The Riverside Community Caucus on Monday night announced its slate for the April 2011 consolidated elections, naming two incumbent trustees and a former member of the village’s parks and recreation board as its candidates.

Trustees Jean Sussman and Ben Sells, whom the caucus slated in 2007, will run for their second terms in office. John Scully has chosen not to seek reelection after serving two terms on the board.

Meanwhile, Joseph Ballerine is the caucus’ third candidate. A longtime volunteer and co-founder with Sells of the Riverside Friends of the Fourth, Ballerine is a former chairman of the Riverside Parks and Recreation Board, which was dissolved by village trustees in September.

While the September vote “probably pushed me over the edge,” said Ballerine, he insisted he is “not an agenda candidate.”

“This is something I’ve been thinking about for the last few years,” Ballerine said. “I think the time is right. My goal is not to go in there and fight, but to foster an environment where we can have respectful and meaningful debate.”

Ballerine is not new to the village board. He served two years as a trustee, appointed by then-President Paul Stack. He’s been especially visible within recreation circles as a former president, board member and coach for Riverside Little League and his many years on the village’s recreation board.

Prior to being elected to the village board in 2007, Sussman was chairwoman of the Riverside Zoning Board of Appeals and served on the village’s Plan Commission. As a trustee she’s been an organizer of the Riverside Arts Fair and is the board’s liaison for zoning and planning.

Sussman has Ph.D. in agricultural and applied economics and is retired after serving as a director for Quaker Oats and Pepsi Co. Sussman was believed to be on the fence with respect to running for a second term. She said she wanted to run for re-election because “there’s unfinished work on planning, the budget, the future and making sure the village’s organization is strong for the future.”

“I look forward to open board communication about present issues and about planning for the future,” Sussman said.

As the board’s liaison to the park board, Sells advocated against dissolving the recreation board.

With Ballerine, he started the petition drive that put an advisory referendum on the November ballot regarding the rec board, and he worked with Ballerine and others to create the Riverside Friends of the Fourth after the village cut funding for its traditional July 4 celebration two years ago.

Sells has also worked to help organize a pair of downtown beautification efforts with the Landscape Advisory Commission.

By BOB UPHUES
Editor : Riverside Brookfield Landmark
http://www.rblandmark.com/main.asp?SectionID=1&SubSectionID=1&ArticleID=6704&TM=76515.55

The forum will be rebroadcast prior to the election on Riverside Channel 6 on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays at 8 a.m. and 1 p.m., and on Sundays, Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays at 8 p.m. RCA’s candidates took the first swings of the day, first with presidential candidate Michael Gorman attempting to blame his opponent Kevin Smith for bringing the downtown TIF and failed property tax referendum to Riverside, saying Smith had “proposed the TIF” and had threatened to cut police and fire staffing if voters didn’t go along with the proposed tax increase. Within minutes, RCA trustee candidate Mark Shevitz dusted off records he obtained in February from the Cook County Clerk showing that the Riverside Party’s Kelly Navarro and Tony Miezio and independent Alex Gallegos had missed voting in several elections, including local races, in recent years.

“We’ve had one group of people running this town,” said Shevitz, referring to the Riverside Community Caucus, which slates candidates for office, “and it’s clear they’ve run out of touch.”

Smith responded to Shevitz immediately, commenting that the RCA candidates had decided “to go negative” and stated that RCA’s candidates had less to do with the demise of the TIF than he did. The village board voted unanimously to cut off funding for the TIF prior to an advisory referendum that spring.

“What we need are people who define themselves by what they’re for, not what they’re against,” said Smith, who also disputed the RCA’s notion that their group was responsible for the overwhelming defeat of the tax referendum, likening it to “taking credit for the sun coming up in the morning.” After RCA trustee candidate James Reynolds stated that the village board had increased spending 47 percent since 2001, both Miezio and Smith blasted the statement as misinformed and a half-truth.

“Either the RCA doesn’t understand how to read a balance sheet or they’re misinforming voters,” Miezio said. Smith said that the increase in spending was directly attributable to infrastructure improvements to roads, the historic water tower and water and sewer systems. The road improvement funds were approved by voters in 2004.

“How would you have fixed the roads, the sewer system and the water tower?” Smith asked. “Would you have renovated them or let them crumble?”RCA’s candidates repeated their message of taking apart the village budget line by line to find economies to prevent the loss of services to residents.

Gorman called the plan “working harder with less,” while trustee candidate Lonnie Sacchi said while there’s no “holy grail” for saving money, he asked that the village make sure “we’re getting the right amount of payback on what we’re spending.”

Reynolds came closest to a specific recommendation in response to a question regarding replacing veteran village staff with more junior employees.”Our current village manager came to us as an assistant village manager,” Reynolds said. “In this economy you can find second-level or aspiring top-level people who will work for equal or lesser amounts.”

Smith criticized that point of view later in the forum calling the RCA philosophy one in which “they’re interested in bringing us a cheaper product.”"This is a quality community,” Smith said, “and we need quality services.” The two sides also sparred over use of the village’s general operating reserve, with Riverside Party candidates insisting that the money be set aside for impending emergencies like the arrival of the emerald ash borer. ”What is important is that we are stewards,” Smith said. “We’re not here just to make sure green spaces are kept up or that trees are in the right alignment, but to make sure we have any trees at all.”

Shevitz, meanwhile, while admitting he thought the emerald ash borer was a “dire threat” said he would encourage looking at outside grant funding for that battle and not focus so much on the general fund reserves. ”We shouldn’t worry about spending down that money,” Shevitz said.

Regarding the central business district, Riverside Party trustee candidate David Lesniak said Riverside needed to reach out more to the businesses community to attract business to Riverside. He disputed the RCA notion that businesses in downtown Riverside should serve Riverside first. ”If businesses thought they could make it here, they’d already be here,” Lesniak said.

Navarro, meanwhile, said she would support hiring someone to manage economic development in Riverside, but hat revenue the village realized from such a position would have to pay for that salary. ”We just can’t sit and hope people will come here,” Navarro said.

Reynolds used Olmsted as his guide regarding downtown business development. ”Olmsted did have a plan for a downtown, one meeting the immediate needs of residents,” he said. “That’s what we need now – nothing more, nothing less. Those are the kinds of businesses we can support.”

Gallegos made his pitch to revitalize the downtown and help stabilize the recreation department by turning Guthrie Park into a mini-Ravinia, with concerts and other live entertainment.

“No other candidate has come up with a plan to revitalize the downtown,” Gallegos said.

By BOB UPHUES
Riverside Landmark 3/17/2009

Candidates at the March 4 forum in Riverside batted around topics from finances to preserving the village’s historic landscape and gave insights into their positions not previously discussed publicly.

The forum, sponsored by the Landmark and moderated by the LaGrange Area League of Women Voters, drew a standing room crowd of between 140 and 150 to the auditorium of the Riverside Township Hall. Divided into two parts, the audience got to hear first from presidential candidates Kevin Smith and Michael Gorman and later from all seven candidates for trustee.

While the broad campaign themes of the Riverside Community Alliance and The Riverside Party were familiar, there were moments of insight into ways candidates would approach confronting tough decisions posed by economic conditions.

First, neither Gorman nor Smith views a property tax increase as a realistic solution to Riverside’s financial situation, which according to the latest numbers from the finance department shows the village eating well into its general fund financial reserves and falling below a reserve of 25 percent of expenditures by the end of 2011.

Gorman said the village’s cash reserves are sufficient and that they could be used “without spending down the reserves to put the village in any jeopardy.”

One specific area where Gorman said the line might be held is within the police department. The village has budgeted for 19 sworn officers, but has within the past several years operated at less than full strength.

Gorman stated that the department has worked with an average of 17.85 officers over the past seven years with outstanding results.

“We’ve had 18 for the past six years,” said Gorman, who indicated he would seek input from residents on what the optimum number of officers should be. “I don’t know how many officers we need. We’ll decide what’s best for the village. We’ll ask what you need.”

Smith, meanwhile, said the department was not fully funded and that an understaffed police department was not feasible in the long run. He said the village’s one detective was not sufficient to handle a case load that in 2008 saw the number of property crimes skyrocket.

Rather than cutting staffing, Smith said he would advocate lobbying state legislators to change rules for police pension funding, which suck funds from operations.

“We can work with the state to take the burden off communities and take the money we have and use it for the public safety we need,” Smith said.

Asked how they would approach balancing the village budget in coming years, the candidates stayed close to previous messages. Gorman reiterated that there was a way to make budget cuts and find “new ways of doing things,” but offered no specifics beyond cutting down on the use of consultants, reining in no-bid contracts and not using village funds for purposes he doesn’t believe are needed, such as the purchase of two homes on Burlington Street to provide additional parking for the downtown business district.

Smith said he had a proven record on Riverside’s budget, saying he was responsible for crafting $400,000 in cuts from the 2009 budget to bring it into balance.

“I led the drive to cut $400,000 from the village’s budget,” said Smith, who added that he had asked Gorman many times for specific input on areas to trim, to no avail.

“It was a lonely battle.”

One clear difference in the ways candidates approached the forum was evident particularly in the trustees’ portion of the event. Riverside Community Alliance candidates James Reynolds, Lonnie Sacchi and Mark Shevitz worked as a team, reading scripted statements and complementing each other’s answers.

The Riverside Party candidates of Kelly Navarro, David Lesniak and Anthony Miezio, as well as independent Alex Gallegos, relied more on extemporaneous statements and spoke as individuals rather than as a cohesive political party.

A new idea coming from the RCA camp, echoed by both Shevitz and Sacchi, was the notion of creating an autonomous forestry department reporting directly to the village manager instead of to public works. No one suggested a method of funding that change or what the financial implications might be.

Miezio said any changes in strategy for maintaining green spaces should not come without input from the Frederick Law Olmsted Society and Landscape Advisory Commission and had to look at the potential impact of an emerald ash borer or gypsy moth infestation.

That threat was cited specifically by Navarro as a reason why the village could not afford to tap into its cash reserves to balance future budgets.

All of the candidates found common ground regarding the importance of saving the Arcade Building and facilitating a private sale of the property. Similarly all of them felt the village should explore consolidating village services whenever possible.

With respect to downtown business development, the boldest proposal came from Gallegos, who works at a Burlington Street bank and emphasized the need to generate foot traffic for businesses.

Gallegos advocated the recreation department organizing and finding sponsorship dollars for an outdoor arts venue in Guthrie Park, which he envisioned as a smaller version of the North Shore’s Ravinia.

RCA’s trustee candidates stressed that they would hire a business development specialist to market the downtown business district, while Navarro said she favored “reasonable incentives” to promote economic development. She also said the village needed “to work with existing businesses to enhance what’s there.”

Reynolds suggested talking to current successful business owners for information on how businesses can thrive in Riverside and advocated attracting niche retailers that serve residents’ needs.

Lesniak said it was important for Riverside residents to determine the kind of downtown they’d like to see to give the village an idea of who to reach out to in their economic development efforts.

“We have to reach out and ask, ‘What do you want? What will you support?’” Lesniak said.

Riverside Landmark 3/10
BOB UPHUES
Editor

1. The RCA claims it can “control spending and improve how Riverside provides services”. (Letter to the Editor, Landmark, 3 Sept 2008) How? Mr. Gorman served on the Long Term Finance Committee and had unlimited access to the Village’s financial records.

What costs would you cut?

How will you improve service levels if you cut personnel?

Do you favor spending Village reserves to balance its operational budget? If so, how will you provide for capital expenditures and how will you pay for expenses such as the gypsy moth infestation and the looming threat of the emerald ash borer that threaten our forests?

2. The RCA was silent during this year’s budget discussions even though its candidates were repeatedly asked for input. Why did you remain silent? What is your opinion of the 2009 budget and what would you have done differently?

3. The RCA claims it can “Lower Taxes” (R CA Flyer, 31 January 2009). How?

4. The RCA claims that it supports our Parks and Recreation Department. However, its candidates have long records of opposition to the Parks and Recreation Department, and have decried public use of the parks for recreation. The RCA’s most vocal supporters want to eliminate the Parks and Recreation Department, and oppose any government funding for recreational programs, deriding them as “frivolous.” Which is it?

Are you in favor of government support for the Parks and Recreation Department?

Do you support public active recreational use of our parks?

5. The RCA says that its entire slate needs to be elected to implement its agenda and that it will block vote to do so. If so,

What is the role of the existing trustees? Are they irrelevant?

What happens if one of the RCA candidates disagrees with Mr. Gorman?

What happens if your whole slate doesn’t get elected?

6. The RCA opposed funding for a second detective (which would have brought what is supposed to be a 21 officer Police Department to 20 officers). And yet it claims it will maintain, “and where possible,” enhance public safety levels. How?

7. The RCA has criticized the community-based caucus process for choosing The Riverside Party candidates, calling it “a closed process.” (Landmark, 11 February 2009) How were the RCA candidates chosen?

8. You claim that The Riverside Party is “led by a Trustee who has pledged to continue the policies of the current Village Board.” No such pledge has ever been made by any sitting Trustee, much less Mr. Smith. On what do you base this allegation?

9. The RCA says that it is going to “ debunk the rumors and non-truths being spread by our opponents,” and that “Riverside deserves a discussion of issues, not dissemination of innuendo.” What are you talking about?

Riverside presidential candidate Kevin Smith turned up the heat last week, challenging his opponent to shed light on his professional background.

Michael Gorman, who is running for president under the Riverside Community Alliance banner, responded by calling Smith’s challenge a stunt and the call for transparency “ironic.”

On Friday, Smith said that as part of The Riverside Party’s pledge to make government more transparent, he listed online links to information about his licensure as an attorney as well as his salary.”

And if you’re interested in knowing about my trial work, with a little creative ‘googling’ you can find that information,” too,” wrote Smith in a release he titled “Transparency Begins at Home.”

Smith is a supervisor in the Cook County Office of the Public Defender.

The call for transparency comes on the heels of the Riverside Community Alliance’s call for Riverside government to operate in a more transparent fashion. For Smith, the call for transparency cuts both ways.”

I’ve been involved in public service for 35 years, and it comes with public review” said Smith in a separate interview. “It’s pretty clear where I’ve been for the last 35 years.”

The implication is that the public does not know where Gorman has been during that time, an intimation that made Gorman bristle. Provided the text of Smith’s release last week, Gorman responded with one of his own.”

This is candidate Smith’s third village election, and to the best of my knowledge this is the first time he has been forced to address transparency in Riverside government,” Gorman stated. “It makes me wonder why he didn’t feel the same way about transparency for the past eight years as a village trustee.”

Gorman called Smith’s challenge “a typical caucus political tactic” that doesn’t “focus on the real issues.”Smith said he wasn’t making any accusations against Gorman.”It’s not accusatory,” Smith said. “It’s a suggestion that the playing field should be level. You can criticize what we do, but it’s out there. I find when people say things to me, they suggest they think they know me. I don’t know if they have the same sense of Mr. Gorman.”

Gorman, who is retired, states in his response to Smith’s challenge that he is an attorney with an active license dating back to 1979, and that he worked as an attorney in the private sector as an in-house corporate counsel. He also states he is a certified public accountant, who actively practiced from 1973-76.

A check of Illinois professional licensing records indicate that Gorman’s law license is active and that he was licensed as a public accountant through 1986; he is not currently licensed as a certified public accountant.”

Gorman expressed amazement at Smith’s challenge, calling his statements “innuendo.”"It’s clear innuendo on my integrity,” Gorman said. “I want to turn the answer back where it belongs, which is back on the issues.”

Meanwhile, candidates running for president and trustee under the Riverside Community Alliance banner, including Gorman and trustee candidates Mark Shevitz, James Reynolds and Lonnie Sacchi are holding a town hall meeting in Room 30 (on the third floor) of the Riverside Township Hall, 27 Riverside Road, on Sunday, Feb. 22 at 3 p.m.

Riverside Landmark 2/3
By BOB UPHUES
Editor