Village needs more study of hospital

As a 30 year resident of Winfield, I was disturbed by the Jan. 17 article in the Daily Herald about the ongoing conflict between some Winfield trustees and the management at CDH. The rallying call, "Let's get it done" was the most disappointing part of the article. Why in the world would trustees Hogan, Sorgatz and Longacre not want town hall meetings and give feedback to all residents concerning those meetings and further negotiations with CDH?

According to a Nov. 12 article on citylab.com "How Nonprofits Can End Up Becoming a Drain on City Budgets," Michael A. Pagano wrote:

"There are other fiscal tools that cities can rely on that are not considered a 'tax' and therefore must be paid by nonprofits. ... water, sewer, sanitation, garbage fees are paid by all users of such services; a linear-curb fee is a charge to owners of property that border streets and can be used to provide street cleaning, street repairing and streetlamp replacement; building permit fees; inspection fees; and the list goes on and on."

That's what we need to talk about, so that we don't have to negotiate with CDH year after year, of course, those fees should only apply to businesses as large as CDH in Winfield.

When CDH changes the game in the future, Winfield will have no option other than to set higher taxes to pay for basic village services. No one is in favor of that.

Susan Halvax

Winfield