Leland J. Kennedy Memoir - University of Illinois Springfield

A: Twice a month.
Q: Twice a month?
A: Twice a month. Of course I was on the finance committee. I think the finance committee
had seven men, and each ward had a member of the finance committee, and the senior one
over me in my ward was George Shane, but he was chairman of the ordinance committee
maybe, or something like that, and he didn't want to serve on the finance committee, because
he just had enough to do, that's all. And I was on the finance committee. Of course there
was seven wards and the finance committee was made up of one person from each ward. Oh,
I think that all of those things have changed now down there now.
Q: Well this bond issue situation that came up. You got involved because you were on the
finance committee, was that . . .
A: No, I wouldn't think so. Maybe that had something to do with it, but it seemed so unfair
not to sell them with competitive bidding. And evidently the Telegraph had an editorial
or two on it, and was critical of it. They weren't critical of paying the firemen and the
policemen their back pay, but they were critical of the way the money was being saved. And
I knew people in the financial world that I had talked to, and so did Geltz, and we knew
people on the streets, merchants and individual citizens, taxpayers all you know, and just
thought they ought to be saved.
It was quite a public issue because the police and firemen had been pressing the city to pay
them. Rightfully so, they owed it to them, and they had it coming, and we never had the
money to pay them. Our corporation counselor at that time was a man by the name of Carl
Hoelkmann, and I think he has two boys that are attorneys in Alton now, and he was a
good attorney. And he and the mayor, the mayor was Leo Struif, and they just thought
the best way to do it was just sell them and get the debt off of their mind.
And I think they might have saved by the competitive bidding. They didn't have competitive
bidding as I mentioned. But they eventually sold them at what they - they wanted to sell
them to one of the local banks I guess or something like that, but they were sold at a price
that would have been the same had they been in competitive bidding and Geltz and I always
got credit for that.
Q: Well now, Mr. Geltz and you, were you kind of a Young Turk faction against the Old
Guard or something at the . . .
A: Well we might have been Young Turks. We were friends, political and personal friends,
but not from boyhood. Just met in politics and there was - well, Geltz was a Turk all
of his life. He stayed in the council thirty years. I don't say that unkindly. He's a brilliant
man, Geltz was a brilliant man, and he was Jesuit-trained, and never did run for any
county office or any citywide office. Oh he might have ran for a county office one time, I'm
not sure about that, but he was a brilliant man and his aldermanic career was just - he
was a disturber I guess. (chuckles)
He started in 1939 and I started in 1941 and I went on to the assembly and alderman for
Geltz. He was a Democratic committeeman I think at that time too.
But that bond issue was probably the most interesting thing that happened in my tenure
as an alderman. We got a lot of publicity out of that. And Mr. Crowsley, the senior
Crowsley, when I decided to run for the General Assembly, he always was very kind to
me. In fact the Telegraph was always kind to me. Because I was a local boy I guess. And
maybe he respected me and I always kept in touch with him on anything that was going
to happen in Springfield and things like that. Even when I left and came back I went down