TON Corporation Counsel

The next section of the Annual Report is for Corporation Counsel. Very briefly, this is the Legal Department for the town of Normal. At the risk of making errors (and, ahem, possibly upsetting anyone in this department, although I'm sure that all of the people in this department are very nice and very professional), I will not list all of the functions of this department. Instead, I thought it might be interesting to note some of the statistics in this report: 1,209 ordinance violations issued by the NPD for unlawful consumption of alcohol (resulting in over $300,000 in fines received); 86 ordinance violations for urination in public (resulting in over $10,000 in fines); and one ordinance violation for "missiles" ($25.00 fine). There is also a list of ordinance violations issued by the Inspection and Fire departments, which include: 37 for obstructing right-of-way, 18 for illegally parked trailer, and 10 for grass, weeds in excess of 8" (I'll have to measure the grass in my yard the next time I wait a little too long to mow). The total for all fines collected in 2008 was $572,428 (compared to $611,733 for 2007). The actual total for all fines in 1983 was -- can you believe this -- just $5,110!! My goodness, people in Normal were sure well-behaved in the '80s (or the fines were really low)!