Why I Oughta...

Early this morning, the folks at ProPublica Illinois released a widget that documents the fundraising and spending of the gubernatorial candidates in Illinois .  Well...it shows most of the candidates - the ones who are *in* the race with a shot at winning their respective primary.  I'm embedding their widget below.  ( Also...one cute thing to mention here:  the url of the story is at: their domain/nerds/story.  Nice touch, right?? ) Loading... There's obviously some interesting things going on here in the race ( like JB Pritzker's burn rate ?!?) that smarter and more tuned in political people can provide context on, but the reason I'm posting this is that it reminds me of the old days. The old days?  Yeah...like back in the mid-aughts when there were plenty of local bloggers - and specifically local political bloggers - that had their own little homesteads on the Web .  That's when I fell in love with the Web and met so many people who shaped bot

Neil Steinberg from the Chicago Sun-Times always does the best obituaries .

Not sure of what he's targeting, but I'm seeing this promoted account from Kurt Summers - the new City of Chicago Treasurer - on Twitter A LOT these days.  I finally caved and added him.  Have to say...it feels a bit like the wrong move right now?  I'd be spending my money promoting the content instead of the account?  Driving people to a landing page to take some action?  But...perhaps...much like we learned with the State Treasurer's race....this campaign will get NO interest and barely any attention.  So...building up your own base of followers might be useful?

Nat and I are proud to be a part of the Host Committee for a Tom Cross for Illinois Treasurer fundraiser that is taking place on Wednesday June 11th in Frankfort. For those of you who don't know Tom Cross, he's running for Illinois State Treasurer.   I've worked for Tom earlier in my career and know him to be a honorable, trustworthy man.  He's exactly the type of elected official we need to clean up Springfield and Illinois. You can find out more about Tom Cross here on his Treasurer site . We'd love for you to join us for this event.  If you're interested in attended, drop me a line!  Alternatively, if you want to donate to the event, click here to visit this link which will track your donation coming in from me .

Word came this week that the City of Elmhurst City Council did something that I have never witnessed a governmental body do before: Aftering giving something more thought, they unanimously adopted a “minority report” version of a recommendation coming out of a committee over the initial “majority” view of the situation. The details of what exactly happened can be found here on the Elmhurst Patch. The interesting part isn’t that a marketing agency only received a five month contract and not a twelve month contract. That’s not the big takeaway here. The important part is that Alderman Dannee Polomsky - my Alderman and neighbor - used this time to make a larger point about the City of Elmhurst taking some time to be deliberate and evaluate ALL of the marketing initiatives as a collective whole and work to optimize them.   For instance...The City of Elmhurst has a role (Part-time) on staff for something called "Visitor and Tourism" while at the same time, Finzall main

This week I received an email in my inbox from Speaker John Boehner asking me to fill out his 2013 "Speaker's Survey" on his TeamBoehner.com site.   The survey asks for your name, email and zip code, but doesn't ask for street address. After the election, the team at OFA put out a similar survey for 'supporters' that asked questions mostly focusing on ones interactions with the campaign. In thinking through these surveys for political organizations, they're really great trojan horses in terms of building a profile and layering data on top of said profile in a quick way.  I'd think that these are mostly filled out by the die-hards.  The dyed-in-the-wool political operative/foot solider type. And that's a great place to start.  Wouldn't the Speaker's office know who exactly on their email list support the Keystone Pipeline?  They'd love to be able to activate/engage those folks on a moment's notice and this survey will get the

Do you live in Spring Valley?  I'm guessing not, but if you do, you can get on the Walt Marini for Mayor train.  I've volunteered some of my time last weekend to Walt's campaign.  He's got a real chance in the race and he's just started to roll out some of his yard signs. Want to get involved in the Walt Marini for Mayor race?   Sign up here .

The City of Elmhurst has an important election coming up on April 9, 2013.  In addition to electing a new Mayor (our Mayor won a seat on the County Board and is resigning from the City post in December), we're also going to be electing Alderman across all 7 Wards, City Clerk and the City Treasurer. After hearing from residents and neighbors as well as talking with my wife, I've begun weighing the decision to get back involved in local government.   Last week, I went to City Hall and picked up a packet and have begun to circulate the petitions to 3rd Ward residents. I've long believed in "Citizen-Government" where individuals from every walk of life stand up to serve our government - at all levels - for a period of time, upon which they go back to their chose professions.  The idea of a career politician was never considered by the founders of our country.  I've served as a Trustee in the Village of Frankfort for six years and on the Frankfort Park Dist

Do you know where to go to vote on Tuesday? Head here and plug your address into the little widget .  You should see your polling place and what races you can vote in.  Yes, the sad truth of the matter is that if you live in Illinois, our votes for President don't really matter. And, due to the Gerrymandering done by Speaker Mike Madigan, our votes for Congress likely don't matter that much either.  But, that doesn't mean you shouldn't vote, right?  It's our only opportunity to have your say. So....What time are you going?

These signs are starting to appear in business windows around town.  2 questions.  Different answers.  If voters read this thing, I have to believe that this effort will succeed and the ban on holding two offices will pass.

Today, we had the honor of hosting Illinois Congressman Mike Quigley - 5th District - at Google Chicago.  His district starts at the Lakefront and includes as diverse an area as Old Town and Downtown Elmhurst.  Starting this fall, he'll be *our* Congressman out here in Elmhurst.  I look forward to watching him as he serves the entire 5th District.

Yesterday, Politico ran a sharp piece on how the Santorum presidential campaign is running ads with Google that feature a endorsement from Rush Limbaugh and lead to a custom landing page that plays a Limbaugh clip that promotes Santorum.  Politico pointed out the importance/relevance  of the Limbaugh connection: It's a smart ad regardless of what state it's in, since Limbaugh tends to be popular with the types of GOP primary voters Santorum is hoping to pick up. But a Google  search analysis   shows that on average, Michigan residents search for Limbaugh in much higher numbers than internet users of the overall United States, meaning the ad is even more effective in that state than it may be elsewhere. Here's a screenshot of the ad.  It was running for users up in Michigan against a series (as far as I can tell) of generic GOP-related queries like [Michigan GOP Primary].   Campaigns have been using search for years, but the possibilities of targeting/messaging i

I just renewed my driver's license via the Illinois Secretary of State's website.  No visit to the dreaded DMV.  No dealing with cranky civil servants.  Just a few keystrokes and in a few weeks a sticker will show up that I can stick on the back of my license that keeps me legal. Thanks, Jesse White.  No wonder he keeps getting re-elected by huge margins.  This is how government is *supposed* to work.

Tonight at the Elmhurst Public Library, our two Alderman - Dannee Polomsky and Michael Bram are hosting their first (of what they say will be a series) of joint Townhall meetings.  They're taking this pretty seriously and even walked flyers around door-to-door to drum up attendees.  That's the flyer (above) that was on our front door this morning.  Good idea. Alderman Bram has hosted one of these before, but with the recent election of Alderman Polomsky (yeah!), they're teamed up together.  That partnership is a great thing for our Ward - and they both have different tools they bring to us residents and will complement each other. Polomsky aims to be the 'Great Communicator' and will make sure every resident feels more plugged into their local government than ever before.  She's perfectly suited for this role and has made communication the hallmark of her term.  With City government being the "closest" form of government to us residents, the comm

News comes today that the City of Elmhurst is pushing ahead with ANOTHER tax increase that will cost those of us in town even more money for the exact same service.   This time it is a 8% increase in the cost of both water AND sewer.  I understand the realities of the revenue/cost situation at City Hall and that the City has said that they can't cut any more (I'm skeptical of that) and they'll (of course) point the finger at others - in this case the DuPage Water Commission - as the real bad guy.  They'll say, "Oh...don't blame us!  The DuPage Water Commission is MAKING us do this!"  What happened to "The Buck Stops Here"?  Apparently that's not the approach of Elmhurst Mayor Pete DiCianni.  Instead, he's going to jam through another tax increase and not loose any sleep over it. I think it is time for the City to STOP being disingenuous with the pricing of water and sewer fees - and this could have been the right time for the move. 

With the election less than 30 days away, it is time for everyone in Elmhurst to get focused on the upcoming votes we're all facing.  Like it or hate it, EVERYONE in Elmhurst needs to care about what the City Council will choose to do in the coming years.  Raising our taxes, solving the flooding issues, keeping us safe, and getting rid of the skunks are all concerns we have.  On April 5th, 2011, we can start to make choices about our representatives at City Hall who are willing to listen to our concerns and bring our values to the City Council. Fortunately for me (and...for you, too!) , Dannee Polomsky, one of my neighbors is running for Alderman of the 3rd Ward in Elmhurst.  I've decided to support her and her campaign because I believe she'd do a great job for our neighborhood.  I recently wrote a letter to the editor supporting her campaign and sent it around to various publications including Elmhurst Patch - who ran it on Friday .  (Thanks Patch team!)  I think I have

With the election for Chicago's Mayor set for tomorrow, it is all everyone is talking about in the papers this morning.  My employer was fortunate to have Rahm Emanuel come by for an hour and a half of tour and discussion with my fellow employees about a wide range of issues including bike lanes, CPS, wind energy, crime and more. I was able to host him and his staff on the tour and speak to him about issues and the city.  While he certainly is qualified to lead our city, I came away from my time with him impressed by his knowledge of the issues he cares about and his clear passion for getting the job done.   Are you voting tomorrow?  I don't live in the city, so I can't, but of the choices, I think he'd get my vote.

The Babe is 2-2 when it comes to voting as she turned up at the polling place yesterday with both Mom and Dad.   We took her when she was SO young to vote in the primary elections back in February .  She wasn't even 2 months old.  Can't believe how small she was in that post. This is her now - her second voting day.  She made such an impression that she was lucky enough to get a sticker from the poll watchers. Nat took her in the booth with her this time as I was able to bring her with me in the primary.  Forget Cubs or Sox, this is too important:  R's vs. D's!

Not only is Congressman Mark Kirk pulling away in the Google Insights for Search Poll, but State Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias is slumping as of late.   They came out of the primary locked in a dead-heat but with the news that Kirk wasn't being totally truthful during the summer, he surged in interest level.  Clearly, as we head into the final week, interest in both candidates is heating up.  Will Kirk's Google lead hold up?

State Senator Bill Brady is pulling away in the Illinois Governor's race as viewed through Google.  He took a lead in September and never looked back it seems.  Some official polls reflect a Brady lead , too.  Will this hold up?