City Council - Regular Meeting

We can go ahead and call our meeting to order of the Bloomington City Council for Tuesday, May the 26th at 6 p.m. And we'd ask that you please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance and then for a moment of silent reflection. We'll take roll call for attendance, please.

Council Member Kern. Here. Council Member Montney.

Here.

Council Member Dannenberger.

Here.

Council Member Straza.

Here.

Council Member Hendricks.

Here.

Council Member Ward. Here. Council Member Lee.

Here.

Council Member Scott. Here. Mayor Brady. Here.

Thank you. Thank you. Next, we move to recognition and appointments.

All right. We would like to recognize, and if you're here, if you'd please stand to be recognized, the appointments to the Human Relations Commission. We have Adinda Akmal, Arkana Narkarni, Jishram Nair.

If you are here. Please stand. I don't think so. But thank you very much for their service on the Human Relations Commission and welcome aboard. Next, we'll move to public comment.

For public comment, I will start by reading a list of names of individuals that emailed public comment prior to the meeting, and it was already provided to council. And then afterwards, after the mayor reads his public comment statement of procedure, we will start with J.W. Barnett and then Nate Marshall to follow. So the emailed list, we have Julie Emig, Tricia Braid, Kim Throop, Kevin Meyer, George Anderson, Howard Hethowick, Angela Rada, Lindsay Marshall, Erin Parrish Meyer, Ruth Burke, and Becky Howell. And after your statement, we'll start with JW Barnett.

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, public comment is an opportunity for speakers to provide their views and feedback to the city council. It's also an opportunity for the city council to listen and hear diverse points of view. To maximize the impact of public comment and show respect, For the expression of all viewers, speakers should remain or should maintain stability and focus on city issues. Speakers must identify themselves for the record, but are not required to give their address. And each speaker is given the floor for three minutes and the council does not respond or engage in debate. Any speaker that engages in threatening or disorderly behavior will be deemed out of order and their time ceased. Our first speaker, please.

Hello and good evening. Bloomington City Council and members of the community, my name is J.W. Barnett, and my intent this evening is to share a message of actually Thanksgiving and some positive energy. I've lived in Bloomington since the summer of 2023. I was sent here by the bishop of my denomination, the United Methodist Church, to preach as an associate pastor at Wesley United Methodist Church down the street. And now the intent of my bishop is to send me to a new church and a new community. I'm actually going to Pinckneyville, Illinois, the community in which I was raised. I've not been a regular to these meetings in person, but I certainly have on YouTube. I've built professional relationships in this city as well as personal friendships. And I know in the last three years, this city has faced challenges, but also celebrated success. I've been fortunate enough to enjoy a position to have some involvement and impact on city issues with admittedly having taking zero heat. So I'm not on that side of the seat there, but here we are. But I just wanted to share some things I've learned from this town, this city. I've learned a lot about this city, about the value of presence and doing all that is in our capacity to meet the moment, even if we do so imperfectly. I have learned that while it is important to keep track of the broader issues that we face as Americans, we do ourselves and our community a better service when we focus locally and act on how those issues impact us here. And I've learned that humanity is in all people, even when there is a temptation in the world to treat them otherwise. And then also I've learned that the message of distrust, hostility, and division that is often pouring out from our phone screens is greatly reduced when we commit to seeing one another and cooperating with one another in person. So I leave this community this next Monday with a spirit of thanksgiving that the lessons this city has taught me, and I will carry all those lessons into the next chapter. It's my hope and prayer. to spread the character and the integrity of this community to wherever I find residents. So thank you for listening to me this evening, and God bless.

Thank you very much.

Next up, we have Nate Marshall, and then to follow will be Barb Stewart.

Howdy, I want to talk quick. My name is Nate Marshall. I lived here in Bloomington a little over three years. I've lived all over this country, and the longest I've lived anywhere is in the Bay Area in California. I was an educator and I spent five years working for Apple. I have been in IT as long as I can remember. I'll start by saying, yes, data centers are necessary. Modern life depends on them. They're an essential part of our daily life when we interact with them invisibly thousands of times a day. Regardless of your politics or even your daily connectivity, this is the facts. However, the new age of data centers are a massive concern. They're built on lies, speculation, and a misunderstanding of scale. I've heard people say things like, Why not use existing places like the old mall or somewhere like that? Well, that location and its parking lots is only about 5% of like one of the little blocks that I see on the maps proposed. Those new data centers are massive. The scale is not something we can really wrap our brains around. Think of something 20 times the size of Eastland Mall taking the place of one of our beautiful farms. The scale is enormous. The need for hyperscale data centers is driven by a lot of different things. AI is part of that. It's honestly ethically concerning for us all in expanding digital landscape where citizens don't have a reliable way to discern truth. And AI continues to erode our ability to find accurate data or reliable information. Data mining and the market of that data is expanding component is ever increasing demand for data centers. We're no longer in the age of the Internet of everything. We've passed that and moved on to the monetization of all of our data and your data. This is a thing for quite a while, and the amount of data that can be collected is expanding on an extremely large scale. It's package-tracked to unique identifiers like you and me. These data centers are eroding our public and personal privacy. Every community and every company that produces any sort of digital product relies on that as a monetary stream of revenue. Privacy is already at a premium, but we'll be competing We'll be turning that into a myth in the years to come. Sorry. The other huge instance for these is data mining cryptocurrency. That is expanding as those keys need to be calculated and built. It gets bigger and bigger and that computing power is growing more and more. It's obvious that data centers will cause water shortages and all that we've heard before many times. As I've listened to these meetings and seen the slippery slope this topic is being brought up, it makes me worry that we're all being hoodwinked and we're being manipulated by smarter players out there. Allowances for energy storage and only five megawatt data centers is just so they can get their foot in the door and into the community and take us for granted. We could be driving through empty lots five years from now of these data centers that have destroyed our environment, destroyed our communities, and destroyed our towns as we know them. They're not going to use unions. They're going to use their own special contractors. They're going to take advantage of everything they can. Thank you.

Thank you. Next.

Next up is Barb Stewart.

Thank you. Tonight's vote is critically important because the yes strengthens Bloomington's future in several ways. For one, yes will prevent leaders from violating government standards. For instance, before adopting the code, the McLean County Board had numerous violations over time. such as one member using county employees to do his yard work. Reading the ethics code regularly since then has prevented all or most of these misdeeds by reminding members of what is expected of them. Your yes will affect council members personally All the things you should and should not do are listed on the ethics code. By signing a public pledge to follow this list, you are responding to the appeal made by the code to your better angels. Your response will be almost certainly produce new resolve so that violations that might have happened will never happen. there might even be no violations for 10 years and nothing to punish. More importantly, yes, we'll increase people's trust by posting the signed code. You actually make a public statement saying you intend to use ethics as a guide in governing Bloomington. The trust this statement will inspire is extremely important. Because the strength or weakness of people's trust is what determines the overall strength and character of the city. And without trust, democracy dies. So your yes will mean a stronger Bloomington and a stronger voice in America's great experiment in self-rule. Only in democracy. Because it is self-ruled. protects the rights and freedom of all people. Only when guided by ethics is democracy strong enough to rule and sustain itself. Ethics codes matter. Thank you.

Thank you. Are there any other speakers?

Next up we'll have Chris Greer and then to follow Michelle Blattheim.

Good evening. My name is Chris Greer. I have been a resident of the southeast corner of Bloomington for almost 24 years. Across the street, of Ireland Grove Road is where one of the possible sites of the data center is. I won't go through all of the environmental impacts, but what I will say is those will directly affect my home and my neighborhood. So I don't want the hyperscale data center across the street from me. It will not make a good neighbor. Um, for me or for anyone in our area, because I know there's a potentially other sites, um, One of the things I am concerned about also is if a data center is built. I'm reading a lot of information that the pace of the technology, those data centers can be obsolete as soon as they're being finished construction. But it could be longer. It could be five years, 10 years. Think of your phone. If you have an iPhone, think about how fast those updated so then we would have this huge obsolete monstrosity also regulation I know that the federal government is doing very little for regulation it feels a little bit like the move fast and break things is their theory in order to to not impede creativity and ingenuity. But I think there are better ways to go about that. I think that we can still have ingenuity and creativity, but maybe in a sustainable and environmentally friendly way someday. Those things have to be looked at. And finally, in a timely fashion, maybe some of you have seen, Pope Leo came out with his encyclical yesterday. I have not read the whole thing. It's 42,000 words. But I did find a quote from it, and it says, calling for prudence, rigorous evaluation, and even at times, a slower pace in adopting AI does not mean opposing progress, Leo wrote. Instead, it is an exercise of responsible care for the human family, and I'll add, and our Earth. Thank you.

Thank you.

Next up, we'll have Michelle Blattheim, and then we will end with Adrian Hahn.

Hello, my name is Michelle. I'm a local resident and a community organizer with Illinois People's Action. I just wanted to thank you all for considering this moratorium vote today. You all have been responsive to the community's concerns, which is great. Like the last speaker, I'm not going to go into the environmental impacts. I think we all know that these hyperscale data centers consume enormous amounts of water and electricity. And I think we all know that the AI that they are generating has a lot of negative consequences, including the goal of wiping out large numbers of good-paying, middle-class, white-collar jobs that we rely on here in this community. So really just what I wanted to say is to really encourage you guys to vote yes to this moratorium. We understand that you don't have the power to just ban this stuff in our community outright, but what you can do is vote yes and give yourselves, the state regulators, as well as community folks like myself, the time we need to figure out what kind of regulations we need and to organize ourselves and be ready uh to push back when folks try to sort of steamroll you know the pretty obvious will of the community which that folks don't really want these here um so yeah i just want to encourage you guys to vote yes thank you thank you all right and last up we'll have adrian hahn

My name is Adrian Hahn, and I live in Ward 3 of Warwick, Bloomington. We've lived here almost 25 years. And I will say that I've also lived across the country, everywhere from North Carolina to California. We've lived in Texas and Pennsylvania. So we have kind of a wide view of life around in the United States. And I am here to basically ask you to make sure we have this moratorium in place. And I personally think that six months goes by really fast and we need to have not only a feeling for ourselves as Bloomington, what kind of life we want to have here. And, um, also, uh, we have to look at where this is going to go right now. Most people think it's going to go out across from the airport. That's what's been talked about. And, uh, This hyperscale data center industrial site is just inappropriate for that area. If you live, say, between two and a half to three miles from a data center, at that point, it's generally concerned to be safe and comfortable. But there is a certain thing called low frequency humming. And that can be felt by the body for 3,000 feet to a mile. So that is something that actually impacts health and impacts your heart. As I can tell you right now, it impacts mine when I'm in an area where I have that. Air quality can be compromised. Visual aesthetics, if you can call it that, would certainly be industrial, which would be kind of out of character for that area. And other issues would be light pollution in the surrounding neighborhoods and the migratory bird flyway. There's insufficient water resources, massive energy consumption, e-waste. If this thing collapses in five or 10 years, who's going to take care of all that? We have location risks and noise. I do want to bring up one thing. And if all of you people know about Erin Brockovich and the work she's done, She currently has a website on data centers, and it's called BrockovichDataCenter.com. And if you can look at that, where the dots are in the map of the United States, where people have been talking about citizen and already built and in the process of construction on the map, half the United States is covered up with dots. So that tells you how much impetus there is for these data centers. So I would suggest if you can to look at that website, it'd be a good resource for in the future. So thank you. And I hope the city will take a serious look at the moratorium. And I thank you very much.

Thank you.

There's no further public comment.

Okay. Thank you all. Next we'll move to the consent agenda, which is number seven on our packet. Are there members that have an item that they wish to pull from the consent agenda? Member Straza? Yes, I'd like to pull 7R, please. 7R. Okay. And then next to Member Ward.

I'd like to pull 7N, please.

7N. Okay. Okay. then we'll move forward with the remainder of the items on the consent agenda. Is there anyone else that has a question or wishes another item to be pulled? Is there a member who would make a motion for those remaining items to be passed?

I'd make that motion.

Second. Is there a second? Second by Member Straza.

And if the clerk would take the vote.

The item passes. No nays to announce.

Thank you. Next, we'll go back to the two items that were pulled from the consent agenda. The first one being 7R, which I believe, Member Straza, if you'd like to go ahead.

Yeah, we're going to do 7R. Yeah, I just had some questions. There's been some comment out there. There's several spaces throughout our community, not just in Ward 5, but in other wards that discuss that. The enterprise zone, and I think it would just be good for people to hear how this happens, that there was some discussion about it in the past, and just want to get more clarity so people feel a bit more, have understanding or comfortable about what we're doing.

Mr. Juergens? Thank you, Council Member Straza. So we're happy to talk about this. We're actually very excited about this amendment tonight. This amendment, a lot of times we have amendments and it has properties in multiple different jurisdictions. The enterprise zone is made up of multiple different public bodies. Tonight's amendment is only property in the city of Bloomington, and it is really all about housing and retail. So there's nothing within the proposed plan that we're looking, oh, this could be a good spot for a data center, a hyperscale data center. There's none of that. None of it's even that large of a property. The largest property in there is

office six points roads and i'm going to let uh our director of development services talk a little bit about that and the other properties that are included in this amendment thank you council mayor appreciate it um yes this there was a recent amendment about a year ago maybe that had other bodies this is uh just ours that we were not ready to add to that former one. We wanted to be very systematic about it and really focus on, frankly, residential. So these are infill properties. The one far west off Six Points actually was looked at for residential development by a developer. It's next to the fire station, next to another neighborhood. It's been successful out there, that neighborhood has. It seems to be a great piece of land for residential development. Water and sewer are there. The other ones, one is the former Kroger site. If you're familiar with that off college, that was supposed to be a Kroger. It has lapsed. They have been subdivided. Nothing is happening. They get a lot of interest from multifamily or mixed use developers. So we want to add those areas onto this. Former post office has had a lot of trouble off of Tawanda, has had a lot of trouble leasing. And the longer something sits, the more work that is needed. So we think the enterprise zone there may help that get moving. The Leslie Drive, there is the conference center over there actually has some expansion land and they would like to expand. So that's that piece. Then there are two stalled apartment complexes. So if you remember the former links project, it was supposed to be about 284 apartment units out there by the Dunn-Raven area. It may not be apartment units, but we're hoping for some housing that is still the plan and any little bit, the material exemption on sales tax for the materials is, would be very helpful. This is starting to make the difference between projects going and not going. The other apartment complex is in the Wittenberg Woods area off Morris and Luce. So that has just been waiting. They couldn't get the numbers to work. They've retooled it a few times. It's been years. We've had the plans in for almost four years. This will make the difference between that going. They're ready to break ground if the enterprise zone passes. So that's what these are about. We're really taking seriously the endeavor to get housing. We didn't think that the enterprise would make that big a difference. It is making a difference in these pro formas. Happy to answer any other questions.

Thank you. And with that, are there other questions? I just want to make a quick comment. Thank you for explaining that. Again, it goes back to, I think, something we've been talking about for a while since I've been on here, at least probably even before that, is how do we find ways to to encourage development, infill especially. That has been something that's been very key, I think, this council and before me and during this time of having infill and trying to engage with people, try to get something spurred on so those areas are developed. Because like you said, some of them have been sitting there for a long time. I know the old post office, office one, has been there for a long time. That building is deteriorating quickly as it sits empty. So thank you for the explanations and for the time you put into it. Thanks.

Is there any other members to, that particular item.

Thank you for that. Yeah, I have just a couple questions. You emphasized a couple of times that this is our enterprise zone. Can you explain for the benefit of the public why that's so important?

So, well, this enterprise zone isn't just a city of Bloomington one, so there's five entities. So, and they all have to agree. So, it's the city of Bloomington, the town of Normal, McLean County, Gibson City, And is it Pyatt? I get confused. Ford. Ford County. Sorry, I drive through both of them on my way home. So those entities, we have 20 square miles to do. This is a consortium of folks. Every town or entity has a little bit different need. Normal added a whole lot with Amendment 5. And again, We added a couple strategically, but we wanted to be very strategic with this next round. It's a lot of work. The BNEDC is the administrator of the enterprise zone. So they do all the administration, they file the certificates, but it is an incentive tool that we have to offer to our landowners and our developers.

And that brings me to my second question. Can you talk about some of the incentives? You talked about the sales tax for materials. Anything else?

So I actually have the interim director of BNEDC, Tyler Cravens, is here because he would be better geared to speak to the actual enterprise zone beyond what we usually see as the incentive. Would you like him to come up and answer?

Sure. Sure. Thank you, Tyler Cravens, Interim CEO at the BNEDC. So outside of that, the largest one that you'll see utilized is also the abatements. And so the EDC is empowered by certain bodies beyond just the intergovernmental parties to the enterprise zone, such as Unit 5, Heartland Community College have all signed on to another agreement related to property tax abatements. Those are for high impact projects. You have to meet a higher level of criteria. Think Ferrero, Rivian, but also smaller ones. The thresholds, $250,000 and 25 employees is the very minimum to be eligible for the property tax abatements. Those are utilized, again, for larger projects. It really is, the meat and potatoes of it is the building tax exemption. The state also administers a couple pieces of it, not us. As the local administrator, we do the sales tax exemptions, and we do the property tax abatements. We do not do utility. There's some potential utility tax exemptions that you can receive from the state. And there's some other state-related incentives that are much more rare in their use. And the qualifications for those additional state incentives as part of the enterprise zone are much higher, like north of $5 million projects. So not a lot of the things that come through are going to be eligible for those pieces of the zone.

Thank you.

Member Lee? Yeah, I just wanted to get some additional clarity and information on the property you mentioned near Dunraven, because that affects my ward. Can you provide more information on what kind of enterprise entities are interested in that? Or what kind of housing are you looking at? Is there any kind of additional Uh, information you can provide regarding that property.

Sure. It is actually held by a developer builder. Um, so the raves, um, they're out doing the Grove. They are trying to make the numbers work on some complex related to residential. It was supposed to be 284 apartment units. Um, they are not seeing this work under that model. So it will probably have a mix, especially to buffer up against some commercial. It won't be detached single family of a low density, but they do have some acreage there. They'd like to do something. I do know they're working with a local Farnsworth on some different layouts, trying to see if a mix maybe of some townhomes and some apartments would work. But that's all I know. I have nothing officially submitted, but it is all residential is the piece that we're trying to add.

Thank you. Thank you. Any other members? Member Straza, does that answer your questions? Yes, it does. City Manager Juergens, any other information you'd like to share? Any other information from our speakers and guests? All right. Thank you very much. Then we will ask the clerk to take a vote specifically. Make a motion. Motion for a second. Seven R, please. By Member Straza and... Second. Second. Member Dannenberger, if you'd take the vote on 7R specifically.

The item passes. No nays to announce.

Thank you. Now we're moved to Member Ward, who asked that 7N be pulled and to your comments.

Yeah, I'm, I'm actually asking that we pull this not because I'm have any concerns about it, but because I don't want it to be buried or lost in the consent agenda. And so I'm just hoping that the staff can give a little bit of an explanation for the benefit of the public about the history of this and the impact of this before we move forward.

Okay. Our city manager, Mr. Jurgens.

Thank you. And I appreciate that. And I've asked our parks director, Eric Veal, and our assistant director, David Lamb, to come up and speak about it. This is a project we are really excited about. It's been in the works for a while, approved. And like a lot of projects, the bids come back and it's a little bit more money. But we are excited about this and truly the partnership with Benward, who is truly the entity that's going to be doing this and proposing to do this. but I'll let our director, Eric Veal, talk a little more about the specifics of the project. Thank you, Council Member Ward, for bringing this forward and council.

So this is a partnership. There was a question about money earlier today, so we'll just start off with that. There's a $600,000 grant through the IDNR, which is Illinois Department of Natural Resources, OSLAD grant, Open Spaceland Acquisition and Development. And so that is the city's contribution, which we received that grant. The remainder up to, I think, $6.8 million more is actually going to be covered by BINWRD, Bloomington Normal Water Reclamation District. I do want to thank Tim Irvin. We invited him here tonight. We had a special event he had to be to for some family, but he wanted to share his thanks and support for you guys, hopefully for tonight, to approve this project. I attended last Monday night his board meeting. And the board, and he approved this item again, as we had already done this once before, but now it's at a higher threshold. So Dave Lamb has been working on this project more directly with Tim. So I'm going to let him share just a few highlights, if you like, about the project.

Thank you, Director Beal, City Manager, Council, Mayor. Thank you for having us here. Yes, it's a cooperative, collaborative project. Planning process included City of Bloomington, Bloomington Water Recognition, Boys and Girls Club, Bloomington Normal, Housing Authority of the City of Bloomington, Friends of the Trail, and IDNR. We're really going to transform that whole west area of Sunnyside Park into a sustainable landscape that's good for the environment. We've got interpretive signage that's going to talk about the water quality, what happens when it rains, for kids to understand what that is. We've got an outdoor gym going in there with 12 different exercises. We've got over 250 native trees going in. 114 native species of native plants going into prairies and stuff like that. So trail systems, solar lighting. We've also been able to achieve site certification. We're going to be the only downstate site that has received this, and that's a holistic certification that's highly sought after in the industry for sustainability. So we're really proud of that as well.

And I'll just wrap it up with two points. I know you favor the west side sometimes, and this is on the west side. And it is gonna be a great benefit. We're expanding a park that already exists to 12 acres with an opportunity for more. This is on city land, but it is next to Binward and just Dave mentioned it, but I'm gonna highlight this. This is a educational opportunity for students. We have bus parking for this to learn about the water life cycle from falling from the sky, going back into through their system, back into the sky and how all of that works. So while we do parks and they do, Help us with this park. This will be an educational landscape as well.

Thank you. Go ahead, Ward.

Unless there are other comments or questions, I'll move approval.

Second. Motion by Member Ward and seconded by Member Hendricks. And if the clerk then would take the roll for 7N.

The item passes. No needs to announce.

Thank you. Next, we'll move to the regular agenda items for this evening under 8A. The first item is consideration and action on an ordinance establishing a temporary moratorium on data center facilities. And I will let our manager, Mr. Juergens, discuss from there.

Thank you, Mayor and Council. Just a couple of things I wanted to highlight on this. This is a six-month moratorium, although certainly the Council could extend it if it needs to be, or if somehow there are regulations that come forward sooner, then you could adopt those at your pleasure, but this will be controlled by the Council. A couple of other things I want to point out, and then we're happy to answer any questions about this. Part of this ordinance calls for at least two public hearings by the planning commission. So this will be a deliberative process where it is very transparent, where we will have outreach to the public, and we will have at least two public hearings. We want one of those public hearings in response to some of the comments that we've received from the council and from the public to potentially also involve, you know, industry people, not just people who work for data centers, but other people to come forward and be able to answer the questions that the council or the community or the planning commissioners might have. So we will be inviting people to answer questions as well. But we do appreciate the consideration of this. We do believe that we need to take a pause and approve a moratorium so that we can put in place better regulations that really match what we know now and is what would be considered a best practice as to what other communities are doing in relation to data centers. So with that said, we're happy to answer any questions and go from there.

Thank you. And with that being said, after I believe we've had two public hearings, a committee of a whole, and lots of discussions there, are there members that have any other comments or questions in regards to the item before you?

No, I don't have any questions. I just have one additional comment, and I won't go too far on this, and I don't expect that we will, but the idea behind this moratorium is so we can set up those regulations, so we can do things like the City of Aurora has done, like the McLean County has done, and then I ask that we start those discussions and those set up immediately.

Thank you. Any other members? If not, is there a motion? I would move approval. By Member Hendricks. Is there a second? Second. by Member Dannenberger. If the clerk would take the roll, please.

The item passes. No nays to announce.

Thank you. Next, we'll move to, um, on the regular agenda, uh, letter B under 8, and it's a consideration and action on an ordinance amending the Bloomington City Code Chapter 44 with text amendments and modifications to additions to the zoning code. And I will ask that our city manager, Mr. Juergens, explains further.

Thank you. Again, so as a best practice, we have started bringing any text amendments, even if we think they're not going to be controversial, and putting them on the regular agenda just for transparency and to give some greater light to them. So these are some text amendments I'm going to ask our Director of Development Services, Kelly Pfeiffer, and our City Planner, Alyssa Pemberton, to talk a little bit more about them. But this is what I would call a hodgepodge of different things designed to address some patches in our zoning code. So with that, Kelly, please take it away.

Certainly. City Manager, Mayor, Council, thank you. Sometimes we call these an omnibus. because it really is just kind of a mix of things. So some of these are coming because we've been implementing code for a while. There are things that have been problematic and we wanted to take the opportunity to change them. There's others that we've been assessing strategically when considering the downtown. Specifically, we've been looking at what upper floors can be and what space is. And we realized that as spaces are created, people are going to need to store more things if we're doing. So where many warehousing have often been a campus setting, we're like, well, this might actually work and be a good thing in the downtown. So that's something a little bit different. We also on when people are in corner lots, there's some confusion because there's front yards and really they should be able to use a little bit more of one of their yards. We've created new definitions. So Alyssa will go through kind of each of them. They don't necessarily tie together. Again, it's more of an omnibus trying to deal with some things that have been problematic or we think that will help people, residents here and or businesses.

Council Mayor Alyssa Pemberton, thank you for hearing this today. I will start by saying we did hold a public hearing on these and they're coming to you with a 7-0 recommendation for approval. And I want to state very loudly a thank you to engineering and traffic because we spent a lot of time working with them on these. There's quite a bit of this in here that came not only from administration of the code over the last few years, but from comments on lack of clarity or concerns regarding public safety, particularly at street intersections, at exits and entrances to and from driveways and alleys. And they were instrumental in helping us figure out what those distances should be, what safety looks like in those contexts. So as you are looking at the clear sight triangle components of this or at the fencing components of this, recognize that a lot of that actually comes from true public safety and engineering backgrounds. The other thing that we have found repeatedly is fences installed in easements over top of public utilities that we are paying to maintain and then not having that same support for the public utilities as we do for the private property owners who use those public utilities. So that's also reflected in some of the changes in our fencing regulations. Doesn't mean you can't put it there. It means you have to demonstrate you're not going to damage public property in the process. We also heard loud and clear that our rooftop mechanical screening is very burdensome for developers. We previously would require 360 degree completely opaque screening, whether anyone could see that side of it or not. That gets expensive and it gets really heavy for old buildings. So it's a much more practical application of rooftop screening for mechanicals. We have a whole bunch of little things in here, like we missed adding RD, went to the list of residential districts we had when it was created in 2021. there is also state legislation that uh trumps us on the ability to apply parking minimums in certain areas we've had a provision that just gives us that out when we can't enforce it anyway says unless in conflict with state or federal legislation We also changed the definition of kennel to align with normals, which changed just over the course of the last year. I'm very excited about that because we've actually had people call and want to move to our community and say, yeah, but I have two dogs and two cats because my son moved home with me. And the fact that those people can come live in Bloomington now in normal, it makes me happy. That's a very quick overview. I'm happy to answer any questions that you have.

Thank you, members of the council. Questions? If not, I have no questions. I was just going to motion to approve. Motion to approve by members Strauss. Is there a second? Second. Second by member Hendricks. And the clerk would take the vote, please.

The item passes no nays to announce.

Thank you ladies. Next we'll move to, um, on the regular agenda item, uh, letter C, uh, which is a consideration and action on an ordinance amending chapter two of the Bloomington city code to amend the rules for conduct of meetings as requested, um, by the mayor. Um, and in that request, we, um, explained and I think had a good conversation at the last Committee of the Whole meeting regarding the purpose and the intent behind this particular motion or, excuse me, ordinance. And so at that time, we explained, I explained what my thought process was, was particularly into substantive changes to amendments and the timing of such substantive changes. I think earlier this evening, the word systematic and attention to detail was used regarding items. And when we talk about an ordinance that's before us, and there's going to be substantive changes to that ordinance that someone is bringing forward, one of the very first things that I believe would be helpful to all the members and to the general public, is if there's going to be substantive amendments, that they be submitted ahead of the meeting by noon on that day of the meeting, in particular, giving our clerk, giving legal the ability to review things, not only in a more timely and thorough fashion, but not under the the scope of things when it's before us and we're in the middle of a meeting so we can better serve the public. There are other points to this particular ordinance. It was drafted by our legal counsel with much discussion from many of us. And if there's anything that you have questions about regarding the proposal before you, I or our legal counsel Mr. Spanos would be happy to discuss the intent of this ordinance. Questions?

Yeah, I've got some questions. So understanding, thinking about this from the, you know, the spirit of it and that kind of stuff, we can still do things under this, like, for example, the motion to divide. If, for example, there is a motion out there that has two parts, and say I agree with one of the parts, but I want to either table or vote down the other part, I can still go ahead and make a motion to divide under this new, correct?

Mr. Spanos?

I think that if the motion like you suggest, and I think I sent you an example was, clear that there's Part A and Part B, a motion to amend proving only Part A and not Part B would be a relatively routine motion and not something that would be complicated and require additional tax or writing so that under the circumstances, I don't think you'd have to continue or postpone that motion under that situation.

Got it. And then can I ask a further question about the process in general? So I understand with our city code that we use Robert's rules only when say the city code is not clear. So when it comes to say motions to divide, we need to have a motion and a second before it's allowed to go ahead and do that. Is that correct?

Yeah, I think this is where we deviate a little bit from Robert's rules. The cleanest process is you have a motion to approve as presented. And then you have a subsequent motion to amend. And then that motion to amend would be to delete the second half. And then you would have a vote on whether or not you amend it. And then you have a vote on whether or not you approve it. I think that's the cleanest process. We don't always go that same route. Sometimes we'll have, this council has had motions from the start that are separate from the motion that's presented. So you could conceivably, based on past practice, come out and say, rather than I move to whatever A and B together, you could come out and say, I move to approve only A. That's been allowed in the past.

And if we pass this, we still can, because that would be a motion to divide and not say a motion to amend.

Correct. I think so, yeah.

Gotcha.

As long as it's not a substantive change. And that, although it changes the full extent of it, it's simple, it's easy, it's straightforward.

Understood.

And it's up to the mayor's discretion. on whether or not is substantive enough change that it needs to be moved. And then of course that decision is subject to appeal. If the entire council were to think, no, we don't like that ruling, Mayor, you can make a motion to appeal that and then address it that way.

So got it. And then my last question on this is we tend to do things, discussion, motion, second vote. Has every got like a motion to divide, not motion to amend in the rules right now, it requires a motion and a second. we preventing ourselves from from performing other motions by doing discussion motion second vote versus motion second discussion vote I'd have to think about it more in more detail but potentially understood I mean it just it seems like we're going in the same direction in the same vein, we want to make this clear, and I want to know whether or not I can do things like motion to divide, and if I can't do that unless things are happening, then we need to have a longer-term discussion, a bigger discussion about how we approach these meetings.

Thank you, and to that exact point is when there are substantive changes that is proposed that is ordinance before us for the exact purpose of making sure that we all understand what we're voting on as it changes before our very eyes in these chambers, we need to have the ability to have our legal and our clerk review what the language is going to be. So if that is submitted to us on the day of a meeting by noon for substantive changes, that's going to afford all of us the ability to understand more clearly with advice from counsel, and to serve the public when it comes time in which to vote, that we understand specifically what we're voting on and the language that's been changed or proposed. Any other comments?

I just wanted to, first of all, thank you for that discussion. It was very helpful. I mean, given the fact that the only thing is changing is we're being asked to bring it to staff's attention just a few hours before the meeting that we're going to have a substantive change and give the opportunity for that to be crafted before we're here in the moment, you know, on the fly making those changes, I think seems to be very reasonable. So thank you for putting this together.

You're welcome. Other members?

I'd like to make a motion that we extend discussion for another five minutes. I'll second.

Motion has been seconded by Member Hendricks.

Do a quick roll call. Council Member Kearns? Yes. Council Member Montney?

Yes.

Council Member Dannenberger?

Yes.

Council Member Straza? Yes. Council Member Hendricks? Aye. Council Member Ward? Aye. Council Member Lee?

Yes.

Council Member Scott? Yes.

Next, since we have extension of time that's been passed, Member Ward?

Yeah, I'd like to speak against this proposal as it's presented. And my primary reason for speaking against it is because I actually value the people sitting out in front of us in this meeting and the views that they bring here in public comment. And I value the opinions of my colleagues as they sit at this table and share their own comments. and viewpoints. As it is proposed currently, this change would essentially rule out the value and the impact of any of those viewpoints. And the reason that it would do that is that it would prevent any of us from doing anything with whatever you all say. Particularly if it's a time sensitive issue. People's eyes may glaze over when we talk about rules in this chamber and the way we interact with one another, but the effect, this may not be the intention, but intention and impact are not the same. The impact of this change means that any one of the folks sitting out there, any one of the people sitting at this dais may have questions wisdom to share. And I can't do anything about it because I won't have heard that before noon. I took note, it was 6.04 p.m. when our first speaker, thank you, pastor, for your service to this community, when our first speaker came to the podium and Sorry, if you would have had something interesting to say about a topic that we were about to vote on and it was a time sensitive thing, I couldn't have done anything about it. Same goes for all of my colleagues. We are tying our hands with this. And so I implore us not to shut out the voices of the very people we supposedly represent by passing this as it stands.

Thank you. Any other comments?

Questions? Member Hedrickson? Yeah, I would just make quick comments. You know, I've been on the fence with this. I've served in many other bodies on the Beacon City Council where we did have rules related to submitting amendments in advance. so that we as members knew what was going to happen with the National Education Association, which is the largest deliberative democracy in the world. I've served on that as well. And we have to submit those well in advance so that the body can review those. I take issue with by having an interest in clarity that I somehow don't care about the voices of residents. We still have the motion to postpone to a later date. And we have done that in the past when we have heard something and said, whoa, we should take a pause on this. and postpone so that we have the ability to take those comments and those concerns into consideration. I do think we need something that is clearer, but I think casting this as somehow not listening to residents, I thought that I had to speak to that.

Any other comments from members? If not, to close. I'm sorry.

I'm sorry. Yeah. Um, we would not be able to take action for time sensitive matters categorically, no matter what anybody out there said, no matter what anybody at this table said for time sensitive matters that would need to be addressed before the next meeting, which in this case is weeks from now, we wouldn't be able to move on those things. if it was a grant opportunity, if it were a matter of public safety, if it were a question of economic development and somebody needed us to make a decision in a hurry, we wouldn't be able to do that. We wouldn't be able to make changes to that.

Thank you. Any other members?

Yeah, so I had the privilege of serving here for five years. And I can't think of a time when we've had a situation where it was imminent that we amend and vote in that moment. We also have the opportunity to call a special meeting with notice that would allow us to reconvene and address something that required a time sensitive response. I found myself uncomfortable on occasion with the extent to which we are amending during the meeting without the opportunity to carefully reflect on each word so that I can make sure I'm making an effective decision. Thank you.

I'd like to move that we extend discussion for five more minutes.

Is there a motion to extend the timing? for five more minutes.

I just made that motion.

Oh, I'm sorry. Is there a second to remember Ward's motion?

I'll second it.

Do a roll call vote?

Yeah, we'll actually just do a quick all in favor. Okay. Aye. All opposed?

Nay. Member Ward?

I'd like to move that we table this to our next meeting. And then once we have that motion on the floor, is it appropriate then to offer some amendments to the item? Or do I need to move something else?

I first want to thank you for articulating exactly what I'm talking about, because now people are confused. And this is what we're trying to avoid, ladies and gentlemen. This is what we're trying to avoid. So with that being said, there's a motion on the floor to table the ordinance before you. Is there a second to that motion? If there's no second, the motion will die. And then we'll go back to the original item of our discussion, which on our agenda is item number 8C. And if there's no further discussion by members, I would ask if there's a motion.

Could I get an answer to my question? My question is, At what point can I bring forward these amendments that I have proposed?

If there's substantive changes to what we're talking about and this amendment were passed, there'd be a process in which to do that.

No, I'm proposing changes to the item that we are about to have, that we are discussing right now.

I understand that. And as I just said, if this particular amendment ordinance would pass, you could bring that particular substantive changes before the meeting of that particular day if we come back to visit those amendments. Outside of that, you would need now tonight a second to your motion.

All right, I have three amendments I'd like to propose, but I'm still not sure whether I can propose them until there's actually a motion on the floor to amend.

You can make that motion.

Mayor, can I offer? Yep. So what I suggest we do is we have a motion to approve the item as presented and a second. But before we vote, then, if there is a motion to amend, then you would come back with a motion to amend at that point. You have a second. If you have a second, then you can discuss that and vote on the motion to amend. Once you have a decision on the motion to amend, then you go back to the original question and vote on the original question, either as amended or as presented, depending on the outcome of the motion to amend. And by the way, our rules specifically say you can only amend it twice. So there can only be two motions to amend. That's not to avoid a second one. It's just to make sure everyone's aware.

Okay. So if the council member has a second to her motion, we then would have to take a vote.

Right. At this point, I don't think you have a motion on the original. Correct. You need a motion on the original issue in a second.

At that point... Is there a member on the original motion on the original item?

I'll motion that we approve the original item as presented.

All right.

Thank you.

By Member Montney, is there a second?

Second.

Seconded by Member Straza. Then we'll take the vote on that particular amendment.

Before you vote, Mayor... Now you want it to deal... This is the opportunity where you would normally come up with a motion to amend if there are any.

That would be Member Ward.

I'd like to propose two motions to amend. I have handed them out to all of my colleagues on the dais. I've handed them out to the corporation council, the city clerk, and the media. So they are in front of you, hopefully, My handwriting is clear enough.

There are three changes here in your writing, and I would, of course, the mayor wants to accept them, but I would consider that one motion to amend with those three items. So you have one motion now that needs a second.

I'd actually like to present them as two.

Well, you'd have to do one, and then you'd have to have a second, and then you'd have to have a vote. Or do I have to have a vote? Then you can have a second motion afterwards. But right now, that's my take.

I'd like them to be considered separately. Is that in order?

If that's your preference, I guess. You have one motion to amend, right? So one person wants to amend it. So then afterwards, then, if someone else wants to amend it, they come back with a second motion to amend it. You have a motion to do it. this as one amendment. That's the way I would interpret it.

And it would be considered a substantive change if the other motion passed.

That one won't pass until this one's decided.

Can you help me understand why you want it to be two amendments? because i was just told that i can only make two amendments and there are three points there and i think that people may have opinions on all three of them so my understanding is that it would be one motion to amend three items like three these subsections of the amendment so you would you could get it done with just one and then to me it sounds like the second is if there's a further amendment on what we originally amended.

I could imagine some of my colleagues not, not liking one of the items, but being okay with another of the items. And that's why I don't want to have it be all lumped together as one.

So we'll take the motion.

that you have made member ward i haven't made a motion yet i'm still trying to get information yeah i forgive me i thought you made a motion may i or may i not make a motion to amend item 12c and then make a second motion to amend item 12d3 and then make a third motion to to amend item 12f

Do you want legal counsel to answer that or you want my answer?

I'd like legal counsel.

Okay, I figured that.

So the rules say there can only be two motions to amend any single item. Okay, so we have a single item now on the floor. You can have a motion to amend. One motion to amend. One motion to amend. Not a motion. Once that is seconded, if someone else wants to change that motion then you can have a second motion to amend and that's it so what i recommend that you do is you make a motion to amend these three items together and then if someone wants to make a motion then there's a vote on that do you amend it Then if someone or someone makes another motion to amend something different, then there's a vote. You have a discussion. People will either accept or reject the second motion to amend. And then once the item has been amended, then you move on to the underlying item.

We need a motion and we need a second. So are you going to make a motion?

Yes, I'll make a motion. I would like to make a motion to item 12 or to point 12 C to add quote, except in cases of time sensitive matters at the end of the sentence.

Is there a second to the members motion?

I'll second that.

Seconded by member Kearns. We have a vote. You can do a voice vote or electronic.

So Mayor, I will need you to vote. It's a 4-4 tie.

So this is an ordinance. So we need five sitting council members, not the mayor, to approve the motion. Let me read the statute to you so we're aware. Where the council consists of an odd number of alder persons, however, the vote of the majority of alder persons shall be sufficient to pass an ordinance. So in order to pass the ordinance, you have to have five. Now, this is the amendment. So I guess we don't necessarily need five to pass the amendment. So you can break the tie on the amendment.

With my vote? Yes. My vote would be no. So then we can go back to... Well, I have another motion.

Another motion. Another motion. Yeah. So there's a Scrivener's error in the document as presented. I'm assuming it's a Scrivener's error. There's no item F. And I would like to... include an item F and that would be to add a definition of substantive.

With that motion that's been made then by member Ward, is there a second to that motion?

of definition regarding substantive and i believe mr spanos you have a definition of substantive i do if you want to adopt it it is a substantive amendment it's an amendment that changes the meaning effect or outcome of the main motion it does more than correct wording or clarify language it alters what the motion would do if adopted

It's your motion that was proposed.

Possible. I just had a quick question. So, was the intent to have a definition in the document? Did it just get left out?

No, I don't think there was any intent at the time to put that in there. I was trying to create some guidance if questions were asked later. to be prepared to answer those questions for you. Thank you.

The reason that I toss it back to you, Mayor, is that it's your item. And so since substantive seems to be important to you, it seems like it would need to be approved by you because after all, you're going to break the tie if there is one anyway.

And I think we've just had a definition of what substantive is from our legal counsel. And I believe that the understanding of a substantive change is something that changes the ordinance significantly. And that's what we're talking about here and asking to be done before noon, the day of a meeting to do so. And so I believe with the substantive definition, we already have that.

So I hear you saying you would be fine with that.

We already have that. I don't know that we need that ordinance. We already have the definition through our legal as well as through the Illinois Municipal League that has presented that definition as substantive changes.

I'm fine with that definition.

Thank you. Next, we can go back to the original. We can go back to the original definition. item, which was 8C.

Mayor, I'm sorry. I'll call point of order. I think we need to actually vote on my motion.

I did not hear you make a motion. If you made a motion, you repeat the motion for the record?

Yes, that we add the definition of substantive as item 12F.

Okay, so there's the motions. There's a second to Member Ward's motion.

I'll second that motion because we have a section that says non-substantive amendments as a definition. Why not add the definition that it seems like we're all in agreement on? I don't think there's any harm in that, so I do second that motion.

Is there a second motion and a second now for take the vote?

Could I ask a question, please, before we- Member Matney? Yes, ma'am. Does this in any way take us into territory that we would be doing like we're doing right now where what one person considers to be a Scrivener's error or something non-substantive would then be debated in the moment, resulting in potentially us being asked to vote on language that could be unclear or could have unintended consequences? When I think about the time-sensitive nature of this and this, We're only asking, I believe, to present our suggested changes about five hours before the meeting takes place. And in the event something arises from public comment or from discussion amongst council members, we would have the opportunity to call a special meeting within 48 hours if it was an urgent matter in order to have that vote. I'm just thinking through what unintended consequences might exist if we further refine a definition that would be subjective as to what substantive means, or it could be interpreted in a subjective way. This is exactly the confusion I think that we are trying to be more disciplined around. So just, especially hearing that that, was just crafted, that definition of substantive, which other than hearing you verbalize it, I've not read that definition before. I haven't thought through what that really means. Anything, what else should I be thinking about to make a thoughtful choice and not just one in the moment?

I... I prepared a few questions and answers in anticipation of this discussion today. And I think they'll help. I think if I just read through them, it might help. I've already read to you the definition of what I believe, how I would interpret a substantive amendment, what that means. The next question was who decides if the change is substantive? And the Mayor under the code would determine whether or not the change is substantive. The Mayor's decision is then subject to a motion to appeal which is submitted to the entire council pursuant to section 2-208. Just like anything, any other procedural ruling the mayor would make, those are subject to appeal. Any member can raise an appeal for one reason or another, and you would vote as a council whether or not you agreed with the ruling that it was substantive or not. And then the next question I wrote, how is this process different from a motion to postpone to a date certain? And I said, it really isn't. If a substantive amendment is proposed at a meeting that has not been submitted in advance, it's treated as a motion to postpone the matter to the next regular meeting. You still have to vote on that. You have to vote on whether or not there's going to be an amendment. If you vote and say there's no amendment, then it's not postponed. And then you get to vote on the substantive motion as it was presented. And then the last thing I wrote is can you still make routine changes without delay to the next meeting? And the answer is absolutely yes. changing numbers, dates, scrivener's errors, things like that. You don't have to move those. So I don't know if that helps or addresses your question, but those are the things that I think the proposed ordinance would do.

So the proposed ordinance that was presented in our packet for us in preparation tonight did not include that language. What was the thought process? If it's important for us to now in the moment add that language, I mean, is that something that was a subjective addition or is that something that you feel would be adding value compared to what was previously provided to us?

I'm sorry, can you say that again? I'm not sure I follow.

So I guess what I'm trying to understand is if this is an important thing for us to do exactly what we're trying to prevent in the future right now, what was the thought process before

by not defining substantive when it was originally crafted and placed in our packets you know 48 72 hours ago well the the ordinance was drafted six weeks ago or more at the request of the mayor um i didn't put a lot of thought process into what is a substantive motion i think that it's honestly i think it's fairly obvious what a substantive motion is i had concerns that someone might raise that question so i went to look I did a little research and that's the definition I found, a part of it and put it together. So honestly, I think we all know what a substantive motion is as opposed to a procedural motion, right? If it's a substantive change, changing a number because you want 100,000 and somebody else wants 50,000, that's easy to do. Something about, well, I want that money to go for this project under these circumstances instead of this project for these circumstances, that becomes much more substantive substantive and therefore more important that we get it right and i think that's the thought i'm not endorsing and i'm not opposing this i'm just telling you i think that's what the thought process was that gave rise to what was tender so in listening to all this discussion i feel like what was provided is the cleanest way to do this because otherwise i can see us um having

discussions that could add confusion, not only for those of us who are voting, but for those who are listening as to whether or not something is substantive, especially given the fact that we can call a special meeting for something that is urgent. And again, in five years, I can't think of a time when this would have been a factor for us. So again, I thank you for sharing that. Counselor, I appreciate it.

You're welcome.

I have one more question based on something that corporation council just said, and something that council member Montney just said a couple of times that we can call a special meeting based on the language of the exhibit a says. The Member seeking the amendment shall move to postpone the matter to the next regular meeting. stating the purpose or nature of the amendment sought. So I just want to clarify that there is no special meeting provision here. Is that correct?

You can have a special meeting that is a regular meeting. We could do it just to the regular meeting. You're right. It says right now, it says to the next regular meeting. That's what it says.

And also the two-thirds vote, you can suspend the rule.

I was going to say, you can also suspend the rules and You know, come back tomorrow if you wanted to. Actually, 48 hours.

Suspended for six weeks.

Well, I'm just thinking about, you know, the context with which the amendment was brought up, and that is for urgent matters. And we do have a means in the event of an urgent matter to convene a special meeting.

I believe that's a different amendment. We already voted that one down. Oh, I'm not making an amendment. I'm just saying that we have a process. You are commenting on an amendment that we've already voted on. The time one?

So your comments are subject matter only.

I'm just responding to Council Member Ward's question about there not being a means to get to a special meeting to vote on an urgent topic. not the issue of a time-sensitive vote in the moment.

Okay. With that being said, is there any other discussion from members? And I believe we have a motion on the floor, and we have a second to that motion. And can we take a vote?

Yeah, the vote is live. We've got Councilmember Ward as the motioner and Councilmember Kearns as the seconder.

Okay.

And we have another tie, it's 4-4, so the mayor would vote on the amendment.

I'll vote no.

And the item would fail.

Now, before we go back to the original item, which was 8, excuse me, yeah, 8C, Our city manager, Mr. Juergens, has comments.

Thank you. And as maybe messy as this is, I think it's good to have these discussions and appreciate that. I think the mayor mentioned something that maybe we also need to take into consideration. There is also a procedure where, as was mentioned, you can suspend the rules. So if something does come up and it's urgent, as opposed to even having to call a special meeting, you can suspend the rules with a two-thirds vote. So with that, there is kind of that, you call it a backdoor, but with those amendments not passing, I just want the council to keep in mind there is still a process in the case of an emergency. If two-thirds were to agree and this new procedure was to pass, you still have that option.

Thank you.

And now... Before you vote, can I point out one last little change?

Yes, sir.

There is a typo in there. There's actually two. G should be F, not G, when we can fix that. And that entire paragraph, G, currently G, should be underlined. That's new language. So that was a mistake.

Thank you.

We won't ask if that's a substantive change or not at this point.

With that being said, we will move back then to Our original item, which is number C, under 8, and I'd ask for a motion. Okay, then we have a second. Then we can vote on that.

And I apologize, my system cleared. So the motioner was Montney and the seconder was, thank you. The item passes. I have two nays to announce. Council Member Kearns and Council Member Ward.

Thank you. Next, we'll move on to our next item, number nine, which is the Finance Director's Report. And our Finance Director, Mr. Rathbun. And City Manager Juergens.

Please go ahead. Okay. Okay. I'll make a quick this evening, the year's over, but it's not. So this is April 30th report, but we still have another month of sales tax. We have vendor invoices still coming in and final audit adjustments. So in the past, we've actually done the year end report three months in a row. The city manager and I are discussing maybe potential ways of revamping this report to council and the community. So who knows if we'll do that three months, but we typically don't start the new fiscal year until August because of those delays. and revenues, et cetera. We primarily focus on the general fund during these presentations. It's the largest fund of the city. It's the tax revenue driven fund. And so we'll be revisiting that, but tonight I'm going to go through some of those same comments, but kind of keep it to what's changed versus going through all the individual numbers. Next slide, please. So the major tax revenues, I'm just going to jump right to the bottom. We have an $8 million positive variance. This is basically on trend with the variance we discussed during the FY27 budget. What we utilized in the budget for the general fund was a $14 million increase in tax revenues. Part of that was the levy. The use of those revenues was explained during the FY27 budget process on several occasions during those presentations, but it addressed the starting deficit. inflation, increases in health insurance costs, et cetera. A couple of just specific notes related to home rule sales tax, just a reminder to council and the community, basically 20% of home rule sales tax is allocated to other activities. 10% goes to the asphalt and concrete fund, and then 10% goes to the county mental health, which we are on kind of a hiatus with them right now, but 20% of the $5 million fund positive variance, you can see would be $1 million of that would be allocated to other sources other than the general fund. One comment related to where we are now, we're seeing we have two months of revenues for home rule and state sales tax that a year ago included the legislative changes that really drove this positive variance. So we've got two months this year related to the legislative change that was supposed to go into effect this last January, just a couple months ago. It wasn't gonna be as dramatic according to the IML, but we're not really seeing any increase there. And we build a little bit of that into the FY27 budget. We build about a 4% increase over the projection from where we were with these larger increases, but it's only really coming in about 2% year over year those last two months. So really it's just showing an inflationary increase, not the legislative increase that IML presented to us roughly around February that we built into the budget. Still no alarms to sound, but it's just right now we're seeing an inflationary increase. Next slide, please. So the general fund, this is the income statement, revenues on this first exhibit, and then we'll do expenses next. Highlighting the projection columns, so those kind of like two columns to the far right centered there, So the first one, projection budget adjustments. So this is adjustments that we're projecting to the revised budget. So $8.8 million in positive variance for the taxes that we just kind of reviewed related to the major tax revenues. It doesn't match exactly with that previous exhibit because some of those revenues go to other funds. There's a locomotive fuel tax, et cetera. So you can see down at the bottom of that column, we're looking at about a $10.6 million positive variance compared to budget. with $144 million total budget for revenues for the fiscal year. For FY27, we budgeted $148 million. Next slide, please. So expenditures, the projection budget adjustments, just going to kind of jump right down to the bottom. You can see with all the ups and downs through those different categories, we're looking at about $100,000 actual reduction. I will comment on compensation. Compensation, you can see a $1.5, $1.6 million reduction in salaries. $1.3 million increase in benefits. Some of that's related to work comp payouts. I misspoke to this related to this a couple months ago when we have some people that are being paid via work comp. This isn't settlements or anything like that. It's just they're being paid via benefit versus the salary. So it just kind of moves down a line so we can have some overages and benefits and reductions in salaries related to people that are on work comp. So it's really kind of a net zero for us, but that impacts that. A couple of numbers just for curiosity, if you're curious about the storm in these salary numbers, we have about $122,000 in storm related compensation, overtime, et cetera, related to the tornado. Was that a month ago? I'm losing track of time now. And about $48,000 in extra brush removal, which would typically be in another fund, but we're posting that in the General fund because it was an emergency declaration. Right now we've got $171,000 total extra costs related to the storm for payroll and brush removal. There's other equipment uses and stuff like that. There are softer costs that are a little harder to get our hands around. Jumping to the bottom center column, the projection for the reserves. Two months ago when I did this last presentation, we were projecting $35.8 million. During the FY27 discussions, we were talking about about 35 million. We're a little higher now. Part of that is related to, I referenced the county mental health hiatus, the three-month delay. So that's adding some revenues that we're not, or not adding revenues, but reducing expenditures going out. And then we're finding out some of the health insurance expenditures are coming down a little bit. We're going to have to subsidize the health insurance fund, but it's coming in about a million dollars less. We thought we were going to have to subsidize about 2 million, but it's just a little over a million right now. So Really, we're targeting about 20% of our revenue totals for reserve balance, 20% of $148 million for FY27. This number's not showing there. It will be about $30 million targeted reserve balance for the general fund. So you can see we're a little higher at the $38 million. It gives us flexibility related to potential pending capital expenditure needs for public work, campus, et cetera. Next slide, please. This is just a summary exhibit for the enterprise funds. I'm going to jump right to the bottom. Revenue trends, almost all the enterprise funds came in right on budget. Emphasizing, wanted to emphasize our parks guys left, and I was going to brag on them. Golf at 113% revenue, $3.4 million versus $3 million budget. Going up, you can see that the year-to-date actual favorable, unfavorable is $465,000. They have a pretty large capital expenditure budget for them for golf for the year. We always talk about how golf basically makes enough money to fund operations, but not usually enough to fund its capital expenditures. But at that $400,000, if they can maintain that profit line, then it goes a long ways towards funding those capital expenditures. And the next slide, please. Fast, just to remind the community, all information online, the budget books, budget presentations for FY27. The FY26 monthly reports are online. Many resources available there. And then I'll take any questions if there are any.

Thank you. And with that, are there questions? Member Montney.

It's just a comment. Before you know it, it'll be property tax season here for us. And with us collecting in revenue over $8 million beyond what we budgeted, And then expenses in addition to under budgeted 10.7 million, 18.8 million. So many people are leaving our community. I mean, people who have reached out, especially retirees whose property taxes are creating a burden for them and their ability to stay in their homes. And I would ask that as you plan for the fall and the votes that you please consider bringing forward an option that keeps the levy flat so that we don't continue to take property tax increases here in this community. I realize that our sliver of property taxes is less than 15% and that we aren't the major driver that people feel. but I think there's an opportunity for all of the taxing bodies to get together and collaborate as to what is reasonable for our people. And this lets me know when we talk about the addition to reserves at 38 million, that we have the flexibility on our sliver to make a difference by keeping our levy flat. Thank you.

Other members? One question. I believe that you said from the storm damage, from overtime and brush pickup, roughly 171,000 total.

That's correct.

Thank you. Next, our city manager's report. Mr. Juergens.

Thank you very much. And as Scott mentioned, we are looking at how we might potentially overhaul our financial reports. So if you have ideas or thoughts of things you want to see that are most impactful, please let us know. We will still keep all the detail as a back end report, but we're just trying to figure out how we can best communicate some of that detailed information. If you could go ahead and pull up my report. Alright, just a few things tonight. First, Summer Read is getting ready to kick off at the library and you can go and get information on their website, but this is always a very popular program. And I actually met tonight to have details on how many people are coming to the library and what their circulation is. It's really amazing as it continues to grow in popularity within the community. So they're doing great things there and just wanted to highlight their summer read program. Next slide. Also, another kudos to Parks. They are, as Eric Veal says, in full summer mode now. Both pools are open. All the splash pads are open. Their summer programming is starting. So just wanna give a shout out to all the parks crews and all that they do over the summer. It's a very busy season for them. Next slide. Then also the downtown streetscape. This is, just wanted to give an update on this. The two intersections that have been under construction are, and the 500 block should be open by the end of the week, weather permitting. So we're getting really close on all of that. We're working on a, hopefully end of June, early July kind of celebration to open up the 600 block where the ring structure is. So we'll provide more details on that. But the streetscape work is coming very quickly and they're making great strides in the 400 block as well. Next slide. Front and center, the parking lot, the fencing came down today. We still have not closed on the property, but we will close at the end of, hopefully before the end of this week. So We were working on how many spaces we're going to designate as permit versus how many will be just four hour parking. So we're really excited to get this parking added into the downtown as well.

Next slide.

All right. I had one more, but it must've been a different one. Just a quick update on connect transit. They announced and approved an agreement for their new executive director tonight at the meeting. I was just there before I came to this meeting. Brady Lang will be the, uh, new CEO. So we're really excited about that. Uh, Brady has been in that interim role for a few months now and has just done a great job. And I've really appreciated the extra communication he's doing with me, excited to get him already talking about getting him here so he can provide, uh, one of the updates to the council and answer any questions that you have on connect transit. So we'll be scheduling that for a future committee of the whole, and then also just providing an update on the transfer station. It is at 90%. And, um, should be at 100% by July. So things are progressing in terms of design. So things are progressing very quickly with that. And we're really excited to get that project off the ground as well. That's all I have.

Thank you. And for council members discussion, we'll start with member Scott.

No, just a quick question or just a quick comment. Appreciate all the work that we did to discuss how we are doing meetings going forward. I think we can all spend some time taking a look at our city code to make sure that we are preventing any issues in the future.

Member Lee. Member Hendricks. Member Ward. Member Strassen. Member Dannenberger. Member Montney. Member Kearns. Okay. If not, I think there's a couple little comments that I have, and The very first would be in regards to Memorial Day. Or I'm sorry, excuse me. Yes, Memorial Day. Go with that one. Memorial Day yesterday, obviously, there was ceremonies at Miller Park and other locations throughout the city. But one in particular that I attended was at Evergreen Memorial Cemetery and the Bloomington Normal American Legion Honor Guard and the cemetery. Evergreen Cemetery staff does a tremendous job, and it was a very moving service and remembrance, especially of our war dead and the Gold Star families. that are left behind. So thank you for them for that. And also then today we had a short visit with Congressman LaHood that was in to tour the proposed new Boys and Girls Club that is now going to be on the side of the present Trinity Lutheran Church. In the future, myself and the city manager and others with Tony Moore, the director of the Boys and Girls Club were able to have that conversation. So we appreciated the Congressman attended this at that particular one today. And I think that's it as far as I have. So with that, I would need a motion to, there's no executive session, so a motion to adjourn. Is there a motion?

I'd make that motion.

By Member Hendricks. Is there a second? Second. Second by Member Dannenberger. All in favor, say aye.

Aye.

Thank you very much. Enjoy your evening.