Journal Editor

A veteran member of the Des Plaines Park Dist. Board this week said that if a new 80-ft. tall billboard is erected on park property, the district, not a private company, should own the sign.

If that happens, said Commissioner Jim Brookman, local taxpayers would benefit greatly because hundreds of thousands of dollars annually generated from advertising on the billboard would go directly into the public treasury rather than to a private company.

"I think this is something we should research," said Brookman during a recent interview with the Journal. "That's been my position for awhile. If we have a billboard in one of our parks, we should own it."

Three billboard companies have submitted proposals to the Des Plaines Park Dist. to erect and maintain an 80-ft tall outdoor advertising sign at the south end of Seminole Park. Seminole is located on the extreme south side of Des Plaines next to a Northwest Tollway toll booth used by tens of thousands of cars a day.

The proposals were submitted last year by Premere Outdoor, Inc., Windsor Outdoor Advertising, and SignCo., based in Jacksonville, Fla. Park Dist. Executive Director John Hecker recently said he met with a representative of Windsor and Joseph Loss of Premere. It was Loss who played a major role in securing permission from the Des Plaines City Council in May 2003 to erect 10 billboards along the Northwest and Tri-State tollways in Des Plaines. City Council approval to erect a billboard at Seminole Park is required in order to meet zoning requirements.

Following a Sept. 1 City Council License Committee meeting in City Hall, it was publicly learned that convicted felon and former Cook County undersheriff James Dvorak was a shareholder and officer of Premere Outdoor. Dvorak also was listed, as of August 2004, as president of Premere Media, Inc., a company whose secretary, Joseph Loss, was also the secretary of Premere Outdoor, Inc.

Dvorak's connection to Premere became known by city officials just a few months after it was learned that Dvorak and Bill Schneider, Des Plaines' assistant city manager and Economic Development Commission director, have been good friends for many years and frequent lunch partners. And at about the same time, Schneider informed Mayor Tony Arredia that he was convicted of mail fraud in the mid-1990s---a fact few if any city officials were aware of. Schneider soon resigned his job with the city. Other connections involving Dvorak and the city have also surfaced in recent months including the fact that he was an employee of a property marketing company working to develop the Mannheim-Higgins Tax Increment Financing Dist. area on the city's far south side.

Not long after city approval was granted to Premere in May of 2003 to erect 10 billboards, the stock of the billboard company was sold to media giant Lamar Outdoor Advertising. While Lamar contends that the stock and asset sale included Premer's right to erect the 10 billboards, the city's Legal Dept. maintains that the sale or transfer of those rights cannot occur with prior written city approval. Such approval has not been given.

Billboards located along the nation's interstate highway system in metropolitan areas near major airports can generate large sums of money on a regular basis. Outdoor signs near O'Hare Airport, for example, can fetch today as much as $15,000 to $20,000 per month for each of two sides. That amounts to as much as $480,000 annually for one, two-sided sign.

In contrast, the three sign companies each made similar proposals to the Des Plaines Park Dist. that, if accepted, will result in the district being paid roughly $50,000 annually for a 20-year period. That would amount to $1 million during that time frame. If the park district owns its own two-sided billboard, it could generate as much as $9.6 million over 20 years. If the district owned the sign, Brookman suggested that an agency be hired to solicit advertising and provide maintenance. The park district would also have to pay to have the sign built which could cost more than $1 million.

In a recent page 1 story in the Journal, it was reported that Rosemont owns seven billboards along local tollways which generate $1.4 million every year for the village.

"We have an obligation to generate as much income as possible for the taxpayers," said Brookman, husband of Des Plaines Åld. Carla Brookman (5th). "This would allow us to get money to renovate our parks and for other expenses without burdening the taxpayers."

Brookman said that when he first became aware of the billboard companies' interest during the middle of 2003, he called several outdoor sign companies on his own to learn more about the subject.

"I was shocked at the amount of money that can be generated," Brookman said.

"I will continue to advocate that we should own the sign. It makes perfect sense," Brookman said. "Rosemont shows it can be done. I didn't know Rosemont owned signs on its own land until I read it in the Journal."