The news that Caterpillar CEO Doug Oberhelman has written Illinois Governor Pat Quinn about the state’s burdensome tax on business should make a lot of people nervous.

The tax was a typical Democrat response without serious consideration of potential damaging consequences. Remember the Illinois tax on trucking companies and how quickly it was withdrawn? Then there was the heavy tax on the boating industry that left many manufacturers broke and bankrupt and their workers unemployed in the country.

Let there be no mistake. Caterpillar has the resources to pack up and leave Peoria and Illinois for other states eager to have the highly successful earth-moving manufacturer and its need for over 20,000 employees. Now all that’s needed to bring Quinn to his senses is for the John Deere Company to indicate an interest in relocating across the river to Iowa. If the unions don’t wake up and send Quinn a message as well, they’ll have no one to negotiate with in the future in Illinois.

DISAPPOINTING

The news that Notre Dame High School basketball player Max Bielfeldt chose Michigan over Illinois is disappointing and hard to understand. We wish him well, but not the Wolverines. Apparently, he felt the pressure of going to the university that sports a huge athletic complex made possible by his family’s financial contributions over the years. It will be interesting to see how he’ll be treated by Illini faithful when Michigan comes to Champaign.

GUTLESS

One of the biggest criticisms of newspaper editorials is the lack of transparency. You never know who writes them. No guts. And that’s true at the Peoria Journal. Neither editorial writers Mike (Beetle) Bailey, Chris Kaeergard, or publisher Ken Mauser had the guts to sign the editorial endorsing City Council candidates Chuck Weaver, Beth Akeson and C.J. Summers. That’s another reason I don’t understand why candidates for public office trot up to the well-guarded Journal “compound” to be interviewed in the hopes of receiving the newspaper’s endorsement. Who cares? For one Beetle Bailey lives in Washington and should butt out. He picks up his check and runs to Tazewell County to spend it.  Secondly, most voters could care less about the paper’s endorsements. Check out who the newspaper endorsed in last year’s primary and general elections and then read who lost.

Here are my City Council predictions. Only one of the Journal’s three “horses” in the race will be elected. That will be Chuck Weaver. Others who will get the nod from voters, not necessarily in this order, include Eric Turner, Chuck Grayeb, Ryan Spain and Gary Sandburg. I also want to disclose that my marketing agency was hired by Grayeb to do his media buying.  The losers will be Akeson, Summers, Stowell, Williams and Azouri, probably in that order.

MORE PJS CHANGES

Despite my criticism of the Peoria newspaper, it has been, and will continue to be, a vital member of our community. Though most of its writers are flaming liberals and all too frequently write subjectively instead of objectively, the newspaper does far better job reporting local news than the electronic media. Hell, local radio and TV news staffs would be lost without the Journal. The first thing they all do is pick up and read the paper each morning. TV assignment editors don’t have a clue about community news when they’re hired. Exceptions are people like former WEEK news editor Jim Garrott, who was born and raised in Peoria. So when I read that people like Paul Gordon and Teri Bibo are gone, I’m disappointed. My good friend, Steve Tarter, will do a good job as Gordon’s replacement. However, I will miss his media insights as much as I will miss Bibo’s anecdotal stories.

POORLY HANDLED

This column was the first to openly predict the firing of Bradley coach Jim Les. Fox Sports confirmed it. If you were an objective, open-minded basketball fan of the Braves, you knew it was coming. What was disappointing was the way it was handled by the university and even by Coach Les. With over 30 years of experience in public relations, one thing I learned was to anticipate and be prepared. Bradley wasn’t, nor was Jim Les.

Here’s what Peoria Journal’s Dave Reynolds, sports writer, wrote about the firing: “He (Dr. Michael Cross, Bradley athletic director) sat down with Les’ assistants and gave them the opportunity to stay during the transition period to a new coach. Then the news release had to be crafted and sent to media outlets.” Since Dr. Cross knew weeks, probably months ago, that he was going to fire Les, those releases should have already been written with everything except the date of distribution. That’s why the university was embarrassed by the announcement first by Fox.

Meanwhile, the silence from Jim Les is deafening. Jim has been a part of not only the university but our community for the past nine years and four years previously as a player. Despite the lack of success overall as a coach, Les is admired, respected and loved by many Bradley faithful. Un-les (a play on words) the coach had his head buried in the sand, he had to know this was coming as much as I always knew the evening Rocket would return from Chicago every night at 9:30. Meaning what? If not formally, in his mind, he should have had a prepared statement thanking his players, the university and the community for their support during his coaching tenure. He didn’t need to appear before the cameras and microphones. The statement could’ve been faxed to the media. It would’ve demonstrated class and humility and ……anticipation. The firing was poorly handled. Interestingly, while the coach hasn’t had the time or inclination to show his appreciation for past community support, he had time to appear on Comcast’s Midwest Sports channel to talk about the NCAA tournament. Les did do a great job on camera.

PLAYING HARDBALL?

Quite a few rumors are flying. One is that Les got his walking papers as early as last December. The university allegedly offered a buyout on his three year contract and Les countered, but got no response until the day he was fired by Cross. Now they’re butting heads, big time, say the rumors. I’m told it could get ugly. I hope not.

A WILD PJS STORY

Speaking of wild rumors, Dave Reynolds must’ve been desperate to write that Dane Fife, the 31 year old coach at Indiana/Purdue at Fort Wayne, was under consideration for replacing Jim Les. Heck, his coaching record is 82-97. And he’s coaching in the what, Summit League? That’s lowering the coaching bar from Les, not raising it. To compound this silly rumor, WMBD-TV’s sports director, Kurt Pegler, ran a story out of Fort Wayne about Fife as if to add credibility. Next from Reynolds will be a story that Lorene Ramsey was being interviewed by Bradley. Hmmm. That could be a good idea.

FUZZY SCHOOL

NUMBERS

When Ken Hinton was District 150 superintendent, he said the closing of Woodruff High School would save $1.5 million. Today’s officials claim $3.5 million has been saved.

Tomorrow, they’ll probably claim $10 million. You know the old saying; “Figures lie and…blah, blah.”

Of course, the savings came from teacher lay-offs, early retirements and other personnel cuts. As one former top district official told me, those personnel cuts should have been taking place gradually each year as enrollments were dropping. He also said some of the alleged savings were countered by higher costs as buses have to go greater distances to transport Woodruff students, renovation and construction costs at Peoria High as well as added security expenses. Replacing Woodruff students with proposed alternative school kids will not translate into any cost savings. The former district administrator told me that in the South they’re building new high schools for 900-1,000 students while Peoria closed a high school with the same number. It doesn’t make sense even with fuzzy numbers, past or present.  By the way, look for Randy Simmons, Principal at Central, to wind up at Richwoods.

MEDIA THOUGHTS

You can expect WOAM 1350 to return to the air in about two to three months. New owner Larry Nelson, from Plano, Illinois, is fine tuning the transmitter site, something the new owners of 94.3 FM apparently failed to do. It’s been off the air since its transmitter tower fell to the ground.

On the national level, I was shocked at how Katie Couric, who’s on her last legs as a CBS anchor, spent so much time eulogizing Elizabeth Taylor. With the U.S. and other countries bombing Libya, home sales on the domestic scene at an all time low, Japan reeling from its devastation, and the President and his family vacationing in Brazil (what else could you call it?), Couric opened her March 23rd newscast with ten minutes about the life of Elizabeth Taylor and then closed her newscast with more. Why? She was just an actress; one of hundreds since she started as a child. Her life hardly deserves to push from the front of the news so many other events that touch many more lives.

In the 1950’s, Newton Minnow, who was chairman of the FCC, said television was a “vast wasteland.” I wonder what he would say about it today. One program I recommend is “Coming Home,” seen on the Lifetime channel. If you can watch it without shedding tears now and then, you have no heart. It’s about members of the military coming home to surprise loved ones.

It appears there’s a big difference between how local news is treated by WMBD-TV and WEEK-TV. WEEK has a tendency to lead its newscasts with national news. WMBD prefers to focus on local news in the beginning after giving the weather forecast. I prefer local news first and I think so do most others.

OTHER MEDIA NEWS

My friend Jonathan Winters sent me a couple of copies of his new and very funny CD, “Final Approach.” As expected, everything on the CD is improvisational and hilarious.  He used different voices and characters for each skit from the 100 year old man to his characterization of a country western singer that was complete with a banjo. Funny stuff.

QUOTE OF THE MONTH

“One advantage of growing older is that you can stand for more and fall for less.” —Monta Crane

VOTE TUESDAY,

APRIL 5TH!