Carbondale Bytelife

Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Mayor Cole Walks on the Wild Side

And on the dangerous side of Carbondale, according to the commenters here. Kevlar vest anyone? I think it was a good thing for Mayor Cole to do and I'd like to see him, or other city council members, walk in that area more often to listen to concerns of the residents. It shouldn't take a shooting to get the city's attention.

Labels: Carbondale, city government, Mayor

# posted by Castle Perilous Games @ 7:23 PM 0 Comments

Monday, June 23, 2008

Donated Salary

Missed this in the Southern last month. According to the article, Mayor Cole donates his entire mayoral salary to charity. Wonder if he'll continue to do that if he gets the Alumni Director position?

Labels: Mayor

# posted by Castle Perilous Games @ 10:53 AM 2 Comments

Friday, June 6, 2008

Cole vs. Suarez

As was pointed out in comments, Mayor Cole and interim director Suarez are candidates for the position of Alumni Director at SIU. Comments on the SI article indicate most readers believe Mayor Cole is poised to get the position.

Labels: Mayor, siu

# posted by Castle Perilous Games @ 12:52 PM 4 Comments

Tuesday, August 28, 2007

Letter to the Mayor

Linz Brown, who spoke against the sales tax proposal at last Tuesday's city council meeting is having the following following letter hand delivered to the Mayor's office today. Posted with Dr. Brown's permission:

August 28, 2007

Mr. Brad Cole, Mayor

City of Carbondale

200 S. Illinois Avenue

Carbondale, Illinois 62901

Dear Mayor Cole:

I am writing to express my concern about one issue involved in the sales tax increase approved by the City Council on Tuesday, August 21, 2007. That concern is the lack of disclosure in the intergovernmental agreement with SIU. Neither the public hearing documents, the proposed ordinance, or the Council resolution authorizing you to execute the agreement disclosed any of the understandings, provisions, safeguards, or other important contents of the twenty-year, twenty million dollar arrangement.

As you will recall, this issue was raised in my prepared statement during the public hearing on Tuesday, August 21, 2007. My comments were as follows: “This proposal does not contain any attached agreements or written provisions that set forth the understandings and conditions for a commitment to SIU. Are you going to vote without knowing what you are committing to or without exploring the financial and legal ramifications of this commitment in writing? That would be totally irresponsible. What about the public? Don’t they have a right to see and react to any proposed agreement as part of the proposal before there is a vote?”

A proposed agreement should have been drafted and included in the proposal packet for the Public Hearing and the Council meeting. This would have been consistent with previous practice by the City. You consistently include contracts, bond documents, and other agreements as part of board meeting packets. Why should this agreement be an exception?

I feel the public has the right to ask for full disclosure on proposed agreements that commit large sums of tax money for non-city purposes for extended periods of time. As a long-time resident, registered voter, and taxpayer in the City of Carbondale, I am requesting that you and/or the City Manager do not sign the intergovernmental agreement until it is available for public comment and returned to the City Council for approval.

Sincerely yours,

Linz C. Brown

Labels: Mayor, taxes

# posted by Castle Perilous Games @ 2:52 PM 0 Comments

Monday, August 13, 2007

Wondered Where He Was.

Given the approaching vote on the sales tax increase, I thought Mayor Cole had been pretty circumspect, even quiet. I checked with Megan Cole at Carbondale Main Street and Meredith Rhoads at the Chamber of Commerce about any meetings he'd had with local business leaders. Neither of them had heard about any presentations he'd made to promote the tax increase proposal since he introduced it in July. Now, thanks to Dave, we know what he's been doing.

Labels: city government, Mayor, taxes

# posted by Castle Perilous Games @ 9:44 AM 0 Comments

Thursday, August 9, 2007

Mayor's LAB Speech

For those you you who don't like listening to stuff online, this week's Carbondale Times has what they say is the mayor's speech before he withdrew the proposal to modify the liquor code. His discussion on the duties of the city manager's office got me interested enough to try to find out more about the CM's office.

Did you know you have to file a FOI form with the city to find out how long Mr. Doherty's contract is for? Maybe if I had just gone in and asked, I could have found out more easily. Asking over the phone, I had to download a FOI form from the city's website, fill it out and fax it back.

Labels: City council, city government, Mayor

# posted by Castle Perilous Games @ 7:14 PM 2 Comments

Tuesday, April 17, 2007

Preliminary Results

At shortly after 9 p.m. with preliminary counts from 26 of Carbondale's 27 precincts, it looks like Brad Cole has defeated Sheila Simon, 54.14% to 45.55% with a total of 3245 votes cast. It also looks like Steven Hays and Lance Jack win re-election and Mary Pohlmann takes Simon's place on the council.

Incumbents didn't fare so well in the Park Board race, with challengers Fralish, Ollar and Suarez beating incumbents Heck and Kang.

Over in the Carbondale Elemenary School Board Race, looks like it's Major, Rendleman and Tolliver, with Elbert Simon the next closest still 6% behind.

Absentee and early votes remain to be counted.

Labels: Carbondale, City council, election, local news, Mayor

# posted by Castle Perilous Games @ 9:08 PM 0 Comments

Election Day

By tonight it will all be over but the shouting. The Carbondale Times got out a special election edition yesterday with last minute coverage of the Park District, School Board, and Mayorial races. Saw a huge stack of them at Schnuck's this morning.

Both Simon and Cole's campaigns have been busy calling voters. There were 4 people in the Simon office until at least 7 last night and an equal number in the Cole office. Simon has another group in this morning making calls again and I think I see a couple of heads in the Cole office as well.

From my point of view, I'd say Simon has done a better job of getting out the vote. There's been steady activity in her campaign office, which overflowed with volunteers on recent Saturdays, with little apparent activity in Cole's office on the same Saturdays I've received 2 calls from her campaign in recent days, none from Cole. After signing up for both campaign's email lists, I've gotten weekly emails from the Simon campaign, nothing from Cole. Both have had about the same number of newspaper ads and direct mailings. If the election comes down to who puts the most feet on the ground, I think Simon wins.

Labels: Carbondale, election, Mayor

# posted by Castle Perilous Games @ 11:05 AM 1 Comments

Wednesday, March 28, 2007

Another Open Letter to Brad Cole

This letter was submitted to the Carbondale Times (which never printed it) on March 28, 2007, and to the Southern Illinoisian on April 11, 2007.

Mayor Cole,

During your 2003 campaign for Mayor, the Carbondale Times published a letter from me informing you that using the American flag in political advertising was against Federal law, and was disrespectful to the flag and to those veterans who fought and died under it. I presume you read my letter, because the offending sign was taken down shortly thereafter. 4 USC Sec. 8, entitled “Respect for the Flag,” states: “The flag should never be used for advertising purposes in any manner whatsoever.”

Nonetheless, once again, a massive banner—apparently the exact same one that prompted my letter in 2003—displays your name next to a gigantic American flag. The fact that you did not destroy that sign after you took it down in 2003 shows that you were only cynically responding to negative publicity, not acting out of genuine respect for our flag and our country. Now you bring it out again, presuming that we have forgotten, in the interim, that it is both illegal and disrespectful to use the flag in advertising.

There are no enforcement provisions for this Federal law; no Flag Police will show up at your door. The law merely lays out what is proper treatment for our flag. As a National Guardsman and a Desert Storm veteran, I have served proudly under our flag for many years. It disturbs and upsets me to see elected officials gratuitously and disrespectfully using the symbol of our Nation for personal political gain.

Shame on you, Mr. Cole.

Jim Syler

Labels: Calion, Carbondale, election, Mayor

# posted by Calion @ 9:37 AM 5 Comments

Wednesday, March 21, 2007

Arbor District Mayoral Debate

Residents of Carbondale’s Arbor District are sponsoring a mayoral candidate debate on Sunday, March 25th from 2 – 4 PM in the Fellowship Hall of First Christian Church. The debate is open to neighborhood residents.

The Arbor District Board states that it "wants to know where the mayoral candidates stand as leaders in the community." The debate will be followed by audience questions.

Sandy Litecky, President of the Arbor District Neighborhood Organization, will moderate the debate and Q&A session.

Labels: Carbondale, election, Mayor

# posted by Bob @ 11:23 AM 0 Comments

Sunday, February 4, 2007

Carbondale Signs US Mayors Climate Protection Agreement

Carbondale has joined the ranks of 393 communities across the US that have signed the US Mayors Climate Protection Agreement (MCPA). The communities that have signed the agreement have pledged to undertake three steps to protect the environment: (Read more)

Labels: Carbondale, Climate, Mayor

# posted by Bob @ 12:59 AM 1 Comments

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