In a move long proposed by supporters of an expanded library at its present location, Glenview has announced it will acquire the Epco Paint Store site at the corner of Glenview and Lehigh roads. The property could provide 30-35 additional parking spaces. Village President Larry Carlson was quick to say this is not a sign that Glenview will add on to the existing library. "Downtown lacks parking," he told the Pioneer Press. "This is a way to get some of it there."

If necessary, the trustees agreed they would take the store owner to court to get the parcel. Mike Puls has refused to sell for the $600,000 village appraisers say the property is worth. The village has said it would help Puls find a new downtown location.

The move comes before Glenview’s new 10-year plan for development is released. During the planning process, a Milwaukee-based consultant said the village might have to buy property to spur more retail development downtown. Might the village plan to sell the library and Epco sites as a block for mixed use development similar to what was done on the southeast corner of Glenview and Waukegan roads? Two or three stories of condos could be built atop storefront shops. Residential development in the downtown area is highly profitable. The site could command millions of dollars from a developer with the money being used to acquire land or build a new library elsewhere.

Glenview’s public officials have sometimes been accused of doing business in the dark – of operating quietly, behind the scenes without properly informing the public, but Tuesday night’s board meeting marked a first as the trustees worked through a power outage, passing a sales tax increase by flashlight.

When the lights first went out, more than an hour into the meeting, everyone sat silent in the darkened chamber, lit only by a couple of emergency lights. "Don’t we have a back-up generator?" asked one official. "No, only the police have back-up," replied another. "We’re not considered essential."

After about 10 minutes of waiting for power to return, a staff member left the chamber, then returned with flashlights for the trustees. Ignoring the fact that some members of the public had left and cable TV was unable to record the meeting, the board continued to debate its 2004 budget.

Village President Larry Carlson had started the discussion earlier with a sober assessment of the economy. "Many suburbs have been forced to reduce programs, cut service levels and eliminate personnel, including police," he said. "Glenview is not going to do that. We are going to sustain the same level of services."

In fact, Glenview will be spending nearly $3 million more in 2004. Most of that will cover higher pension and insurance costs for village employees and retirees plus liability for the village. A new fire truck will cost $238,000. It’s been purchased to "standardize" the fleet. There’s nearly a million dollars for architectural services on a new police station. The village will also hire two new police officers, and three firefighters, while budgeting more than $100,000 for improved communication with the public.

The village will also provide a 4 percent cost of living raise for all employees plus a one-time "adjustment" – a $10,000 pay hike for top managers, pushing them to nearly $118,000 per year.  (In public budget hearings, this number was never mentioned, but a source at Village Hall says the increase was discussed during an executive session.)

Carlson explained that businesses often reward key personnel. "It’s essential to the organization’s success," he said. "This is one of those times. Our department heads are the best of the breed in the areas they serve: finance, public works, development, fire, law enforcement. Over the long haul, our basic compensation has not recognized the professional standing of these department heads. This needs to be fixed."

Editor’s note: If village managers were so badly underpaid, one has to wonder why they stayed on the job. Development Director Mary Bak and Public Works Director Bill Porter have both been in their jobs for more than a decade, and while the police and fire chiefs are relatively new to their jobs, there were dozens of applicants for both positions when former chiefs retired.

Perhaps this $10,000 raise is something more than a "fix." We’d guess it’s a farewell gift from Village Manager Paul McCarthy who has been in his job since 1983, building an expensive little empire at Village Hall with the help of these department heads.

Village management also asked for a new geographical information system or GIS that would cost $2 million over four years. The aerial mapping system would show precisely where roads, utilities, pipes, shut-off valves and sewers are. "One of the things that caused delays on the Lake Avenue project was inaccurate plotting of utilities," Carlson said, adding that existing maps were sometimes wrong. With this new technology in place, public works crews could get an underground map of any neighborhood on a laptop computer in their truck.

"This system will help us avoid extra costs and delays in doing things the old way," said the president. "This is something whose time has come. We can begin this now, or we can begin it later. To do it later will cost more money, and we’ll find ourselves in the position of those buggy whip manufacturers who decided to wait a few more years to see if those horseless carriages really would catch on."

Editor’s note: Actually, the price of technology often comes down over time, so there’s no guarantee that adopting GIS next year would, in fact, be more costly.

While some sources of cash for local government are drying up, new ones are coming in. Budget Director Dan Wiersma said the sales tax had been strong in Glenview and projected an increase of $2.2 million next year – even without the local hike. He also noted $500,000 in make-whole payments for the general fund from taxes paid at The Glen and $150,000 from a new amusement tax paid by movie goers there.

To provide extra money for local government, Carlson proposed a one percent sales tax on everything but food, medicine and cars. He said a significant portion of this would be paid by non-Glenview residents, ignoring the fact that those most likely to shop in Glenview are those who live here, but when Carlson opened the public hearing, Glenview’s power family stepped up to testify. Bob Abt, his two sons and the comptroller of this town’s biggest single source of sales tax revenue warned that a rate hike would be bad for their business and for the village.

"We’ve enjoyed being here," said the senior Abt, "But you need to be competitive. We probably have 95 percent of our customers coming from outside the village. We’d be at 9 percent with a village and county sales tax increase. Niles is 7.5, Deerfield is 6.5 and Racine, Wisconsin is 5.1. We could lose a lot of business and kill the goose that laid the golden egg."

Another member of the Abt team said his store was "about taking care of customers, and if our rate has to be at 9 percent, we’re not doing a great service for our customer. If we’re selling a plasma TV at $10,000, and we gotta’ charge ‘em $300 more for that TV, they might think twice. We’re gonna’ grow 14 percent this year. That’ll help your revenue. We have a monster payroll. We spent so much money to come here – we spent our family’s life savings to come here!" He then proposed Glenview cut the amount of the tax hike in half.

Carlson pointed out that even with a full one percent increase, Glenview’s rate would be the same as that of Schaumburg and Palatine and only slightly higher than Niles, Morton Grove and Skokie at 8.5 percent. "It’s all very close," he said.

Editor’s note: The trustees should have laughed Abt out of Village Hall. They’re doing a brisk business on Milwaukee Avenue by their own admission and pocketing half the sales tax they should be paying to the village under a 15-year deal they demanded before moving here. If service is their concern, they could always match their competitors’ prices by taking the extra percent from their profits.

You gotta’ love guys like Al McAndrew and Lyle Cazell – senior citizens who aren’t afraid to tell it like it is. McAndrew is particularly bold in mocking the pomp of Glenview’s village board – calling the village Manager "Mack," to the horror of Carlson who insists he be called Mr. McCarthy. Appearing before the trustees Tuesday, McAndrew demanded to know if McCarthy was also getting a $10,000 pay hike.

"Off the top of my head, I don’t know," said Carlson.

"Well he knows," said McAndrew, turning to McCarthy. The manager said he was getting a 4 percent cost of living hike like everyone else. He did not mention the bonus payment of $60,000 in his retirement package.

"Well how much are you getting now?" McAndrew wondered.

"You could look at the budget," replied a testy McCarthy. "We’d be happy to provide you with any information that you’d like."

McAndrew charged on, suggesting more firemen were not necessary since two new stations have yet to open. He pointed out that Jewel had recently cut 450 cars from its Midwest fleet. Now, the grocery chain’s employees are paid for the miles they drive and must cover their own insurance. "We would benefit tremendously from that system," McAndrew said.

If Glenview needed money so badly, he added, why not ask Abt. Under a 15-year agreement, half of sales tax revenues that would normally flow from Abt to the village are returned to the store. McAndrew thought the store should be willing to share some of that cash.

Lyle Cazell began his testimony with a bit of history, telling the trustees that before most of them were born he was flying bombing missions over Europe. Now, as a senior citizen with a limited income, he thought the village should spare him a sales tax increase.

He predicted new businesses would not come here and those that had recently opened at The Glen Town Center would struggle if the total sales tax rose to 9 cents on the dollar – as it might with a local and county-wide increase.

"A sales tax is regressive. It impacts low-income families most. I wonder if the village board knows that or cares," he said, adding that he had seen no effort on the part of village government to become more efficient, productive or thrifty. Cazell said he would welcome comments from the board, but no one wanted to acknowledge or address his complaints.

Trustee Jeff Lerner had said he would support the one percent sales tax hike – not because he agreed that it was needed but because he did not want to be an "obstructionist." The Watch joked that this community should take up a collection and buy him a spine for Christmas.

On Tuesday, after hearing from the boys at Abt, Lerner seemed to find his courage. "When the largest taxpayer in your town comes to you and says you may put us out of business, especially after they’ve invested their life’s savings a year and a half ago, I think it behooves us to re-evaluate what we’re doing. His concern should be our concern." Lerner went on to attack the process by which Village Manager McCarthy extracted early support for the sales tax increase. "One of the things that’s troubled me with the entire budget is that we were presented from the beginning with just two options – raise the property tax or raise the sales tax. I don’t think we’ve been offered the option to eliminate things, to go through this budget line by line."

Trustee Mary Beth Denefe agreed. "This is why we have public hearings – to get comments from residents and from merchants who do business. It seems to me we need to do a balancing act here. That’s what this is about. Residents want quality of life. They want sidewalks and other things that make Glenview a great town to live in, and we need to balance those interests with other concerns we’ve heard tonight. She proposed delaying acquisition of the Geographical Information System for a year and bumping the sales tax up one half of one percent.

The board then voted to go with the smaller number and delay purchase of GIS. With Cook County raising its sales tax .25 percent, Glenview’s total will stand at 8.75 percent on the dollar.

Editor’s note: The village board is elected to represent the interests of residents, so it’s particularly disturbing that the questionable complaints of a merchant got our trustees to do what the plight of senior citizens and moderate-income families did not. Cazell and McAndrew were dismissed without a word of debate, but the points they made were valid. If the village really needs more money, it’s time to look for internal efficiencies at Village Hall rather than raising taxes again.

Another member of the public stepped up to ask for enough money in the 2004 budget to connect Glenview’s sidewalks and bike paths. Glen resident Steven Cole presented about 250 petition signatures in support of that cause. "We think it’s important that adults and children in the community be able to move around the village safely on bicycles, in strollers, on skate boards and in wheelchairs if necessary without having to go into traffic – without being worried about a sidewalk abruptly ending."

Cole urged Carlson to make this a priority next year – to create an integrated and comprehensive plan to connect sidewalks and bike paths. He urged the village to contact county, state and neighboring government officials if their cooperation was needed to build sidewalks along streets not controlled by Glenview.

Carlson stressed that the 2004 budget contained $60,000 for sidewalks along arterial streets where none exist and asked public works director Bill Porter to elaborate. Ignoring the fact that key access streets to The Glen are not scheduled to get sidewalks, Porter said asphalt shoulders along Lake Avenue would be replaced west of Patriot to the Tri-state overpass, tying into existing sidewalks on Milwaukee Avenue. He said the new Haverford development along Willow Road would add a small stretch of sidewalk, and he thought there was money to build connecting paths from Patriot to Shermer and to close a gap in Landwehr’s sidewalk leading to Winkelman School.

Editor’s note: This is a substantial issue for neighborhoods all over town. Members of Willowbrook Schools’ PTA signed Cole’s petition. So did residents of Glen Oak Acres and south Glenview. With Park Center, a new Metra station and The Glen Town Center at The Glen, everyone wants pedestrian access so they and their kids can get there safely. People who ride bikes want to reach Gallery Park where they can enjoy a spin around the lake. Likewise, kids at The Glen need to reach Glenbrook South High School, Westbrook Elementary and the Plaza del Prado. Many would find it convenient to use Shermer or West Lake avenues, but there are substantial sections of those streets that lack sidewalks or bike paths. The $60,000 in next year’s budget is a meager bone from a board that should be more concerned with such grass roots issues. A comprehensive plan for safe bike and pedestrian travel should be crafted and funded by the village board.

NEWS FROM THE NEIGHBORS

– After five years of pushing the idea, Northbrook’s village manager has decided not to support a river walk there. Mark Damisch said he would not object if a private developer wanted to do the honors but is no longer willing to spend $384,000 up on the project. He denies the decision is linked to a recent community poll showing two-thirds of area residents didn’t want to spend anything to build the walk.

– Wilmette has restored a large mural in the lobby of its post office. The work, "On the Soil Is Our Worth," was commissioned during the Great Depression by the federal government. Decades of dirt had left the farm scene looking drab with green skies and yellow-brown clouds according to the local newspaper, but Wilmette Life reports three days of deep cleaning gave the work a fresh new look.

– Want to learn more about construction of that new security wall in Israel? Join Kymberlie Quong Charles of the American Friends Service Committee at the Evanston Public Library to view photos and maps and discuss the human rights consequences of the barrier. Her talk begins at 7 p.m. Tuesday, December 9.

– If you have yet to purchase a 2004 wall calendar, Glenview’s talented nature photographer Carol Freeman is again offering a collection of her work in calendar form. It’s called "In Beauty, I Walk" and is available for $10. For more information, e-mail carol@freemandesign.com

– The Sybaris, Glenview’s hot pillow hotel on Milwaukee Avenue, had hoped to advertise gift cards with a 3'x4' banner out front, but the village board rejected their request.

READERS WRITE

EB applauds Trustee Lerner’s call for a line-by-line review of Glenview’s budget: "Miracles do happen! Trustee Jeff Lerner finally spoke the words many of us have longed to hear. ‘We trustees were given no options. Either raise property taxes or sales tax. I think its time we looked at the line items of the budget.’ After those remarks the board was able to eliminate a costly expenditure and cut the sales tax increase by half. It’s time for trustees to stop being rubber stamps for management and staff. To date, Trustee Mike Guinane has been the only one who dared to question excess expenditures."

DG responds to our story about Glenview police getting two dozen calls involving BB guns and air rifles – items now being sold at The Glen: "I urge residents to contact the village board and Galyans store manager (847-730-7400) if they want the store to stop selling air guns. Before the police end up responding to a call that involves an injury due to one of these guns, this issue needs to be addressed. Galyans provides easy access to these guns in a residential are near a school."

LA wonders what’s with the holiday decorations and the street lights: "Once again this year the holiday lights north of Lake Avenue on Waukegan are not lit, but there was plenty of money for decorations at Hooverville – aka The Glen. There, however, the street lights are out along Patriot in front of The Glen Town Center, with the busy intersections at Independence, Chestnut and W. Lake completely dark. It’s an accident waiting to happen. And Chestnut is a real obstacle course in the dark, going from three lanes to two with headlights coming at you and curb placements that should keep the body shops in business for years."

Our new online background pleased those who have found our original chartreuse too hard on the eyes: "I like your new color. The last letter you published on people running for office for different boards was an interesting thought! Love reading the Glenview Watch."

A Watch reader from Boston writes: "My folks still live in Glenview, so I visit often. I attended my 30th GBS reunion this past fall and felt much more up to date on Glenview issues because I read the Watch."

ALF at The Glen suggests a shuttle: "I am a resident of the Cambridge development. I commute downtown and walk about six blocks to the train. Has there ever been a thought for a shuttle for the community. It could be a big money maker if it served the entire Glen at designated pick-up/drop-off points. It could be used for other purposes too, like the Park Center. Don't get me wrong, I like walking to the train, but when it is eight below, it would be nice to be picked up at the corner."

Biff Thiele was irked by Library Board President Mark Grant’s letter in this month’s official publication: "Mr. Grant repeated the story the board wants the public to accept – that it will be cheaper to build new at The Glen – while ignoring the savings of $15 million-$20 million to be realized while staying at the current location. We don’t need four stories at the current site as Grant suggests. We need to move the post office to maximize savings to the taxpayers and to enhance the public’s choice. Grant and the board need to look at options which respect those wishes, rather than looking for any and all excuses to deny that preference. The process and the board’s decision are forever flawed, unless officials address the legitimate concerns and suggestions of residents. Until that time, they should not pretend to be doing this for our sake. By ignoring the opposition, clearly they are not."

And a computer-aged guy wonders if a big library’s really needed in Glenview: "Our library board refuses to accept that most residents it represents do not want a Taj Mahal library at The Glen. Board members also fail to recognize that home computer growth reduces trips to the library. And in two separate surveys, 60 percent and more of Glenview residents resoundingly preferred a library at the downtown location. Instead of acting on that information, the board manipulated its latest survey with lower Glen costs than a downtown location while deliberately omitting the lowest cost choice: Namely, a renovated existing library and two-story east side addition with both ground level and underground parking at the Epco site. Northbrook, Niles, Wilmette, Mount Prospect and other towns have renovated and added-on at existing locations. But our library board wants a huge, expensive building at The Glen, same size as the large library in Evanston, a town with twice the population of Glenview! They also want Glenview residents to pay double the cost for a Glen library than for library expansion at its present location, but refuse to publicly mention or acknowledge it. Living in Glenview (not The Glen) with three school-age computer-savvy children, we say to Chairman Grant and the board: Stop manipulating us and start leveling with us. Join maverick library Trustee Johnson in recognizing and acting on the realities."

YOUR TURN: Write to glenviewwatch@aol.com or 3537 Maple Leaf Drive, Glenview, IL 60025. If you haven’t already done so, please consider making a contribution to support The Watch. Non-deductible checks should be payable to Glenview Watch. Thanks for your support and for reading. Dean Schott and Sandy Hausman, Co-Editors.

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