The Johnson Blog

Ramblings of a geek with a few hobbies…

Tag: wtf

  • NIU

    Dave pointed me to this:

                               alias: skazmie2
                            name: Kazmierczak Steven Phillip
                     pretty_name: Steven Phillip Kazmierczak
                      first_name: Steven
                     middle_name: Phillip
                       last_name: Kazmierczak
                           email: skazmie2@express.cites.uiuc.edu
         student_department_name: School of Social Work
            student_program_name: MSW:Social Work -UIUC
       student_level_description: Graduate - Urbana-Champaign
              student_major_name: Social Work
                         address: 1207 W. Oregon
                                : M/C  140
                                : Urbana, IL 61801
                  office_address: 1207 W. Oregon
                                : M/C  140
                                : Urbana, IL 61801
                           title: ACADEMIC HOURLY
                      department: School of Social Work
                            type: person phone student staff

    That’s right. The shooter at Northern Illinois University yesterday was a current student at our alma mater, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

    😦

  • CWLP Water Rates

    It was reported in the local paper that CWLP has asked the city council to double the water rates in as short as a year and a half to pay for a new water pumping station. They say the current pump is 70 years old and in very bad shape. I’ll take their word for it, but double the rates??

    I have a few questions.

    1) We are currently building a new power plant, could this wait until that is completed in a few years? How much will repair costs for maintenance on this old pump to keep it going? How much to fix if it dies? In the article they mention skyrocketing steel prices as a motivation for doing the construction now, but can it wait another couple years?

    2) This pump has been around for 70 years – it has been getting older every day. Why is it now an emergency, versus say 2 years ago? A 68 year old pump is almost as old as a 70 year old pump.

    3) If it just HAS to be done, how about these rate increases being temporary?