DeKalb Times

City of Genoa City Council met Sept. 7.

Here are the minutes provided by the council:

Mayor Brust called the meeting of the City Council to order at 7:00 p.m. Roll call was taken. Aldermen Wesner, Pulley, Freund, Stage, Winter, Cravatta, Hughes and Holcomb were present. Quorum present.

Mayor Brust led the Pledge of Allegiance.

Guest Speakers – Introduction of Officer Bryan Havlicek was tabled at this time.

Motion made by Alderman Pulley to accept the minutes of the August 17, 2022 City Council meeting, seconded by Alderman Holcomb. No further discussion. Voice vote was taken. All voted yes. Motion carried.

Motion made by Alderman Wesner to approve payment of the account’s payables for August 15, 2022, seconded by Alderman Winter. No further discussion. Roll call vote was taken. Aldermen Wesner, Pulley, Freund, Stage, Winter, Cravatta, Hughes and Holcomb voted yes. Motion carried.

ITEMS FROM INDIVIDUALS IN ATTENDANCE – Mayor Brust stated that the owners of Rise and Shine and Kirkland Family Restaurant are pursuing the purchase of the building on the West end of town by Lloyds Landscaping. They have been speaking with staff in regards to the Facade Grant, currently as the grant is written it is for the front of the building however since the front of the building does not face the road, they are asking for consideration of 2 Façade Grants so that they can update and improve the front of the building and the side that faces the road. They will be remodeling the whole inside starting with the bar area to have that open first as they work on the restaurant area. They both were at the meeting and spoke to the council as to what their plans were.

OLD BUSINESS - None

NEW BUSINESS

CLOSED SESSION: FOR THE PURPOSE OF APPROVING THE MINUTES OF THE PREVIOUS CLOSED SESSION AND FOR THE PURPOSE OF RELEASING CLOSED SESSION MINUTES: Motion made by Alderman Wesner to go to Closed Session for the purpose of approving the minutes of the previous closed session and for the purpose of releasing closed session minutes, seconded by Alderman Pulley. Roll call vote was taken. Aldermen Wesner, Pulley, Freund, Stage, Winter, Cravatta, Hughes and Holcomb voted yes. Motion carried

RECONVENE REGULAR SESSION: Motion made by Alderman Pulley to reconvene regular session, seconded by Alderman Stage. Roll call vote was taken. Aldermen Wesner, Pulley, Freund, Stage, Winter, Cravatta, Hughes and Holcomb voted yes. Motion carried.

RELEASE CERTAIN CLOSED SESSION MINUTES: Motion made by Alderman Freund that the minutes of closed session meeting of the Genoa City Council be released in or in part for public inspection in accordance with the Open Meetings Act. The minutes to be released are those which are set forth on the list which has previously been submitted to and reviewed by the members of the city council, which list is before me now. Minutes to be released 4/16/2019, 6/4/2019, 8/20/2019, 9/3/2019, 10/1/2019 and 6/1/2022. Alderman Freund further moved that the city clerk be requested to prepare the minutes as reflected on this list for public inspection as soon as possible, seconded by Alderman Stage. Roll call vote was taken. Aldermen Wesner, Pulley, Freund, Stage, Winter, Cravatta, Hughes and Holcomb voted yes. Motion carried.

DISCUSS THE ANNEXATION OF 5 ACRES BETWEEN NICHOLAS CIRCLE AND NICHOLAS CIRCLE: Motion made by Alderman Cravatta to discuss the annexation of 5 acres between Nicholas Circle and Nicholas Circle, seconded by Alderman Winter. Mayor Brust stated that this property is currently in the county and not city limits, however it is surrounded by subdivisions within the city. The other issue with this property is drainage. Public Works Director Janice stated that this property was originally owned by a landscaping company who did not do much improvement to the property and the drainage was not much of an issue however, now that there are new owners, they are starting to improve the property and the drainage is becoming an issue. The council needs to make a decision if we want to ask the landowners to annex into the city, leave it and not annex it into the city and try to work with the new landowners in regards to the drainage issue or we can force annexation of the property into the city. The positive point of having it annexed into the city is the city has more control over the property and what is being done on it since it is surrounded by subdivisions. The downside to having it annexed into the city is the cost of having the drainage issue fixed along with water and sewer hookup. There was discussion and feedback from the council. The administration will look into the different options such as how much each option will cost and report back to the council in the future.

DISCUSS DOWNTOWN IMPROVEMENTS: The City unfortunately did not receive the Rebuild Main Streets grant from the State of Illinois. The City has since been working on scaling the project back and evaluating available funds, including ARPA funding and remaining 2020 bond funds, to still move forward with a downtown project that would include brick crosswalks, new ornamental street lighting with electrical buried under a brick ribbon along the back of the curb. Mayor Brust stated that he would like to get the council's feedback on how to use these funds to improve the downtown area as part of the revitalization that has been discussed thus far or something else. City Administrator Alyssa Seguss had passed out a pamphlet that had some ideas on it for the council to look at for the downtown area revitalization. There is also a quote from CES to make these improvements, currently the estimate is on the high end to try and prepare for any inflation. There is also an optional idea with Emmett Street, however it is not included in the quote from CES. This project will run from Sycamore Street to Washington Street, the city wanted to have it go to Lloyds but unfortunately there is not enough funds to go that far at this time. Finance Director Jan Tures stated that the bond money is to be used for street improvement and the city had added infrastructure on the bond under the assumption that when we started doing road projects, we would find sidewalks or storm sewers that needed to be repaired along the way. With the infrastructure being in the agreement with the bond the downtown falls within the parameters. City Administrator Alyssa stated that we will still be continuing to do a few streets. There was discussion and a pamphlet that was handed out to council as to what improvement would like to be completed. There was also discussion about closing off Emmett Street by the library with some ideas and improvements to that area. There was good feedback from the council, the council is interested in moving forward with this project.

DEPARTMENT REPORTS

Finance Report – Treasurer & Finance Director, Jan Tures stated that they have the draft back from the audit report that they are currently going through all the numbers and making corrections it's about 150 page document, working on letter of transmittal from the mayor, working on management, discussion and analysis report that goes with it. We will be presenting to the finance committee the draft, Sikich will be coming in two weeks and presenting to the council in October.

Public Works – Public Works Director, Janice Melton stated that Katie Lang and Janice have been working on a grant for reforestation of areas that have been cleared out of invasives and dead ash where the disc golf is currently at. Public Works have been really busy with the park for Volksfest this weekend. ComEd is going to be putting in a few poles mid-October, Janice has signed off on a few permits, they are upgrading it should be minimal interruption for people, ComEd is upgrading and being all done by IDOT specs. Central Park is coming along. They have solid bids, City Administrator Alyssa now has everything and there is a grant to see if we can use some of that money. Led copper is moving along and hoping to get everything done before the November deadline to give the underwriters moving on that. After all the homes have been inspected a letter will go out to inform residents. Janice stated that even houses that were tested with lead because of the polyphosphate that is added to coat the lines, the only time that the city has had a slightly elevated reading was when the resident had been gone for a couple of weeks and the water sits in the line. In the letter they inform residents to let the water run and flush out their lines for a couple of minutes. There are test kits available at stores if they would like to purchase one if they are worried about it. Alderman Cravatta asked if Janice had heard anything about the Catholic Church retention pond and residents on Hill Street getting flooded? Janice stated that nothing has changed that she is aware of, she stated that there are plenty of storm drains and plenty of space. Public Works did not get any phone calls about this. She is wondering if people have landscaped areas to make this change.

Police Department – Chief Smith reported that there are quite a few events this weekend, the police department will be staffing some of those, there is also a home football game. The accident hit and run the police department has completed its investigation and is just waiting for some medical results to come back. There was a department meeting before the city council meeting and the chief sent Brian Havlicek home, who is our new full-time officer. He was on the lateral list; he was part time before and is taking Ryan’s position who stepped down a couple of weeks ago. There are now 58 golf cart and UTV stickers; for the most part everyone is being courteous and following the rules. School has been busy, there have been quite a few fights, 3-4 DCFS stuff, some harassment stuff. Alderman Hughes stated that he has personally witnessed golf carts/utvs going way too fast and not following the rules of the road. Chief made a note of it.

Administrative Report – City Administrator Alyssa Seguss reported that everyone has fliers at their seats for the Kishwaukee Water Reclamation District Open house to see how it works on Friday September 9th from 12- 3 if anyone would like to stop by, however you do need to RSVP if interested. The staff will be meeting to talk about some personnel policy adjustments tomorrow, the city attorney will be present for the meeting. That will be on the next agenda as well as hopefully the Park District draft agreement, the city attorney is also looking at this with the items that were discussed in a previous meeting; the park district was really excited that the city is going to work with them. The city has a façade improvement grant application in and are currently working through some of the details. The police chief and city administrator have been inundated with property maintenance issues recently, in Alyssa’s opinion it might be time to really look at how we handle property maintenance issues as a city. The problem is that homes are deteriorating so far and neighbors are getting so upset and by the time it gets to the city there is not much that the city can do because it has deteriorated so far. There needs to be a happy medium between the chipping paint and a home that is sitting vacant for years on end that it is uninhabitable and then becomes the city’s issue. The city has gotten in touch with homeowners and got nowhere. There seems to be lots of problems with rentals and lack of upkeep. Looking for some guidance internally to help fix this issue. The city is also looking at working with the health department to see if they can get some cooperation in the county side. The staff met with Brian Granger in the River Bend Development who is making some fantastic progress with the public improvements, they are seeding the public retention ponds out there which was a significant cost to the developer; they are working ahead on their list and a few items that may be pushed back on the schedule but the city is working to keep that communication open with them. They are anticipating about 4 more years before that development is complete. Still looking for some task force members for the comprehensive plan, unfortunately there has not been a great response from non-elected officials, so if anyone knows of anyone who might be interested, they are looking for 15 people and we are currently near 10, please have them contact the city.

Mayor’s Report – Mayor Brust stated that they had the first company/employee picnic which was a great success and a lot of fun, hoping to make it bigger and better for next year. Thank you to everyone who made it possible. A few weeks back there was a disc golf ribbon cutting, great showing and beautiful day; very positive reaction. A thank you to public works for making it happen and to Brian Wallace for making it happen with getting donations, it is a great addition. Like Alyssa mentioned we need about 5 people for the comprehensive plan to get this task force filled. Downtown project is exciting and will more than likely be posting on social media about it to get ideas, interest, objections to try and spearhead some of these potential conflicts these ideas may cause in the future and try to get more feedback from the community.

ANNOUNCEMENTS – Volksfest is coming up Friday, Saturday and Sunday; IML conference is coming up on the 16th of September Alderman Hughes and Mayor Brust will be going down on Friday the 16th if any other alderman are interested it is a great opportunity to meet other alderman, other clerks to get some great access to other communities, if interested please let Alysa know asap because she will have to get you registered. Alderman Cravatta asked about the Baxter & Woodman Dinner which is going on per city clerk. Alderman Pulley stated that the council will be getting an email in regards to Harvest Fest Shirts shortly.

Motion to adjourn the meeting of the City Council was made by Alderman Wesner, seconded by Alderman Pulley. Voice vote was taken. All voted yes. Motion carried. Meeting was adjourned at 8:42 p.m.

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