GREETINGS FROM MAYOR LARRY MORRISSEY
December 2006Dear Friend:
Holiday greetings to you and your family! I wish you peace and happiness at this busy time. It has been a challenging but productive year in our City, and I have summarized some of our 2006 highlights in this newsletter. As we recap 2006, we have a lot for which to be thankful. I am encouraged by our progress, I thank you for your support, and I look forward to a great 2007.
Economic Development
Jobs, jobs, jobs! In 2006, we saw the Rockford area unemployment rate decrease to the lowest levels in six years, but we know we have more work to do. Work on the Lowe's Regional Distribution Center has brought a lot of construction work and promises hundreds of full-time jobs with benefits. UPS also completed an expansion which promises 200 new jobs. Much of our local manufacturing community saw significant upturns in business, but we know we continue to face strong competition from across this country and internationally. That is why it is so important that we do all we can to make our people and our infrastructure as strong as possible. To ensure that our community reduces poverty and increases wealth and good paying jobs, it starts with education.
Education
In 2006, the City changed course by taking an active role in our schools and by partnering with our school district. We have had epidemic levels of truancy in our schools. Following the successful daytime curfew that our administration spearheaded last year, we were able to take advantage of a change in state law this year and enact a truancy ordinance. Our goal is to keep our children in school. The truancy program is unprecedented in Rockford, and includes a partnership between the City, County, School District and United Way.
I also hired this year Adam Smith as the City's first Director of Education and Life-Long Learning. In addition to lending his expertise on the truancy problem, Adam has led the Mayor's Youth Advisory Council, a group of 16 teens representing area high schools. The Youth Advisory Council reaches out to young people in our community and addresses tough issues like truancy and crime among their peers and improving the quality of life in Rockford for their age group. We held our first Youth Summit in the spring, and the Mayor's Youth Advisory Council has started nFACTOR, (www.the-n-factor.com). This effort is a youth movement that tackles the root causes of many social ills like crime, truancy, low college enrollment, teen pregnancy, drug use, and drop outs. nFACTOR works to positively empower teens through a program of service projects, social events, and positive image and marketing about the value of education. We are also working with business leaders to expand our public and private partnerships to improve education and explore innovative efforts like charter schools. Our positive efforts on the education front have been coupled with many new policing strategies.
Public Safety
In April of 2006, Rockford native Chet Epperson was named our new Police Chief. He has brought a new, dynamic spirit of change to the department, and shares my commitment to accountability and community policing. Community policing involves the police department working closely with people in neighborhoods to prevent crime and react to small problems before they become big issues. The Chief has restructured the department to be more effective and accountable. We have adopted a more comprehensive crime reporting system and put "cops on the dots" - using technology and street level information to put officers where they are needed.
The Police Department has made more arrests for prostitution, aggravated discharge of a firearm, and drugs in 2006 than in past years. We are also turning around tough areas by aggressively and consistently enforcing laws in places like our "weed and seed" zone, a 60 block area that had the highest crime in the City. These efforts will continue, thanks to a $175,000 grant from the U.S. Justice Department that will fund a new police substation in that area. We are implementing similar approaches throughout the City.
To maintain the health in every neighborhood, our policing and community development efforts have also followed the "broken windows" approach. We have led the charge to enact tougher ordinances regarding littering, garbage, graffiti, panhandling, parking on lawns, and property standards. We have been working with the police department regarding enforcement of these new laws that will greatly improve our quality of life in Rockford. But the City can't do it alone. We need the involvement of our citizens in community groups and neighborhood organizations to promote "Excellence Everywhere". To assist that effort, we are working to revive the Neighborhood Network to help coordinate and support our City's neighborhood organizations.
Capital Development: Roads, Rail, River !
In addition to our education and law enforcement efforts, we pushed hard for capital development projects in 2006, but we have a lot of work left for 2007. We lost a spring 2006 referendum that would have put more money into infrastructure projects by shifting from property tax to sales tax. The State of Illinois also failed to pass an infrastructure plan which continues to leave millions of dollars in unfunded local projects. We saw with our Labor Day flood the impact of decades of poor storm water management practices. We must improve our local and State investments in roads, rail, storm water management, and other critical infrastructure if we are to compete globally and provide a good climate for home owners and business growth. If we can get those investments made, then we can further expand some exciting growth opportunities throughout our region.
We saw in 2006, for instance, that by working with local leaders, our representatives in Springfield, the Governor and his administration, we were able to add Rockford to a riverfront development program that will provide for tax credits and grants for supporting our riverfront properties. In addition, we obtained a $1.76 million grant for our river walk. These two programs will spur our downtown river walk as design and engineering work will continue in the next year. Our City council also recently voted to support an engineering study of the riverfront dam so that we can continue to create development opportunities up and down the river.
Our City Council is also moving forward on a $23 million dollar investment partnership with Winnebago County to renew and redevelop our Downtown MetroCentre. Renovating our MetroCentre is an opportunity for the City, County and Metro Authority to create a vibrant facility in our downtown. The City currently subsidizes the MetroCentre over $900,000 a year for operations. The proposal is to take that subsidy and put it in a payment stream for construction bonds to support the renovation. For the first time, the County will also invest in the MetroCentre at approximately $450,000 per year. This facility has gone 25 years without any major upgrades. We must be willing to invest in capital improvements in order to expect a return on our investment. The private sector has recently made considerable investment in our downtown, as evidenced by the 15 new businesses that have opened downtown in 2006. MetroCentre improvements will join the tremendous spurt in private investment in our Downtown and help the MetroCentre compete and encourage further private growth.
Echoing this emphasis on improving infrastructure, we will be looking to our City Council to propose another referendum in the spring to shift to a sales tax method for road and other capital improvements. We need a better capital planning that spurs opportunity throughout our City. As I mentioned in my last newsletter, I firmly believe that sales tax is a better alternative than continuing to raise property taxes. I ask for your support on this issue in the spring, and we will have much more discussion on this during the coming months.
Healthcare Modernization
In my September newsletter, I addressed the proposed changes to the City's health insurance. I would like to thank the employees, particularly from our AFSCME bargaining unit, for their leadership through this difficult negotiation process, which concluded with an agreement with AFSCME, which also applies to our non-union employees. We have begun enrollment in the new program for our AFSCME and exempt employees, which for the first time offers a wellness program, life insurance, and a health savings account option. These efforts will help us regain financial viability to our health insurance program.
Rockstat: Accountability in Management
We have also been focusing on improved management practices and customer service at City Hall. In early 2007, we will introduce our new customer service system that will better track and manage requests and help us to more effectively deploy our resources. This "Rockstat" program will also be at the heart of our accountability efforts. We all need to work smart and have a system that helps us to help each other, especially in times of crisis. This will be the heart of our management accountability system.
Regional Cooperation and Partnerships
The key to all of our progress is partnership. We are working with partners at the Riverfront Museum Center, Tourism Bureau, Rockford Area Economic Development Council, Winnebago County, other local communities, and many private citizens and developers to create positive change throughout our City and the region. In this spirit, we were pleased to spur regional cooperation and economic development opportunities by hosting for his first ever speaking engagement in Rockford, Chicago Mayor Richard Daley. He was the keynote speaker at the annual meeting of the Rockford Area Economic Development Council. He stressed the necessity of improved rail and transportation for the success of Rockford and Chicago. Mayor Daley spoke of the importance of regional cooperation for us to compete globally.
Trade Missions
And to compete globally, we must know the challenges and opportunities of our global marketplace. Consequently, I was involved in two trade missions this year. In the first trip, I joined over 20 business leaders representing the Rockford Area Economic Development Council in visiting Sweden. Many Rockfordians claim Swedish ancestry and its culture runs deep in Rockford. We participated in business match-making sessions that will help Rockford businesses increase their opportunities in Sweden and Europe, as well as bringing new business opportunities to Rockford. Our City has the 4th largest Swedish-American population in the nation. Representatives from Sweden have already visited Rockford twice since our trip there, and I expect these new relationships to reap benefits to our business community.
In addition, I visited several China cities and spoke to 1,500 people at an International Forum on Economic Development in our sister city, Changzhou. It was a great trip for understanding our challenges and opportunities in China, and to see the ongoing investments they have made in infrastructure and education. We need to help our small and medium sized businesses to compete and succeed with China and Asia instead of becoming a victim. Thus, we look forward to organizing additional seminars to help our people compete and thrive in our global economic climate.
Overcoming Challenges
I thank each of our families for their support for the community. We have had some very tough challenges this year as we dealt with our Labor Day flood and recent snow emergency. We have challenged the status quo, and have engaged public debate and discussion on numerous issues. I have had the privilege to see our City workers and community members rise to the occasion as we battled extreme challenges. We have battled FEMA to try to obtain much needed support from our Federal government. We continue to deal with the aftermath of the Labor Day flood and we will continue to do all that we can to help one another.
We have made progress on many issues this year because we have taken on the tough issues. We are acting on the commitments made when I ran for Mayor: improving education, enhancing public safety, and making the necessary capital investments and management changes that will spur positive economic growth and development. I thank you for your support in this process. Achieving Excellence Everywhere is not easy, but it is well worth the journey. May God bless each of you during this Holy season, and to each of you, have a blessed new year!
Mayor Larry Morrissey
City of Rockford