Logan County Board Finance Committee
Guidelines for Community Benefit Fund Not Yet Set
Committee tables CAPCIL request

 

[October 10, 2024] 

On Tuesday, October 9th, the Finance Committee of the Logan County Board met to discuss many important topics. The meeting was held in the Blue Room at the Logan County Safety Complex. Of the topics on the agenda, two were a CAPCIL request for money to go toward a new roof and discussion over whether an audit of the courthouse restoration would be necessary. For a breakdown on the latter, please see our other article on this meeting.

The committee just made a quorum, or the minimum number of members present for official business to occur. The number needed, out of six, was four. The four present were chairman Dale Nelson, vice chairman Keenan Leesman, Jr Glenn, and Joseph Kuhlman. Members not in attendance included Emily Davenport and Bob Sanders. Board members Michael DeRoss and Jim Wessbecher were also in attendance, though they are not members of this committee.

Toward the beginning of the meeting, Breann Titus of Community Action Partnership of Central Illinois (CAPCIL) spoke and requested the board donate $10,750 to her organization to be put toward a new roof that their Lincoln facility building is in dire need of.

For those unaware, CAPCIL is a non-profit organization dedicated to fighting poverty. According to CAPCIL’s website, they empower “vulnerable populations through poverty-fighting initiatives.” Several of these initiatives they offer are life coaching, Head Start and Early Head Start, and Strengthening Working Families Initiative. The Head Start programs focus on providing young children of low income families with quality early education. In addition to these, they also provide nutrition services to low income seniors, as well as organize and operate Workcamp for Lincoln.

The cost of the new roof, after CAPCIL puts the $69,000 they received from their insurance policy toward it, would still be $21,000. Titus shared that they went to the city of Lincoln for one half and were asking the county for the other. Titus additionally shared that much of their funding is grant based. Since that is the case, capital improvements (or work put into a property to, among other things, extend the life of the property) are not “allowable expenses.” The reason they are looking for donations is to “not put pressure on our programs and services that we provide to the community,” according to Titus.

Nelson then asked about CAPCIL’s annual budget, stating he believed it was around $12 million. Titus concurred, stating that only ten percent of that amount could be used for “operational or administrative expenses.” Titus added that this is for all six counties that CAPCIL operates in, not just Logan County.

DeRoss then asked if CAPCIL has any funds set aside for repairs out of their operating expenses. Titus shared that they do have a fund for building maintenance in their annual budget, but that this is for basic repairs such as heating issues or replacing a broken air conditioner. This amount is not large enough to cover the roof repairs, though. Upon a further question about the feasibility or lack thereof of setting aside more money for larger repairs, Titus said “that [funding] has to come from either fundraising or private donations to allow us to do capital improvement.”

Glenn then chimed in, asking if the Finance Committee agreed to freeze community donations. He said this was nothing against CAPCIL, but referenced back to a decision made in August to give $500 each to several organizations that reached out for funding, regardless of the amounts they were asking for. The reason the committee agreed to do this was due to the fact that they did not have guidelines for how to use their community fund.

The committee then began to discuss the fallout of agreeing to fund CAPCIL’s request when they had already made a decision to limit the use of the community fund to $500 until the guidelines are established. It was ultimately decided to table CAPCIL’s request for now until official guidelines can be established. Nelson stated that creating guidelines will be put on the agenda for November, and then they can come back to CAPCIL after they are established.

Titus shared that they are going to have to move ahead with the roof repair whether or not the county is able to give them the money to do so. “We are making the repair before winter,” stated Titus. “We do not believe we will be able to get through another winter without further damage to the interior of the building.” Titus then went into brief detail describing the issues with the building, including leaking due to the roof being flat. She stated that this result is frustrating, as she filled out the request in early September and was told then by Davenport that some of the guidelines still needed to be worked out. She said that they are happy with whatever the community is able to give, though. She also shared that the city agreed to give $7,500 to the repair.

Nelson did tell Titus that he will try to see if he can get the board to vote on guidelines this month so that they can revisit CAPCIL’s request next month at their committee meeting. Glenn then added, “I think this is the exclamation point on the fact that we need to get this done. We’ve been talking about this for months.” He then thanked Titus for coming down and sympathized with her, stating that he understands her frustration. Leesman then addressed the committee, asking them to prepare something to share at the next meeting in regards to the guidelines that they need to write.

[Matt Boutcher]