Meetings tonight.

I will be attending both the city council meeting tonight and the school board board meeting. I will be at the school board meeting for a short time. I will have an update on what I can from there. Then it will be off to the council meeting.

You can get updates on both here tonight.

Planning commision say's no to Walgreens.

Walgreen's was again in found of the planning commission looking to get a spot in the Kenwood area. The store has been trying for a number of years to get a store in the Kenwood area.

Every time is has been meet with rejection from neighbors and business's in the area. The planning commission however has always approved the project. The council has then declined to follow there lead. This time they did not allow the project to pass the commission.

The issues of vacating an alley which Walgreen's wants will now go in front of the city council. It would seem this has little chance of passing the council after the commission denied it.

The above is cross posted at www.duluthnewsnow.com .

I think this is a good thing. I love Walgreen's and do a lot of shopping there. I think however this would ruin the Kenwood area. It would also hurt a long standing local business. As much as I like shopping at Walgreen's I also love our local shops and try to shop at them just as much.

The big Zoo vote.

The big vote to allow the zoo to be taken over by the zoological society was last night. This was a much anticipated vote and was glad to see the council was going to vote on it. Well of course there was a new councilor appointed last night I still thought the vote should happen. This is because the councilor appointee should have been keeping up on this and all issues.

To the vote last night Tony Cuneo said he would like to see it remain on the table because he had yet more question. Now remember this has been in the news and the council has seen it for a number of weeks. The society along with the city has been ans wearing questions all along. Sharla Gardneralso said she would like to see it on the table again because she still has questions plus the union had just submitted some paper work to the council that she wanted to make sure there would be no law suites.

The vote to table passed 6-3 this is a bad because now we must wait two more weeks for a vote. When every councilor said they were in support of the society taking control of the zoo. This vote better be 8-1 I don't expect Gilbert to support this. Councilor Gardner said last night she does so she better vote that way.

Should the zooligicail society take over the zoo?

Councilors and Public if you want the zoo to have any chance of staying open you must let zoological society take over control of the zoo. The city has had control of the zoo for a number of years. Well the zoo has been getting by under management it could hopefully do much better under private ownership.

The may has already said that if the vote is against the society taking over control of the zoo then he will look at closing it. I would not consider this a bluff the Mayor has been very stead face on his disicion to balance the budget. This is to his credit. The Mayor is doing what needs to balance the budget.

The zoological society has an opportunity like none other. It will not be easy but it is better if a private organization is running the zoo. They can run it more like a business. This will open the door for looking a new ways to improve the zoo.

The society understands the project they are taking over and I believe they have a good starting plan.

Councilors public this is simple if you don't want the zoo then don't let the society take control of the zoo. If this happens it would be tragic.

The city will be forced to close the zoo if the society does not take over. It is that simple. They can ill-effort continue with the zoo.

post coming this weekend.

I will have quite a bit about the zoo. On Monday there could be a vote on whether or not the zoological society will take over the zoo or not. There is a lot to this story. Stay tuned.

New council president.

This years council president will be Greg Gilbert. This was not much of a surprise because he said he will not run for re-election. Being president was something he had hoped to do before his term ended. To no shock to me the council gave him that chance.

There is no vice president yet. They will fill after an appointment is made for the open council seat. I am guessing it will be either Stauber or Fedora. I know that councilor Fedora had said he had planned on running. I don't know about councilor Stauber.

Thank you Roger Rienert.

I had a great chance tonight to thank Roger for serving on the city council. We did not always agree but I told him I believe he is (was) one of the best councilors ever. He conducts him self professionally and is very respectful. I also believe that his middle of the road stands on many issues will be missed.

I wish him the best as a State Rep now and as I said to him tonight I hope he can get more attain to Duluth for the capitol.

Just a reminder.

State of the City is on Monday. It will take place at the DECC. The Mayor's speech will start at 6:30 pm, as the council meeting will take place first at 6pm.

Council pay cut.

Former police chief Eli Miletich think the councils pay should be cut in half. Well I am not opposed in part to this, I do have a few issues with it.

If we are going to talk about cuts to elected officials then the first place we need to look is the top official and that is the Mayor. Regard less of who that is then maybe you can talk about others taking a pay cut. We then need to look at not elected officials pay chief administrator pay is insane. If these two things were to happen then you can come and talk to me about council decreasing there pay.

I also believe that if there is an increase or decrease in pay to any elected office the citizens should vote on it.

Don Ness

Mayor of Duluth Don Ness believes that this is the year that we change the course of histories in our country and the city. He said in a wish for 2009 to the Duluth News Tribune published yesterday in Northland Forum part of the paper.

One would think the Mayor believes the change will come because of who was elected President. Yet as Barack Obama makes his cabinet choices it is much of the same that President Clinton had. Were is the change from politics as normal? I am not as optimistic that we will see a huge change in our countries politics.

I think we could possible see change in the way our city is ran. As we have seen Mayor Ness do what is necessary in his short time as Mayor to date. I am hoping the Mayor Ness continues with the tough decisions that face our city. Understand that many people and special interest groups will be unhappy with them. I also hop that he sticks to the promise he has made to the city council and work to get to a pay as you go system and not bond for everything.

14% levy increase.

Well there was no one at last nights meeting that spoke against any part of the levy increase. All of the levy increases passed by a 5-4 vote. Those that voted against them were councilor Stauber, Fedora, Fossile, and Krause. These are the five that supported it councilor Gardner, Cuneo, Anderson, and Gilbert.

I am getting sick of people just complaining and not doing anything. It is time for people to start going to the meeting and voicing there thoughts. It is time for people to call and email councilors. There is a reason these councilors listen to special interest groups. One is money the next is they are the most vocal.

Tonight's council meeting.

Tonight's council meeting is a very importation one. If you care about your taxes that you need to attend the meeting.

On the schedule is were to set your tax levy. One proposal wants to set it at a 14% increase. Regardless of were you are on this issue get to the meeting. I hope you are for lower taxes in the economic time.

No council meeting tonight.

As many of you know there is no council meeting tonight. Next week however is the big one they will be setting the levy. I encourage anyone concerned to attend the meeting.

After first interviews.

Well now that the filing is closed for Rienerts seat it is on to interviews. After tonight's meeting nothing seems clear except for the first part. There will be interviews Dec. 11th starting at 6pm all the people will be interviewed.

After that it now seems it could be unclear as to what happens next as a councilor raised a concern about how to and how many people should be in the final vote. Well the chair of the committee thought she may have had it figured out it may not be. With question asked by councilor Fedora. He asked how many rounds of vote there would and when the final vote was up how many would there be left. Gardner said that would be five or six. Councilor Fedora thinks there should be more.

There for at this point tell it is all worked it is unclear as to what will go on. The other thing we do is that there will be at least one more interview process.

At 3pm we sit at 25.

With an hour and half to go to the closing of filing for the city council seat we sit at 25 people wanting it. Many thought there would be 50 to 60 people that would have filed for the seat.

The way it is set up now is they will interview everyone once. Then they will have to eliminate the list down to 12 and then they would interview again.

Here is who I think the top 12 could be keep in mind that this is before the first interviews however. In no particular order.

Mike Akervik

Jack Arnold

Ronald D. DeGrio

Gary E. Eckenberg

Becky Hall

Daniel Hartman

Scott Keenan

Russell Stover

John Rathe

Jon L. Donahue

Maureen Booth

Jay Cole

This is just a quick look over the names check back later for more.

******UPDATE****** 4:15pm

The list now at 31 and I think it will be hard to pick a top 12 there for I will most likely not have finale top 12 list till after he first interviews and I hear what everyone says. Do I think I could be in the top 12? Yes I do.

4:45pm filing is closed and the number is at 35 more later.

Truth and taxation meeting

The meeting is tomorrow (Monday). at city hall. Go if you are concerned about your taxes. Even if you don't speak show up. Meeting starts at 7pm.

Was the vote decided before hand.

There has been questions on the vote last night about land sale on Park Point. Some seem to think that two councilors promised the there vote in favor of the land sale. why is this? They (she) seems to think that they would normally support something like this. The councilors in question are Tony Cuneo and Jeff Anderson.

Now in a normal situation would Cuneo and Anderson support this no. The better question is would any councilor most likely not. We are not in a normal situation however. Our city is facing huge finical troubles for this year and beyond.

I believe times will not be as bad for citizens and business in our area as it will in many other parts of the state and around the country over the next few month. I do however thing the city government will continue on in a dismal budget situation if we don't take the steps needed now.

This is why councilors Anederson and Cuneo voted for the land sale they understand this. Well councilor Gardner does not. This was about what was best for Duluth it had nothing to do with buying votes like Gardner wants you to think. This is just yet another attempt to make her look good to her supporters. Yet she puts the city at jeopardy with her vote.

BREAKING NEWS: Duluth City Council Approved Land Sale on Park Point.

The Duluth City Council has approved the land sale of three parcels on Park Point. The 6-3 vote helps with the city budget. Should this have failed it would have for sure meant more city cuts and layoffs for the remained of 2008 and beyond.

The sale of the land was meet with some opposition tonight, the small group also fired out false accusations that councilors had promised the administration there vote no matter what. There was a small group of about six citizens at tonight's meeting the did not want the land sales to occur. Well no one spoke in favor of the land sale at tonight's meeting.

When it came time for the councilors to comment most of them did not like the idea of selling the land. Councilor Anderson went as far as saying it was bad practice for the council do this. He then voted in favor of the land sale. Those that joined councilor Anderson were Fedora, Cuneo, Kruase, Stauber, Foslie. The three that voted against the land sale were councilors Gardner, Reinert and Gilbert. Councilor Gilbert went as far as saying these single home project could be as bad as beacon point project was.

Council filing started today.

Those interesting in filing for Roger Reinerts council seat could start to do so today. I know of a few that did already pick up there application well others have not as of yet. You have to the first of December to pick up an application and return it to the clerks office.

Who will get Reinert's seat?

As many of you know Roger Reinert will be replacing Mike Jaros for the state 7b seat. Jaros did not run for re-election. This will leave his seat open on the council.

You may also know that I have said I will file and I will very soon. Now understand that there will be a lot of people filing for this seat. I am excited about this opportunity well I think it will be very hard for me to receive the appointment I look forward to the next few weeks.

Some say I have no chance well that may or may not be true. We will find out in the end. Many are seem to basing this on what they think they know about me. I many times wish people would talk to me before they toss a label on me or anyone for that fact.

Anyway stay here for updates.