Letters to the Editor: Park Board Needs to Represent Taxpayers Needs First

Park Board needs new approach

It is time for a change at the top of the Oswego Park District.  The three candidates who are not now on the Board bring excellent business experience, judgment, and perspective on how an organization should be run efficiently.  They have proved themselves in the private sector, where competition ensures only the best run organizations survive.

We need this new approach in these difficult economic times.  Salvador Barocio and Leonard Wass are running for six-year terms, and Roy White for a two-year term. 

All three of these highly qualified men have my vote. Please join me on April 5 to elect Barocio, Wass, and White to the Oswego Park District Board.  It’s time for a change.

Michelle Samano, Montgomery

Park Board needs leaders for tough economic times

The rebuttal letter from the Oswego Park District incumbents was weak, and showed their desperate attempt to shed good light on themselves.  Thankfully, Sal Barocio and Len Wass have put the spotlight on the current Board's inadequate oversight of the Park District.

My take on the situation is that the current Board presided in an era where money was flowing into them like a tsunami because of rapid community growth.  The Board proved to us, as Barocio & Wass showed, that they were creative in spending our tax money, and much more.  Our community situation has changed for the foreseeable future.  Growth has stopped, unemployment is high, foreclosures continue, and our tax base shrinks.

This is no economic environment for the current Board to deal with.  We need to replace this old Board with persons who demonstrated the ability to lead and run organizations during tough economic times. 

All three challengers have my vote on April 5: Salvador Barocio, Leonard Wass, & Roy White.

Tom Cook Sr., Oswego

Park Board has no interest in representing taxpayers

An incumbent Park District Board member, Ms. Danielle Ebersole, proved to the community that she, and her fellow Board colleagues, need to be removed from office.

In her letter, she whines about potential cost reductions that more fiscally responsible candidates might make if they are elected.  Her whining is about hypothetical cuts in staffing, and she then tries to emotionally enlist voter support to preserve these high paid/high benefit cost jobs. 

These Park District Board members must have never been told that they have a fiduciary responsibility (read: LEGAL) to represent the taxpayers and voters, not the staff they are charged with overseeing.  They seem to be on a campaign to preserve the status quo as the biggest spending Park District in America (on a per resident basis).  It is clear that Ms. Ebersole's loyalty and interests is in perpetuating the bloated staffing and compensation cost levels, that she and her fellow Board members created.  

Her letter alone is enough evidence that this Park District Board has no interest in representing the interests of the taxpayers and voters.  They are more interested in continuing to expand the out-of-control empire they developed.

We should all vote for the fiscally responsible challengers:  Salvador Barocio, Leonard Wass, and Roy White.

Chad Turner, Montgomery

Park Board members fear mongering

The incumbents on the Oswegoland Park District Board still don't get it.  

Two Board incumbents recently characterized the information Mr. Barocio and Mr. Wass provided voters about out-of-control Park District spending as "misrepresentations".  Mr. Barocio's detailed response discredited these baseless claims.  He also showed why his and Mr. Wass's research is correct.  In a separate letter, Mr. Stephen Youhanaie offered evidence to the accuracy and validity of the Barocio/Wass analysis, and also discredited the incumbents.

Now again, another OPD Board member, Danielle Ebersole, weighed in with the same faulty statistics, but embellished her letter with emotional personal attacks on Mr. Barocio and Mr. Wass.  She used the old tactic of fear mongering, and pleading to the voters to preserve the good deal OPD employees have.  

Not only is this Board "business challenged", incapable of computing simple items like total compensation, they substitute emotion, fear mongering,  and personal attacks in place of dealing directly with the facts.  This is the hallmark of desperate people who know they can't refute the facts.  We see this behavior coming out of Washington DC all the time, and it is even more reprehensible when it occurs in our community.

It is time to replace the incumbents-all of them.  Tough times are ahead, and yet they pass a record budget, dip into the reserve fund, and increase our 2011 tax levy by 7.8 percent. 

Please vote for the challengers, Barocio, Wass, and White come April 5. 

William Gade, Oswego