Councilmanic

• This blog has moved

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  ...to councilmanic.volan.org. Please visit there. [...]
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  Posted: November 14, 2008, 5:33am EST
  by Steve Volan

• New location for Councilmanic: councilmanic.volan.org

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  I'm jilting Blogger for a WordPress install on my own site. Please visit the new site from now on councilmanic.volan.org [...]
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  Posted: February 21, 2008, 5:07am EST
  by Steve Volan

• Two types of Council meetings, and the obscure difference between them

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  The Bloomington City Council meets weekly, on Wednesday nights at 7:30. While these meetings are always open to the public as a matter of course, how one gets to participate depends on what week of the month it is.
  
  
  Regular-strength and concentrated
  
  That's because there are [...]
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  Posted: March 28, 2007, 10:01pm EDT
  by Steve Volan

• The chicken who came to Council to roost: FAQ

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  Yes, it's true: I entered the Council Chambers after last week's meeting began, and took my seat as an elected member of that august body...clad head-to-toe in a chicken suit, which I wore the entire meeting.
  
  The photo's caption: "Chicken Little? In observance of the [...]
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  Posted: October 31, 2006, 10:13pm EST
  by Steve Volan

• Getting your questions asked in a Council meeting

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  I chaired the July 27th budget meeting, the last of four over four straight nights. There wasn't a single public comment on any section of the budget, which we have been reviewing one department at a time. Virtually no member of the public attended in person.
  
  I'm surprised. [...]
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  Posted: July 27, 2006, 6:18pm EDT
  by Steve Volan

• Issue: Reopen 7th Street near Jordan Avenue

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  The portion of 7th Street just north of the Indiana University Auditorium (just west of Jordan Avenue) has been closed to all traffic for a couple of years now. It is being used as a staging area for construction trailers for new IU buildings.
  
  The closure prevents buses from [...]
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  Posted: July 26, 2006, 7:12pm EDT
  by Steve Volan

• Budget week 2006 (July 24-27)

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  Since the budget process went from five weeknights over two weeks to four straight weeknights over one week, the city budget hearings have coincided with the week of the Monroe County Fair. Monday and Tuesday nights were four hours each, and we thought ourselves lucky to get away after that [...]
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  Posted: July 26, 2006, 6:49pm EDT
  by Steve Volan

• The new dawn of Hoosier Daylight Saving Time

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  Until early this morning, other states used to revolve around Indiana. The country changed its clocks twice a year; we didn't because we were right on the time zone line geographically, and we're a vertical state. After many years living without Daylight Saving Time, I grew fond of not having [...]
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  Posted: April 02, 2006, 5:24am EDT
  by Steve Volan

• The boundaries of District VI

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  District VI is the centermost of Bloomington's six councilmanic [sic] districts. Below I've appended a list of the streets which bound District VI, as well as neighborhoods and IU residence halls within the district.
  
  The boundary runs right down the middle of the street. The Bluebird, for example, is [...]
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  Posted: February 06, 2006, 3:44pm EST
  by Steve Volan

• The difference between city and county

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  Because Bloomington is more than half the population of Monroe County, the city and county governments rival each other in size. City and county government meetings run side by side all the time on Channel 12, the local cable TV channel devoted to government. Both city [...]
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  Posted: January 26, 2006, 1:19am EST
  by Steve Volan

• The very basics of the Bloomington metro area

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  Here is the Monroe County Courthouse, the very heart of downtown Bloomington.

  
  
  

  
  

  Bloomington (70,000) is the only "city" in Monroe County (120,000), and the county seat. The next largest population center is Ellettsville (5,000), which is too small to be a city and so is [...]

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  Posted: January 26, 2006, 12:35am EST
  by Steve Volan

• The very basics of how Bloomington's city council works

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  Bloomington's nine councilmembers meet in regular session twice monthly, on the first and third Wednesdays of the month at 7:30 pm.
  
  It may seem like we meet more often than that. That's because we do. Let me explain.
  
  Any item we consider -- an ordinance, an appropriation ordinance [...]
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  Posted: January 25, 2006, 5:17am EST
  by Steve Volan

• Is the council nit-picking...or is the newspaper cherry-picking?

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  It's a little premature for me to post this, as I haven't finished introducing the blog as a whole. But here's my first article of any substance in the new year. It's a guest column to Bloomington's daily newspaper, the Herald-Times, about their tendency to editorialize and to trivialize local [...]
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  Posted: January 24, 2006, 2:08am EST
  by Steve Volan

• The very basics of cities in Indiana

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  Indiana has three classes of cities. There is only one "first-class" city, which is defined simply as being more than 250,000 population. That city is Indianapolis, also the state capital. It has a mayor and a 25-person city council.
  
  Then there are "second-" and "third-class" cities. Second-class cities must [...]
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  Posted: January 19, 2006, 2:20am EST
  by Steve Volan

• No such thing as government in the singular

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  I find that most people don't understand government.
  
  Partly that's because there's no such thing as "government," in the singular, monolithic sense of the word. There are many "governments," plural. There are federal, state and local governments. The executive vies with the legislature and the judiciary. Departments within [...]
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  Posted: January 18, 2006, 3:44am EST
  by Steve Volan

• About Councilmanic

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  I'm a sitting councilman in Bloomington, Indiana USA. Since before I took office two years ago, I've been thinking about publishing a blog to articulate my experiences and work out my thoughts as a municipal officeholder. Partly it was to reach out to my constituents; partly it was to reach [...]
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  Posted: January 18, 2006, 2:58am EST
  by Steve Volan