Last week’s Park Ridge Herald-Advocate carried both an article (“City Council attendance rates vary in Park Ridge,” June 19) and an editorial (“Who’s missing city meetings?”, June 19) on the attendance of our City Council members since the Council was reduced from 14 aldermen to 7 as the result of a 2006 referendum masterminded by Mayor Howard “Let’s Make A Deal” Frimark to give himself a Council he could control with only 4 votes instead of 8.
Kudos to Aldermen Rich DiPietro (2nd Ward), Dave Schmidt (1st Ward) and Frank Wsol (7th Ward), who were singled out for their fine attendance records.
And then there’s 5th Ward Alderman Robert Ryan, who also was singled out…for the worst attendance among all the aldermen. Ryan missed only one Council meeting but was MIA for a whopping 12 committee meetings in his first year in office even though he chairs no Council committees and does not serve as a Council liaison to any other City committees or commissions. As the H-A editorial pointed out, he has “one of the lightest loads on the council.”
Ryan serves on only two committees, Finance & Budget and Public Works, but they are arguably two of the most important ones. As the H-A editorial noted, missed committee meetings can cause missed explanations on issues “which can impact decisions on many subsequent cases” because it’s at committee meetings that aldermen “ask technical questions,…consider input from the public…[and] discuss issues in detail.”
Ryan’s many absences have not deterred him from making decisions on significant City issues, however, and his decisions have often been contrary to the expressed desires of his constituents. He bucked an outpouring of opposition from his 5th Ward constituents when he voted to give the politically-connected developers of Executive Office Plaza a variance to add 8 units more than what the is permitted by the City’s zoning code. He also bucked his constituents living near St. Mary’s Episcopal Church with his support of a PADS homeless shelter there.
In addition to ignoring his constituents, Ryan also supported the crackpot give-away of as much as $2.4 Million of City money to Napleton Cadillac, before General Motors made that a moot point by pulling Napleton’s franchise. He also has expressed support for increasing the size of the area available for R-5 zoning, portions of which are in his ward. And while he was missing 12 of his own committee meetings, he was able to attend the April Public Safety Committee meeting where he pushed for the construction of a big new police station without any explanation of how we can pay for it.
Not surprisingly, Ryan’s absences don’t concern his political master, Mayor Frimark, maybe because Ryan still ends up voting exactly the way Frimark wants him to vote. And they also don’t seem to concern Ryan, whose response to comments about all his missed meetings was: “This is a volunteer job and obviously I’ve got to put my business first.”
No, Mr. Ryan, that’s not the way it works. You’re the only representative the people of the 5th Ward have to represent their interests in the City Council. When you don’t show up, they are unrepresented. When you show up unprepared and ill-informed, they are under-represented. And when you make a statement like that, they are disrespected.
The position of alderman was a “volunteer job” when you ran for it, and nothing’s changed since that time. If you don’t want to give your aldermanic duties the time and attention your constituents deserve, then maybe it’s time you un-volunteered.
9 comments so far
Quite right about Ryan being Frimark’s pick, although it took me a while to figure out that the mayor invited Ryan into the race because he couldn’t quite trust his friend and Purple Ribbon princess Judy Barclay to play ball on all of his bigger is better condo develompment plans.
But you forgot to mention the real reason Ryan doesn’t have to go to the committee meetings to find out the details about things. He just goes and meets with the parties, like he supposedly did with Norwood builders before he voted to approve their zoning variance at EOP. So he most definitely is “properly” informed when he votes.
I am a 5th Ward resident and I know that I, and many of my 5th Ward neighbors appreciate what you are bringing to our collective attention today. And it was a pleasant surprise to see the Herald Advocate not only include a regular piece on this issue in its most recent edition but to editorialize on the matter.
The sad fact is that the 5th Ward is terribly underrepresented in the City Council. This cries out for a solution and one solution would be to reverse the idiotic council reduction of not so long ago and restore the council to 14.
And this is not only a 5th Ward issue and attendance is not the only measure of an alderman’s effectiveness. Take an objective assessment of every ward’s Alderman. I for one do not think it’s a stretch to say that another representative in every ward would contribute by adding some (possible) diversity in thinking; not to mention simple coverage when others are away or possibly just sleeping in the midst of a meeting.
Finally. on the matter of Alderman Ryan, you mention a few important issues where he has seemingly gone against his ward residents despite their outpouring otherwise on the issues. In a recent issue of the PR Journal a guy by the name of Dan Knight wrote a Letter to the Editor wherein he said that Ryan had “abandoned” his ward residents. I think this is a good characterization of Alderman Ryan. He seems not to listen to the people he represents but instead to the “special interests” on the other side of the issues as his residents or the Mayor who apparently can simply tell him what to do or how to vote and Ryan does it.
People need to remember the HA article and editorial when it comes time for Ryan’s reelection, should he decide to run again. On the other hand, maybe we’ll get lucky and Ryan will see the obvious and step down or just not run again… we could only be so lucky.
Arrogant and illinformed and …classic Chicago’s style politics proponent! We have received a kick in the …by electing Mr. Ryan to the council. Boy do we miss Judy or what? At least she would have been there fighting Da Mayor! And representing the 5th ward.
I’d like to see a response from Mr. Ryan. Can the Public Watchdog ask him for his comments? In particular, I’d like him to address how he intends to improve his performance.
Disappointed:
No, we don’t “miss Judy or what?” because she didn’t deserve to win. Barclay lost because (a) she ran a really crappie campaign based on nothing more than over-estimated name recognition, (b) she was viewed as a Frimark friend and, as a result, didn’t attract those anti-Frimark voters, (c) she lost the old Homeowners Party vote to Ryan, and (d) she didn’t call herself “Judith” and learn a British accent to impress those shallow voters who think sounding Brit is a sign of intelligence.
Any alderman who doesn’t want to do the job should just say so and quit. NObody’s holding a gun to their heads and demanding that they stay in office. And any alderman who didn’t realize there was going to be a lot more work with only 7 instead of 14 is too dumb to deserve the office.
“Call herself ‘Judith’ and learn a British accent.” HAAAAAAAAAAAAA!
The only person who ever called Judy, “Judith” was Chuck Baldacchino which reminds me of his silly attempt to cut his hair and get a suit, The sneakers were just hysterical with the getup.
Is Chuck back again?
Whatever happened to Chuck’s blog?
Yikes … Ryan is using the “You Say – Letters to the Editor” section of today’s PR Herald-Advocate to complain about his workload.
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