Lincoln, Illinois

City Council Committee's Meeting

July 27, 2010

Minutes of the City of Lincoln City Council Committees' Meeting held in the Council Chambers

on Tuesday, July 27, 2010.

Those present were Alderman Anderson, Alderman Armbrust, Alderman Bacon, Alderman

Busby, Alderman Hoinacki, Alderman Horn, Alderman Neitzel, Alderman O’Donohue,

Alderman Tibbs, and Alderman Wilmert. Also present were Police Chief Greenslate, Building

and Safety Officer Mr. Lebegue, Street Superintendent Mr. Jackson, EMC Manager Mr. Tackett,

Fire Chief Hulett, and City Engineer Mr. Mathon. Also present were City Attorney Mr. Bates,

City Clerk Mrs. Martinek, City Treasurer Mr. Conzo, and Recording Secretary Mrs. Riggs.

Mayor Pro Tem Busby called the meeting to order at 7:04 p.m. There were ten Aldermen

present (Alderman Anderson, Alderman Armbrust, Alderman Bacon, Alderman Busby,

Alderman Hoinacki, Alderman Horn, Alderman Neitzel, Alderman O’Donohue, Alderman

Tibbs, and Alderman Wilmert ) and none absent.

The Mayor Pro Tem asked for the Committees' Issues to be Presented:

Finance, Policy and Procedure:

Chairman Alderman Anderson said she did not have anything but she wanted to turn

it over to City Attorney Bates with regards to a concern that has come to his attention.

Mr. Bates said they have been requested to issue a mortgage release. He said that Mrs. Martinek

has been contacted by the property owner. Apparently in 1986 the city made a loan out of the

CDAP revolving fund loan. This was a grant received and the city was to use those funds to loan

out to people for job creation. There was one loan made in 1986 for $75,000.00 and the people

that borrowed the money granted the city a second mortgage on certain real estate they owned

locally to secure and was second behind that of a local lending institution. He represented the

city in 1986 and saw the mortgage this week and his handwriting is on it. The current owner

is looking to sell that property and in the process they did a title search and this mortgage

showed up. There are no records to show that it was or was not paid back. He has not personal

knowledge whether it was paid or not. He felt that Alderman Busby was the only other person

that might have personal knowledge and he doesn’t recall it either. They have been asked to

tender a mortgage release on a piece of property and he didn’t think anybody knew whether it

had been paid or not. If they can’t find the records saying whether or not it has been paid there

is nothing they can do about it. The law requires us to issue a release 30 days after the note has

been paid. If they can come up with proof they have paid they can say the city is slandering their

title by keeping the lien of record.

Mayor Pro Tem Busby said they need that on the agenda.

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Alderman Busby said the tabled item where the department heads have to contact one person

from the Finance committee for any expenditure over $100.00. He said Alderman Anderson

didn’t figure this was going to work with two people so he said what about one person and

Alderman Anderson wants her name off the list. She has a full time job, Chairman of the

Finance Committee plus she does the bookwork for the First Presbyterian Church. She is quite

busy. He asked for discussion.

Alderman Horn said if a fire engine needs gas she was sure that it was more than $100.00 to fill

the fire truck. Is that something they would have to call about?

Alderman Busby said special fund money, gasoline and he couldn’t remember the other item.

Alderman Anderson said the exceptions for gas, special accounts and medical exams. Alderman

Busby said the special accounts would be grant money for police department, drug money.

Alderman Anderson said she still has concerns here because there are a lot of gray areas since

there are a lot of things that have been bid out and we have commitment to take care but part

of her says that we have department heads that we’ve entrusted to take care of this. Alderman

Busby said they are not doing it thought. Alderman Anderson said the flip side is they are

having issues. She hoped this was a huge wake up call not only for the department heads but to

all of them as to how their dollars are being spent. She is not sure this is a workable solution and

that was just her opinion.

Alderman Wilmert said he in principle supported some sort of oversight over expenditures

if for no other reason than to make everyone aware of what is going on. I can’t say I am ok

with approving or disapproving a certain expenditure. I don’t know that I want to take on that

responsibility necessarily. Something has to be done and he didn’t know that he had a workable

solution or an alternative at this point.

Alderman O’Donohue said he had not been there and asked if the department heads are not be

fiscally responsible for the department’s money. Are the department heads being dealt with for

their lack of due diligence?

Alderman Busby said they have all been talked to. Don’t like to micromanage but some of the

department heads are not doing their job.

Mr. Bates said he needed clarification. For my one or two people in the legal department and

he wasn’t sure if Mrs. Martinek got billed from the Circuit Clerk for the filing fees on all the

OV cases. He files a zillion ordinance violation cases and he doesn’t know if the city gets billed

for those if they are recovered or not. He would have no way of knowing if he was going over

$100.00 or not. He said one of the fast track things he has to order title work and he could be

going over $100.00 there. He would not know he was going over.

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Alderman Neitzel thought the alert had been made to all the department heads and they should

review it in 30 days and see how they concur with how it is going. We’re out of money that is

the bottom line.

Alderman O’Donohue said what is the consequence for this not happening? Alderman

Busby said they are short money because of the state. Alderman O’Donohue said some

of the Council has lack of trust for the department heads which is a much bigger problem.

Mr. Bates said the thing he has heard and they all talk about a budget. How many times have we

sat up here and said when we talk about an expenditure in the budget? It doesn’t matter if it is in

the budget because the budget has two sides the expenditure and the revenue side. Just because

the expenditure has been authorized on the expenditure side it doesn’t mean the revenues

have come in on the revenue side. He thought the point everyone has been missing is that the

expenditure is in the budget but it doesn’t mean you can spend the money when the money in the

revenue side has not come in.

Alderman Busby said he was getting a consensus that next Monday night he would just remove

that from the agenda. Alderman Hoinacki said he liked Alderman Neitzel’s idea about reviewing

it again.

Alderman Anderson said maybe on workshop nights they can have the clerk give them an idea

of (current print out) where we are at that would show us areas that are above their percentages.

She said maybe the department heads needed that as well.

Alderman Busby said they could come to city hall anytime they wanted and get a report. Mr.

Bates said Mr. Plotner used to have a graph every month that showed what percentage had been

expended and what it should have been for that point in the fiscal year and maybe they should

also have that from the revenue side what was budgeted time come in at that point of the year

and what has come in and he thought if they could see what the shortfall of that revenue is it

would be a lot easier to show how critical that is. Mr. Conzo said that could be done. Alderman

Busby said they have$400,000.00 coming in from real estate taxes on August 2, 2010.

Fire/Water & ESDA:

Chairman Alderman Horn said she did not have a report.

Fire Chief Hulett said in reference to a follow up to a comment that Assistant Chief Dahm made

last week we had some promotions and appointments. Our firefighters were involved in a couple

of successful resuscitations (3 in a week) and the reason that he mentions that is that it is very

unusual that they can resuscitate a patient and typical survival rate for a cardiac arrest in the

field is less than 10% so it is very unusual that this happened three times in one week. It was a

combined effort our firefighters on the scene first followed by the Logan County Paramedics.

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Fire Chief Hulett said it also included the ALMH staff. Basically two gentlemen are alive

today because of efforts of our firefighters, paramedics and hospital. The one gentleman was

in the hospital for about a week he is in his early 60’s and went back to work on Monday. The

second gentleman is in his late 30’s early 40’s and he is stable in the hospital and thought he

would be ok. Unfortunately the third gentleman passed away in the hospital after a few days.

These people were clinically dead when we arrived and had no pulse, they were not breathing

and it’s all based on how quickly we can get there with our trained EMT’s and paramedics. We

recently had an upgrade where our EMT’s can actually put in advanced airways and lifesaving

medications. He wanted to thank everyone that was involved with these three calls. He was out

of town and had nothing to do with it.

Mayor Pro Tem Busby said if you are wondering why the fire department was the only unit there

the other three units of EMT’s were all in Springfield so that is the only back up the city has is

our fire department.

Grounds, Buildings and Local Improvements:

Chairman Alderman Tibbs said she did not have a report.

Insurance:

Chairman Alderman Bacon said she did not have a report.

Ordinance and Zoning:

Chairman Alderman O’Donohue said he did not have a report but I their baskets they

had a report from Mr. Lebegue. Alderman Anderson said she appreciated the report.

Police:

Chairman Alderman Hoinacki said he did not have a report.

Sanitation/Technology:

Chairman Alderman Wilmert said he did not have a report. He had a report about the GPS issue.

The regular drivers that go there have been informed about this and that two weeks out of every

year and it is during that time when that rule is not followed.

Streets and Alleys:

Chairman Alderman Neitzel said she needed to put on the agenda the approval of the grant for

DCEO of $675,000.00 and IDOT for $1,875,000.00 on the agenda.

Mr. Mathon said he had received an email concerning parking downtown and someone had

questioned if alongside the parking lot at the Farm Services building across from the old Courier

building along Pulaski and McLean and the alley. Currently it is no parking and the centerline

stripe jogs over to the north. When the striping was done with the downtown overlay that

parking lot was still the site of the old gas station and the entrance was along that frontage.

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Mr. Mathon said there are now parking blocks and that is no longer used as an approach. If

there was some striping down they could get an additional four parking places along that side.

He didn’t have an estimate of the cost and it would be done by the street and alley department.

Mr. Bates looked into the parking spaces and it did not seem to be prohibited. Mr. Jackson said

they have the surface tape but they will have to rent the surface grinder and it was about $500.00

for the whole week.

Alderman Neitzel said she had received a letter from the Logan County Fair Association for

running the street sweeper from Wednesday, August 4, 2010 through Monday, August 9, 2010 in

the amount of $436.14 and asked to have that on the agenda.

Mr. Jackson said that covers man hours plus the equipment and travel time. Alderman Busby

said how about getting rid of the material and that street sweepings are considered hazardous

material.

Mrs. Martinek opened the following bids for the Broadway overlay:

Illinois Valley Paving $614,322.26 with bid bond attached

PH Broughton & Sons $538,970.82 with bid bond attached

Alderman Neitzel asked to have those on the agenda. Mayor Pro Tem Busby said after being

awarded how soon will the work begin.

Mr. Mathon said that will likely depend on which contractor does the work. He knew that

Illinois Valley Paving was the higher bid but they were already committed to 2 city projects

currently and 2 state projects that will be starting very shortly. He expected the work to start

after the Balloon Fest after the end of August.

Sidewalks, Forestry and Lighting:

Chairman Alderman Armbrust said he had a petition by Brian Miller at 106 Oglesby Avenue for

a sidewalk with the work to be done at the City’s expense. He asked for that to be on the agenda.

Sewer Treatment Plant, Sewers and Drainage:

Chairman Alderman Busby said he wanted on the agenda to go out for bid for a 24 X 100 storage

building and bids to be opened August 24, 2010 then it was changed to September 14, 2010.

Alderman Busby said he also wanted on the agenda to go out for bids for the wall around the

sludge storage facility to be opened September 14, 2010.

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Alderman Neitzel said do you think this is the right thing to do showing the rest to save

money that we don’t have. That seems to be our consensus tonight to save money. I’ve

said it before the Sewerage Treatment plant is the Cadillac and the rest of us are Chevy’s.

Alderman Busby said it is because state law says it has to be self sufficient.

Mr. Jackson said he didn’t know if they wanted to discuss the contractor’s fee at the landfill.

They are having some problems with some of the contractors saying they aren’t contractors. We

need to come up with an idea of who should be paying and who should not be paying. He has

called different places and it all varies. Champaign County they charge homeowners and all

$3.00 a bag and it has to be in a bag and anything larger than a bag they go to $13.00 a cubic

yard. Taylorville and Bloomington doesn’t allow contractors. Bloomington allows taxpayers

two truck loads or two trailer loads. Springfield you have to buy the tags for $1.50 but they have

a pickup service. Macomb doesn’t allow contractors but they charge a fee on their water bill for

you to take stuff to the landfill. Currently we charge those that we know are contractors since we

opened it up in 1989 or 1990 that are advertising.

Alderman Neitzel said she didn’t know of a fair way to do it and they don’t want to charge the

taxpayers because they are charged to death now. Alderman Armbrust said he didn’t know

how they would keep track of it. Alderman Busby said his grandson mows his yard as well as

his other grandparents too plus his mother’s and is always taking stuff to the dump for the three

yards and they are all taxpayers.

Alderman Wilmert wanted to know what kind of revenue the contractors are bringing in.

Mr. Jackson said $10.00 pickup, $40.00 for a dump, and $125.00 for a semi and it varies

on what type of vehicle they have. He said they only bring in $800.00 to $900.00 per year.

Alderman Tibbs didn’t want people to not be clean and take care of things and didn’t want that

message out. Alderman Anderson said it seems there should be some way of making it a little

fair because there are businesses that don’t necessarily have it on their vehicle and vehicles

that do have it and are being charged. Alderman Busby said they could give it some thought.

Alderman Busby made a motion to adjourn and Alderman Neitzel seconded it. There were ten

yeas (Alderman Anderson, Alderman Armbrust, Alderman Bacon, Alderman Busby, Alderman

Hoinacki, Alderman Horn, Alderman Neitzel, Alderman O’Donohue, Alderman Tibbs, and

Alderman Wilmert), zero nays, and none absent; motion carried.

The City of Lincoln Committee’s as a Whole Meeting adjourned at 7:55 p.m.

Respectfully submitted,

Risa Riggs, Recording Secretary