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IS IT TRUE June 12, 2012

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The Mole #??

IS IT TRUE June 12, 2012

IS IT TRUE

we are very pleased today to lead off with praise for some very positive change that has taken place with respect to the Evansville Utilities Board since Mayor Winnecke took office and shook up that board and its leadership?…the meeting place has been changed from the dungeon of the Civic Center to a large room on the third floor that accommodates around 50 people?…that agendas are now published on the Friday before meetings are held as opposed to a couple of hours before as had been the custom for at least 8 years?…the meetings of the Evansville Utilities Board are now recording just like the City Council meetings are and that the minutes are recorded verbatim?…that these changes are all designed to promote transparency which is a necessary condition for good public policy to prevail over self interest and crony capitalism?…the City County Observer would like to take this opportunity to thank Mayor Winnecke and the 5 members of the Evansville Utilities Board, including its President Jeff Hatfield, for making the decision to move this direction and having the courage to implement step one to achieving it?

IS IT TRUE we are somewhat confident to say that if this kind of transparency would have been in place during the Weinzapfel Administration that the Johnson Controls contract in its present form would not have had a snowball’s chance in hell of being approved?…programs and contracts that can stand up to honest review and informed scrutiny do not need to be done in dark dungeons out of the public eye by boards that are intentionally manipulated by timing, misinformation, and political pressure?

IS IT TRUE there are a couple of things from the past that have been on our minds for a few weeks and that today is a good day to bring them up?…we are wondering exactly what became of the audit of the City of Evansville Information Technology department?…late in 2011 Councilman John Friend and others were insisting on an audit of the IT department lead by Matt Arvay and that the cost of such an audit was estimated to be just over $100,000?…we hope that the money is in the budget as both City and County officials had said it would be and that the audit will be done on schedule?

IS IT TRUE we are also wondering what the heck is going on with the official default of Earthcare Energy?…the last time we heard anything there had not been any official default letter served upon Earthcare and they were countering Mayor Winnecke’s on camera assertions saying that they were in complete conformance with the contract?…we are also interested in hearing any news that may be out there with respect to the new RFP that is supposedly being crafted to attract a downtown convention hotel developer/operator?…these and other things seem to be in a quiet period which has historically been followed by a storm?

IS IT TRUE that it was reported yesterday that since 2007 the net worth of the average American family has fallen by 40%?…the period of time from 2007 until now is taking on an economic look as though history may look on this as equivalent to the Great Depression?…the NASDAQ stock index is still sputtering at only half of its peak which occurred in March of 2000?…most of the country is still in the midst of a housing contraction that has returned the prices realized for real transactions to values more associated with the 1990’s or even earlier?…that it has been well documented that federal government spending as a percent of total spending spiked by 35% to 27.3% of all spending in 2007 and has stayed there?…that incidentally the time when the federal government spent the least would be the mid 90’s under President Clinton when federal spending dropped to below 20%?…that all governments large and small should take notice of the inverse relationship between government spending as a percent of all spending and prosperity?…that these facts cannot be hidden or explained away as foreign countries with massive entitlement programs were collapsing during the 90’s too?

Kids Fest 2012

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WNIN Kids Fest, presented by Bunny Bread will be held on Saturday 15, 2012 from 10a-2pm. Last years, Kids Fest was a blast and we want you to join us this year for the fun.

2012 Kids Fest characters are:

Cat in the Hat

Clifford the Big Red Dog

Curious George

Super Why

A special appearance by the Bunny Bread Bunny

More to come!

On the Carpenter Home Stage , we have some great acts from our community.

Tales and Scales

Storytellin’

Brice’s Taekwondo

More to come!

VHS Pet of the Week: “Hansel”

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Greetings from Hansel, a 2-year-old, neutered DMH. Hansel is as laid back as they come and will be an excellent addition to any family. He loves to just lounge around and take in his surroundings. A home with lots of windows will be absolutely wonderful for this wide eyed boy. Hansel doesn’t mind sharing his space with other cats and should have no problem adjusting fairly quickly to a multi-cat home. He would love a couple of kids to pal around with but has no objections to being the only “furkid” in someone’s home. For more information on Hansel, visit www.vhslifesaver.org or call (812) 426-2563.

Jehovah Witnesses Convention Coming to Ford Center

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Date: June 11, 2012
Release Date: Immediate
Subject: Jehovah’s Witness Conference
Contact: Bob Warren/Laura Libs @Evansville CVB 812-421-2200

FOR INTERVIEWS W/JEHOVAH’S MEDIA – LARRY MESSINA 812-989-2043

JEHOVAH’S MOVE DOWNTOWN!

EVANSVILLE IN. – For their ninth annual conferences in Evansville, the Jehovah’s Witness District Convention will be held at the Ford Center in downtown Evansville. This year, the two weekend conferences are scheduled June 15-17 and June 22-24. Organizers are looking forward to holding their event in the new downtown arena which opened in November of 2011. The Evansville Convention & Visitors Bureau is proud to work with this group – our largest religious conference hosted in Evansville each year.

Due to the change to the downtown venue, the Evansville Convention & Visitors Bureau includes a heads-up to the downtown district in our message informing local businesses and restaurants to expect 4,500 attendees on each of these weekends. They continue to select Evansville as the site of their annual conference because of our quality facilities and hotels but, mostly, because they enjoy the warmth and friendliness they experience in our community. They travel here from Indiana, Illinois, Kentucky and Tennessee. They fill our hotels, restaurants, attractions and stores generating over $2.9 million in direct expenditures for Evansville and Vanderburgh County. Since this group first chose Evansville in 2004 as the site for their summer conferences, they have contributed more than $30 million to the local economy.

The public is invited to attend their services which are free and open to everyone. Sessions at the Ford Center begin on Friday, June 15 through Sunday, June 17, and on Friday, June 22 through Sunday, June 24, 2012.
The schedule is:

Morning sessions begin at 9:20AM.
Break for lunch at 12PM.
Afternoon sessions begin at 1:50PM on Fridays, 1:35PM on Saturdays, 1:25PM on Sundays.
Sessions conclude at 4:30PM on Fridays and Saturdays and at 4PM on Sundays.

The theme of the convention this year is “Safeguard Your Heart” to study and note the Bible’s message to protect one’s figurative heart in order to enhance the quality of life now and in the future. Music and prayer services will be the focus on Fridays and Saturdays with baptism ceremonies and the Bible Drama highlighted on Sundays. Throughout the continental United States, there will be 385 conventions in 103 cities this year. Worldwide, there are over 7.6 million Witnesses in more than 109,000 congregations.

For information on the conference or to obtain a press pass, call Larry Messina at 812-989-2043. For other information or assistance, call Bob Warren at 812-421-2200 or Laura Libs at 812-449-5560.

IS IT TRUE June 11, 2012

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The Mole #??

IS IT TRUE June 11, 2012

IS IT TRUE on this coming Tuesday at 1:30 PM there will be a meeting of the Evansville Utilities Board? …that past and present Utilities Board meetings are held in the extremely small conference room located in the Water and Sewer Department office area?…that holding the Utilities Board meeting during this the above time and location keeps the public from attending meetings of this important board?…if the Utilities Board meetings were held in room 301 across from the Mayor’s office the $50 to $80 million dollar Johnson Control project would have allowed the public to feel welcomed to attend their meetings so they could add their input on this project?

IS IT TRUE that the City County Observer spent some time on Google doing some research on the successes and failures of Municipal WIFI services similar to the Johnson Controls project that the Weinzapfel Administration rushed through during the last month in office?…that there are not a lot of reports out there on such things when one excludes reports written by Johnson Controls and reports that are of a financial nature that were written and published prior to installation?…that there is one study that the CCO posted previously regarding a Johnson Controls project in Cumberland, MD that on the surface sounded superb until we realized that it was a projection and not a performance based report?…that the most cited reporting on the first 10 pages of Google references is the failure in Hollywood, FL?…there are plenty of announcements of cities that are planning to do WIFI but most of those result in poor outdoor signals?…that the systems do seem to be capable of checking the water meters fairly well where fiber is fully in place and new meters are installed?…that in the first 10 pages of Google reports when using the search terms “municipal WIFI” or “Johnson Controls+Smart City” that there are exactly ZERO reports of success that are written by a third party?

IS IT TRUE that Evansville City Councilman John Friend, CPA took a bold step last week by challenging the projections for savings that was made to the City of Evansville back during the early stages when the project was under consideration?…in Councilman Friend’s letter of challenge he exposed the fact that the total savings over 20 years for a $57 Million (plus interest) project is only projected to be $87,000?…that will only amount to an average savings of 4 CENTS PER PERSON PER YEAR if it even plays out the way it was bought to be?…Councilman Friend also challenged several methods chosen to do the savings calculations and made a projection of his own that the losses will be over $1 Million?…that was arrived at without challenging any of the assumptions used like the rate increases and higher water and sewer charges assessed to the people of Evansville?

IS IT TRUE that the CCO encourages private vetting efforts and Councilman Friend to leave no stone unturned in getting to the bottom of these numbers which are being called out by many people as not necessarily reflecting a reality of high probability?…we hope to see a hearing in Evansville much like the hearing that the IURC held regarding the Vectren dense pack project?…that both of these projects are projected to save people money but designed to benefit the entities that are doing them?…that is why the City of Evansville should come under the same level of scrutiny that Vectren is now under for cost neutral project?…it is only fair that these projects are VETTED in a rigorous manner?…we do believe that Vectren knows how to add a column of numbers correctly but have no recent evidence in the VETTING department to believe that the City of Evansville can even get 1 + 1 to equal 2?

WC Handy Blues and Barbeque Festival June 13-16

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The W.C. Handy Blues & Barbecue Festival has become one of the largest free music festivals in the nation, drawing attendants from just about every state and many countries. The festival is a celebration of the life and legacy of Henderson resident and “Father of the Blues”, William Christopher Handy. According to legend, the Alabama born composer and his band were traveling home from the postponed Chicago World’s Fair in 1892 when they ran out of money in St. Louis. Work was scarce there, so Handy left the rest of the band and headed to Evansville, Indiana.

In need of funds, Handy worked on a street paving crew and joined a local band that performed throughout the region. While the group played at a Henderson barbecue, he met Elizabeth Price, who soon became his wife.

The festival books some of the hottest national and local blues talent each year. The opening day of the festival is highlighted by the “Taste of Henderson Barbecue” where you can enjoy barbecue of all varieties sold by local teams and listen to great live music in Henderson’s Central Park. Live music at the scenic Audubon Mill Park on the Henderson Riverfront continues every night from Wednesday evening to Saturday night. There are a host of other events throughout the week as well, including a Mardi Gras-style Street Strut, Handy Lunch Breaks at local eateries, lectures, dance classes, and much more.

Read More…

UE’s Concrete Canoe Team Heads to Nationals

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This Sunday, 17 UE civil engineering majors hit the road to Reno, Nevada, where they will compete in the 25th Annual American Society of Civil Engineers National Concrete Canoe Competition. The competition will take place June 14-16 at the University of Nevada, Reno.

The competition provides civil engineering students with a practical, hands-on application of the principles they learn in the classroom, along with leadership and project management skills.

The 22 teams that qualified for this year’s National Concrete Canoe Competition, representing some of the top engineering schools in the United States and Canada, will be judged on the design, construction, innovative features, and racing ability of each concrete canoe. UE’s purple and gray canoe, “Tempest,” measures 20 feet long and weighs 250 pounds.

UE earned a bid to nationals by placing second in the Concrete Canoe competition at the ASCE Great Lakes Student Conference, held April 19-21 at Bradley University in Peoria, Illinois. Out of 14 Concrete Canoe teams, UE finished second behind the University of Wisconsin-Madison, narrowly edging out perennial powerhouse the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign to advance to nationals.

Last year, UE hosted the National Concrete Canoe Competition and was the smallest school ever invited to do so. This year marks the third time in the past four years that UE has qualified for nationals.

“I couldn’t be more proud of our students’ continuing success in the Concrete Canoe competition,” said Mark Valenzuela, UE associate professor of civil engineering and the team’s faculty advisor. “This year’s team has logged over a thousand person hours designing and building their canoe, ‘Tempest,’ and it was a thrill to watch them outperform some of the nation’s top engineering schools at regionals. They certainly earned the chance to showcase their work on a national level this summer.”

For more information on the 25th annual ASCE National Concrete Canoe Competition, please visit www.asce.org/concretecanoe.

Municipal WIFI Report from New York City turns into Debacle

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New York City CTO resigns over public safety wireless network debacle

The NYC Wireless Network (NYCWiN) launched in 2008, more than four years after the RFP was issued, and many had high hopes for the network, which was to be dedicated to one use: public safety. The users of the network were to be the NY Police Department and the NY Fire Department. We wrote about it on MuniWireless in Big Doings in the Big Apple (2008):

“NYCWiN initially will cover about 70 percent of the city’s 322-square-mile expanse, according to CIO Paul Cosgrave, who last week gave a detailed project update to several committees of the New York City Council. Cosgrave told the City Council that the service area will be expanded to 95 percent coverage by the summer, with full coverage by year’s end.”

The project’s rollout was headed by lead contractor Northrop Grumman Corp., utilizing UTMS-based infrastructure from IP Wireless, a subsidiary of NextWave Wireless. The initial 5-year contract was valued at an extraordinary $500 million, with nearly all of it coming from the city itself; part of the initial public safety rollout was funded with $20 million from the Department of Homeland Security. According to the New York Times, the network is “underused and outdated”.

When NYC issued the RFP in 2004 many people told me in private that the project would be a terrible waste of money and that the only beneficiaries would be the systems integrator (Northrop) and the equipment provider (Motorola). Indeed, a commenter to our 2008 article seemed to possess a crystal ball when he wrote on MuniWireless:

“Northrop Grumman is walking on egg shells. The launch is behind schedule and the good old boys from VA have taken over the mgmt of the project. Of the 400 sites that Northrop was supposed to launch only 120 may be lit. There are constant problems with IP wireless equipment and there is low morale w/i NGC. HEADS WILL ROLL. The folks @ DoITT are misrepresenting the truth.”

What was needed was not a dedicated public safety wireless network but a wireless network that could have been used for multiple purposes by all city departments, with excess capacity being leased out to private firms, non-profits and community groups that would provide wireless access to NYC residents and businesses.

NYCWiN is only part of a larger, more ambitious plan called PlanIT to upgrade the city’s IT infrastructure, but delays and cost overruns have made PlanIT a highly controversial issue for the Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s administration and recently may have cost the city’s commissioner of the Department of Information Technology and Telecommunications (DoITT), Carole Post, her job even though Ms. Post arrived at the DoITT many years after the project had commenced.

According to the New York Daily News, the city tried to sell the network back to Northrop Grumman last year, but Northrop turned down the generous offer. The city had been trying sell and leaseback the network because it costs $38 million annually to maintain and few police and fire department employees are actually using it. The biggest users are the Dept. of Transportation (for controlling traffic lights) and the Dept. of Environmental Protection (for wireless monitoring of water meters).

Source: by Esme Vos on APRIL 15, 2012 in CITY & COUNTY WIFI NETWORKS, WIFI NEWS

Councilman Al Lindsey Supports John Friend’s Call to Fully Vet the Johnson Controls Deal

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City Councilman Al Lindsey
To My Constituents and the People of Evansville,

I have been following the Johnson Controls proposal with much interest. As the agreement was entered into without a vote of the Evansville City Council and before my term of service began, I would like to join my fellow Councilman John Friend in his call to study this very closely and confirm that it will be financially in the best interest of the people of Evansville and the 6th Ward that I represent before this is allowed to go forward.

Councilman Friend has my respect as a CPA and as a good steward of taxpayer dollars. If he says this deal needs to be vetted, he can count on my support for his recommendation.

Al Lindsey
Evansville City Councilman, 6th Ward

This letter published by the CCO without edit, bias, or opinnion.

Councilman John Friend, CPA Challenges Testimony before IURC regarding Johnson Controls

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Councilman John Friend, CPA

COMMON COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF EVANSVILLE, IN
CIVIC CENTER, ONE MARTIN LUTHER KING JR BLVD
ROOM 301
EVANSVILLE, IN 47708

June 7, 2012

Umbaugh & Associates,
Certified Public Accountants, LLP
8365 Keystone Crossing
Indianapolis, IN 46240
Attn: Mr. John Seever, CPA

IN RE: Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission
Evansville Water & Sewer Department
Docket Number 44123

Mr. Seever,

In reference to your firm’s testimony per the above matter, as the Finance Chairman for the Common Council of the City of Evansville, I have reviewed the submitted documentation as filed. According to your firm’s expert testimony, as evidenced by your submission, precisely, Exhibit DLB-1, page 7, (Joint Petitioner Case-in_Chief), Mr. Douglas Baldessari, an Expert Witness under the employment of your firm entered testimony whereby his analysis spanned twenty years resulting in savings to the ratepayers of our City equaling $87,492 though out the entire project, not simply each year, but, cumulative. And most amazing, the investment total, including Interest During Construction (IDC) and Allowance for Issuance and Rounding equals approximately $57,000,000 or .15% of the risk capital.

Within the approximate $57,000,000, includes IDC of $4,275,180 plus the allowance for issuance of $1,101,388 totaling $5,376,568. The water portion of the IDC and Allowance per your documents is stated at $1,437,150 and $381,252, respectively. Per your firm’s amortization, page 7 titled Comparison of Guaranteed Savings From JCI (Johnson Control, Inc.) Contract & Estimated Installment Payments, your exhibit starts with the total cost of the project including capitalized interest (IDC) and the allowance for issuance equals $56,690,000 which was previously rounded to $57 million, includes the interest for the two year as capitalized interest amounting to $718,575 per each year, totaling $1,437,150. Now, with the total cost including the IDC & Allowance already included in the amortization, the interest of $1,437,150 would be in error in considering the savings. Thus, instead of the project saving our ratepayers $87,492, in fact, the project will not save but COST them $1,349,658, clearly in violation of the Indiana statutes. This is apparent, and, as the finance chairman of the Council, demands immediate correction to be filed with the IURC. For consistently sake, if the IDC was correctly included, then why not the Allowance? My opinion is supported by several of our CPA colleagues.

In further review, at the time of executing the contract on November 28, 2011 by the president of the utility board, it appears that the cost of the Network Infrastructure was a guaranteed maximum price and the minutes clearly indicate that the cost was not yet determined and, subsequently, when those cost were determined, 21 miles of fiber optics was excluded; thus, addition costs driving the cost vs. savings.

In review of your document, page 137, shows non-measured savings of $468,646 as a result of terminating seven positions, but, in fact, those positions will be relocated. Even though, you may consider attrition, your exhibit fails to phase out those positions though out the periods. We will not instantly save those dollars. Considering the margin of .15%, this, in my, opinion would be material.

Further review reveals that your exhibit (DLB-1, page 4) allocates the new meter cost of $21,684,738, 50% to Waterworks and 50% to Sewer. Obviously, the utility does not meter waste? Then, why would $10,842,369 be associated to Sewer, and, even if, somehow, the allocation could be rationalized, why doesn’t 50% of the savings be allocated to Sewer?

Please indicate the time period for the correction of the capital interest issue. Of course, if you desire to discuss the above my office number is 812-473-3388 extension 229 and the email address is jfriend@johnfriendandco.com.

Sincerely,

John E. Friend, CPA, CVA
Finance Chairman
Common Council of Evansville, IN

CC: Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission
Hon Lloyd Winnecke, Mayor of Evansville, IN
Mr. Jeff Hatfield, President of the Utility Board
City Clerk Office for the City of Evansville, IN

Attachments

Source: Anonymous and posted without opinion, edit, or bias by the CCO

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