wanted us to forget about the Upjohn report, and forget about details. I don’t think so. I do agree that this is an important issue, but I don’t think it’s a good deal in its present form.
Comments are always welcome.