City Council - Regular Meeting

Good evening everyone. Welcome to the Monday, December 1st city council meeting. Clerk, please call the role. Alderwoman Baney here. Alderman Glad here. Alderman Dhy here. Aldwoman Bassie here. Alderman Davis here. Alderman Cook is absent. Aldwoman Miller here. Thank you. Please stand for the pledge. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

At this time, it's public comment portion of the meeting. Is there anyone that would like to make a public comment uh regarding items that are not on the agenda this evening? See none. Moving on. Moving on to the presentation uh and discussion regarding the downtown parking study. We have Kimy and uh Kimley Horn here to present uh the parking study. If you could step up to the podium and if you Monty will probably help you out a little bit. Thank you, Monte. All right. How you doing? Floor is yours.

Okay. Uh well, good evening. Uh my name is Peter Lemon with Kimley Horn. Uh I'm joined by my colleague Sophia Camp uh who worked in this as well as a few other folks. Um so I wanted to take a minute tonight to walk through uh an overview of the study to start with kind of a an introduction some of the objectives uh some of the methodology and then get through some of the the key findings and then ultimately uh some of the recommendations. There we go. Okay. So, in terms of some of the the key objectives uh of the study, the first was to uh collect data and evaluate current parking conditions throughout the downtown area. And I'll get into the specific specifics in terms of locations, but we wanted to evaluate what are the current conditions like, how many spaces do we have, how many are being used at different times of the day, and do we have enough capacity uh or do we need uh capacity improvements throughout the downtown area? Uh the second was to uh understand what our current parking demand rate was. uh what basically in other words, what is the current uses and businesses in downtown generating in terms of parking and how can we use that for future planning purposes as downtown continues to to evolve and uh and grow. And then finally recommend uh look at recommendations for different strategies or improvements uh that we can use to enhance downtown parking and uh think of it thinking of it as not just in terms of like hey do we need more parking or less parking but how do we support our downtown businesses? How do we make downtown Mckenry a place that is attractive? We don't want to create barriers. Uh we want to make sure we're supporting and encouraging economic development for a vibrant downtown. All right. There we go. It's finicky, but I think we got it. Uh so, first in terms of uh the areas that were included in the study, you see three different zones. Uh there's the blue zone, that's uh we just called it like the Riverside District. Uh then we have the green, which is the

green street. uh uh sub area and then red is the main street sub area. So the first step was to inventory the parking spaces, the public parking spaces that we have there. It's a mix of on street uh on street parking spaces and public off- streetet parking spaces. We didn't get into private lots or private locations um but the publicly or publicly accessible uh spaces within each zone. Um we then did parking utilization and turnover counts. And so the utilization first is basically how many of those spaces are occupied. So we went through on four different dates. Um Friday we did we picked two Fridays and two Saturdays. Uh Friday May 2nd, Saturday May 17th, Friday June 20th, and Saturday August 2nd. We wanted to look at some little bit of seasonality in there, but also we wanted to pick days that were busy um had good weather. Uh I think there were uh shows at the Vixen. So there were they were busy kind of summer days that we wanted to look at in terms of uh active uh downtown uh environment. And so for each hour um especially the the f the last two dates, the Friday, June 20th and Saturday, August 2nd, we did counts hourly from 9:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m. So every hour, we were able to collect how many cars were parked in each on each street, locating it by block or each street segment. We did this by uh through collecting it through drone footage. So every hour we had drones that flew over, collected the video, and then we went back and then processed that and reviewed it to identify how many spaces were occupied or not occupied on each block. Um the third part was turnover. So there were about half a dozen blocks that we wanted to focus on to identify how long cars how many cars turned over within a space or how long cars were parked. Um in particular, um you know that there's a lot of four-hour parking restrictions. We wanted to identify did we have a lot of people parking for more than four hours or did we have people uh how long were people parking for their stay uh downtown?

Hold on. I'm foreshadowing here. Let's see if I There we go. Okay. So, in this map, you'll see a color-coded uh kind of sections by street by each block of uh the parking. And just to go through the color coding on the legend, if you go from the bottom to the top, you'll see that we're kind of like up to 25%. It's kind of that purple 25 to 50% light blue. So if you see on the map anywhere that's light blue or purple, this is during our peak uh parking utilization. So the busiest time of all the counts that I talked about, all the hours, this is our peak time. It was on the Friday, June 20th in the evening. So this is what you would have found um the green. So, we're getting here we're getting up from 50 uh percent to about 75%. And then the yellow is kind of where we're starting to get busy and that goes up to up to 90% and then 90% and above is red. Typically, for a an area like this, a downtown district like this, you'd want to shoot for about 80 to 90%, you're starting to reach what we would call effective capacity, where you might have a space open on a block, but in a sense, it feels very full. There's not a lot of availability. Um but in the um once you're below that, you feel like much more comfortable in terms of the number of spaces. And what you can see is along Riverside, unsurprisingly probably to you all on a summer Friday night, um it's red. You know, that's where it's very busy. There might be a space or two uh open as you drive down. Um same with on Pearl, that first block off to the west or on Green Street, you can see that that's red and the lot there across from the Vixon, that lot is red. But if you're willing to go a little bit further into that lot or if you're willing to walk a block away, a lot of times you can find um plenty of spaces where those blocks are um you know half utilized or or less. And then on the main street uh sub area, you can see that there's uh quite a bit more available parking. Even just looking

along uh Main Street itself, you can see itself has has quite a bit of uh low lower utilization. In terms of uh turnover, um we had uh I would say across the different sub areas about five to six% of the vehicles were parked for over four hours. So, uh there's some people who are parking maybe longer than what the regulations would allow. Um that tends to be, we don't know who those people are exactly, but in most downtowns like this, that tends to be employees who are parked for a longer period of time. Um, and so we'll get into into how to try to address some of that going forward. Okay. So, the next three slides I'm going to run through the three different districts in the parking utilization. Um, and what you see on each of these is sort of a a demand profile starting at 9:00 a.m. and going till uh uh 900 p.m. Uh, so this is again for Friday, June 20th. This was the busiest uh evening or day of the four days that we surveyed. And then you'll see each of these um images below kind of represent the different uh peaks or associated times from the drone footage that we collected. And so this is the Riverside Drive sub area. Uh you can see that the peak time occurs uh at 8:00 p.m. So we're getting close to 80% overall for that sub area. And uh then it starts to drop off precipitously after that. So, as you can imagine, a lot of people they go out to dinner, finish up their dinner, and then they start to head home. U but during the rest of the day, we're kind of around like 50 to 60% um as we go through the lunch hour and work our way into the early afternoon towards the dinner hour. Um I'll get some This is touchy. All right. Now, so on the Green Street side, uh you can see like we had a

little bit more of a climb uh right there towards the dinner hour, but again, you see like overall we're about 80% uh occupied during that peak time, which is right there at 8:00, and then we start to drop again after that. So, it's a consistent theme. And then on Main Street, you see like our peak is actually a little bit earlier, closer to 6 p.m. And a little bit of that like uh lunch rush as well. So you kind of see how it peaks, goes back down and picks back up and then starts dropping down uh earlier in the evening than the other two districts. Um so when I mentioned the different objectives, the second one was to start to understand uh what is the current parking characteristics of downtown in terms of a demand rate and how might we be able to apply that to future planning. So, uh, we worked with staff and identified the total amount of, uh, gross commercial, uh, floor area through each of these districts and then looked at what was our peak parking demand, uh, public parking demand, uh, in that time. And so, you can see that we're about, uh, 4.2 to 4.7 in the Riverside and Green Street districts, and we have a much lower parking demand on the Main Street uh, district. Um, but if we're looking at 4.2 two to 4.7 spaces per thousand square feet. Um, so we can use that as we start to evaluate what future planning needs you might have for parking as you have additional growth in the downtown area. And we can also look at other um other resources, industry resources that are maybe not as specific to downtown Mckenry, but can start to give us a sense as well. I would say this is probably on par with what we would see in most uh most other places. Um but what we then did was looked at in the in the downtown Mckenry uh master plan there is a conceptual development uh for the green street area. So we took that uh that footprint and worked with staff and identified um this uh

conceptual development program. So we had 125 uh residential units uh 5,000 ft of retail space and then 15,000 square ft of uh restaurant space. And so what we did was we looked at the rate that we're generating now uh within this area and how many spaces would that uh would we recommend to serve uh those uses. And so for the residential we would recommend 159 spaces for for that. Uh the 111 spaces for the retail and restaurant combined um at the at the peak times. And then um then we also need to look at what spaces might be displaced. And so um currently this this site would uh displace 249 spaces but not all of those spaces are being utilized today. So what we did was there's 127 cars parked in that portion or the footprint of this development. We would recommend providing um as I mentioned earlier once you get over 90% you you want a little bit of a buffer. If you're like the hundth car and you provide 100 spaces you don't want to be looking for that one car in that 100 space parking lot. You want to have a little bit of a buffer. So we applied that that buffer to this this uh this 10% extra buffer to those 127 spaces. So when you add all that up, we come up with 411 spaces. So if you had this concept, if this conceptual redevelopment plan were to be brought forward to you and you know be just like this program, um we would recommend uh providing 411 spaces to serve its demand plus the demand of of folks that it would be um displacing that are currently parking in that area that are you know already there for other uses in the surrounding district. And that could be um you know that could be in a lot of different forms. That could be surface parking, garage parking, however the development plan would want to put that forward. In terms of other areas that we started

to evaluate, uh we wanted to look at parking capacity. We wanted to look at different regulations and the efficiencies uh that they offer for parkers in downtown um Mckenry. Uh we wanted to look at signage. Was it clear? Uh does it send is it efficient? Does it direct people where they need to go? Are there things that we need to do to help manage some of the demand in certain portions of downtown? Uh we want to look at walkability and how people get to and from a parking space at the different to the different destinations that they're visiting. Uh we want to consider emerging technologies and EV charging and even the idea of paid parking which we're not recommending. Um so to touch on some of the key areas of the recommendations uh one was regarding uh regulations and efficiencies. Uh so currently as I mentioned there's a lot of 4hour parking restrictions uh signed throughout the downtown area. Um the areas that are highlighted in that sort of black uh dash line basically Green Street and Riverside those are the areas where we had the highest uh parking utilization. They're obviously the most popular. Um, we had higher areas of low, you know, we had turnover throughout the day, but the highest areas of, uh, people parking for over four hours. So, we want to create those areas where we do get a little bit more turnover. People can come and go. Um, and we wanted to provide a recommendation of a two-hour parking for those those stretches. Um, most the average parking duration throughout these was uh 1.7 to 1.9 hours. So, most people are parking within that time frame anyway. And we also still have 4-hour parking in all of the different lots and so forth. It's really just kind of focusing on these highest in demand spots to create a little bit more convenience for people uh so that the spaces aren't aren't occupied for longer periods of time. All right. Okay. And then uh so you'll see a little bit on the signage here. That middle

sign reflects kind of what that uh what that sign might look like in terms of replacing the 4hour spaces. One of the other things that we noticed throughout uh there are some areas in downtown that have permit only parking and the signing is a little bit confusing. Um for example in the lot off Green Street just uh west of the Vixen. As you go further back there's a section there says permit only. There's a few other sections in town that say permit only. And we found those to be rather underutilized. Um, I think it's because the messaging makes it seem like you have to have a permit to park there when in fact, uh, in talking with staff, the intention is actually that's where people with residential permits are allowed to park. Uh, it's not that that is exclusively for those folks. So, we came up with uh the sign you can see in the 4hour uh sign um recommending a little bit of a change of how that might be uniformly uh posted and saying having a placard at the bottom that says permit holders accepted. This is pretty common. We see this in a lot of other communities. It just seemed right now that the communication is confusing to people and those spaces are going underutilized when in fact they'd be available for other uh downtown parkers. Um the other uh sign you see there on the right is a more consistent messaging and signing of the different public lots through town. Um you guys did some great kind of wayfinding signs. This kind of follows that uh that that look or feel of those other wayfinding signs throughout downtown and starts to build on identifying the different lots, providing what hours they're available and any restrictions that might be present. Um and it just kind of goes consistent with the other signage that you've invested in in downtown. And then in terms of walkability, um there's a lot and I uh I guess I'll call it the lot that's kind of right up on 120 uh just west of Green. I don't want to go back because it's taking me a hard time to get through these slides back and forth. Um but it's kind of elevated there. And when you look at the

utilization map, um the main lot right off of Green Street was highly utilized, basically full. But that lot up top is actually highly underutilized. And part of it might be because it's um visibly just not in direct line of sight from some of the shops right there on Green Street, but also there isn't really a good um stairway or access of what how most people would want to walk from the lot to uh different businesses on Green Street. So, one was trying to improve walkability by improving the pedestrian connection there. Um also, uh I think when you look at the utilization, you'll see that there are some areas that are red or highly utilized. And if you're willing to walk a block or block and a half or two away, you'll find blocks that are highly underutilized. And every community has a different level of uh walking tolerance, you know, how far people are used to walking or want to walk. Um and sometimes that's just cultural, that's just what they're used to. Sometimes it's like, well, maybe that's not a great walking experience, or maybe uh maybe we need better lighting, or maybe we need to be more pedestrian friendly. Or when you look at Elm, it's a busy it's a busy street. it can act as a barrier uh between say uh the north and south sides. And so when you're on Green Street, if you're to the south, that makes sense. I don't want to cross the I don't want to cross 120 because it's busy traffic. It doesn't feel comfortable. So we've recommended some ways to make the intersections a little more pedestrian scale, a little more pedestrian friendly, uh to encourage people to be able to park just a block away where there's a lot more parking available um and access some of that additional capacity overall. And so we've identified a few ways for how you might be able to do that. And then this is a map that's in our report. It kind of locates each of those that I just talked about in terms of uh some of those specific intersections where those pedestrian enhancements could be could be made relative to their uh utilization. And then I think finally uh we broke these uh the recommendations into short-term and long-term. So, I wanted to focus on some of the short-term

action items. Uh, so the first was installing new regulatory signs. U, these are intended to help uh clarify that permit parking uh issue that we talked about earlier. Um, and making sure that those designated spaces are clear for downtown employees as well as uh downtown residents who use those spaces. Um, the second was providing additional uh wayfinding and parking monument signs. So, that was the one uh concept that I showed you at the different uh parking entrances. So, for consistency and awareness of where parking lots are, where I can uh so that there's not confusion, especially from out of town guests. It's like, hey, where can I park or not park? Not really sure. And it makes it very clear as to where you can park and for how long. Um, investigating the status of parking regulations. There are a couple uh couple spaces uh just on the uh the lot off of Green Street on the north side. The south face of the building has signs that say it's for building tenants only. And I think there's some uh there was some confusion as to whether those lot those spaces are part of the public lot or whether they're actually tied to those businesses themselves. They were kind of underutilized in the evening. And so it's um you know if those spaces are truly considered public parking um let's clarify signage so that's accessible for the visitors of downtown. Um modifying parking relations on Riverside and Green Street uh to establish a 2-hour time restriction. And so I mentioned these are those like high utilization blocks. Uh this is an effort to uh discourage people for parking too long. Most people are parking for under two hours anyway. Um but it really clarifies those high those high demand spaces for more convenience and more turnover. Um increasing the effectiveness of parking uh regulation enforcement through use of uh LPR or license plate recognition. So, this is a way for uh the police to go through and identify uh which vehicles are there uh and for how long they're there and whether they're um you know in violation of the the

parking restrictions. You can't really go around in chalk tires anymore. So, this is the this is the technology and it's relatively affordable uh to be able to do that. This is most communities or even uh other institutions like hospitals and campuses uh they're using that as well. And then finally, the last one here was exploring lowcost opportunities for additional uh public parking. Um, and so some of those might be uh small spaces here or there. Another option I mentioned, and this kind of gets into some of the longer term, is working with other developers. So, if you do have a developer that comes forward with a green street redevelopment, uh, working with them to making sure that you're accommodating their parking demand, but also the parking demand that they might displace. And then potentially depending on what their parking solution might be, there might be a way to add additional uh public parking as part of that um as part of that solution. Um with that, I think that's the last slide, right? That was it. That's it. So here to answer or try to address any questions y'all might have.

All right. Any questions by council? Oh, I'll do ambassador. on.

Hi, thank you for this. Um, when I was doing my research, uh, the city's current layout of parking spots on the Green Street area, not specifically over by what we would call the former, uh, funeral home, but just that um, lower area. Um, again, I when I was doing my research, it did not look like it was ideal for maximizing usable space and promoting a a smooth flow. So my question to you, was layout and traffic flow in this parking area um something something you analyzed and do you have any recommendations?

Um I think so the area you're referring to is just north of the river west of Green Street, right? The old the old funeral home like that area is it's highly utilized. Exactly. Yeah. And the the one area I would it's uh could you get more spaces out of it, I guess, is what you're asking, right? Yeah. Uh it wasn't something specifically that we looked at, but uh in going through the lot, I remember that the side kind of along the river, say on the south side, it gets used almost like parallel parking.

And typically, I would say the most efficient parking lot designs has spaces around the perimeters. Like if you were to have like say 90° parking spaces, you would kind of ring the whole lot with 90° spaces. you might be able to get a few more spaces along that side of the lot, but then you would lose some spaces more internally uh because your spaces would be deeper than they are for par parallel spaces. Um you might be able to get a few more spots in that area, but if you look a little bit more west in that lot, there were sp there were parts of that lot that were highly underutilized. Um, let's see. Yeah. If I push this, is this gonna light up or I don't know if Yeah.

Uh, yeah. Here. Here I can go. I think if we go to this one. So, you can see um the lot you're referring to is in red right there. Right. Correct. Yeah. And so, as as you go further uh kind of west into that lot, there was a lot of open spaces at that time. So, could you ek out a few more spaces in the red zone? You could probably get some. Um, but there's also a lot of spaces nearby that you're able to still use. So, you could probably get I don't know. I would It wasn't something that we specifically looked at, but I would guess you might along that southside, maybe you could get a net gain of like 10 spaces or something like that.

Okay. Because right now the parking is its width. So, if it was switched to length, would that increase parking? Oh, you're saying because right now it kind of has shorter aisles that go north south if you were to go east and west. Um,

I don't know. You uh I'd have to look at it. I don't know that that might be an option to gain a little bit more. Um, because but you would have like longer aisles. So, as you're kind of seeking parking, you're also kind of going down longer aisles. So, sometimes there's a bit of a trade-off of like if I want to go all the way down to come back and look for that. Um, it kind of gets into like what do you prefer as circulation? You might be able to net out a few more spaces, but it probably wouldn't be that significant, but it's an option. Yeah. There's nothing preventing you from doing that, I guess, is what I'm saying. Thank you. Yeah. Any other questions, comments? Aldan Miller.

Thanks, Jet. Um, I was surprised by the outcome that we have adequate parking, but clearly your study gives me clarity that one, we don't have the right signage, and people don't want to walk to available parking, which I I get because our land isn't level. It's we don't have any walkways. To your point, um, did you do have you done any research on premium paid parking? So, the red line on Riverside Drive, the red line on Green Street, I I'll use Lake Geneva as my example. If you want to be in front of a business, you're going to pay for that parking. If you're willing to walk a block, you get free parking.

Did I know it's not in your report, but is that something you're familiar with? Not one of your recommendations at this point, but is that something to consider? Um, so to my knowledge, paid metered parking would be this would be the first in Mckenry if you were to introduce paid parking. Um, there's obviously you you I think you'd want to engage a lot more with business the businesses, you know, in that area and what they, you know, what would their impression be? I would imagine a lot of them say like, I don't want paid parking in front of my business. It's going to shoot people away. So, there's always that consideration. The one thing I would say about like paid or metered parking is it's also not about like a revenue generating source. Um it's more about how do you manage the utilization and so um you know you could conceivably put in paid parking uh to try to um if it was market based depending on how much it costs to park there um and then you could control the cost to uh get it to a point where you're at like say 75 to 85% parked. you're really uh not typically over that right now. Um you're kind of like right at that level where there's always like maybe a spot or two available but not a lot. Um it's it's just pretty complicated like how of like is it every day? What is it certain time periods? Um you have to have the logistics in place to collect the money. What most people aren't doing the old school parking meters anymore. They're all uh digital uh or mobile pay. Um, so I think there's more to it than just like could you install it, it would be kind of dealing with the the different stakeholders on those streets and how they might react to just having their block uh handled for that. So, I think in terms of the recommendation of moving those to two-hour restrictions and having proper enforcement of them, I think would start to drive uh what the metered parking would probably um seek to do anyway, which is the getting some

kind of utilization, not having people park there for too long. There's always the and if you look at this map, you can see um yeah, if I went down by the closer to the river, there's that lot that's blue and that's, you know, so that was less than half half full. So there's always like kind of spaces within a block that people can go to. So it's not that there's a lack of supply, it's just that people like to go into the high demand spaces and fill it up almost entirely before they're willing to go one more block away. Um, I don't know that the metered spaces would necessarily um, uh, decrease that utilization unless you priced it higher to the point where people are willing not willing to pay. So, you're always going to want to kind of target around 85% or so as your peak utilization. And that's kind of where you're at right now. Um, so I I would say like right now that's probably not uh something I would recommend. But going forward in the future, if you found yourself consistently at 100% or 95% plus and the current and the uh proposed uh 2-hour restrictions were not being uh either enforced or followed and still problematic, then that might be a way to help um address the utilization problems.

Thank you. As many council members here, we've lived here a long time and we've gone from the meters that took dimes Yeah. to the meter maid who chocked our tires every four hours to nothing, right? Um, and you know, it's it's a never- ending issue. So, yeah, thank you. Um, and I think you bring up some good points. So, I have a question. Uh, you say June 20th was the busiest day out of the four. Yes.

Um, so the one I wouldn't say it's a concern, but the Vixen wasn't as I'm just stating the Vixon wasn't as busy. must not have been as busy as it's four days because June 20th they only sold 144 tickets when there the capacity is Ross would know more but I think 790 or something like that seven so you know so obviously you know there is and I'm not saying the Vixon sells out every show every night

um but that just keep that in mind that the one night that you know there was 144 tickets sold and then talking to some restaurants uh that contacted me um those nights that were looked at were on their lower ends of of their average. So, I just want, you know, for just clarification, but yeah. And what I Yeah. What you could imagine is then the lot, you know, the Green Street lot, it might have been further parked further in or even the lots off of off of court. Uh I don't remember who their act was on the acoustic. It was an acoustic night. Nelson, no idea. Bobby, you probably would know more. But yeah, I had summer is always a pretty

Yeah, Nelson was I don't know if that was that night or that was Taylor Swift night was uh one of those nights that I thought it was that was packed. But uh you know, but I'm just saying like there there you know, it's hard to catch those nights on what's going to be good, what's going to be bad, but yeah, I just wanted to be transparent and say, you know, there there is always going to be that Yeah. Um, we had also those times that are going to be slammed in downtown when there's big events like Shamrocks the Fox, a sellout at the Vix in which then people travel to Riverside Drive and then Whiskey Diablo and you know all these other restaurants are busy as well.

Yeah. And and and what I would imagine is too when you when it gets busier when you have more demand I know like we were going to look at I think it was the weekend before the August 2nd um but I think it ended up we called an audible because it was going to rain that it rained that night. So, we're like that might skew the data even more. Um, and so, but when you have those uh either special events or like a sellout music show or something like that, you know, people are going to have a different walk tolerance just like if you went to if you're just going downtown for something, that's one thing. If there's a parade downtown, you're willing to park farther away because you know it's a special event and people's tolerances change. So, you would start to see these blues and purples turn green, yellow, possibly red and things like that. Um, and so I guess, um, maybe my point is is that if you had this happening more frequently, then you start thinking around like, all right, you know, do we want to tolerate this high level of parking utilization across a larger section of our downtown before we kind of uh, tackle maybe the capacity issue. At this time, it doesn't seem that it's needed, but if you have more consistent things like that going forward, that might be something you'd want to look at then.

Sure. All right. Great. Thank you. Alderman Dhy, you touched on it a little bit in the report, but talking about the crossing of 120 and I don't know if you can answer the question or if that's a city question, but who controls those lights in terms of if we push that walk? I mean, it's it's a long wait. Is that ID do that kind of controls the timing of that or I think it would be I don't know, Greg, if you have others, but Yeah, that's a that's a ID dot intersection at 120 and Riverside Drive. Riverside. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah, it's ID do handles that. Yeah. So, is there any do we have any leeway that request that

uh we can uh certainly reach out to them, but uh you know ADA accessibility and all this stuff is a high priority for them, but uh you know we might be low on the list of their items that we have that they have to take care of. I thought so.

Yeah. And so so some of the things that um as Greg's touched on like ADA requirements and there's there's you know the width of the street you know from like across the crosswalk and an average walking speed. That's what dictates what the countdown time or the the flash time is. One of the things that we uh kind of talked about a little bit in the report is the idea of a leading pedestrian interval. So, these are typically like three to four seconds where um you know, you can imagine you're at an intersection, the light turns from red to green or uh turns red and it's typically red in all directions for about a second. Um and then usually the walk sign comes on parallel to the side that gets the green. Um what a leading pedestrian interval does is it turns on the walk phase only before that light turns green for three to four seconds. So pedestrians sort of get a head start. So they're not now trying to cross as traffic's already going. they're able to kind of go ahead and start going. So, they're already in the intersection kind of getting a head start. Um, it only takes three to four seconds um in each, you know, you do that twice, so it's like say six seconds. Um, but it's pretty effective in just helping kind of create a more pedestrian friendly intersection. And, um, that's something that you could look at with ID do and say like, hey, if we were to allocate reallocate 3 seconds in each direction to pedestrians first, um, that could go away. You may not be able to reduce the overall time it takes to for the the flash, but you might be able to introduce a little bit of a head start for pedestrians.

I don't have a time with the amount of time it takes to walk across it. My issue is when you push the button, you may be pushing it for 10 minutes before before your turn comes up. Yeah. Changes the lights. Yeah. And that obviously the green street's even worse because if the fire department sends something out now, the whole thing is resetting. It's It's a disaster. Yeah. It has to recalibrate. Yeah. Yeah. Just run. No, I go back. I go back the other way around the bridge. Alman Glenn, go ahead.

Yeah. All I want to m mention is as far as these crossings across 120, you know, we keep talking about blending the downtown areas. However, you know, each one has its own significant uh characterization and crossing 120 is going to get more and more uh complicated as we go down the road because if you take a look, 120 traffic counts keep significantly going up. Yeah.

And I wouldn't be surprised in the next 10 to 15 years they're not going to be talking about widening 120 again. So like I say, I think to some extent we need to look at uh reality and that's the fact that 120 is going to be a very difficult crossing unless uh somebody wants to build a bridge over it or something. Um yep, bridges would be an option. I would I would generally steer away from that just because the ADA requirements are trying to get over. You got to ramp and get up and over. Um, what I've seen in many cases is, you know, a community might build a bridge and then people are just like, I'm not going to wait to go up the stairs or I'm just going to cross. Like that takes too much time to get up and over. Um, but I mean, I guess that just goes to the the point of kind of working with ID dot and trying to see, you know, um, I think ID do is definitely more more I won't say progressive, I'll just say more pedestrian focused than they historically have been. So, it's always worth kind of that conversation with them to say like, "Hey, what are some tools if we, you know, if we looked at, you know, a menu of items, whether it was leading pedestrian intervals or bumpouts or just reall reallocating some of the the time um to serve pedestrians a little bit more uh north to south. Um, see what they see what they say. I think that's they're they're definitely more open to that than I think they would have been even like 10 20 years ago. But worth the conversation. Have you ever seen a municipality uh possibly look at u a instead of an overpass an underpass underneath one something like 120?

Uh I know it'd be quite expensive but yeah it'd be pretty expensive. Um that would be the main thing. I mean could you do it? Yes, it'd be very expensive. And again, it's not something that we'd want to do in the next couple years, but it's something to think about for the future as traffic keeps growing and growing more. Yeah. All right. Thank you, Alder. Bassie, go ahead. By you mean By going to be a forever problem. Um,

the Riverwalk goes under 120, by the way. And which kind of is I don't have a question, but just a comment. I think messaging is everything. And you really made a great um point of mentioning that multiple times in here. I mean, just as an example, if you don't want to go through that crosswalk, enjoy the Riverwalk. It was quite expensive to your point and it does go, you know, from restaurant to restaurant and even parking lots to um other parts of town. But I think one of the problems that we have that you also did address is some of these parking lots aren't all that well lit from the parking lot to maybe the main part of Green Street. And if we were able to and I you had a photo of a little pee sign for parking. I walk that all the time. I've never even seen it. Like I it's just never caught my eye. So, you know, to have better messaging and just clearer um you know, identifying routes that people can take. And the Riverwalk in our downtown is so beautiful. And when the streetscape gets done on Riverside Drive, I think really just it's almost like a cultural shift of, you know, messaging about the things that you can see and enjoy and the leisurely time of taking a walk versus worrying about getting from that parking lot to the restaurant. Um, I think is something that as a community we would really want to wrap our arms around and and start. I mean, we have a beautiful mural that goes from one parking lot to Green Street. And if that was a little better lit, that would, you know, be a really interesting way to, you know, go from a parking lot to dinner. So, I would really be in favor of, you know, coming up with some solutions just that guide people through our community, especially as things improve and look better and we add more, you know, enticing things in the area.

Yeah, I think we found that in other communities as well. Sometimes it's um you know the walkability isn't so much that there isn't a connection, but it's the quality of the connection. So sometimes it's like oh maybe like the sidewalk is um you know up and down and it's like doesn't feel comfortable. Sometimes it's it goes by storefronts that are vacant. I don't think you have a lot of I don't remember seeing a lot of vacant storefronts, but sometimes like that's not a high quality walk either. So things in terms of like visibility, having it be well lit, good quality, all those things start to then generate a uh kind of just creates that walk radius that people are willing to go uh creates a larger radius for people. And then you then then you're able to tap into some of this like parking capacity that you have that people aren't using regularly. Or maybe some people like that and they're like, "Hey, I have my secret parking space. I never have a problem right there.

Don't don't tell anybody." Well, and and I mean like Venice is such a great example. Like when that road gets finished, you know, and and it's, you know, doesn't look like it's looked over the past few years. I think that might be a nice step in getting people to feel more comfortable walking in that area. Um but I would love to see us invest a little bit more in those kinds of solutions. Awesome. Aldin Miller, speaking of the mural, that alley appears to be wide enough for a car. Is there any thought process to making that a oneway into the Court Street parking? Is that even a Is that even right next to that building when it goes down? Yeah,

I think that's their private property, I think. Is that Yeah. Yeah, that's a Yeah, that is a private alley right there. We had to get the ement. Yep. Thank you. Any other questions by council? All the one By, if we decide tonight to purchase the building on Green Street that's um in here, will we be able to switch that parking to be public that's currently private and marked for customers of that business only? Uh so that's actually our that is our lot. Those signs showed up there. Oh, interesting.

So that's identified and I think we'll probably do something with that if we if we purchase this tonight. I would like. So even on this they say they're private, but they're not. They're labeled. They're labelled. They're labeled private. But that is a city lot. Interesting. Thank you. I I don't do parking enforcement, so don't look my way. All right. Any other questions? We're good. Thank you very much for your time. Appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you. And then Russ, go ahead.

Thank you, Peter. Um, so I would like to bring city council's attention back to the agenda supplement because at the end of the discussion item, there were a few recommendations in there that we were looking to receive some guidance from council on. Um, uh, at the very end it was, you know, just your feelings regarding the wayfinding. um any appetite for modification to the existing parking ordinances that exist on Riverside Drive and Green Street. Um we've touched on the ownership of the spaces that are labeled as private parking. Um, and then just exploring other potential options for increasing parking volume, you know, through lowcost avenues, whether it's adding additional marked on street parking in areas where we're able to fit it in, even if it means amending some of our current parking ordinances to allow parking in areas where currently there is it's labeled as no parking. Those would be some examples. But that's what we're looking to get from council tonight in terms of feedback. Glenn.

Yeah. You know, over the years, we came up with the the twohour, the 4hour parking spots, certain areas for different reasons, and I can't even remember how many different reasons there used to be. Um, but it was to accommodate the businesses that were there. And I I tend to wonder before we were to take any decisions or actions on any of this that maybe we need to talk to have a liaison uh out to all the businesses down there and bring up the this uh you know as far as what their thinking is as far as the 2hour and 4 hour. And maybe they'll have some good reasons why they feel it needs to be left where it is. and that again maybe uh they don't care anymore. I mean, you know, but uh it would be good to get an input on the businesses and how it might affect them if we change some of the parking regulations.

Alder Miller,

I think to Mr. Adams question, I to me the short-term action is is signs. You know, when Bobby walks by the blue paint, the blue pea, I can say the exact same thing. I've probably driven by the blue pea, walked by the blue pea, never put it in my brain. But then I get over to Riverside behind the on the west side where it has big parking with an arrow, clearer and obvious. So, I think the first thing we need to focus on is signage, creating something bigger and better because people are missing it. And then the connectivity of how to get to the parking lots that aren't obvious. So, how to get to Court Street parking lots that aren't obvious. You know, a walking sign like parking. I I I would bet to guess people don't know that you have to go up through Jels or come down court to get to the back of those and then it's a half a block to get to Green Street. So, we have to identify it. And then, you know, to Miller point, we have a small lot down there and yet we have Court Street two blocks away. Now that Venice is going to be done, are we creating a pedestrian ability with directionals down there so they know there's two parking lots back there. So, I think signage can solve a lot of this which is important to me to keep people downtown. I want bigger, better signs. Thank you. Glenn.

Yeah, I agree that our signage could be better. However, um we are creatures of habit. And if you have been visiting the downtown area for years, you always went to your normal route of where you went to park and all of a sudden now it's all crowded and and you never even thought about that there's other places to park. And I don't know what it might take to take and to some extent train those that come down to the downtown area that there are other options and just putting signs up. I think I don't think the average resident looks for signs. I think the person that comes out of another area and comes to the downtown area has never been there. I think that's where the they you know the signs are really helpful. But I think to some extent uh I don't know what it might take to uh wake up some of our residents that come downtown that are used to certain things that aren't working because of the growth and uh and get them to try different areas. I don't know. There's got to be something out there that we can do. And I think that's what what it is is we just need to familiarize uh Oldtown Mckenry of different places to park and different options that they have. You know, you take a look at take a look at the old funeral home. Nobody uses it, you know, and I hear that from everybody, you know, and what what what's it going to take to get people to start using that parking area, especially those that are complaining that there's no parking down there?

Signage. I mean, it has no signage there. Is it just signage? I don't know. You gota remember I think in in sorry, but I think the people that are now going in our downtown is not just residents. I I want to say 60% not I don't know, but I'm saying 60% of those people that are coming in our downtown are outside city limits, you know, and I think that's even more important that signage is so important uh for our downtown and what parking lots they can park in. And you know, I think there's also collaboration with the Vixen or something like that where, you know, maybe there's an automatic email that goes out says, "Hey, here's the parking lots they could park in." And I think they do that. They do that, especially sold out. Okay. So, I kind of figured that, but I maps that we've made.

So, I think it's important like that other businesses do that. We could talk to, you know, Whiskey Diablo, DC Cobs, the the, you know, buddies, Jexels, you know, and and have a map that is sent out to all those people that come and visit um and on their website like parking, you know, I make it a tab on their website. It takes five minutes to add a a page. So, maybe there's things that we can do, but I think signs is 100% needed. And I think, you know, whether it's a monument sign or a parking, whether there's restrictions, whatever the case may be, I think the signage is is our biggest concern. And I don't disagree with you about having someone talk to the business about the two-hour and 4 hour. Um I think it the last thing we want to do is change it to twohour and it doesn't work and pisses people off and then all of a sudden we're switching it back, right? So I I do think um you know whether and you know I could talk to staff, we could figure out a way to to get to those businesses. Doug Martin obviously has all the contacts and emails so maybe he's the liaison to do that. Um, but uh, you know, we could certainly discuss that, but I think signage is is definitely a must for sure.

So, sorry I cut you off, but no, good. It's fine. It's exactly what I was thinking. So, we're right up. Hold on, baby.

To um, give you the feedback you're looking for. I think signage is really important, too. Plus, I think it's kind of a cornerstone of a classy community to see things like that that the city's invested in that help people to find their way around. So, I would be in favor of that. Um, I I absolutely agree. I would never want to exclude our local businesses from being part of the conversation, but when I I really thought about it and took a walk down Green Street, and I can't think of one business down there that a customer would need to park at for more than two hours. Um, and very few I mean, at the Vixen, yes, but that typically happens after 8:00, so it's kind of exempt from that where everything else is a restaurant, coffee shop, boutique shopping, you know. Um, so if the businesses were in favor, I would be in favor of a two-hour parking limit if in fact it's something that we are enforcing, you know. Um, so that would kind of be key for that. And definitely if there's private parking that's not private parking, we should do that. And I am also um in favor of just looking for additional parking downtown if we can find whether it's reconfiguring some of the things that we have. But I think all of the recommendations that were made um I can stand behind.

Awesome. Chief Yeah, I would just I would just add one thing that um hasn't really been brought up, but just being able to establish addresses for all of our parking lots and get them into Google Maps as actual public parking because they're not currently now and people rely on GPS all the time to get to where they're going and they just don't populate. So, I think there some of them are on ways. Yeah. So, um I agree. Yeah, I agree with you. And then also, can you chief, sorry to uh put you on a spot here, but 2-hour and 4 hour? I know we've had conversations when I first was elected. Can you explain what what transpired with the 2-hour?

Yeah. So, historically, we were two-hour parking except for a couple of the we'll call the off streets. Court Street between 120 and Pearl had some 4-hour parking, and so did um Park Street between 120 and Pearl, and so did areas like around Veterans Park and things like that. But we were two-hour parking on the main part of Green Street, Riverside Drive and on and uh Green Street. Um we got feedback from the sitting council. This is 2017. Um after getting feedback from those existing businesses that they were getting tired of getting tickets uh for ex extending past the 2-hour parking and these were more about owners of businesses, I think than anything. Um so council advised they wanted to change it to four hours and that's the reason why we did that. sitting council gave staff direction to change it to four.

Okay. So, I think this study recommends maybe two to three, two, so um but yeah, I I agree with Alderwoman Benny. Thank you. I know otherwoman Bassie's had her hand up for a while, but we've kind of had the discussion this week. That's okay. But one of the things I want to bring up is the fact that uh visionary wise uh you want the downtown area to be a multi-stop area. You don't want somebody to come downtown just to go to Jexels and nowhere else,

you know, and and some people don't. Some people might want to go down to, you know, shop at the boutiques or whatever, and then they want to go down and have something to eat somewhere else. Now I got to move my car because we got two-hour parking and we've already been out here for an hour and a half. So, you know, we got to look at it at all angles and not necessarily is the twohour changing it, you know, the answer. Okay. Hold on, Bassie.

Um, I think signage also is is probably the single most important thing that we need to do. Um, but the two-hour parking, that's actually only on the street. So, the lots would still be four hours. So, if you know you're going to be there for a while, you can park in a lot where you're going to have four hours. If if I know I'm going to be walking downtown, I always park by um Veterans Park because I know I'm going to be minimum of a three-hour walk when I'm downtown. So, that was one thing. Also, um, we talked about the fact that there the parking lot that was previously the funeral home is not used that often and every time I drive there, there's so few park uh cars parked, if you look at these pictures, you can almost count them. Um, would it help to make people feel safe if we had more lights there at night? Um, you know, I will be the first to say that I think Mckenry is extremely safe. I never ever worry about my safety at all, except for maybe the squirrels in my yard, but that's a non-issue. Um, but to make anyone else feel comfortable, would it be worth looking into lights by where we've got the former um, funeral home so that people are more comfortable? So, I think Bill Bill and I have had those conversations where we did that lot and we raised the money to do that. I think uh the cost to add lights over there was pretty significant and I think that's why we avoided that at the time

until I think until we had a a clear direction of which what we were going to do and had in terms of development or anything else um we didn't further explore because of the cost of the lighting uh program would be in any of those particular lots. completely. That is something that I mean lighting that up would would bring some more awareness and and a and a safer feeling to them as well. So, we can certainly look into that and get some ideas, you know, temp, you know, I don't want to say temporary lights now put those light towers out there, but you know, something maybe there's some opportunities to I don't know what kind of power we even have in that lot, but

I mean, it's something I can look into from downtown. And I know we've had some pretty good success uh with lighting. Um both Peterson Parking lot, if you remember, that used to be really dark out there as well as even the Knox Park um that parking lot down on on Green Street was also pretty dark that we've had some success putting some lighting in in those locations as well. Um even in the the boat um Miller Riverfront Park in the boat launch. Um we've lit some parks over the last parking lots over the last five years that we've had some success. So, it's something we can look into. Thank you, Alderman Miller.

My only other comment is if you're adding the parking to Google, we probably should add it to some of the parking apps, even though it's free parking. I know when I go to your point that more than 50% are probably out of towners. If I go anywhere, I'm always on one of my parking apps trying to figure out where I am and where parking is because I I I clearly don't know some of the other areas I go to. So, if we can look at parking apps along with just Google Maps, I I don't know what that takes. I don't know how to put put us there, but Monty, you're my wizard. I'm sure you can deal with that. Um, just food for thought.

I will add that the the parking lots are all labeled in our downtown um and do exist on Google Maps and Google Maps, I think, has a partnership with Ways and so if they appear in one, they usually appear in the other. Um, I just pulled them up and confirmed that each of them has a label with an address on them. And so they do exist in terms of parking apps. That's something that, um, again, maybe Monty's the wizard on that one, so we turn to him. But it's something to look into, I would say, as well. So, so like Spot Hero is kind of like my go-to whenever I'm out of town, and it just identifies all that parking that's available. So,

any other one, Benny? if we get it in Google properly, it might actually pull it into some of those apps, just so you know. But I just want to say too, I absolutely agree with um Alderwoman Bassie. I think it's not, you know, the signage is important, but there has to be a level of comfort and an experience. So um anywhere that we can make sure that I mean I feel used to feel that way on Venice, too. It's pretty dark. So like that parking lot, the parking lot itself is okay, but getting from that parking lot anywhere else would feel sketchy if you didn't know the neighborhood. So, I think there's multiple places we could look at that.

Well, in in the funeral home parking lot, you have to walk across into the alley behind a long building down three little stairs that are cut in between two bushes to get to the green street behind Green Street Cafe. And you know, to to just think about that, it's like, yeah, I wouldn't park up there and do that, especially in the winter, cuz that's a sheet of ice going down that hill. I didn't even know there was that much to it. I have never Oh, yeah. It's that little adventure back there. Yeah, you can just pick up um 120 right away and then turn on the green. So, you don't have to worry about that.

Oh, you have to go on the adventure. Then make sure you have good shoes on. Some people like to walk. I like to walk, but I like to see the dur. Right. Right. All right. Any other questions, comments? Everyone agree that we should look at signage and go that route. We'll uh What about the addresses, too? I like that idea. The addresses at the on the

on the parking lots. Yeah. So, we'll we'll look into staff will look into that and take care of all that and make sure that's all completed properly. Um, I know it's on ways because I went on ways and looked, but nonetheless, staff will take care of that. We'll we'll get that taken care of on the 2 to four hour. Uh, we'll get a staff member to work on that and then, um, we'll go from there on the responses. I can have a question. Sure. Go ahead.

That lot that's across the street from the Vixen, you know, by Green Street Cafe, feels very temporary. And I think that for a long time we've all felt like that was probably either going to be a development or was going to be something more permanent. If we don't have the need for a permanent structure like a parking garage, something like that. Um I would be interested in having a conversation in the future just how do we make that feel like it's more permanent that it's not half kind of grally half you know I mean maybe that's something that would also make it feel a little bit more welcoming. Sure. because right now it just feels so temporary, you know.

Thank you. All right. Awesome. Well, thank you guys again. Appreciate it. All right. Moving on to consent agenda items 6A through 6. You do not have to stay for this. Okay. Just want, you know, I know it's fun and all, but you know, um 6A through 6D. I am looking for a motion to approve 6A through 6D. Alderman Dhy. I'll make a motion to approve items 6A through 6D as presented. All right. Second. Alderman Bainy. I'll second that motion. Thank you. Discussion on these items by city council. See none. Clerk, please call the role. Alderman Dhy. Yes. Alderwoman Bainy. Yes. Alderman Glab. Yes. Alderwoman Bassie. Yes. Alderman Davis. Yes. Alderwoman Miller.

Yes. Thank you, councel. Next item on the agenda is 7A, soapbox derby. A motion to approve one, host all American soapbox derby as presented. Two, authorize city support services and closure of certain portions of Walkagan and Green Streets in conjunction with the event. And three, waiver of all associated fees. Uh, Director Hopson, do you want to present this item in any way?

Sure. I I just am very excited to be working with the uh the Soapbox Derby Association who have come together um both some some local representatives Justin Bender is here as well as um some of the greater Chicago land uh representatives that all come together to make this a reality. I know we had a presentation or a a public input last year at one point. Um and it appears, you know, we've worked through a lot of different days and some of the logistics and uh we're happy to bring back this family oriented event to our to our downtown. I know as we talk about that, it's one that was uh very popular for a number of years and and with a minimal impact uh both on on city services. Um, so they they do a good job of uh having their volunteers and um from our point of view there's some some pre-etup that's things that we'll do in terms of barricades or uh garbage cans um some bleachers that type of thing and then traffic control will be uh a big part of it. But that's not even a major uh major a major cost for us for this type of event. Uh bring it back to downtown. So happy to answer any questions you might have and and as well I'm going to volunteer you if you want to answer any questions or if you have anything else that that you'd like to add.

Thank you. If you want to come up to the podium. Justin's brought so much energy to this and so as a local participant and somebody that's has a quite a bit of passion about about this and I could never express what uh what he's brought to it. So you have other things to add? Hit the center button and lower the mic a little bit. There you go. A little bit more. No, I'm just kidding. Go ahead. Thanks, Justin. Um, Justin Bender. Uh, if any of you have any questions, I'd be more than happy to answer it. Bassie, go ahead.

Um, it's not a question. It's just a statement that I think this is a great family event and it's a good example of types of events where the city should be waving their fees. And I'm really looking forward to bringing this back to the community. So, thank you so much. And I will be voting yes. Thank you. Any other questions, comments? Hold on, Benny. Go ahead.

I just have a comment. First of all, I'm really glad to see you guys back here. And I also am very excited about this event. Um, when I was out in the parking lot, Justin made a song about this event. And it is so fantastic. Not that he needs to play it now, but I hope that the city will use it for promotion and that you guys listen for it because it's amazing. It's really good. Very cool. I would second that. It It was really catchy. It was a good Yeah, good video. Oh, mom's trying to embarrass you now. Um, but no, I got it. I could send it to him. Um, but yeah, so Glad, go ahead.

Yeah, my only concern is is the waiver of the fees. Uh, maybe for the first uh event, you know, first year. Um, I wouldn't have a problem, you know, the way the motion is. However, uh we should know what those waiver of fees with, you know, total it up uh for us uh afterwards uh to know for the future uh because an event like this hopefully will grow and grow and we've got to look at see how much you know it's going to impact the city down the road. So, please

Yeah, I'll be happy to track track those and then this would be hopefully this is an event that returns annually and that would be part of a future supplement as well. Um, but I can also do Wikido do a report after the event and and provide information right away. So both in both you'll see that in both of those uh both of those options. Davis. Yeah. I guess my biggest question was is there anything else going on on that date? I mean in the past it's always been um aligned with you know a larger event. So the staff's already out there doing that stuff. So to do that with as part of the setup and to wave those fees, I wouldn't have a problem. But as a standalone event, I I have reservations on that.

I think this is the type of event that becomes an anchor event um for businesses potentially rally to rally around. There's not an event offering that we have in June. Um there used to be the the food truck event that was on Main Street. Um they have done that for a couple years now. Uh, and then the other event that would happen in June would be the day at Peterson Farm was an event um that we've seen out there. But in terms of other events that are currently scheduled, there's nothing else at this point. Um, but we do have a pretty good pretty active downtown group. The the Mckenry Mile has started to present themselves and become more active. Um, and so that's something that between them and the chamber and and obviously us as a parks department, maybe there's the potential to create a little bit more of a buzz so that people are coming down that are coming down downtown to watch the races. Then we also want to encourage them to kind of flow through the downtown and experience other things that we have. So I think having the date finalized through this process is the first step in trying to then build something off of that.

Yeah. And that that's exactly my comment is I don't see this generating a lot of revenue for the city as part of that. But if it's part of another event, then totally get it. I understand. And when we say it will grow, um I don't know if I see it growing that large where it's going to be its own event to generate that. So,

yeah. So, Davis, uh, Justin and I have met a few times. Um, and he would love to incorporate the downtown businesses and some involvement, whether it's another event tied to this. Um, so I will be meeting with Justin. We kind of wanted to wait till this is all approved, too. But to see how we can um combine the downtown area, whether it's just all the local businesses doing stuff and the chamber does something with them. So, getting him in front of the chamber and seeing how we can tie that all together. And I agree. I mean, you want to get people on the downtown, but you also want people to attend this, not just the families. So there it's a we get it. So, um, and I think for you as well, like you want this to be bigger every year. So, we'll we'll help and do whatever we got to do to try to do that. I think historically has has been one of the things that's presented some challenges with the event is that um if you know if you're a parent you're going to sit and watch that all day and and but if you're a visitor you're going to watch a little bit but maybe you want to come back for the finals but in the meantime meantime you want to go do something else and then come back for it and so you know we and one year we incorporated some food trucks and that had a little bit of success um but the potential maybe to do something else is there with this being kind of the hub of that. So, we'll come back and see how we can do that.

All done.

Again, being a lifetime resident, I used to be very excited about Soapbox Sty and with lots of children in my life, I would spend my day out there getting sunburned. So, I'm very excited about having it back. And I think since we've had this Bucks Derby, since not having it since 2018, we now have Miller Point, which I think people will leave the derby if they're not watching a Heat, walk down Walk Keaggan, go across the bridge, do a little shopping at the at the at the at the mini shops, and wander their way back. So, I think we've created a environment to make this grow. Um, and even thinking about Last Shamrocks on the Fox where we put all the food trucks in one parking lot and created a food court, that may be a wonderful opportunity to supplement our downtown businesses. If I remember correctly, there were 500 people at this in 2018. Those bleachers were full, were they not?

Sometimes yes, sometimes no. It has I don't think it's ever been really packed. Um when we've had there was at one point I think we had 30 around 30 racers one year and that was probably obviously more racers more people came. Um but yes I mean people do come to watch it. It certainly is a I think we can build this into an event and we can incorporate our other areas because we've made that entire stretch much more usable with the finish of Miller Point in the Riverwalk. We didn't have either of those in 2018.

Right. Well, if any of you have any ideas that that we could pass on to Justin or, you know, anything like that, send them my way or Bill's way and then we can meet with Justin and see how we can incorporate those ideas to him and work together and try to make this success, you know, for for the whole event, for the whole day.

This this Saturday is typically, you know, in the last two summers, we've had the summer con Saturday summer concerts once a month at Miller Point. This would be one that would fall on that. Now it's, you know, maybe people come down early to experience the soapbox derby and then go to the concert after that. Um, provided that that's something that um, again is sustained by the budget in the upcoming U budget process, but that's been a um, included in the last two years budget. We've had some good success with our Saturday concerts. Uh, just those those once a month bigger concert as opposed to the the less formal Sunday um, just come down into to a food truck. So, I just want to add that as well. I just want to put one more idea out there just because we can. Um, many other communities that are creating the environment that we're envir in creating downtown have on entry points to like the Riverwalk a placard or a frame of calendar of events. So they have every summer event and its location at every entry point. So that you walk up to it and you go, "Oh, I'm here on May 1st, but oh look, the soapbox derby is on June 14th." So if somebody doesn't know where to Monty, you're doing a great job with the website, but if we already have individuals out there meandering, I I think we need to incorporate not only the parking signs, but a schedule of event signs that is a sheet of paper behind a closed plexiglass frame just to keep people aware of what's coming up. I I I think it's important as we're creating this environment,

even something with a QR code, you know, that way you're not putting everything on one sign. You're just a QR code that goes right to a specific site. Kiosk by the Riverwalk shops also has all those, but I don't know how many people look at it. Hopefully, they do wasn't cheap. So, all Sue's look at. Have you seen it at the Oh, okay. I was thinking that you that was one of the the blue pea kind of things. If above the QR code, I'm not going to walk up to a QR code and scan it just because I say schedule of events QR code.

I'm not going to walk up to a QR code and scan it just because I will. But if it says schedule of events QR code, I'm likely to go ahead and capture it. Thank you, Sue. Go ahead. I have a question for you, Justin. How many communities um surrounding communities have a soapbox derby? Do you know? Uh back in the day, they used to have quite a bit. Uh nowadays, there's none of them. Oh, so Mckenry would be kind of exclusive in having this activity.

Yeah. Uh back when I raced in Mckenry, I raced against people from Crystal Lake. Uh I mean as far out as uh what's the name of that town? Rockford. Thank you. Uh yeah, I mean there it brought a lot of people from all around to Mckenry. Uh back in the day there I mean the race goes back to 1939 and back then I mean almost every town around here had a race. Mckenry is kind of the only one that lived the longest. Okay. Excellent. Thank you.

Any other questions, comments? All right, Justin. Thank you. Appreciate it. All right. At this time, looking for a motion to approve 7A as presented. Alder one Miller. I'll make a motion to approve 7A as presented to Post all American soap box. Authorize the city support services the closure of certain portions of Wagan and Gra Street in conjunction with the event and to wave all associated. Thank you. Second Alder Bainy. I will happily second that motion. Thank you. Discussion once again by city council. Any public comment regarding this item? Clerk, please call the role. Alderwoman Miller. Yes. Alwoman Bainy. Yes. Alderman Glab. Yes. Alman Dhy. Yes. Alwoman Bassie.

Yes. Alman Davis. Yes. Thank you. Thank you, council. Thank you, Justin. We'll be in touch. Okay. Appreciate it. Next item on the agenda is 7B, purchase of 1219 Green Street. Looking for a motion to authorize the mayor to sign the proposed city of Mckenry notice to of exercise of option to buy 1219 Green Street, Mckenry, Illinois. I'm looking for a motion to approve. Alderman Dhy, I'll make a motion to approve item 7B, the purchase of 1219 Green Street as presented. Thank you. Second, Aldin Miller. I'll second that motion. Thank you. Discussion by city council on this item.

Yeah, I um before I probably should have spoken up before the motion. The 90 days to close commences on the day the option is exercised. We have until December 31st to exercise the option. Um we talked about this among ourselves whether we wanted to push this off to the second meeting in December. Uh we didn't see any reason to do that. uh tonight. If you wanted to delay the closing by 30 days, let's call it till December 31st plus 90 days, uh you could authorize the mayor to sign this at his discretion or on a particular day besides tonight. If if this is a Carolyn question more than anything or Suzanne on money flow, if it doesn't matter, we'll close it within 90 days. No problem. But do you have any finance reasons or any other reason to delay this by 20

30 30 days? Caroline, not really. No, I mean the only thing we will have to do is a budget amendment at some point. Yeah. Oh yeah. Yeah, that's right. That was mentioned too in our discussion. So from the staff standpoint, it doesn't matter. The motion's good. Okay. All right. Discussion by city council. Although Embassy, um, where is the $550,000 coming from? I didn't see that in the packet, Caroline. I mean, at this point, it would probably be coming from reserves.

Okay. Is that the one that we've got at um in a 4% interest bearing account? Yes. Okay.

One other thing I did offer at the mayor's u suggestion at the after the last meeting. He thought it might be worthwhile to explore um I did talk to Pat McAndrew and the um the seller would like to occupy this for a year probably no longer. So we know the rent that will be have to be paid at least uh the gross rent uh without pluses and minuses. Um, so the mayor suggested maybe reducing the purchase price by the full year of rental payments to bring it down to some degree, but Pat didn't think they were interested in that. We haven't finalized that because we haven't really spoken since we informed him that we might be exercising this option, but we might explore that again. Maybe not. There's nothing to act on. I'm just making you aware of that possibility.

Thank you. Okay. I still have a few more. Um, so is it safe to say that the city will not be taking out a bond for this 550,000? No, we would not. You wouldn't. And the reserve is that money that we had allocated for the 31 expansion. I mean, we have more reserves than just that. It wouldn't be taken from that.

Okay. All right. Thank you. And then my my last question is um 1219 Green Street was built in 1939 and it is an important part of Mckenry's downtown. So my question is is it the city's long-term goal to preserve the historical building or market it to a developer and risk the possibility of demolition? And I'm looking at you, Ross, because I'm thinking you're going to have my answer. Well, our 2050 plan shows that that building is gone. So, I mean, I guess that's going to be council's decision to make uh as we move forward with any potential developments on on that site. I I I don't know why we would be purchasing it if we didn't have plans to develop it, but again, that's going to be a council decision in the future.

Thank you, Ross. Wait, can I ask one more question? Sure, go ahead. So, in the event that we choose to demolish it and let's say we take care of that, do you have to come to council to get approval to demolish it? Yeah, that would all have to come come through city council. All right. Thank you. I mean, I I can't authorize anybody to take it down. I just make sure it's going to come. Just the cost alone would require council's approval. Thank you. I also just wanted to point out quickly that this would be a TIFF eligible expense as well if we wanted to recoup that from the TIFF at a future date. Any other questions, comments? Any public comment regarding this item? Clerk, please call the RO. Alderman Dhy, yes. Alderwoman Miller, yes.

Alderman Davis, yes. Alwoman Bassie, no. Alderman Glab, no. Alderwoman B, yes. Okay, I passed. All right. Um, next item on the agenda, staff reports. Uh Russ Adams, you got something for staff reports this evening?

Yes, I do. Um obviously, Mother Nature threw a bit of a curveball at us with all the snow and Flood Brothers was not able to complete their leaf collection. Um they were not able to complete zone 2 last week and they still have two weeks remaining on the program for the year. So, we've been in contact with them. Um, obviously with a foot of snow out there, they're not going to be able to resume anytime soon, but they have agreed to do a leaf collection in the spring once the snow has melted and leaves are no longer frozen to the ground. We will work on coordinating dates with them for that and getting that pushed out to the residents when the time comes. Um, so stay tuned.

What's that? People can bag waste. Yard waste is still going through December 15th. So, anyone who does have if there's leaves out in front right now or any other yard waste that can be bagged and disposed of curbside unlimited as usual. Thank you. Can we make sure we get a post out so we can all share that if you don't mind? Yeah, we will be posting. We'll put a Nixel out. We'll post to Facebook and the city website informing all the residents. Great. Go ahead. Can the city plow the top of mine off so I can get to my leaves?

Yeah. All right. Any other staff reports?

Done. All right. Um, I just would like to uh make a public uh announcement regarding last week our community lost a true pillar of Mckenry, Joseph Stannic, a man whose impact on this city will be felt for generations. Uh Joe was more than a former alderman, more than a mayor, and more than a trustee. He was a servant leader whose heart was always centered on family, faith, and community. His dedication gave us parks programs and progress that helped shape the Mckenry we know today. It's no wonder he was known as the parks mayor. His vision built spaces where families could gather, children could play, and memories could be made. Joe lived a life rooted in service, loyalty, and love, and now reunited with his former love, Maryland. We honor the legacy he leaves behind. On behalf of the city of Mckenry, we extend our deepest conso condolences to the Stanic family, and thank you for sharing Joe with all of us. Uh our community is better because he was part of it. So, uh Joe Stannic, uh his services was this, uh this weekend and today. Um but uh yeah, so I just wanted to make sure that we recognize him for his service here in the city of Mckenry. Uh other than that, I have nothing else. Uh any city council comments? Alone ambassy?

Um I attended the Bull Valley Bridge open house um last week and I wanted to thank public works. It was very informative and I learned a lot. So thank you so much. Any other Alderman Miller?

Yes. Thank you. Um, first of all, I want to put a shout out to Ross and parks or public works. This snowstorm was horrific and your guys did a great job. Um, I only had a few residents call about a hit mailbox, little snow on a culde-sac, who shovels the sidewalk in front of the post office. Um, and given that we had how many inches of snow? eight 10 I don't even know. Um I thought that was manoot for the moment. So congratulations. Um also wanted to put a shout out to parks and the guys who did the lighting the tree and the parks look amazing. So for those of you who weren't at the tree lighting ceremony last week, it was it was really kind of a special thing. Um, I think this is the tallest tree we've had in the hole.

And I know there was some creativity of getting the tree to stand up. Um, but the but the guys really did a great job. So, thank you for all that you've done and thank you again for continuing to support our community. I I'll just add that that is a donated tree. A local resident was uh more than happy to donate that tree to us. So, it's a little bit taller than we would like, but it worked out pretty good. So, is it 14 ft or 16 ft? Uh, I think it's close to 16. It's It's big.

It's the I think it's the tallest that I remember being down there. So, and it just it it just is beautiful and it was a nice night. So, thank you, Marjette, for being there and doing your thing and um it was great. All right. I second all that, by the way. Go ahead. I just want to say thank you as well. The shoes were awesome. No, really because like I went out and wow, I can go shopping now. I'll figure it out. Hopefully you were shopping local in M in Mckenry. Yeah. Yeah. Only shopping in Mckenry, right? But only any other Glenn? Go ahead.

Yeah. uh we talk about uh the leaf problem and um I just to some extent am not happy about the fact that they didn't get to finish uh the zone two. Uh I would hope that that would be the first zone that they finish up. Uh they should know where they ended up and in the spring that it's the first place that they should be going to. I mean, I had a tremendous amount of leaves in my front yard. I know. And uh in fact, in order to get it within the two feet or four feet of the curb without going into the street, I actually had to wind up uh spreading it out to where it was out in front of the parkway uh next to me just to get the leads all out there and work my tail end to get them off out there for the week that it was scheduled and they never got there. Now, there is another problem with them, and that's the fact that uh I don't know if anybody else has had this complaint, but uh their billing is terrible. Terrible. Um couple months, well, more than a couple months, but a couple billing periods. Uh back in the spring, um they took and I got a bill that was due the next day. And of course, I sent out the bill the the check. And two weeks later, I get another uh letter that says that I'm past two. And then I call him up and I told him when I sent the check and two days later all of a sudden it clears the bank

and it was kind of weird. Now this last bill and this is becoming excessive. Uh I have talked to other residents. Uh this bill was for the beginning the first was the billing period. They actually show on the bill that they sent it out on the 6th. It was due the 27th and I got it in the mail on the 26th. Now, I sent out the check today. It'll be interesting to see how long because sometimes I've had two or I had to call them that it takes three weeks for them after I mail in the the check to for it to clear my bank, which kind of screws my up. as far as my budgets and everything else that I review my bank statements all the time. So, we need to talk to them as far as getting that done because it isn't just me. It's it's residents also that are are telling me that. Uh so, there are some some problems that they've got uh out there. It isn't residents that are just complaining ridiculously or anything else because I've I've experienced it myself.

Sure. Is it just me or is it funny that you're writing checks? I don't know. I'm just saying I I'm just going to throw that out there. I I I don't even own checks. But I know. I know. But the point I'm getting more than anything else is is I want to give them money and they don't want to take it. I get it. I get it. You know, I get it. I just find it funny. Um I don't know. Yeah. Uh Happens with our water. Oh, it happens with our water bills, too.

Oh, that's crazy. Oh, that's crazy. Okay. Everyone sign up for online bill pay. Yes. Um, no checks. All right. Any other questions, comments by council? All right. You want in the record? Yeah. Everyone good? Alone. Banning. Go ahead. Motion to adjurnn. Yes. Motion to adjurnn. Second. Alone Miller. Second. Thank you. Clerk, please call the RO. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.

Yes. Thank you everyone. Have a good evening. Drive safe. Russ, don't leave. I just got a complaint about Blood Brothers.