Have you ever noticed how sometimes trying to get a straight answer is like trying to pull teeth. It happens all the time, and most often when trying to get an answer from a government official, especially at the local level. What is a bit unusual is when a government official, in this case Naperville councilman Doug Krause is trying to get a straight answer from Mark Curran, the Naperville Public Utilities Director of Electric.
It happened during the January 15 Naperville city council meeting when Krause asked Curran where the money is coming from in order to pay for over $1.5 million of additional expense for the ill-conceived Naperville Smart Meter project. Trying to get a straight answer from Curran was like a parent (Krause) trying to get a straight answer from a teenager (Curran) who ducks, dodges, and deflects repeated efforts by Krause for Curran to ‘come clean’ and be honest with the council, and with Naperville residents.
Watch and listen as councilman Doug Krause uses persistence to extract the truth from Curran.
Curran’s first response is ‘the capital fund’, then he says it comes from ‘some other projects’, then it moves to ‘borrowing’ and ‘bonds’, and then finally the truth is revealed ….it’s coming from increased electric rates; in other words, it’s coming from the residents and businesses of Naperville.
In defense of Mark Curran, it must be very difficult trying to defend the indefensible. It’s his job to make a ‘bad deal’ sound like a ‘good deal’, and try to get everyone to buy into it. Ironically he is getting the residents to ‘buy’ into a bad deal by raising the electric rates.
Other than his performance on the Naperville Electoral Board, councilman Krause has almost consistently been a voice for the residents of Naperville. Not one other council member can come close to Krause’s efforts for the residents of Naperville.
Obviously councilman Krause knew the answer, as did everyone who has followed the Naperville Smart Grid Initiative. Give councilman Krause credit for shinning a light on the truth.
Mr. Kraus is neither fish nor fowl. With respect to the smart meter fiasco he voted for it while seeming to defend citizen’s rights to protest via a non-bidding resolution then orchestrating a scheme to disqualify a significant number of petitioners by saying he reviewed the names on the petitions. Further he then voted to disqualify the petition while our half-awake and totally brain dead mayor went along for the ride.
He is a sheep in wolf’s clothing and one should be very careful in entrusting him with information or expecting him to protect our freedoms, financial fiduciary responsibilities and now our right to have term limits and district councilmen.
You know a person by what he does not what he says! His past votes on these issues speak for themselves. He wants to be the next mayor and is playing both sides of the coin.
The more I learn about this project, its implementation and the behavior of our elected officials, the more betrayed and disgusted I feel. Beyond that, at this moment, I am speechless.