[OccupyCU] township items

Wed Apr 11 14:35:17 UTC 2012

Thanks for the wrap up Stuart - and to Karen and Martel for speaking out.

The impoverishment of the Township by Pam Borowski, a former real estate
agent, is one of the biggest untold stories in CU. She ran her campaign on
keeping taxes low for property owners, to the detriment of the poorest of
poor in the community. PB's predecessor Linda Abernathy was increasing the
amounts of funding and numbers of people served. CUCPJ launched its Unity
March a few years ago at the Township office to bring attention to Linda's
work. A change in the township office, in my mind, would do more to improve
the lot of those in our community most hurt by the current economic
Depression than any of the referendum issues.

BD

On Wed, Apr 11, 2012 at 1:04 AM, Stuart Levy <stuartnlevy at gmail.com> wrote:

>  And... we may yet have a Champaign special meeting to re-consider the
> free speech proposal.  There was some real argument over it -- a
> deliberate-looking block of right-leaning people sitting on the left side
> of the audience voted No on every question, and then left at the end of the
> township meeting, as though they'd come specifically to oppose those
> referenda.
>
> One woman, Stephanie Williams, said she would have supported the
> referendum if your amended version had passed, but thought its language too
> vague in its original form.
>
> *But*, after the amendment (barely) failed, this same woman argued for
> proposing *another* Township meeting to consider a revised amendment. After
> brief research the city attorney confirmed that we can call for a special
> meeting if a mere 15 electors sign saying they want it.
>
> So ... we can do this again, and may yet get the free speech referendum on
> the ballot in Champaign!  We gathered a dozen signatures on the spot to
> call for a followup meeting.   I assume that we'd need to specify the
> proposed meeting agenda at the same time we submit the signatures.
>
> If we're game (I am!), I think it'd be good for all interested to meet --
> including Ms. Williams, now on this list -- to tweak the text to be as
> compelling as possible.
>
> Other sparks flew too.  Several of us (Karen, Martel Miller, Eva Jahle,
> and I) spoke during public comment about Champaign Twp's provision of
> general assistance - a tiny amount of money, intended by state standards to
> be provided to a very limited set of people who have no other source of
> support (including people awaiting decisions on Social Security disability,
> those not eligible for TANF, etc.).  We criticized from several points of
> view - that the reports don't indicate how many people were served or
> requested assistance; that the paperwork required for applicants to prove
> eligibility is very burdensome in time/mobility/expense; that Champaign,
> though nominally using the same eligibility standards as Urbana, is much
> stingier about actually handing out money; that fully $50K of the incoming
> general-assistance tax money went *unspent*, compared with about $70K
> actually handed out, plus a presumably-larger amount spent on paying the
> Supervisor and staff to administer this miserly support.  And other stuff.
>
>
> At the end of the meeting, Karen brilliantly lit another spark.  We were
> set to approve the township expenditure reports for the year, which would
> normally be approved pro forma.  She got up to say that the general
> assistance portion of the report was incomplete: it should detail how many
> people had been served by general assistance, and how many rejected.
> Martel spoke too and concurred.
>
> Result?  The right-leaning left half of the room voted to approve the
> expenditure report, and the left-leaning right half voted to reject.  We
> *won*. *The report was not approved.*    Pam Borowski, who had run for
> Twp Supervisor on a platform of not providing services for the poor and has
> clearly worked to keep her promise, looked mad, and (I trust) was
> professionally embarrassed.  Yay, Karen!
>
> [FYI, the Twp does put out quarterly reports detailing general assistance,
> including total expenditures, numbers of people served, how many are newly
> in or newly out of the program, how many transition onto Social Security,
> etc.   One sample -- Oct-Dec 2011 -- showed about $14K paid to 52 people.
> That'd be about $90/month if those 52 people were in the program for that
> entire quarter.  If they're getting more than $90/month, and they should be
> (state standard is well over $200/mo), then actual numbers served at any
> given time are even smaller.]
>
> Not entirely what we could have wished for, but not at all bad, and
> definitely a lively night.  Direct democracy can be fun.
>
>
>
> On 4/10/12 10:39 PM, Ian K wrote:
>
> And, in the end, two votes were not registered at the Champaign meeting
> due to early departures (kids have bathroom needs). We should have won all
> four contests. Well done!
> IKD
>
>
>
> On Tue, Apr 10, 2012 at 8:57 PM, Melanie Sivley <melaniesivley at gmail.com>wrote:
>
>> Citizens United passed by a large margin, 20+ for & 12 against. The
>> second one failed by 1 vote. And yes, thanks for all the hard work!
>>
>> Melanie
>>
>> Sent from my iPhone
>>
>> On Apr 10, 2012, at 8:55 PM, Michael Weissman <mbwmbwmbw at gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>> > Both our items passed unanimously in Cunningham (Urbana). 25-0 and
>> 28-0, I think.
>> > Any news from Champaign?
>> >
>> > And once again, thanks Colan!
>> >
>> > --
>> > Michael Weissman
>>  > _______________________________________________
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>> > OccupyCU at lists.chambana.net
>> > http://lists.chambana.net/mailman/listinfo/occupycu
>>
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>
>
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-- 
Brian Dolinar, Ph.D.
303 W. Locust St.
Urbana, IL 61801
briandolinar at gmail.com
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