In Taxi-Cab Confessions, we wrote about how Park Ridge Taxi, the Oakbrook Terrace based company apparently owned by Oakbrook Terrace resident Dean Dinev, was putting on a public relations blitz that might be directed to the renewed application of American Taxi for five taxi licenses that would allow it to pick up residents in Park Ridge – a market Park Ridge Taxi currently monopolizes.

In that same post we also wrote about how, back in February of 2005, when Mayor Howard “Let’s Make A Deal” Frimark was still just an alderman and mayoral candidate, he voted against American Taxi’s application for a Park Ridge license. Two days later, Frimark’s mayoral campaign fund got a $500 contribution from the wife of Park Ridge Taxi’s then-owner, Lee Carpenter.  What a coincidence!

So Monday night’s City Council Committee of the Whole meeting should be of interest to Park Ridge residents, especially those who consider themselves free-market types, because it featured a guest appearance by Dean Dinev and about 10 of his drivers.  Mr. Dinev spoke at length in favor of his company’s monopoly and against American Taxi’s even getting so much as a City Council hearing on whether the residents of Park Ridge might be better served to have a more open taxi market.

Which makes sense, given that his monopoly extends not only to the regular taxi service that most of us know and sometimes use but also to a proposed contract [pdf] for transportation services for high school District 207’s Special Education Program – because a Park Ridge license appears to be needed in order to qualify for that contract.

Can you say “Bingo!”?  We’re betting Mr. Dinev can, both in English and in Russian.

This being the final weeks of a hotly-contested mayoral election between Frimark and 1st Ward Ald. Dave Schmidt, however, the focus of the COW discussion went beyond just taxi service.  Schmidt noted that Dinev’s company recently (Feb. 25) made a $1,000 contribution to Frimark’s campaign fund, and he suggested that the contribution might look like classic Illinois pay-to-play government in light of Dinev’s lobbying of the Council to deny a licensing hearing to competitor American Taxi.

That last remark drew an immediate rebuke from meeting chair and Frimark lapdog, Alderpuppet Jim Allegretti (4th Ward), who banged his hand for lack of a gavel and sharply noted that, as mayor, Frimark doesn’t vote. 

But that’s not quite true.  Or maybe Allegretti just didn’t remember the January 28, 2008, Council meeting when he and fellow Alderpuppets Don “Air Marshall” Bach (3rd Ward) and Robert Ryan needed and got Frimark’s vote to break the 3-3 deadlock and give Napleton Cadillac (a $1,000 contributor to Frimark’s 2005 campaign fund) up to $2.4 million of our tax dollars in what amounted to a quasi-bribe to keep his dealership in Park Ridge. The relevant excerpts from the minutes of that Council meeting can be found by clicking here [pdf].

So while Frimark normally doesn’t vote on matters before the Council, who’s to say that he wouldn’t get a chance to vote on American Taxi’s license application if it were to come to a vote and…oh…say…Alderpuppet Tom Carey (6th Ward) decided to once again vote “Present”?  Or if…oh…maybe…Ryan missed yet another meeting?

On the other hand, it’s looking less and less like there will be a vote on taxi licenses, given the comments of Frimark’s alderpuppets Monday night that American’s application doesn’t even deserve a public hearing, much less a Council vote.  “There obviously is not a need [for taxi competition] because no one has said that there is,” posited “Air Marshall” Bach. 

Yes, we guess that a cool $1,000 to help get ol’ “Let’s Make A Deal” re-elected says more than enough for Bach and the rest of Frimark’s Council.