Frantziz - I meant that the local businesses have been driven elsewhere by economics, and won't return if rents are too high for the meager traffic. That's what happened in Detroit - even popular restaurants moved out to the Burbs because they couldn't swing it in town. We have a town where people (and I speak of the majority here) don't want to spend more for higher quality than they are used to. Case in point - Riv Foods can't sell prime meats - no one will pay for them (or not enough people, anyway.) I hear people bitch about their prices quality and head to the Egg Store or Berwyn Fruit Market. I suspect there are a lot of people here that are strapped to pay for their homes. So I wouldn't expect to find them clamoring to pay for meals at restaurants that have to divide a much higher overhead among fewer customers. Our present landlords are not motivated to do what it takes to make these locations acceptable. Hope it changes, but.....
Riverside Info » About Riverside
What should Riverside government look like?
(25 posts)-
Posted Saturday Nov 10, 2007 14:50 #
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Riverside's main assets:
LANDSCAPE
HISTORY
SCHOOLS
Whatever we do as a governement should further these assets, and not diminish them; at a minimum, government should not harm them.
Call it the 'asset test'.
Posted Monday Nov 12, 2007 16:29 # -
Catherine, the Jenney Tour did not require our services but benefitted greatly from it. Instead of breezing through town as one of several stops, Riverside was the highlight, as befits Jenney's hometown. This is the type of service we need to step up to increase awareness of and spending in Riverside, even among our own residents, many of whom take our history and uniqueness for granted.
The Riverside Museum is an underappreciated gem, the credit for which goes to the dedication of people like Susie Bartholomew, Ann Nowatarski, to name two. The problem with the way things were done in the past was that the Historical Commission was too reliant on the extraordinary time commitment and drive of someone like Susie. People like her come along once a decade, if that often. This is not the type of commission that merely meets once a month to advise and direct, although we do that too. Consider that as a new Commissioner you must first learn the basics of museum archiving, which is something you can major in at a college. Then you must learn how to use the software, learn the collection, and the museum procedures. Now you are assigned 2-3 months per year where you must check and respond daily to the e-mails and phone messages plus work at the museum every Saturday during that month from 10-2, all the while fulfilling your specific assignment such as giving speeches and tours, creating new brochures, or entering in the death notices, property transfers and accessions on the computer. Given the demands, it is hardly surprising that we are the only commission in the Village that has gone for years without our full complement of seven commissioners, putting additional strain on us.
Now that I have bored everyone, here is my point. In spite of all that effort we needed to do more. Specifically, raise funds and better promote and accomodate historical tourism. The fundraising is directed toward making the West Wellhouse a second museum space, this time focused on exhibits, and not, as our very limited space presently demands, an archival and research facility. Having the Museum Director allows us to focus on what is now of utmost importance and relinquish the mundane but vital tasks to someone who is trained to do them. Having the Director is also the key to the Museum obtaining grants. The vast majority of grants (especially those that bestow significant funds) require the applying museum to be open a minimum number of hours per year, which would be impossible to achieve with our volunteer staff, all of whom work outside the home. Also, it is widely understood that the grant givers are less likely to bestow a grant to a museum that does not have at least some professional staff. The Museum Director is presently researching and writing grants with the help of the Commission. We are also stepping up the number of exhibits in the library, creating wide ranging programs designed to get people involved with the museum and local history, and reaching out to natural allies such as the Oak Park - River Forst Tourism Board. Coming soon, we hope to be working closely with the grade schools on a Riverside history curriculum and we will be creating a volunteer museum docent program.
Lastly, I feel the need to make a pitch for optimism and wise investment, both in terms of time and money, public and private. Doing nothing and reducing our government so it can only perform the bare minimum will lead to inevitable decline. Olmsted wrote "I have all my life been considering distant effects and sacrificing immediate success and applause to that of the future."
Posted Tuesday Nov 13, 2007 00:18 # -
I don't know how you can speak of diminishing government, decline, planning for the future and Olmsted in the context of this discussion. No money is being spent on restoring and maintaining and planning for the future of the Olmsted landscape, it is deteriorating, the bare minimum is spent on it, and it is in decline. It is always at the top of the list when budget cutting is discussed, no grass mowing, fire the forester, etc. The Olmsted landscape is the most important historical asset Riverside has. IT is the national historic landmark, not the village per se. It is also the source of property value and tax revenue. If it is not made a priority, you will have no tourism.
Jenney's hometown was in Massachusetts. The day in Riverside was part of the celebration of the centenary of his birth. A number of buildings in town are attributed to him. That with the Olmsted setting, and lunch (which they did not get), would suffice for a good day trip. There was never any plan to "breeze through" town. Did the Chicago Architectural Foundation share any proceeds with the museum, or did they take it all with them?
If the museum director pays for herself, fine. Perhaps she can get a grant to the preserve the National Historic Landscape Architecture District. I am all for history and its preservation, and you could consider this public education. But people want the full complement of police and fire, yet reducing police was on the table. People want government subsidized Recreation. No one wants their special interest cut. In that case, there should be no problem with the trustees getting a tax increase. I personally do not have a problem giving it to them.
I would note that there are two political parties dedicated to the proposition that government bloated beyond its essential purpose is itself a destructive force of both the present and the future.
Posted Tuesday Nov 13, 2007 10:08 # -
Catherine - you have enunciated that exactly right. It is the landscape that is the heritage, not the "village". the houses or the CBD. It should be a top priority. Fire engines come and go, as do Village politcians, but the landscape is the thread that remains to bind us to the past. Olmsted created this place by planting some 47,000 trees and plants, and laying out the roads that, even though it was done before the automobile, styill gives us the beauty and thrill of ever changing vistas as we motor to our mundane tasks. We should work at presrving and restoring that - every day - and if this other stuff has to suffer, well so be it. This landscape is in our trust, not to do what we think might be good at the moment, but o preserve and hand down to those that come after us.
Posted Tuesday Nov 13, 2007 12:03 # -
Just a factoid: I recall reading somewhere that Jenney lived in Riverside 15 years. For me, that is enough to claim him as a 'son'. Shoot, I want to claim Lincoln as a son, since HIS son lived in Riverside for a bit.
Posted Tuesday Nov 13, 2007 14:38 # -
This topic has been enlightening, particularly with respect to the historical museum. In my mind, a compelling case has been made by Frantzis that the limited expenditure on a museum professional could reap some pretty decent dividends. I think the Village needs a museum--not just because we are a national historical landscape landmark, but because of the significant architecture that we have and because of the significance of the Village in urban and suburban development. A grant here, a grant there, who knows what we might get. (Speaking of grants, I see in the Landmark today that the police department got a grant to conduct saturation seatbelt and child seat checks throughout the village over the next couple weeks. I know this is "found money," but it does not exactly thrill me. I'd like it if they could get a grant to help them stop people speeding down Burlington and Quincy as they cut through town (like the jackass that was tailgating me this morning on Burlington)).
I do agree with Catherine that the way the landscape ends up at the top of the budget cutting list is maddening. Was eliminating the forester really on the table? I do think we can maintain the landscape and still provide some decent recreation programs. The problem is that I'm not really sure there's much to cut in recreation(realizing that one could argue that the whole rec department could be cut)--the programs are fairly limited.
Finally, with regard to Spatny's example of Riverside Foods above. It seems to me that Riverside Food's core clientele are older Bohemians from Berwyn, who lost the grocery stores they used to shop at due to demographic change there. Look at what they offer--no prosciutto, but several kinds of prasky; plenty of iceberg lettuce, but no arugula. A separate freezer case full of frozen ducks and geese--fully stocked even in the middle of summer. I don't think anyone other than a Bohemian is cooking a duck or goose in August...
I'm being a bit glib, and probably trafficking in some gross generalizations that verge on ethnic caricature. However, I do think that there is a demographic in Riverside (and I'd argue it's the majority demographic) that would pay for a better selection of meat and produce. I suspect, however, that Riverside Foods is doing fine as it is, and we won't see this change for a few more years, until its main demographic dies off.
(And thanks for the book recommendations above)
Posted Wednesday Nov 14, 2007 12:34 # -
Well as one from a Bohemian family who was born at St. Luke's but grew up on 21st and Euclid, just a few blocks from my dad's pahramacy at 6500 Cermak before moving west, I think you may be right about some of the shoppers. They have the look of those who gave their lives to Western Electric or Ceco Steel or one of the thousands of small machine shops that used to dot the area. But since I also owned a home in Ravina, and lived in Mill Valley, Marin County, CA for almost a quarter century (and you cant' get more yuppie than that) I'm glad to still have the Bohemian restaurants arond for a once in two months dinner, and the chance to shop at Joe and Frank's or the Archer Ave. Bobak's for Central Euro specialties. The best of the bakeries (Stetina's, Charles Fingerhut) are gone (sadly) but since I just hit 70 I can tell you that caraway and poppyseed are necessary for a long and interesting life. Arugala - goes with Jicama, and rhymes with fool. Now roast goose, crispy skin with caraway on it, potato dumplings, wine kraut... and gravy, made in the pan, perfect for the 4th of July! Along with a few tankards of Pilsener and some strudel for desert - the perfect light summer lunch. Maybe some fruit dumplings on the side, rolled in sauteed bread crumbs and melted butter and cinnamon sugar dribbled over them. My aunts thought a salad was a wedge of iceberg on a plate with the bottle of Kraft french dressing to pass around. Maybe a slice of Dressel's Whip Cream Cake for dessert, a shot of sliwovitz in the black coffee, and then a nap.
When my grandmother was alive, she went for the summer to Union Pier, Michigan, where we owned a big house on the beach. Three or four of her daughters or daughters-in-law were there with her, and man, could they bake? We had a table on a big glassed in porch that sat sixteen, was covered with oil cloth, and at least half of that was covered with baked goods each weekend when the husbands would drive up and then go back on Sunday night, taking the old road through Gary, etc.
One of my aunts made little yeast dough bisquits called vidolki, whch were served with a dollop of povidla (homemade prune butter) and a big spoonflu of freshly made whipped cream, real whipped cream. The stuff was almost yellow. They were out of this world. I'd make a plate, have some coffee in a big white cup with more whipped cream in it, and go out and sit under the sassafras trees and play with the dogs and eat those. Even the dogs were roly-poly, but they weren't bald like the rest of my family. Old times - all gone now.
Those were people who wanted to be sure there really were 20 blades in the Gillette dispenser, and took them out to count them. But they paid their bills, maintained their property, and had something called "The Bohemian Easy Payment Plan - 100% down and nothing to pay. Not big consumers, except in food and beer. Hard workers though, and tough too.
Posted Thursday Nov 15, 2007 17:31 # -
Yes, eliminating the forester was one of the budget cuts suggested by the administration to the Long Term Finance Commitee, you can see it on the village website.
After that kid speeding down Burlington killed three of her passengers, I wrote the police chief about speeders on Burlington. We do not have the personnel to keep a patrol car on Burlington and/or Quincy at night.
We also have an IDOT grant to increase traffic safety and prevent fatalities around the schools, especially near the intersection at the middle of town. Since IDOT is funding the increased access to the train via Centennial, and Metra wants condo development there, maybe they will fund a study as to how we would control the traffic from wall to wall condos around those same schools near an intersection backed up by a train.
Posted Thursday Nov 15, 2007 18:20 # -
Thanks a lot spatny! I just gained 20 lbs reading your post!!! lol
I do like arugala, and jicama for that matter....But I wouldn't be mad that the Riverside grocer didn't carry that stuff. However, it would be nice if the produce that they DO carry is fresh instead of the mushy red peppers and pre-wilted spinach (of which they only had 2 bags that had an expiry date of THAT DAY, and not a fresh unbagged bunch to be seen).I think most folks wouldn't argue about paying a bit more to get fresh stuff. And a better cut of meat. Most times that store smells like old milk and bad meat (much like the Mr. N market used to that resided on the Harlem/Archer intersection, but not quite that bad).
Just my opinion, please, no rotten tomatoes...
Posted Friday Nov 16, 2007 06:52 #
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