Peoria resident airs grievances over city decisions

A little less than a year ago myself and fellow neighbors witnessed a huge amount of truck traffic on Beardsley Road in violation of City Code 14-76. The majority of that traffic was the hauling of fill with the destination being the project on the northeast corner of 83rd and Happy Valley.

I formed a group of residents and had over 50 signatures on a petition to the city to enforce the city codes and route the traffic to Tessmer Road.

We received a reply from the mayor’s office that we would have a meeting, but calendars were in conflict and the meeting was scheduled for four weeks in the future. Coincidently, one week before the meeting the traffic was rerouted, and the loads of fill were satisfied at the end of that week.

We were promised a meeting face to face with the mayor. As we entered the room for the meeting it was communicated he would not be attending, and we refused to deal with the bureaucrats that were present. The mayor's assistant left me a voice message that I recorded stating I was disrespectful. My point is this: It appears that the city was salivating on the fact that the project would generate more tax revenue and looked the other way when enforcing the code.

It was recently reported in the Peoria Independent that the developer came crawling back to the city begging for concessions, which were granted. Adding to this, the developer stated the project was also being scaled back. Anyone could see that demand for the plan was flawed from the start with competition from development on Happy Valley and Lake Pleasant that stifled the attraction of additional venues.

The city purchased with our tax dollars land in P83, and thanks to your reporting, it has now been exposed that it was sold at a significant loss recently. The city should not be in the land speculation business, gambling with our hard-earned money. Developers take risks and some are rewarded, some are not. The city can just brush it off as a mistake with no consequences to the leaders that approved the purchase.

The Helicopter! Councilmembers Shafer and Dunn were shot down when asking common sense questions. The mayor's ego showed well as wanting this shiny new toy with no thoughts about carrying costs or if it was even necessary. The statement was made that it did not cost the city as we got a grant from the state. Duh! Who pays taxes to the state? We do! Question: Why not lease it and try it for a year, then decide. That's what a businessperson would do.

Full-time mayor? I understand that the voters approved the mayorship going from part-time to full-time. Our current mayor is still running his business and is AWOL. Regardless of if he is not taking a salary, which no one can confirm for me, we expect the mayor to be full-time. We are being short changed.

A 15% raise for city manager? Look at the historical increases this position has received in the past 30 months. It's appalling. The rationale was that other cities have higher pay. Why is that relevant? Just because other cities make stupid decisions, why should we?

The idea of a Peoria airport. Ego driven? Seems to be. It is my understanding that Glendale’s airport has not cash flowed since inception. Glendale taxpayers are subsidizing it even though there is more commerce surrounding it than the middle of nowhere where Peoria airport is being proposed.