If you’re a fan of Judge Judy, you know it’s one of the few places where the good guys usually win, and the not-so good guys (also known as idiots) get embarrassed on national television. Not only do they lose the case, they get publicly humiliated from coast to coast.
Judge Judy doesn’t like hearsay; information received from other people that can not be adequately substantiated. President Ronald Reagan brought to life the old Russian proverb, ‘trust but verify’. A very wise piece of advice indeed.
It’s a piece of advice that Naperville city officials did not follow recently, when city manager Doug Krieger and mayor Steve Chirico discussed news with a reporter about a new grocery store (Fresh Market) opening in northwest Naperville, which appeared in the local newspaper last Wednesday.
The only problem is that it wasn’t accurate. Fresh Market is coming to Naperville on the far southeast part of Naperville near Rt. 59 and 95th street, not at the reported location of the former Dominick’s store on North Aurora Road.
The problem started when a sign was incorrectly placed on the former Dominick’s property announcing the future opening of Fresh Market. A picture of the sign was posted on social media, and then sent to Krieger and Chirico. This was followed by the interview, the story went to press, and the news hit the streets. Oops inaccurate information was trusted, while nobody took the time to verify the facts of the story.
What’s the big deal, it’s just a sign with wrong information being reported and published and everybody passing the buck. The problem is that trusting without verifying is happening more and more often. How much false and inaccurate information is being passed to city officials, and then acted upon without anyone confirming its authenticity.
Does the Illinois Municipal Electric Agency ring a bell? How about sky-rocketing electric rates in Naperville? Maybe Naperville city officials should begin each meeting with the words “trust but verify”. It just might save everybody a lot of embarrassment and a lot of money.
Yes, and you bet!
Nothing will save us money except and until our elected leaders finally come to the conclusion that individual citizens who earned their money know best how to spend it. Government’s function is not to steal as much as they can get from tax payers before finally being kicked out of office.
Nor is it to build empires of people, buildings, places and things to name after themselves, reward cronies, adopt nonsensical agenda 21 items that save nothing and increase costs to the residents.
It is to be fiscally responsible, handling OUR money as if it were their own, give away nothing that is not theirs, minimize government to essentials and do away with the needless, intrusive and counter productive regulations, laws, edits as well as picking winners and losers.
Time to go back to basics and put a city manager and a council who are competent, honest, efficient and believe in our Constitution where the individual not the state is the reason for its existence not the other way around. On a federal level vote Trump to throw out the garbage and make America great again.
Oops, just received our CON March Electric Utility bill. Not only are the rates going up 8.3%, but these clowns also voted to add another line item charge (or credit) called the Purchased Power Adjustment (PPA) for the actual cost of providing power and allows the utility to better address fluctuations in the power market. Wow, they aren’t reporting any limits to this monthly charge.
PLUS an additional $1.50/month to the Customer Charge line which is another !3% increase.
Sell the Electric Utility, pay off the City debt and take away the ability for CON continually use our property taxes as an ATM.
Many of us tried to make our citizens aware of the scam our city’s business manager and our 9-0 council was perpetrating on the public re: the electric company. Now the devious, sneaky add-ons and huge increases are hitting with a vengeance and its not over yet. Since it is obvious these clowns can’t manage anything especially an electric company we should get a competent negotiator to sell the whole thing to somebody who can and cut our losses.