 City approves street closures for "Save Logan" rally By
unanimous vote, a request from the Lincoln/Logan County Chamber of
Commerce for the closure of Pulaski between Kickapoo and McLean was
approved for Oct. 13.
Mayor Keith Snyder said that in addition to the street closure
for a rally, the chamber of commerce is planning a motorcade parade from their
offices to the downtown area. They have requested a police escort.
Snyder suggested that the Lincoln Fire Department also send a
vehicle to participate in the motorcade.
The chamber is planning on leaving their offices at approximately
4:30 p.m. and arriving in the downtown Lincoln area at approximately
4:45.
The public is invited and encouraged to come out on Oct. 13 and
show their support for the Logan Correctional Center.
Along that same topic, Alderwoman Stacy Bacon, who is employed at
the Lincoln Correctional Center, was taking orders from council
members for "Save Logan" T-shirts. The shirts cost $10 each,
with profits to go to the "Save Logan" campaign.
Bacon, Alderman Jeff Hoinacki and Snyder were all wearing the
shirts for the evening meeting. Snyder asked how the public could
purchase a T-shirt and was told they could be ordered by contacting
Dale Ridgeway, John Black or any Logan Correctional Center
employee.
Snyder said he would borrow from Bacon a comment she had made
earlier in that he didn't want to wait for the spring tulips, he
wants to "paint the town red" Oct. 13 with "Save Logan" T-shirts.
As the topic of the prison continued, police Chief Ken Greenslate
said the city department had recently participated in a
multi-jurisdictional training exercise at Logan. He commented on the
level of professionalism at the prison, saying: "I was very
impressed."
Dan Fulscher, of the Logan County Emergency Management Agency,
was in attendance, and Greenslate asked him to say a few words about
the training.
Fulscher said it was a first-of-its-kind training involving
Lincoln and Logan Correctional facilities, Lincoln police and fire
departments, Lincoln Rural Fire and EMA. He said the exercise was a
mass casualty drill that went very well. He also commented there was
100 percent attendance from the various departments.
He ended by saying: "It kind of tugs at your heart, but when we
were done, the last thing we said was that we promised we'd all be
here next year."
Snyder also mentioned the state hearing on the proposed closure
has been set for Oct. 26 at 5 p.m. at the chapel on the campus of
Lincoln Christian University. He said he wanted to really pack
the place that evening, with everyone showing their support for the
prison.
Bid for Kankakee overlay approved
On a matter that was tabled two weeks ago, Alderwoman Marty
Neitzel, who chairs the streets committee for the council, said she
wanted to remove the business of approving bids for street overlay
projects from the table.
Once the items were back on the voting agenda, Neitzel indicated
in her motion that the city should throw out bids for overlay
projects for Pulaski and Sixth Street but award the bid for overlay
on Kankakee to Illinois Valley Pavement. Illinois Valley had placed
a bid for $139,619.13. The motion was approved by unanimous vote.
This is the end of discussions that have taken place over the
last few weeks about doing an asphalt overlay on Pulaski and Sixth,
which would cover some of the city's original brick streets.
As a result of throwing out the bids, the council will now have
time to determine a proper course of action for the city's brick
streets. Hopes are to have a plan in place to protect and preserve
as much of the original brick as is possible and take new bids
accordingly shortly after the first of the year.
Consent agenda and other items
The following items were approved by consent: a petition by St.
John United Church of Christ to close part of an alley on Oct. 15
from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. for Germanfest; a petition by Main Street
Lincoln to close certain streets on Nov. 25 at 5:30 p.m. for the
annual Christmas parade; making the traffic light at Broadway and
Kickapoo a four-way red light; and a petition by Mark D. Hayes to
construct a sidewalk at 721 Tremont St.
Also approved by unanimous vote was a motion to approve
advertising for the city's new city administrator position and a
motion to accept the gift of a deed to property on Eighth Street
from Abraham Lincoln Memorial Hospital
In matters related to the gift of the property, Alderman Buzz
Busby said he'd like to have letters written to the hospital and the
Woods Foundation for all the city aldermen to sign, expressing their
appreciation for the gift of the land and the funding to build a
health park.
Public meeting Oct. 13 to discuss new city health park plans
Snyder said a public meeting is scheduled for Oct. 13 at Central
School, beginning at 7 p.m. The purpose of the meeting will be to
begin planning the city's new health park by seeking input from the
public.
Aldermen share their conference experiences
After concluding the business of the city, Mayor Keith Snyder
asked that all those who attended the annual Illinois Municipal
League conference in Chicago this year speak briefly about what they
did and what they learned.
The weekend event offers city leaders across the state a chance
to come together and interact with each other, sharing ideas on how
to grow their communities and learning from a variety of special
sessions about innovations and best practices that they can possibly
implement in their own towns.
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Those in attendance this year included Snyder and council members
Melody Anderson, Buzz Busby, Jeff Hoinacki, Kathy Horn and Marty
Neitzel.
Neitzel was the first to speak, saying she saw the annual
conference as the only place where aldermen from different
communities can meet face to face and share knowledge, and that
alone made it a trip worth making.
She spoke about what she had learned about use of concrete as an
alternative to asphalt for city streets and discussed an interaction
she had with a city official from Wood Dale.
That person had shared that the city is on a pilot program using
beet juice as a snow and ice deterrent in the winter.
According to Neitzel, the beet juice is sprayed on city streets
prior to a storm. She also shared that last year the town
saved $8,000 on salt by using the beet juice.
Horn said she attended several sessions, including two on the
topic of economic development. In both sessions, the speakers
stressed the importance of having a good relationship with the
economic development component of a community.
Horn said this was a good message for Lincoln, in that the city
aldermen need to invest time in getting to know the new development
partnership director, Michael Maniscalco, and in talking to him
about what the city needs.
Horn also attended a session on municipal electric aggregation.
Quoting a handout from Aaron Rasty, co-founder and president of
BlueStar Energy, electric aggregation is "the method by which
municipal or county governments can enter into electricity
purchasing agreements on behalf of consumers within their
jurisdiction."
This same topic was also discussed at the development partnership
banquet last week on Wednesday evening and will be presented to the
city council by Rasty in a meeting later in October.
Anderson said she attended meetings regarding pension reform and
also had an interesting discussion with an exhibitor in the
exhibition hall of the conference. She talked to a representative
from Trane Inc. who told her about a program they have in place to
do audits of city building energy usage.
Hoinacki attended a session called "Hitting the target," which
talked about retail recruitment. He said the session was very
worthwhile and addressed many of the things the city of Lincoln
should be doing. He noted the session provided a list of businesses
cities should go after.
When Busby was ready to take his turn, he first had to ask
Greenslate if he was carrying a weapon in the chamber. Greenslate
said indeed he was, so Busby asked him to lay his hands flat on his
desk in plain sight. After Greenslate complied, Busby said he had
attended a workshop "How you can operate without a police
department."
Busby said the gist of the story was that it can be done. He said
the method of keeping peace without police involved hiring two city
marshals by mayoral appointment and using the county sheriff's
office instead of city police.
Snyder said he acted as a moderator on a discussion on workers'
compensation and also attended two sessions on broadband.
He learned that the cities of Highland and Rochelle are doing
fiber optic. Speaking specifically about Highland, he said the
community of 9,000 is using fiber optic for cable, Internet and
telephone for their residents. When asked about the payback on their
investment, Highland officials said that with only 23 percent of
their residents taking advantage of the broadband services offered,
the payback on the investment was in only two years.
The city of Rochelle estimated their payback at five
years. However, Snyder said they have also set up a "high-tech park"
where they are renting "rack space" for large hard drives.
In discussing the cost of installing broadband, Snyder said he
learned the average cost is approximately $38,000 to $40,000 per
mile, and 80 to 90 percent of the cost is in doing the trenching.
He also noted that in the city of Du Quoin, they are currently
placing 3-inch conduit in every trench they dig. Snyder said right
now they don't have anything to put in it, but they are getting
prepared for the day when they can move forward with fiber optic.
Snyder said he also had the opportunity to speak directly to the
mayor of Vandalia. Vandalia also has a correctional center
that in recent years has been at risk. Snyder said it was good to
talk to them about the situation.
In the end, Snyder reiterated the opening words of Neitzel,
saying the annual conference was well worth the money spent on it.
[By NILA SMITH]
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