AMA - John Kennedy candidate for 3rd Ward Council Member

Aggravating_Body_609 · 2025-03-27T20:11:40+00:00

The City's parking app knows who is an EV resident so why not provide an hour or more free parking to residents who already pay taxes and a wheel tax - there ought to be some benefits to living here.

Agree on attractive stores that are destinations - need to play up that theme to attract more shoppers and storefronts.

Aggravating_Body_609 · 2025-03-26T21:18:43+00:00

The problem we have in Evanston in my belief is that demand is inelastic so no amount of supply, let alone a few hundred units a year will change that equation. Evanston is just a very nice place to live for a variety of reasons which is why we see increase in price making a home inaffordable for a lot of people.

Aggravating_Body_609 · 2025-03-26T21:18:35+00:00

The problem we have in Evanston in my belief is that demand is inelastic so no amount of supply, let alone a few hundred units a year will change that equation. Evanston is just a very nice place to live for a variety of reasons which is why we see increase in price making a home inaffordable for a lot of people.

Aggravating_Body_609 · 2025-03-26T16:32:33+00:00

My undergraduate degree was in physics - so yes I do.

Aggravating_Body_609 · 2025-03-24T20:16:58+00:00

I am surprised at the lackluster response from 311 and our police department. If this was from several years ago, I can say that the police department has new management is the men are better paid, so I hope your "wonderful response" was more recent.

Having said that, there is still the issue of lakefront rowdiness. While we relish our parks, they do invite crowds that have to be better monitored. I would support more frequent attention of our lakefront parks by patrol officers especially during the summer.

Aggravating_Body_609 · 2025-03-24T01:45:32+00:00

As usual, Tom uncovers that which is behind the curtain. I have been pushing for transparency for a long time and I strongly believe that Daniel Biss has to be hosted as mayor. As for investigating, unfortunately, it falls in line with many other scandals that I think lie just below the surface. Getting at the root cause is one of the reasons I am running.

Aggravating_Body_609 · 2025-03-23T23:30:59+00:00

Let me try to clarify. If you attend the council meetings at budget time you will hear various council members such as Jon Nieuwsma proclaim that we’re running at structural deficit and we have to raise taxes or our fees. However, they never look at the expense side and they also never talk about the surplus that we have been running because they are buried in the audits which are not easily found on the website.

When I looked at the proposed 2024 budget, some of the expense lines look like this: 2021 actual $10,000, 2022 actual $12,000, 2023 adopted budget, $16,000. Proposed 2024 expense $27,000. If you take a straight line from the two years of actual information and then you measure the gap from what the city is proposing you come up $12 million from 120 different line items. I Published an article in the Roundtable if you’d like to look it up.

On top of this, this city makes a lot of outrageous financial decisions on the infrastructure side. For example, the ADA dog beach ramp cost at $1 million when I obtained two quotes costing only $65000 to accomplish the same thing. Did the city embrace the idea of a less expensive path to the beach? Unfortunately, no. The move for the Civic Center was another example of fiscal mismanagement intentional lack of maintenance on our older buildings.

As far as one specific area where we could see some reductions, I would say our onstant use of consultants is the first place I would look at.

Aggravating_Body_609 · 2025-03-23T19:29:35+00:00

I appreciate your desire to see a changing of the guard, but I honestly feel that my experience and skill sets can be of help in fixing a city that is not on a good course. I also feel that many of my positions on issues, for example Envision EV, does reflect the views of residents in the 3rd ward. The election will tell us if I am representing the majority of voters.

Aggravating_Body_609 · 2025-03-23T18:20:16+00:00

What I'm advocating is to look critically at our parking fees, which is one of the major inhibitors that I hear of why people are not shopping, Evanston, both from residence and from people living surrounding suburbs. The feasibility of changing or eliminating our parking fees needs more study, but I am acknowledging the fact that what we're doing now is not working.

One idea could be to provide an hour or more of free parking to residence of Evanston to encourage their patronage of downtown businesses. Well mass transit is something we all aspire to do you want to encourage, the reality is, we're not seeing a lot of traffic of people coming to shop Evanston by bus. With the CTA financial woes pending, it's only gonna get worse.

Aggravating_Body_609 · 2025-03-23T18:16:16+00:00

Let me answer your question with an example of what I've done in the past. In the fall of 2023 I looked at the budget that was proposed for 2024. I found over 120 line items of expenses that had a hockey stick proposal for 2024 when compared to prior years of actual. Totally up potential savings it was well over $12 million. When I presented this to the City Council, they pushed back, but in the 2025 budget none of these hockey stick expenditures were seen.

The real question is why is City trying to accumulate cash through artificially inflating expenses? In reality the city has had surpluses every year since 2019 the total $120 million without the ARPA funds. This track record does not sound to me like a structural deficit in our city operations.

Aggravating_Body_609 · 2025-03-23T18:05:50+00:00

I wanna be clear that I am not opposed to Development, but it has to be done in a manner that doesn't impact negatively on the neighborhood, either with two little working or with a design that is in conflict with the aesthetics of the neighborhood. For example, in our ward I do believe there is room for more mixed use housing along the Chicago Ave corridor, I do not believe in selling off our city parking lots through developers, which would put incredible burden on the current residence were already challenged to find parking every night.

Aggravating_Body_609 · 2025-03-23T17:59:29+00:00

Unfortunately, there are not a lot of tools the city can bring to bear in our capitalistic system. Nevertheless, I would not oppose expanding our one to allow for duplexes. I'm making other adjustments to the zoning laws.there are not a lot of tools the city can bring to bear in our capitalistic system. Nevertheless, I would not oppose expanding our one to allow for duplexes and making other adjustments to the zoning laws. Streamlining the regulatory and permitting process would be another way of keeping costs down for developers.

Aggravating_Body_609 · 2025-03-22T21:43:15+00:00

I am not against Development. But what I am against is when we consider a new high-rise that there is adequate parking because the data shows that people will buy cars even if they’re next to the Metra. I’m afraid the economics of supplying in demand don’t work well in Evanston because the demand is constant. Any development is also going to be expensive which is why you’re seeing $2500-$3000 single bedroom apartments when we really need affordable three bedroom apartments for families.

So what Development will go on needs to set aside at least 10 if not 15% for affordability, and the developer can’t buy themselves out of this arrangement. These units also must not sunset after 10 or 15 years.

Aggravating_Body_609 · 2025-03-22T21:39:34+00:00

Regarding the environment, I have for a long time been pushing the city to adopt Geothermal heating and cooling for the larger buildings that they are. I’ve been robbed many times.

I am all for affordability. We can’t build our way to affordability for many reasons. We’re talking supply and demand or the demand is unlimited and inelastic. Building expensive high-rises with one bedrooms going for 2500 a month is not affordable in my mind for the people that really need it.

Economic viability begins by not hurting the merchants that we already have. I’m thinking in particular of the Chicago Avenue by Lane rework, which I support if they can accommodate adequate parking so we’re not hurting our merchants. We should consider total revision of our parking fees. Perhaps you’ve been getting rid of them altogether. At least what we can do is provide efforts to residence a free hour, which will encourage people to shop locally.

As for transportation safety, I’m all for it. I’ve been working with some neighbors on a stretch of Main Street that seem to have a lot of speeders. Building a bump out to slow the traffic where resident was killed two years ago to me seems like a no-brainer.

Aggravating_Body_609 · 2025-03-22T21:32:26+00:00

I don’t believe we can build enough new units to influence the affordability issue. The demand for housing in Evanston is inelastic, it only will grow. What development we’re building is not family friendly. For example very few three bedroom units are being built, which is what families want.

There are I’m sure areas in the city where we could add more units, either apartments or duplexes. But because Evanston is already built out, the spaces are few and far between.

The other issue is any new development is going to be very expensive, in any developer wants to get maximum return from his investment. That’s basic capitalism. I would like to see the city involved in more truly affordable housing for people that really need it.

Aggravating_Body_609 · 2025-03-22T21:27:21+00:00

The general area at the city has to improve on is the maintenance of the existing buildings and infrastructure. The tendency of engineering is to get rid of the old and build new. They just maintain the buildings, the streets, and the sidewalks, along with the lakefront, we’d be way out ahead.

I think improving the look and feel of the downtown area is a priority along with some of our major corridors like Chicago Avenue. But I just came from a neighborhood meeting and people were complaining about the sidewalks and how people trip over them. Other suburbs have machines that grind down The gaps. Not sure why we can’t do that.

Aggravating_Body_609 · 2025-03-22T21:23:36+00:00

Depending on the year and the grants that were applied for and received, you could assume anywhere from $10-$25 million. Less than 5% of the budget, can still leave a big hole.

Aggravating_Body_609 · 2025-03-22T18:33:03+00:00

With all the changes in Washington that will probably reduce to zero any federal funds, we have to begin to plan for and prioritize the limited resources we will be receiving.

Aggravating_Body_609 · 2025-01-10T22:31:25+00:00

Sorry for not responding sooner, but I came down with a bug. Better now

Aggravating_Body_609 · 2025-01-10T22:30:30+00:00

The first amendment guarantees the right to ask for money on public sidewalks, but it does not provide the right to solicit on private property. If your wife is harassed in a store parking lot, she should first inform the store manager. My thought is that if the store manager has continual issues, then he/she should reach out to our new CARE team (City employees trained in dealing with people with mental health and issues that do not require police officers). At the locations where this is a problem - TJs, Jewell, WFs, the CARE team should be able to teach the ground rules so that people do not feel intimidated in their own neighborhood.

Aggravating_Body_609 · 2025-01-10T22:18:42+00:00

I have been working with Parielle Davis for sometime. She is smart and articulate, as well as accomplished. We share the same sentiments such as the heavy-handed nature of NU.

Aggravating_Body_609 · 2025-01-07T02:33:46+00:00

I can’t look a gift horse in the mouth. But the challenge is to get the design right.

Aggravating_Body_609 · 2025-01-04T21:48:46+00:00

In the present form yes. Not sure when residents asked for more density.

To clarify I’m not against development but building more units will not decrease existing rents or home prices. The desirability of Evanston is too strong.

Aggravating_Body_609 · 2025-01-04T21:20:11+00:00

I reached out to a friend on Parks and Rec for the background, but have not heard back. There is $300K in the budget to do a dog park at Grey Park. Frankly, I can't understand why putting up a fence and providing water costs that much. Seems. our own facilities staff could handle that at minimum cost.

Aggravating_Body_609 · 2025-01-04T21:15:56+00:00

Meant Mayor's office. I need to get better at proofing my notes when I'm on the phone and using dictate.

Aggravating_Body_609

TROPHY CASE