City Council - Regular Meeting

It's like

I'd like to talk about items 7 through 14 Monday to Monday. And the vineyard's nice. You sit on the deck and it's just kind of like it's like a gentle sloping. You just come out for miles.

Well, you guys missed the doughnut handout on Saturday. Yeah, dude. Over 300 donuts were gone by 10:30 and we had to go down to go down buy cookies from somewhere. more. Yeah, I get some backups. Dozens of people people like free. Yeah, the first hour. They don't want They don't want anything. They didn't really want to talk about it. One for you, one for me. Good turn up though, huh? They were just happy to get apple cider donuts. The mayor was great. They went fast. The ball. So is all my money.

I'd like you to pick like a school. It's so expensive for little boys. Put the army.

Okay. We were called to order the regular meeting of the Bavia City Council for Monday, January 16th, 2025. I would ask that you all please rise for a brief invocation to be followed by the pledge of allegiance. Tonight as we meet uh we find ourselves living in a troubled world with a lot of wars and dis disagreements and worldwide it's very unsettling. And so we just ask that they peace be settled again on the earth that we live in and that we go forward from this time and place trying to find relationships in a positive nature with all people living in equality and goodness and appreciation for the world that they live in. Tonight, as always, we want to ask for a special blessing on those from our community who are serving in foreign on foreign soils and in in our own country in the defense of the liberties of the United States of America. And we just ask that a special blessing be showered upon each one of these men and women as long along with all those from throughout our country who were serving with them tonight. Also, we ask for a special blessing on those in our community who are feeling injured or sick. And we just ask that the special blessing be shown to them as to regain their health. We also ask for direction and understanding by the members of the city council as we meet tonight knowing that in the hearts and minds of each of them they are here to do what they feel would be in the best interest of the community of Bavia. We ask for all these blessings. Amen.

Who'd like to do 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. Ask the city clerk to please call the role. Very slowly. Raza here. Lancy here. Beck here. Malay here. Malone here. Wolf. Sulfa here. Baron here. Leman. Lman

here. Peeper here. Fenbach here. Anderson here. Vogal singinger. 12 present, two absent, your honor.

So, we have the necessary quorum to conduct business. Uh, moving item four, which is a reminder from the chair, that if you're going to address us tonight, we ask that you come up for front here and use the podium and use that microphone to speak in. Uh, this meeting is being recorded on film. So, if you're going to speak, it's important that you get to that microphone because we don't want to have you being shown on TV with you're talking, but nobody can hear you. So, that's what we want to have that done. and it makes a better understanding for anybody that's watching to have that ability to do that. Uh, moving to item five, items uh to be removed, added or changed on tonight's agenda. Alman Beck,

uh, your honor, item D on the consent agenda should say June 6th, 2025 payroll. And then item E under accounts payable check register amount should be $4,764,390.76. Anybody else have any ideas for agenda issues? Do we need to call a role on that or she just just as long as she corrected in the consent agenda? All right. Put it in the minutes. Okay. Moving to item six, consent agenda. Alderman Beck.

Your honor, the consent agenda reads as follows. to accept and place on file the committee of the whole minutes for May 13th, 2025 and May 27th, 2025, the historic preservation commission minutes for June 16th, 2025, and the 2025 post issuance compliance report. And for approval, the June 6th, 2025 payroll in the amount of $1,89,31146, the accounts payable check register in the amount of $4,764,390.76. The city council minutes for June 2nd, 2025 and for approval the cow executive session minutes of for May 27th, 2025 on the purchase of real estate. The cow executive session minutes for April 29th, 2025, collective bargaining and personnel. Resolution 2025-83-R authorization to purchase equipment maintenance for network storage devices. Resolution 2025-31-R financial hosting financial systems hosting Ordinance 2025-34 amending portions of title 81A5 rates of the Bavia M municipal code and resolution 2025-87-R firewall and security subscription maintenance renewal. Your honor, I move we approve the consent agenda as read.

Second move by Alman Beck, second by Malay for the approval of the items on the consent agenda as approved as presented. Any discussion? Kirk, call the role. Beck, I Malone. Hi. Wolf. Hi. Sulfa. Hi. Baron. Hi Lman. Hi Peeper. Hi Baronbach. Hi Anderson. Hi Barza. Hi Lansancy. Hi. 12. Yes. No. No. Two absent.

Motion's approved. Moving then to item seven which are matters from the public. Does anybody in the audience tonight wish to address the city council? You're all nice looking people out there, right? I guess not. Okay, moving to item eight, which is presentation of an update on the wastewater treatment plant rehabilitation project and Jerry Ruth that is our reporter is here in and he's the gentleman that's doing much of the work. So, I think we really got somebody here who's got his strong hand on what's all this massive improvement that's now taking place in our sewer plant. Jerry,

thank you, Mr. Mayor. Uh, here's your update for June. Uh, so, uh, things are still moving along. Not nearly as fast a pace as it was early on the project, but now it's instead of the general contractor doing a lot of work, it's almost all subcontractors out there doing work. So, a lot of the stuff you'll see, um, there's not a whole lot of concrete left. There's not a whole lot of, uh, large structures going in. It's just finishing off the structures that are already there in place. So, the headworks uh the brick facade is done. HVAC is uh nearly complete. The roofing uh was touched up. I think there's one or two items need to be addressed on the roof of that building. And uh the trolley hoists were put into the building and load tested primary clarifiers. Uh process piping. Uh last time you saw pictures, we were bringing the area up in between those four circular structures. And so that is uh a couple feet away from uh being at grade now. So they're bringing that up uh on top of the process piping they completed. There's some concrete going in uh mainly it's for electrical duct banks. Uh but the concrete work is pretty much done in this area. Primary clarified diversion structure. They're running electrical to that as well. We have some actuated gates in that structure that'll allow the city to um quickly raise and lower those gates. takes a lot of turns on a gate actuator if it's manual. Primary clarifier control building uh electrical inside going to be ongoing until we do startup. Um which should be sometime in the next month, month and a half. So not going to put uh money on it that next update I'll be giving you. We actually have equipment operating uh but we're getting really close. Uh the brick facade on that building also is uh pretty much done with uh some sealant and that hanging out there and all of the equipment uh is installed. Final clarifier 701 which is the last of the three final clarifiers. We finished the rehabilitation of that with a

replacement of the entrance stairs. The equipment inside was uh rehabilitated with the wear items and things that had failed and the electrical was rerun. sludge handling building. Just some minor process piping installation, but that's just uh sort of on hold for filler work when the critical path work uh has a break or if they have like a rainy day. So, some photos. Uh this uh is the far south end of the site between the three final clarifiers. There's this lower area where we have some pumps that we need access to that provides uh wash water basically for the plant. It's reused water, uh, essentially a little bit cleaner than river water that we use for some of our processes. We put this stair and the, uh, sort of sump pit outside of that vault as a way to easily access that without having to go through a ladder and go through confined space entry. This is at the headworks, so way over on the north end of the site. um masonry wall, the screening wall that's on the lower level there right outside that sort of conceal the dumpsters of debris and grit that will be uh collected in this building. Um so it's sort of screening it from public eye. The concrete pavement right outside including door stoops and the approach slab uh this is just pictures of the rebar um that those have been poured. Here's inside. You see the trolley hoist. That's the yellow beam along the ceiling. And the photo on the right, the photo on the left is the uh load test. They hook up literally giant uh weights to make sure that the um hoist can actually lift what it says it does, which is good because the first time it failed and we had to send it back and get new ones. So, here's the aerial from May. You'll see the brick looks pretty dusty. The roof still has the flap going over the corners. And if you look at the photo here, the brick looks much better. The roofing has been uh lapped over the side

and secured in place. And the next thing to happen would be the coping that goes over the top of the edge of the uh roofing system. Here's a view from above Flynn Street um right at the north end of the site facing southwest. And here it is from June 1st. So it's really starting to come together. You see the screening wall just being constructed there uh outside the building uh right near the center of the picture. Jumping over the primary clarifiers, just minor odds and ends. This is a handrail that runs along the inside of Clarifier 402. Um clarifier 402 is one of the ones that's not going to have any rotating assembly on the inside. Uh it's just going to have uh be like a surge tank and uh operators may need to walk along the lawn around the perimeter of the tank periodically to clean it. And so this will make sure they have something to hold on to or uh tie on to. You see they have uh little eyebolts that they can use for tie offs if they need to. Some minor piping. That's the red piping going in that'll end up getting painted probably brown. Um in the clarifier is one of the functions. This is particularly for uh for scum. Duct bank. I mentioned uh in the intro uh going around the center structure, there's a lot of uh conduits going through there and eventually they get covered in concrete and coated red on the top. So, we know to uh you know, take our time and be careful. A lot of stone going in, a lot of earth moving in between these structures to bring it up to grade. So, here's a picture of uh back filling and uh regrading the soil uh around these structures. is the uh equipment pads that uh provide some of the supporting equipment. In this case, the odor control system has a tall concrete pad. U so that was placed this last month.

Here's an aerial from May 3rd. And if you look at the aerial from June 1st, you'll see that the center area between these four tanks is really starting to be brought up. final clarifier. The last one that we're re rehabilitating, we got uh similar to the primary clarifiers, we got a handrail all around the perimeter so uh operators can use that for access as they walk around the laundromat. Doing some wiring work and placing new stairs outside of that last clarifier. And so we should be uh pretty close to done with the clarifier work down at the south end. There's some odds and ends process piping. It's sort of hard for you to see here. just looks like a room of piping, but uh they did install some sections of pipe that were missing and now we are pretty much ready to go. It's just a matter of getting startup guys out there and getting the city staff trained. And this is just an aerial showing you how these things sort of relate to each other. Uh there are three final clarifiers here. They're all the domed structures at the south end of the site with u the nonpot vault on the bottom right hand corner of the screen. All right, update on cost. Terms of uh our total output, so to speak, for this project, engineering and construction combined, we're just over $40 million. So, as of uh the contractor's schedule compared to his contractual final completion date, he's 63%, but he's 90% in terms of cost. That just goes to show you how far along they are out there. Change orders, no change from last month. still writing $13,000 net ad for the project with no days requested. And so, uh, these slides are pretty much the same as the last time I spoke to you. There's no real change to what he's showing as his, uh, contractual end

dates for these in order to meet his schedule with original final completion of June of 2026. This is based on current prog progress. Uh I put the final clarifier sort of faded. I think we we've met that milestone. So we're generally a year ahead for that. But that was that was not a crit critical path item. So it doesn't really um move the dial, but all the rest of these I think you'll see uh start to get knocked down in the next two months. So last month we talked a little bit about what prompted the upgrade. So I just wanted to reiterate that to you guys. Scott was up here talking about uh what drove it. Um the reasons that we outlined in the facility plan back in 2008 are still the reasons that we're pursuing it today, which is the replacement of aging equipment, regulatory drivers such as lower effluent limits on the water that enters the Fox River and capacity concerns. Yes, a lot of the equipment was at the end of its useful life. There were w water quality requirements uh for the Fox River for our discharge into the Fox River and uh those nutrient limits for uh phosphorus in particular was the driver for phase 1. Um the ultimate need is still to expand from 4.2 mgd which is million gallons per day to 4.9. Just to give you some perspective over the last 5 years the average flow into the plant was about 3.9 MGD. So we're at 93% capacity. So we there is still that driver um for us to expand uh with the next project phase 2B. There were several alternatives considered. The three that made the facility plan back in 2008 was a new consolidated and expanded plant in the southwest that would handle 9 MGD. There was a concept to split flow and send some to a new southwest plant and maintain the downtown plant at 4.2. But the plan that was selected was to expand the downtown plant to 4.9 and send some of the other flows that were

being considered to be added to uh the Bavia collection system elsewhere. The phase expansion, well, this is some just some reviews for some of your neighbors to the north and south. Uh everybody's sort of being affected by uh these tighter nutrient limits. Um, all major dischargers, which is everybody that discharges more than 1 million gallons a day uh per on their permit in the Fox Valley have to meet the 0.5 milligram per liter effluent total phosphorus by 2030. Our phased approach has allowed uh the treatment plant to maintain their operations within a restricted site through all of the phases, including the one we're doing now and the one to come next. Um, we've replaced and upgraded our solids handling capabilities. We've replaced the headworks and the primary clarifiers. Almost there. Um, we've improved the hydraulic profile throughout the site to remove our reliance on an intermediate pump station. And we created the space required that we needed to expand and upgrade the biological process and add tertiary treatment which is going to be needed and included in the next phase. So, let's talk about that next phase. Um, I mentioned we're expanding from 4.2 2 to 4.9 MGD. The upgraded biological process is going to include new larger aeration basins in the middle of the site and reusing some of the existing infrastructure that was built in the late '90s. We're going to be constructing tertiary treatment facilities to make it much easier to maintain a effluent limit down at the levels that you're going to be at in 2030. Um, and we'll be able to denitrify. So, it's not just phosphorus that we're removing as part of this process. It's also total nitrogen. Um, a review of how we got here because I've I've heard this question a lot like it feels like we're always doing projects at the wastewater plant and they all take a lot of time. I mentioned that we did a facility plan initially in 2008.

Phase one wasn't completed until 2019. Um, the objectives of that project as a review. the main building at the north end of the plant that holds a lot of the administrative laboratory, garage, and uh solids handling functions of the plant. We're replacing equipment and buildings from uh a project that ended around 1990. Chemical phosphorus removal. The driver for that was the effluent limit. Um it was an inter an interim solution of 1.0. Um and I and I mention again I'll I'll keep mentioning uh we have to hit 0.5 by 2030 and then the digesttor operations building again rehabilitation of uh improvements made back in the late ' 80s early '90s phase 2A which I'm anticipating we're going to be done with that this year um some of the improvements are review of that project water street we did a lot of infrastructure replacement along water street so failing and failed sewer and utilities in that area found a lot of issues that we didn't even know that we had. Um, for example, a 48 in pipe entering the plant was half filled with debris, so it was throttled pretty badly. Um, we were able to clear all that out uh with our uh scope in Headworks. We were placing equipment and uh a building that was constructed in the '7s. Same with the primary and excess flow clarifiers um and the pump stations that service the primary clarifiers and the excess flow clarifiers. Those were all from the 70s. The equipment had been upgraded since then, but the structures themselves were pretty old. The final clarifiers and UV disinfection again 1990s um clarifiers and the UV technology that was no longer supported by the manufacturer. So phase 2B, the next phase, what's what are the objectives? We need to meet the lower total phosphorus limit. So, a biological nutrient removal process will capture the phosphorus in the solids, make it easier to settle it out in the

final clarifiers, but it won't be as reliable as we need in order to continuously meet our.5 mg per liter limit. So, we're also expanding capacity from 4.2 to 4.9. So, we're doing more and we're adding more tankage. the operations building that's tied onto the back end of the aeration basins that's going to provide air to the aerration basins. It's going to provide uh waste activated sludge handling which is just sort of how a treatment plant maintains uh its temperature so to speak and maintains operations to continue to remove BOD and uh total suspended solids. And we're going to be providing uh chemical handling and feed systems in this building as well. the tertiary treatment building. The objective is uh we've bound the phosphorus in the solids. The tertiary filters will literally pull more solids out of the flow. So, we've captured in the solids, but sometimes solids go over the weir and into the Fox River. This will help us pull more of the solids out of the flow and uh lower our effluent concentration to much more acceptable levels on a much more consistent basis. We're also providing the same treatment for excess flow and uh UV disinfection for all flow to remove our reliance on uh sodium hypocchlorite. So that is phase 2b just a visual pretty simple one of where these structures are going. New biological process basins will be right in the middle of the page. the tanks to the left of it, the rectangular tank uh tanks are going to be uh improved to provide uh phosphorus and nitrogen removal as well. And then the tertiary treatment on the right hand side, those tanks are from the 30s. Uh and that's where we'll be removing those and putting in a new building uh to upgrade the plant in 2B. So, in terms of schedule, where we're at and where we're going, um, right now we are in for planning approval with the EPA.

I'm anticipating to get planning approval this year. Uh, there will be a, uh, a hefty design with this next project that hopefully will start this year, bidding in 2027, and construction from 2028 to 2032. So, this process does take a long time. Um, especially if you're looking at phase three because there is a phase three. Uh, it's way in the future, but just wanted to review that for you. For anybody who hasn't read my 2-in thick manual of these projects, we're expanding the anorobic digesttors and bioolid storage. We're providing storage offsite for the beneficial reuse of bioolids. It's been in the plan for a long time. The city currently hauls off their bioolids to a landfill. Um so this would remove that uh facet of how the city handles their bioolids but there's not a driver for that right now. Uh the equipment installation rehabilitation replacement since these projects have taken so long by the time we get to the end some of the stuff that we installed in the first phase may start to show its age. Normal service life is between 15 and 25 years depending on what it is. So if it takes 15 years to get around to it again then we're going to have to get around to it again. In terms of excess flow clarifiers, we didn't put them in in this phase. Phase three is when I see that becoming a need. So, we have that in the budget to install the rotating assemblies. Then, dewatering equipment replacement and expansion. This is the equip equipment they in we installed in phase one. So, the center fuses can show their wear pretty quickly, faster than some other pieces of equipment. And then there's potential regulatory requirements. These are the unknowns. This has always sort of been out there because we don't know when rules or laws are going to be promulgated. So for example, POS, microplastics, heavy metals, chlorides, and total nitrogen. So we're unsure about what the limits are going to be and when they're going

to be, but we do reserve that potential for phase 3 to add to the scope. So that is your update for the treatment plan. And if there are any questions, please feel free to ask on the Oh, go ahead, Jim. You know what? Just given the level of investment that we've put here in the length of time, um I know most people don't know this is going on. Um are we ever going to do like an open house or anything for people just between phases so they can see where all their money's going? It's a great idea. Yeah. Um I'm not sure who would be driving that train, but I'd be happy to help.

No, I think it's I think it's a great effort. Um and um I I know I hate to say it like this, but uh the first thing you noticed or at least as a long-term resident was the lack of odor downtown since this project's been going on. And I know it'd be great if people could actually see the new infrastructure that's in place. Um especially because we've done things like moving the food pantry too as a result of this project. There's been a lot going on that people may not be may not understand is related to this. So open house be nice. Got it. Yeah. Thank you. Thanks, Jerry. Um the the regulatory stuff is that going to be more from the state or from the federal government. Do you think that EPA which which one's going to be?

It depends on it depends on what it is. Uh some of it is federally driven. Some of it is state controlled. Um I didn't have up there. Excess flow blending. That's something that the feds want to push but Illinois has been adamant against. Um POS is sort of a a wave that's coming across before the science gets there. So, I'm hoping that that is delayed a little bit longer until we fully understand what it is and how to properly handle it and get rid of it.

Then the other thing I was going to say is make sure you have the same crew working on the next phase is this one cuz I've been here for a lot of big projects, even some small ones that pale in comparison when you show the numbers of what's been outside of the budget. I mean, it's just that is that just doesn't happen. So, give you guys a lot of credit for running the crew the way you have down there and the fact that everything is coming out ahead of time. I think really shows that that you've got it planned out perfectly and executed very well.

Thank you. picking up on what Alderman Wolf just said, uh, I know of several mayors and city councils in the area who have already asked me when you get this done to a displayable position, they would like to come and tour it because there are other towns watching this with great interest and admiration for what you're doing here. So, we're kind of setting the stage, I think, for, you know, other people to want to try to emulate Betavia. Now that's you know want you want to build something that looks like your sewer plant. I don't know there's a lot of people would kind of shine when that idea got said but I think there's something to be said. Uh I've had several people from the city of Aurora talk to me over the years about how they appreciate what we are doing here and what we are going to do here because as you know they now withdraw most of their drinking water from the Fox River and that this is one of the main discharge points north of where they withdraw the water that uh is coming to them. And so they're very appreciative because they think this is really going to help them in trying to meet the standards that they're trying to attain down there now. And I know they've invested a lot of money in that plant which is down at Route 25 and I think Indian Trail down there. But they've they've got a ways to go but they're very appreciative of what we are doing here. So I get a lot of compliments from people not in Betavia but from outside who are having their own set of issues and they think the Bavia is going to be a contributing factor in allowing them to overcome some of the the issues that they are now faced with. So I feel good about it and we certainly have been able to capture some federal and state money on this thing to help help move it along. So I think it's all coming together very good. So, appreciate all the good efforts that Troder's having. Are you planning to come to the Fourth of July fireworks with your family?

Uh, you bet. Yeah. Okay. Well, let me know when you get there and I'll get you a nice seat. I say that because these folks are big supporters of the Pavia Fireworks program and I want to keep them happy in that regard. But uh they uh they really do do a nice job and they want to be part of the community and be part of the community and live here and everything else. So we got all the right moments and happenings occurring with Troder. So I'm appreciate all the good efforts that are going on. Anybody else? Well, thank you. Look forward to hearing from you again. Yeah. See you next month.

Okay. Uh moving then to where am I at here? Uh nine. Yeah. Matters from the public presentations by the water and proclamation on the Betavia depot museum anniversary. Your

honor. A proclamation. Whereas the Betavia Depot Museum was established in 1975 through the dedication of communica community members committed to preserving and celebrating the rich history of Bavia, Illinois. And whereas the museum is located in the original 1854 Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad Depot, an architectural and historical treasure that has stood as a symbol of Betavia's role in the development of transportation and industry in the region. And whereas for 50 years, the Battavia Depot Museum has served as a vibrant center for historical education, preservation, and community engagement, inspiring generations of residents and visitors alike. And whereas the museum has consistently offered exhibits, events, educational programs, and archives that showcase the people, stories, and spirit that define the Battavia community. And whereas the Battavia Park District has promoted the museum's mission, provided professional oversight, and ensured ongoing public investment in the museum. And whereas the city of Battavia recognizes and celebrates the invaluable contributions of the Battavia Historical Society, volunteers, staff, and supporters whose passion and commitment have sustained the mission, the museum's mission for five decades. Now therefore, I, Jeffrey D. Sheli, mayor of the city of Bavia, do hereby proclaim June 16th, 2025 as Battavia Depot Museum 50th anniversary day in the city of Battavia and encourage all citizens to join in commemorating this milestone, honoring our shared heritage and supporting the continued success of the Battavia Depot Museum for generations to come. Your honor, I move we approve the proclamation as read.

Second. Motion second and approved. Court roll. I Malay I. Malone I. Wolf. Hi Sulfa. Hi Baron. Hi Lman. Hi Peeper. Hi Farenbach. Hi Anderson. Hi Foginger. Hi Barza. Hi Lansancy. Hi. 13. Yes. No. No. One absent. Motion's approved. Well, I'm very honored tonight. We have most of the major participants in this in this room. And we have Mr. Hoffford, the president of the historical society. And we have the executive director of the Battavia Park District. And we have the curator of the depot museum. And who am I forgetting here?

The guy standing at the podium that probably donated half the stuff to the museum.

Oh, would you want to have all you three or four come up and we'll take some kind somebody going to take a picture? Yeah. Good evening, mayor and members of city council. On behalf of the Betavia Park board, staff, volunteers,

I just remember

and friends and all the local champions of the depot museum like to thank you. This is truly appreciated. and a tremendous honor. And um it's hard to believe it was 50 years ago that a group of passionate residents turned a retired train depot into a precious small museum. And you know, fast forward 50 years later, uh it houses the rich history of the Betavia and um is truly special and meaningful to so many. And it's truly an honor again uh to be here tonight to accept this proclamation. You're keeping the legacy alive and uh we're looking forward to having all of you at the 50th anniversary this Saturday and we're going to be celebrating from uh 10 till noon. So please mark your calendars. We'd love to see you there. Thank you.

Thank you. Uh I just want to invite all the members of the city council to come on Saturday to the program. It starts at 10:00 in the morning and goes to about noon, you think? Mhm.

And you're going to have a of all those involved in making this what a great place it is are going to be there. And we're also are going to be visited by Pat Verbar who was the first curator of the museum. And she's flying back from flying up here from Florida to be here to be part of this cuz she was the one that met with all the folks that I think back I was a newspaper reporter when this was all going on. when I was in college and almost everybody that was involved are not with us anymore. They're all passed and uh I'm one of the Well, you weren't Were you here? You weren't quite here yet, were you? I watched you over the bridge. Yeah.

Okay. You were just just starting out.

Okay. So anyway, we uh we very very are fortunate to have all these folks come back together that are still around and we have some great memories of those who put this all together to begin with. And this whole thing started with a donation of Beta a couple Betavia residents said they wanted to have people give some money and to move the depot museum. It was up at Van Beern and Webster by back of Berkeley's restaurant or grocery store and they had a have a ceremony and we put it on a moving truck and brought it down and put it where it is and so and then there was a lot of work to do to get that PL building was in rough shape and getting that into the shape it is I think speaks well to everybody that was involved and now under the good leadership we have at the Betavia Park District and at the historical society we've gotten more money invested and put into it and we've gotten professional staffs in here now to kind of run it. So, I I want to just thank the Battavia Park District publicly for all your good efforts to really make this thing swing and shine is something that Battavia can be very proud of. And when many of the old-timers, if there are many of them left that come back and see it, if they stop by to see me, they give very high compliments to what the Betavia Park District and historical society have done there. So,

well, we couldn't do it without the historical society, that's for sure. Well, a great partnership of working together. So, it speaks well to what Betavia is really all about and what makes us kind of a unique place amongst all the rest of the communities out here. So, thank you for helping Betavia achieve this very notable moment. Thank you. It's our pleasure.

Now, on the agenda, we have Betavia Main Street. Hi, Okay, while I'm setting this up, I just want to say uh Main Street works with uh the DP Museum all the time, and we're so thankful uh to work with uh Kate and Jessica. They make uh everything so easy when we work with them. So, thank you. All right, so thank you. Um I'm going to present Okay. So, just to start off with, we have Cocktails in the Park coming up. That is our main fundraiser for the year. It's on uh July 26th this year. And this year, we've added something new. We're doing a VIP raffle experience. And for each $25 donation that we get, you'll get a raffle to um get this VIP experience. and you'll be able to skip the line uh for you and five of your friends. A reserved picnic table front and center with real linens and a floral centerpiece to take home. Six drink tickets and the drink tickets and the raffle tickets are interchangeable so you can decide what you want to do with it. Um we'll bring you an appetizer tray with all the oper offerings from each restaurant. Our our photographer will take professional photos of your group um which you'll get digital copies of and then you get a little Betavia swag. some of our t-shirts and hype team stuff. So, hope to see you guys all down there. Um, next, um, just some things that we're doing. The farmers market was named, um, by Cane County Chronicle, was voted by the the readers the best farmers market in the in Can County. Um, we're really happy about that. Um, we were ranked in the top 15 shot Chicago land by the Chicago Sun Times. And then um uh Susie

Ray, who is our um community uh promotions coordinator, created this reel that you guys just saw. It was Main Street's highest uh viewed self-created reel ever. Um and you can see the numbers there. We're so happy about it. Um I think the market makes it really easy, but the drone footage and and all of that together uh really shows how magical the market is. Um we received the visitation report from Illinois Main Street. That's part of the um data that they share with us. This is from Placer AI. And if you can see, we had uh the number of visits to Betavia was almost 2.5 million um with uh almost 450,000 visitors. Um and each one of those that is unique visitors. It doesn't matter how many times they come. That's just then within the year they had to spend at least 10 minutes in downtown to be counted in that. Um and then you can see our visitor ratio of visitors to Betavia residents is nice and high and people are staying about an hour. Um so we were happy with those numbers. Um and another thing I'll note is the annual visits um since 2017. um it has increased every year and it's finally surpassed the precoid numbers. So, you know, it's good good to see people are still coming downtown and we're still seeing good traffic there. Um I have a full report if you anybody wants to see it. I don't want to bore you with going through all the numbers and what Oh, yes. Yeah. You want you want Oh, you want the report? Okay. Not to go through the whole thing now. Um, and then other downtown promotions that we're working on. Um, we're just trying to take advantage of that farmers market traffic and, um, we have that new, uh, chalkboard that we're asking

questions, just trying to get some engagement. Um, and then we are using those little, um, chalkboards in the market just to remind people of the great things that we have downtown. So, it's just another way to just kind of um, get people to move around downtown. And then we just had an article printed in the uh Daily Herald visitors guide which was a nice little write up. And then we had another spot on uh Chicago on television. We were on CBS News on Friday with Father's Day gifts um which you know is exciting I guess. Um uh so in those segments we were able to promote six businesses. Um, and then we also had another social media um, influencer came out last come out last month and that highlighted six businesses as well. So, we're just trying to make sure to cover as many businesses as possible when we do these promotions. Um, and then finally, uh, Tabletop Game Shop is a boardwalk shop this year. Um, they have been really impressed with Betavia and just how welcoming we have been to them. and they they have two other locations in Tenley Park and as we go, but they've really liked Betavia and they've already opened another brickandmortar shop. So, they're over by um Berkeley's. So, they opened uh the beginning of the month. They are a board game shop with uh card games as well, plushies and collectible cards. So, that's all I have today. Does anybody have any questions?

Yeah. Hey, um, you know, after spending all that time at the farmers market this weekend, that that's that's a great place for surveys, surveys, like asking people what they would like to see in Battavia and all that stuff, including like housing options, stuff like that. You you want to see us doing surveys? Is that what you said? Be a great place to. I don't know if that you or us, but Well, um, I mean, if you guys want to come down, you're more than welcome. Uh sometimes we only want when we have volunteers doing it, we only want them to do fun stuff because they're volunteers and we don't want to make them scare them away so they'll never come back. Um but yeah, uh that's a great idea. Any other questions? Hi.

No question. Just a comment. Um, I met with an elder person this past Saturday from Lombard and they couldn't stop talking about Battavia Main Street and the boardwalk shops and farmers market. So, keep doing what you're doing. And she just loved talking about Betavia and said she wanted Lombard to be the same. So, just wanted to share that.

Well, thank you. I would just offer up that in the region they're talking about us very positively and I've already talked to the executive director here. The mayor of Fossmore has asked me if they can set a date sometime in the next few weeks where they're going to bring a team of business people from Fossmer out to Betavia on Saturday morning and walk the farmers market and meet with her and talk to everybody about what's going on here cuz they say they hear nothing but great stuff about it down there and they think that somebody down in the far south suburbs would maybe try to re recreate the idea down there. So yeah,

we they will be coming up here soon. I don't know exact date yet, but she's very actively trying to get it together. So yeah, sounds good. All right. Thank you. Thank you.

All right. Moving then to item number 11, which is ordinance 20 to 25-023 amending the city code related to related to electric and water meters. Who's got this one? Um, this was discussed at a hurricane meeting. Um, really the only thing this was done for and set up for was to be able to allow a resident to basically go backwards and not have a radio frequency um, meter installed in their house. they had problems with the RF or whatever their perception was on it, they wanted to change that and go back to an old manually read meter with just the dial on it to to be able to come up with the numbers for each month. Um, and then we had to set rates for that because that is a different thing than currently we just drive through the neighborhood and we can read them going down the middle of the street. So, it's pretty simple. Um, so we did change rates on what that would cost and the installation of the meter and the removal of the meter. So, that's basically what this does. Anybody have any questions? Not. I'll make the motion that we um approve ordinance 2025-20 uh 23 amending the city code related to electric and water meters.

Second motion and second. Any further discussion? Kirk, call the roll. Wolf. I. Sulfa. No. Baron. Hi. Leman, absent. Lman, hi Peeper. No Farenbach. No. Anderson. No. Boglesinger. Hi. Barazza. Hi. Lansancy. No. Beck. Hi. Sorry. I Hi. Thank you. Uh Malay. No. Malone. Hi. Uh seven yes. Six no. One absent. You don't have to vote. No,

I don't have to. Doesn't require doesn't doesn't require majority or just simple majority six. It's approved. I would have voted for it had I voted, just so you all know.

All right, motion's approved. Okay, moving to 12. Approval crossing guard at Union and Illinois Route 31 South Pavia Avenue. Who's got this one? Guess I'll take it. Um we discussed this quite at length I think um at our last cow meeting and you know basically it's a a choice. Um we've got a hight traffic intersection that has had issues in the past um still even with the road diet. There's some you know speed issues uh drivers not paying attention. There's a lot of things that feed into that intersection. And so, basically, it came down to when we talked about this at the cow meeting was whether we wanted to have the city pay for uh crossing guard again at that intersection or whether we wanted, you know, the public to step up and really learn how to use the equipment that we have out there in the way it's supposed to on to me a much simplified uh route. um having just two lanes of traffic to cross where inherently the four-lane crossing led to the problem of possibly, you know, including a a a pedestrian walking across that street. If the third lane was stopped and it was a van or a truck, you couldn't see the outside lane. And the outside lane, if they didn't stop, presented a huge problem. So that was where we were at when it was a four-lane road. It's now two lane with the, you know, the two-way turn lane in the middle. Um, I've kind of not decided where I'm going on this after a week of thinking about it and going out and watching the intersection, looking at it, talking to people that use it regularly. So, I'm not still not sure I'll say that. Jen,

um, one thing I'd like to add is, um, very early on, and this was part of the strategic plan, not only for the bike commission or the active transportation, um, was the purchase of pedestrian, bicycle, traffic device for us to be able to to count that information, grab that data. Um, I would like to get more data in order for me to really make a vote on this to see if there is a need for that. um that is one of the best practices that um you put in play when you're um working with something like this with a hightraic area. Um I think that it's something that we've invested in. We didn't have it last year. We had different things going on and I think that it's worth taking a pause and gathering some of that information to really see um how many people are really crossing that area. um everybody can sit there and say that they see this or you know things are going faster but until we actually have that hard data I think that that is something that is important for us to make decisions on. We talk about making decisions based on data all the time. Um so here's an opportunity with something that we've purchased for this intent for us to take that next step.

Thanks Alice. Um I just wanted to comment on that plan. Um I was looking at that plan as well and according to that plan under the existing conditions on page 23 um residents had responded to a survey and they identified the routes that they frequently use for walking and biking and routes that need improvement. And the route that was listed at the top with the most votes was route 31. Um, so just reminding everyone because we've all looked at the plan and in addition the plan lists that the top five factors that influence a decision to walk somewhere based on the survey respondents. 66% of the servants respondents said the ease of crossing at intersections is one of the top five factors. So that means something. The community has spoken about this before and of the top six factors that influence biking in Betavia, 59% of the respondents indicated that the ease of crossing at intersections was um important. So just reminders for everybody as we're thinking about our vote and under recommendations for this plan, we have priorities that we have as considerations, right? And I believe that adding a crossing guard during the summer weeks would check all of the boxes under our prior prioritization considerations. Big words. Um, priority one, the projects that provide access to key destinations. The quarry is a key destination. Priority two, projects that provide access to underserved populations such as those people living under the poverty line that can't afford vehicles. older adults, our youth, and households with fewer or no automobiles. Priority three, projects that were prioritized by the

community in surveys, maps, and focus group conversations. And the fourth one, projects and areas with bicycle and pedestrian injuries from crashes. As Leah mentioned in the last week's meeting, we don't like to think about it, but we do we did have tragedies in recent memory. Um, and honestly it makes me a little emotional um because I can relate as a mother um and as um as having a middle schooler who is in baseball and I know several of you have children that play baseball. Um and that really hits close to home because it's a fact that's reality that has happened. We want to prevent it. We want to be um forward focused. The last priority is projects that are feasible within the next 10 years based on cost. The cost that we're talking about is not a big cost. 15,000 was last year. I acknowledge that perhaps the cost will go up with inflation and costs going up in the economy. However, that's a small price to pay for saving a life. We just spent $350,000 in public safety for our surveillance cameras, plus annually 80, $90,000 that we're going to continue paying for public safety for cameras. You guys thought that was important. I think this is important. Um, last week some individuals mentioned that the middle lane uh was a safe place to to wait for traffic. The middle lane is technically not a pedestrian refuge island. It's a turning lane as mentioned by older person Wolf. So that should not

be viewed as a safe place for pedestrians to wait. This is a temporary solution in my opinion um for the summer weeks when we know that pedestrian and bicycle traffic is high and it's a nominal cost until we're able to put into place something more permanent as we continue to talk about and have more conversations. Uh the hawk system has been mentioned um and we are able to have more permanent engineering that will you know happen in years to come. Rahhat said two years um at the minimum. And some of you mentioned those um social media campaign on Facebook which uh I also love those videos. Um six out of those 11 videos that have been posted mention the quarry. Two two others of them indicate downtown Bavia. So that's eight out of the 11 middle schoolers that travel on bike or foot to places in our downtown Bavia with friends. Our message is slow down Bavia. Keep our kids safe. In each of those videos, that's what they say. Let's do that. I realize that some of you who voted no last week are in different wards. Most of them are east of the river. So, I acknowledge that perhaps your lived experience is not the same as those that are on the west side of the river, but I just wanted to remind you all and ask you all to listen to those of us who have lived experience um crossing 31 and um acknowledge that it is dangerous. Those of us who use it do not feel safe. uh in this work I think it's important that we acknowledge those voices that affect their affected voices that come to the table. Those 36

emails that we received as of 7:00 today. Um those people we should be listening to our residents, right? Those people that live in this town and cross the street, especially when we have money that's earmarked in the budget for it. Max mentioned last week we have $25,000 earmarked for transportation safety and he planned or and I don't know about him planning it but the city planned on uh using it for education. I agree education's important. I would like it to be combined engineering and education if we're able to do it and we are because we have the money. 100% of the voices I heard support a crossing guard there. We have on record, like I mentioned, those 36 emails. None of them that I know of have supported the no vote. So, we have the money, we have the voices. This is a no-brainer to me. I did not take this job for the ego. I took this job for the hard decisions that we need to make in order to make our sound our town safer um and our community better. Uh we don't stop improving as a city. This is ongoing. So we must continue to strive for a safe Bavia. We all took the same oath of office to try to do our duties to the best of our ability. So let's make sure we keep that at the forefront as we do this vote and we serve the public and our community.

Yeah. Um you know thank those words. Um this is one of those situations where you know we don't have to look too far for somebody who's lived around 31 for 20 years. That person's me. Um, I have lived a block from 31, both down on Blaine Street and up towards Wanzi Trail. I've seen, you know, at least two accidents a month on on 31. Um, the road diet has definitely helped and I can tell you that point blank cuz number one, I don't hear as many accidents happening at Fabian and 31. I mean, I literally hear them when they happen. Um, so we're making a a lot of great progress that we that we should acknowledge. I mean, we've done a great job with 31 so far, but we're not done with the journey, right? Um, we do need some structural changes, right? And, you know, whether it be some sort of traffic control device to to, you know, to shut those to stop those vehicles as they're speeding. Um, you know, and to be honest, to to be fair, and I think I've said it a couple times, I'll say it one more time. You know, I did my my wife was nearly killed on an accident on 31. Uh, it was 6 weeks before our wedding. Uh, we were happy she didn't have to use a walker to to go down the aisle. And it was quite frankly near where this crossing happened. Um it was somebody was going 60 miles an hour down 31. My wife was making a left very cautiously. She couldn't see the car and and she got nailed. So so we know 31 has traffic issues both personally and just hearing from the public. Um we have this money budgeted. Um so so we're not going to take away from anything. And you know next year we should work out this cost with the park district. I agree 100%. you know, perhaps the park district should be paying for this, not us, because quite frankly, they're bringing the children across 31 like that, right? And we are just talking about one intersection, not every intersection. If we really want to solve this for good and make sure we no longer need these um these crossing guards, it's really about getting that structural solution in place. So, I I hope when the next discussion happens, it's more about a timeline on on when we can make that

happen. So, thank you Sera beat me. So, I've lived on I lived on Route 31 for decades, right down by the Goland's house. I The Corey was my babysitter during the day cuz both my parents worked. I literally would walk through the Galand's driveway across the street, walk through the cemetery to get to the Corey. I'm still sitting here today cuz I could look both ways. Literally, I understand people's concerns, but that's we we put the road diet in place to try to alleviate those concerns and for the people who were on who not on council last year, this crossing guard situation was a temporary stop gap while the road diet was being put in place. If there truly are still concerns because you don't feel that it's safe at that particular intersection, literally two blocks to the north is a traffic signal. There's your structural engineering. I mean, you go to Main Street and you can cross the street up there. There's a stoplight two blocks to the north. Also, when you're looking at these types of things, you're going to start having then people say, "I want a crossing guard here. I want a crossing guard there." that's going to just be I mean it seems a bit um like you're picking and choosing here for a small amount of people that would utilize this particular intersection as opposed to other intersections that may be just as utilized or more utilized where people feel less safe than they state that they feel here where there's actually a road diet. So, I mean, I just don't see the need for a crossing guard. And again, I would also point out that last year the crossing guard was not exactly top-notch. And the other thing I would agree with is Alderman Baron saying, "Do we even have any data as to how often this crossing guard was utilized? How often this intersection was utilized to justify the cost?" So, again, I believe

the road diet has been very effective. I would like to know if the chief has any information about these alleged crashes that happen twice a month on Route 31 because I'm not really aware of that. I don't see that all that often. So maybe he can put some input on that. And um since the road dies been put in place, I'm not aware of any injuries of anybody crossing the street anywhere on Route 31 that's been reported. Maybe the chief can update us on that. So, I just think that I don't think that the crossing guard is needed here at this particular intersection for the cost unless we actually had some hard data showing, you know, why we need it here other than the unsilent minority. Everybody, I mean, anybody who's been on council long enough would also know that you can get 50 people to send an email, no problem. and it's the the majority who are not sending an email who um you know probably have a different view on the whole situation. But so I just wonder if there's any data about these alleged multiple crashes on Route 31 every month since the road diet has been put in place.

So we have still had some crashes on Route 31. I do not have the data in front of me um with regards to um you know how many more crashes or fewer crashes there are. Um my perception is that there are uh definitely fewer crashes, but I will pull the data. I don't want to uh guess at that. I will pull the data and I can get that for the council in the very near future. Thank you. Sarah,

um I want to respond real quick. No one did ask for a crossing guard at another intersection. We had this last year and we did not hear from anybody asking for anything any crossing guard anywhere else. Um we have heard from people via email. We have heard from other residents um saying how important this is. I am very empathetic. I live west of both 31 and Randall and I have driven my son his um he has friends that live near Routollo. I will drive him and his bike there so he doesn't have to cross both of those busy streets because I'm very afraid of that. Um I've almost been hit on my bicycle when I was pulling a burly trailer on 31. Um a friend of mine, her father was killed on Randall and Key. So, I have a healthy fear of those intersections. So, instead of having him ride, I will drive him to the east side and he'll drive to the Cory and I'll go to the Cory and pick him and his bike up. Um, so I understand the concerns that people have and I feel like we could collect data cuz I love data and I think that is a very good idea and I think we should have that. But I think we could collect data concurrently with having the crossing guard and see both how often it's used, if it's needed. Um, I feel like it's such a short window of time that if we stopped to collect data, we would probably miss the time. People are very concerned. We have the money budgeted. Um, maybe if we collect data and have the crossing guard this year, we can find out that no, we didn't need it at all or they were sleeping all the time. I don't think that's what we who knows who knows what we would find. But I think data collection in the crossing guard would be my preference going forward so that we can either justify either way what it is but peace of mind that this brings I think is very valuable

or back. Yeah just a brief notes so to the chief's point having data. So just pulling up the annual report for the police if we look at 2022 which is the one I happen to pull up. looking at 23 accidents at uh um 31 in Fabian, just that one intersection. Okay. Um that doesn't include the rest of 31. Um and if we look at 2024, as mentioned, road diet has made things better. Right. So for 2024, we had 15 accidents at at 31 in Fabian. Again, not having the information for the rest of 31. So So twice twice a month is about right. Go ahead.

DJ. Yeah. Um yeah. Um as I uh mentioned uh last week, uh the whole reason we had a crossing guard was because the road diet was taking so long. That that was the reason and it was a stop gap measure to get us until we had a the road diet in place. Uh if we approve this now, aren't we saying what what's next year? What's going to be different about next year in the following year? Are we going to have a crossing guard in perpetuity there? That's not what the the when we decided to do that road uh diet um was about okay when we need to buy some time or have that crossing guard until we can get to that uh in terms of accidents and Fabian at Fabian and 31. Uh that's far from the where we're talking about that has that's that's irrelevant data. we're talking about a a union crossing there um where there is now a um road diet and so I think that's uh that was what the plan was and I think we should stick with what the plan was

um I just clicked through the past week or so of the um the media releases that we received from the police department and there's one or two crashes on 31 in every single one of those. So, a couple a day, not major ones, but there are incidents on those street on that street all the time. Um, not all of them were on Fabian. They were throughout the street. Um, I think $15,000 is a fair price to pay. Everything in the consent agenda we just talked about without I'm sorry, we didn't talk about a single item. All of them were double, if not triple that cost, and we approved that without batting an eye, without discussing a one word of any of those items. Um, if this is something we have to do every single year until we have a hawk system, until we have a an a refuge there for pedestrians to wait in the middle of the street, um, then so moved. I will approve this every day. If somebody else has another intersection that's getting highly used by pedestrians that they feel is unsafe, they want to bring to us so that we can discuss a crossing guard there, bring it. Let's make every street as pedestrian friendly as possible. I agree. I would love to have data. I would like to have pre and post intervention data, however, and I will not base future safety discussions on what is likely, like Sarah was just saying, suppressed demand because we have an environment that is not safe enough for people to comfortably use. So, we would base our decision on, well, nobody's using it, so why do we have to make an intervention? Well, nobody's using it because it's not feeling very safe or it's not actually safe. So, I won't base my decision on current usage when we know usage would improve if we were able to put measures into place.

Lansancy.

Yeah, I think uh I mean, everyone makes some great points. I think uh you know, I've had I've had a little change of heart here cuz you know um you know, I think Alderman Vold Votinger makes a great point. I don't think we have enough time, unfortunately, to just halt and collect data. Um, and with the money budgeted, with what it is, I I mean, I feel like there's no harm, no foul. Run them both congruent. That way, we now have data moving forward. We check the box with before and after as well. Um, a little bit before. Um, but I I I mean, I just think we're we're beating this thing to death and we need to um we need to do what's right here. And I I I think that's probably just I mean, Alderman Sula makes some great points, too. I mean, I I truly I empathize with some of those points. But at the end of the day, I don't I don't see the harm. When the money is budgeted, if it wasn't budgeted, it' be a little different story, but I think I still end up with the same conclusion. But I think we run them both congruent. We get the data. That way when this comes around again, um you know, it it is it's it's a pretty it's a little more black and white, a little less gray. So that's I'll be voting for it.

Fairb one one one last point. It's a minor point, but I think it's a big point. Um I think the park district should be paying for this whole thing. I mean it's all it's all tied to the quarry operations, right? I mean so it's a little silly. It's come to art table every season. Laura, uh the park district's position on it was not that they didn't want to share in the cost of it. It was that they were advised by the park district's attorney that the liability issues were uh too great and that they should not do that provide those kinds of services. What are liabilities?

Yeah. Um you know again great points. I think this is a good healthy discussion uh to have. Um a few thoughts that are crossing uh my mind here is first off we did hear from the community. We heard a lot from the community over the last couple days. I think once it kind of came to the four that we were considering this, it motivated folks and that's not nothing. Um I think uh some great points were brought up in those emails that I hadn't considered before. Uh and it does give our citizens peace of mind. Uh I want to be honest that u you know it's not entirely true that it's budgeted. It's just that we have money set aside and we're moving it away from education to intervention. though I do believe intervention is better than education in this instance. But let's be clear, we are going to be moving it from an education campaign to an intervention campaign. Um, you know, I I agree with uh Alderman Farenbach that, you know, the the park district should be a partner with us in the future. I understand that in the past we've gotten no. That doesn't mean in the future we will. Uh their board changes, our board changes. uh they are elected officials who can be uh persuaded and engaged by the public and just as I receive 32 emails they can receive 32 emails. Um I don't say that to anybody in particular uh who writes email you know who may have sent us emails but if you're listening at home you know you might write that down. Um to me again you know the the cost here isn't breaking the bank. Um it's not we we know where it's coming from. We've thought it through. Uh I'm aware of the tradeoff that we're making here. I hope all of you are aware of the trade-off. For me, the trade-off makes sense. It gives folks peace of mind, which also is something we need to recognize that feeling comfortable utilizing our streets and sidewalks has value in itself. Even if we don't save a life, if more people are using our sidewalks and streets, that's still a win, right? Plus, we might we might prevent injury. We might, you know, it's hard to prove a negative. It's hard to

say if we did or didn't like save a life, but um we know that that's dangerous. you know that people will feel more comfortable. So again, that feels worth the price tag here. Uh the last point I'll make here real quick is that if we do keep coming back year after year looking for a crossing guard there, well then we know we have a pretty serious problem. I think we know right now we have a serious problem that's going to require some more intervention. But if we continually are hearing from the community that we don't feel safe there, um we're one year into the road diet, so we don't know right now. Maybe next year people feel more comfortable. If they don't, we need to get really serious and really think about what then our next steps are. So, um, it it makes sense. Again, just real quick, from a budget standpoint, I know where it's coming from and what I'm giving up to get it. It'll make people use our infrastructure in our town and the quarry and all the things more effectively. Uh, and it might save a life. So, uh, I think for those reasons, we we all should be supporting this.

Um, just a couple of points. Um just to remind everybody where we've had um pedestrian and vehicle incidents have been at the corner of Kirk Road and Wilson Street. We have people that have been trying to cross there. They don't have a crossing guard. Um and it's probably a lot busier right now because there are kids that are probably going across the street for food. Um, one suggestion that maybe we could think into the future is maybe have a shuttle service because that would not only service those residents on the east side of Betavia that aren't as close to the quarry as some of the other residents that live in the closer neighborhoods. Um, but could also be as an option to some of those um, kids that are scared to cross 31 and maybe put the parents at peace of mind. Um, as a parent of somebody, I am a parent who has gone through what many of you have gone through. I still go through it with my own child. My child travels many miles on probably one of the most dangerous roads through Indiana to get to school. I understand the frightfulness. So, I don't take this lightly, but as you over time, as you get used to it and you see it, the anxiety does get better. So, it is scary at first, but we can't always hold back our children. We have to teach them the right things in order to do that. Um, I do still support um the need for um getting the data. We've always talked about that. Um, you know, I I would rather see that before I put in a vote. I do have one resident who did not write an email and is not in favor of this. Um, we were out talking and we almost got barreled down by a 16-year-old girl driving a jeep through the neighborhood. So, I don't think it's necessarily an

intersection. I think it comes down to the drivers and that's what we have to do is what can we do to get the drivers involved with and and aware of their surroundings. Right. I don't know. We don't have a motion yet. I I was about to make one. Everybody says what they want to say. And would you like to make a motion? I'll make a motion that uh we direct staff to uh hire a uh crossing guard for Union uh in Route 31. Second. Motion in a second. Sir, did you want to say something?

Yeah, I'm I'm afraid I may be a little late to come up here with the discussion, which has been fabulous, but my name is Regan B. I'm the uh chairperson for the active transportation advisory commission and we are very much in support of putting a uh crossing guard there again. Um you've all done a fabulous research and and took a lot of the words out of my mouth. So I'm kind of going to kind of ramble a little bit unfortunately I think today. But um in our support of having a crossing guard there I think it's important to realize some of the points that a lot of you folks did bring up tonight. One is um that the road diet while being effective is still very much a state highway. Um, and that that left turn lane is not a pedestrian median. That's an active left turn lane at that intersection that, you know, some folks may still get confused when trying to, you know, navigate that area while that light's flashing. Those flashing lights, too, that are used there, um, in all reality, they're really a false sense of security for some pedestrians. Um, folks see those lights and when you see a yellow light, sometimes at a stoplight, sometimes you get that impression you're going to speed up. I think we've all been there. And some folks will still see that with that blinking light. Let's beat the pedestrian that's trying to cross the street. And a lot of folks aren't educated enough on those lights. They think once the lights been pushed or the buttons been pushed and the lights on, I'm free to go. They're done watching. So having a crossing guard there gives that extra piece of security that I think is very important. Um we mentioned the uh the the pedestrian counters. Um this is the exact scenario what we want those pedestrian counters for. We we have them over at Kirk Road right now um for just this reason. because of pedestrian interaction with vehicles. So, I would encourage us to get this data while we're using the crossing guard and it's something that we can that's data that we can use then next year too to see, you know, do we need to make changes? Do we need more infrastructure to direct folks to Main Street where there is a controlled intersection? I mean that that's a that's a possibility, but I think in the meantime, we need to to step up to the plate and continue to be the example

that Betavia is for pedestrian and active transportation and continue to have a crossing guard there at least for this summer and then reevaluate again with some data. So, thank you. Nancy,

real quick, I meant to mention, is there any way cuz I know I think it was you, Laura, that mentioned that obviously we had some lackluster uh bid winners or employees of that bid winner or however we hired these folks. Is there any metrics we can hold these people to? Anything we can do to like clause in the contract? Like I don't know. I'm trying to think. every clause in the contract, it's any individual employee who decides that day that they're not going to perform that every time we um contacted them about an issue. I I have to say they did address the issues then. So, and it just turns out that the company that we're using, there aren't very many companies that supply these services over the summer. It's primarily they uh their work is done during the school year, right? Crossing the school children. And so we may end up with the same service provider that we had last year. We'll just have to step up our supervision and and make sure that we uh hold them to the promises they make in their contract.

Yeah. I mean, I by no means want to burn a bunch of staff time on somebody having to go up there and, you know, watch these people. It totally defeats the purpose. But, you know, keep your eye out, everybody, right? We don't need them sitting in their cars or up in someone's yard in the shade of a tree, right? You know, the job is to be there on the corner. Get an umbrella. If if you're waiting hours for someone to show up, that's the job. Right. Right. Okay. Thank you. You want to Could you do speak in a very briefly, please?

Sure. Sure. My name is Danielle Sligger. I'm a third ward resident. Um I have two children. One's a middle school, one's an elementary. Um I definitely would say I'm involved in the community. I'm a school board member as well as leadership with BCDI, very involved in the school community. I'm not here on that that part of it, but just to let you know, I mean, we've had I've had a lot of community discussions. Um, I really appreciate the time y'all are taking to have this conversation. Sitting on the school board, I understand there's there's a lot of pros, cons weighed. I would just urge you um to really appreciate what safety brings to this community. We ask our community be an active community to be part of community together and to wage that on hopefully some education is good enough by now. I'm I'm really a little disappointed in some of your comments. You know, back in your day, Mr. Sula, of crossing, we're dealing with a lot different of operation of vehicles. There's a lot of distracted drivers. I think we all can really agree on that part. And so leaving that to children to be able to navigate a median and putting that on their hands is not fair to wait for data is wonderful. Um but what does that do for the now and what does that do for the need? Could you maybe not individualize us out please?

Sure. Sure. I didn't know that was I'm sorry. Um you can always go two blocks up to a stop point. Excuse me.

You can always go two blocks up to a stop. I know, but there's we encourage our children who are middle school age because I think you can enter the Corey without supervision at 13. So, we're relying on 13-year-olds with the 13-year-old developed brain to make those types of decisions. We know they're excited to go no matter what parents indicate. We are community and we're here for our children. And I don't understand why we would not want to employ with a small amount of money someone who could potentially help reduce a cause of injury or even worse than that. Um with the understanding that there should be great conversation that you guys are having but that would lead to more permanent solution. It doesn't sound to me that I understand that the road diet that the last year's crossing guard was just until the road diet was done but this is still brand new to a lot of Bavia. This is the first summer that people are crossing that road and I don't think there's been enough education, enough awareness, enough anything in order to really understand what this brings. What I do hear is that a lot of parents are sending their kids to cross at that intersection and it's scary whether they're crossing at Wilson, they're crossing at Maine, we have a duty to protect and to just kind of, you know, just make sure everyone is safe. And so I just I appreciate again it's hard decisions um but I think we need something now and something that would just and kind of bring that sense of safety while you guys do have a more in-depth discussion on what a more permanent solution is. That's all my ask is. Thank you.

Can you keep it short, please? Absolut absolutely.

Uh my name is Jared Swisiki. I'm in the fourth ward. This doesn't impact me at all. Um, we almost bought a house over there that would have been close to the quarry. It didn't take me much to say, "Boy, what would that have been like to try and cross that street?" Um, or, you know, I mean, I think anybody who even thinks crossing a busy street like that is easy, you know. I mean, I think of my wife who stays home with our kids and her potentially carrying bags with two kids and trying to coordinate getting across that road um on their own. You know, anybody who thinks that's easy probably hasn't had to carry bags and try to navigate two young kids. You know, we're not even just talking about kids on their own going. We're talking about parents trying to coordinate that um in conjunction with getting across safely. So, for me, doesn't impact me. I'm totally for us spending the money to keep uh citizens of Betavia safe. And you might not know if you saved anybody, but you'll definitely know if someone dies. So that's another thing to keep in mind that if someone dies, this is going to be a vote that that comes back up. And I'm a I I work in data. Data is great, but when you have to make a decision today, you don't have the luxury of saying, I need all of the perfect data, right? You have to take what you have and make a decision based off of you want of what you have in front of you. And if you don't have the data, that means that you failed last year and you failed over the winter to get the data to be in a position to make a good solid decision with all the data that you wanted today. So, um just another full support of uh of us paying $15,000 or $18,000 for this year. And if we want to re-evaluate the road diet because it sounds like maybe some people thought there was a haven in the middle and maybe there isn't um and make that better so that we don't need this in the future. Hey, that's fantastic, right? But today is the decision and the decision today is do we make it safe for this summer which is already in swing. Thank you so much

a couple of things. There was no need for data last year because as Alderman Malay has pointed out several several times this was a one-off thing. There was a crossing guard one time that was it until we got the road die in place. Before that for decades there was no crossing guard there. That's number one. Number two, are we being a bit discriminatory then to all of our westside residents to the south? Cuz I can tell you that if anybody who claims they've lived on Route 31 or has been in the area for quite some time, they would know that many many people cross at Morton Street and they walked to the Corey by getting through the cemetery. That's a very big access point for children. So, do we need a crossing guard at Morton Street as well? Why are we discriminating for Union Street? I mean, this is the whole point is like if you really think that you're not safe at an intersection, then there's there's already a stoplight at Main Street and you can use the stoplight. If you don't feel safe at the stoplight, I don't know there's I don't know what else to say about that, but I mean, we're just looking at it where what we're going to have crossing guards, you know, should we have one at Morton? Should we have one down maybe by Carile by the baseball field for all those residents as well? I mean, should we have one up at McKe

as well? You know, Houston, Houston. I mean, where are we going to Why is it that this is just the one spot that everybody's all focusing on? I mean,

yeah. Um, you know, first off, yeah, maybe we didn't need the data. Last year is what we thought. Turns out we were wrong, right? Like, it's evident that we're wrong on that. So, I I don't know. That doesn't land too much for me. As for sort of the the rhetorical why not everywhere have a crossing guard. Um I didn't get 32 emails for another crossing guard at another place. Um I have known that this intersection was dangerous. People have told me. I've seen the unfortunate results of this intersection. They haven't told me that other intersections except maybe down by Mill View. Folks have said something there. Um if folks start coming to me and saying, "Hey, what about here? What about there? What about Houston? I cross at Houston. I find Houston safer than crossing at Wilson. That's where I cross with my kids on the bike because there's not a blind turn. You're coming up uh Wilson, turning right onto 31. That's dangerous when you can't see around the uh the dress shop there, right? If I'm on a bike, I can wait till it's clear at Houston. Um but uh so, you know, some of the counterarguments that I hear don't hold weight. Uh, and you know, I understand that the thought of paying paying money every year is is not great and we need a permanent solution that isn't going to cost us this every year. But for here today, um, unfortunately, maybe we needed the data last year. We failed, right? We didn't do a good job if that was the case. Um, yes, the road diet's supposed to fix this, but it's still new. We don't know. And the people who are crossing there don't feel safe at the moment. We have a problem. We can fix it. We know where the money comes from. We know what we lose if we spend the money. Um, and it's not busting the budget. This isn't, you know, I we should be worrisome of every dollar, but this isn't, you know, the biggest the biggest check we've ever written. So, you know, that these just don't hold weight that, you know, they aren't persuasive to me at least.

I just have a comment that I take offense to saying we failed. There was no failure about not getting data. This was not anticipated that we would ever need the data because as has been stated when you were not on council, this was discussed and the road diet was taking a little bit longer and there was some concerns about that particular intersection due to an incident. So, we agreed to get a crossing guard for last summer. It is not a failure on our part for not having data. That is a complete misstatement.

Yeah, I apologize if that's offensive to you. I think I heard that we want data and we should have had it and we don't have it. I don't know. We can call it a failure. We can call it a lack of foresight. Um certainly didn't mean offense by that, but if that's the way we need to say it to get the action, you know, I I not here to make you happy. I'm here to say what's what the truth is. We if we wanted to mechanism, we didn't have the mechanism and we've since purchased it. That's why it was part of the act of transportation and the strategic plan. Now we have it and now we have it. We got it. When did we get it, Laura? Is this what When did we get it? Hold on. This is not the discussion that we should one at a time.

And we're getting this thing way overboard as far as our arguments here. We're arguing with ourselves and we're not arguing about the issue. Alderman Fiper, I was just going to respond to the note about using the um traffic light intersection to cross. I was going to say that adds like 10 minutes to a walking trip which in the middle of summer I think people are rationally gonna want to avoid. So could you imagine if we delayed a car trip by 10 minutes people would be freaking out. So it's a bit of a double standard I would argue. And that's a one-way trip extra 10 minutes. So I just don't see people making that rational decision. That depends if you're actually living south of Main Street though.

Oh sure. So, I mean, you're talking about a very select waste of 10 minutes in terms of walking up to Main Street. You have to be south of Main Street. Then, what about everybody north? Maybe they're going to McDonald's. They could be and then going to the quarry. So, they're probably not crossing at the Corey, so they're not even part of the discussion right now. And that's why it's important for us to get that data. Oh, I agree. We should delay things.

Yeah. You know what? I agree to pretty much everyone who's speaking at this point. Um, we are talking with ourselves. I'm just going to point out we have an a whole commission who looks at this much longer and deeper than than we do and and they've come up here and said they're for this. It's not a lot of money. I don't know how we're not going to solve anything tonight. Uh the people who it's their job they've endorsed it. So I I don't know what we're talking about at this point. Yeah. I I will say right now I'm going to call the question so we stop this crazy discussion. Yeah. We're and we'll vote on this and we'll see what we do with it. Circles here. Okay. Okay, we have a motion and second on the floor for the motion to approve the crossing guard at Union and Route 31. Cer call the roll.

Wolf, no. Sulfa, no. Baron, no. Leman, absent. Lman, hi Beeper. Hi. Fenbach, hi. Anderson, hi. Voggelinger, hi Barza. Hi, Lancie. Hi, Beck. Hi, Malay. No. Um Malone I nine yes, four no, one absent.

Nine yes, four no, one absent. Motions approved. So we will have a crossing guard for another year. And I would encourage us all to keep an eye on this and make your own observations going forward. U I think there was a lot of things that were said that were very fortright and needed to be said, but I mean I think this is something that has already been brought up. We we could have other folks from other crossings here sooner than later wanting us to put those up in other locations. So I think we got to have some direction and handle and policy as to how we're going to do this going forward. And this is probably a a good start for it. So

you can make it through a discussion like that. you get across. All right, let's go to the administrator's report. Laura,

yes. Um, we have received preliminary concepts for the public restrooms on North River Street and uh where the tin shop currently is and we expect to bring these uh to you for feedback at our next committee of the whole meeting. Um, we've launched the green program and that is um utilization of some of the revenues that we receive from the uh bag fee, the single-use bag fee and um 25 residents will receive a free home energy audit and up to $3,000 in order to make the um improvements that are recommended as a result of that audit. So, if you're interested in that program, you can go to uh betavia.gov for bring your own bag, and there are all of the details there. Um, Officer Elizabeth Webb and River, our comfort dog, and Tim Austerman from our code enforcement department delivered a presentation for seniors at the Senior Savvy E Expo on Friday. That was a a uh program that was organized by the park district, but the city was one of the sponsors and they delivered a presentation about fra uh fraud prevention, specifically home improvement contractor fraud, and it was really appreciated. Um the plan commission meetings for uh June 18th and July 2nd will be cancelled, but there will be a special meeting on um June 25th that will be added to replace those meetings. on the agenda would be uh variances for property at 329 to 339 South Harrison Street, a conditional use for a tattoo facility at 127 State Street, which is replacing an existing uh facility that does the same thing, and then also a

public hearing to extend the South River Street moratorum for an additional um 90 days versus the current 180 days. This morning we had the joint review board meeting um which is a required meeting each year to review the past year of each tiff district with each one of the the taxing bodies um come together and they hear what is uh what we accomplished in the last year and then also what is coming in the year ahead. uh we are uh advising them that tiff one will be ending at the end of this year so that they should be adjusting their levies accordingly for the following tax year. Um and I can send a copy of Anony's presentation to all of you from that meeting. That's all I have unless anybody has any questions for me. Um

the um solar panel installation on nonforprofits and smaller commercial properties. Any idea how soon we did they reached out again? would have been here sooner if there wasn't a micro burst. I'll tell you that. That's what I think. Okay. I'm not sure we're uh quite going to be able to tee it up for the um cow on the 24th, but I'm thinking that at one of those meetings in July, Steve Allen is there. He might be able to Does that sound doable? I I'll I'll send I'll send a message over for next week. Really? All right. See, we will we will aim to exceed expectations. Fantastic. Not a question, but I won't be here for the the 24th the the cow meeting next week.

Everybody know I'll be gone. All right. Looks like Tony's in charge. Yeah. Yep. 24th, I think. So, you're here. Great. Negotiate. Okay. Thank you. Council,

your honor, I do have one. wanted to give the council an update from the Tri City Ambulance Board. Um we just approved our budget for the fiscal year for the the TCA board and our contribution stays pretty much the same at 265,000 um a year for that. Um the one thing that we did do that we did have a couple meetings about was is we did raise the fees. So basically a a basic life support uh transport runs $2,400. Now um and 2,700 if you're not a non-resident. Um on the advanced life support side, a resident would be 2650 and a non-resident would be 28.50. So the fees have gone up. We are still below the median around our area. Um the prices have just gone up crazy. Um, one of the other things I wanted to let everybody know was one of the issues that we've dealt with um, over the past several years, both city here and at Tri City Ambulance, we're three years behind getting ambulances. So, we may be starting to shuffle ambulances between different cities. So, the Betavia and the St. Charles ambulances that rack up all the miles will get switched out with a Geneva one that doesn't run nearly as much or the ondemand one has had to step in quite a few times. We actually had to borrow somebody else's backup ambulance, I think, in the last month, cuz we had three of them out at once. And the chassis are the big issue. They they can't get them. So, we're basically ordering and trying to pay for ahead of time an ambulance that we're going to get in three years. This is similar to like what we're dealing with in public works where we can't get the chassis. So, just a little bit of an update on that. Um, one of the things I also wanted to bring, if if you look at the money we spend at 265,000 to have that service provided in each one of our um, fire uh, in the firehouses.

The fact if we did it inhouse with our own employees would be easily a million dollars more for each city to you know have that service provided. So this is something that we have to keep t talking about it so that it doesn't go away that having those things like tricom and tri- city ambulance is a really good thing for the tri cities you know to commit to do that and to constantly make sure that that works for our city has been a really good cost savings for the city and a great provider

would just have a comment on that I would like to see some numbers on that to just say it's going to cost. You say a million, Laura saying 2 million. Uh we've heard that the the uh um the number of uh calls that the ambulances are going on has increased significantly, increasing revenue for the the provider, the the uh for Prairie State. Um so I I would like to see some actual data uh that shows that we're actually saving money and not lose leaving money on the table or losing money. I'm sure we can find the data for that. The revenue is to Tri City Ambulance, not to PSI has a set amount that we pay them in the contract and the revenues for all of the calls for service come back to Tri City Ambulance.

City ambulance. That's what I was asking for before and we were told that we couldn't have that information because it was proprietary. No, Tri City Ambulance is you guys. You can City Ambulance. I'll find that out and come back and report on it. All right. Yeah. Appreciate it. Yep. That's all. Anybody else in the council?

We're going to the mayor's report. I just want to give some comments. As all of you know, we were hit by a storm last week. Uh, and it can't kind of came out of nowhere. or the weather bureau apologized to me that they didn't get any warning out about it cuz they all of a sudden it just got out to the west side of Betavia and it was a thunderstorm and suddenly it blew up into this thing that came rolling across Battavia. It basically stayed south of Wilson Street and down to about our city limits and thus north of Geneva didn't hardly have anything and it came where was the route of it? It was probably down that maybe the center of it was Carlile Road on the on the west side and over on the east side it was just south of on South Prairie Street and that area there and uh it did a lot of damage. A lot of people had shingles or windows blown out or all kinds of different stuff. Uh we uh I was very proud of our city. Both the fire police and the public works all responded. We got electric department came out in full boore because that was where we took really serious damage and we were able to call upon our neighbors who own municipal and electric utilities and they came over and helped us and now we've we've done that for them. So we needed it the other night and so I think we had most almost everybody back by what 12 hours was it do you say?

Longer than that but yeah 12 to 14 roughly.

Yeah. Uh, and that was in very concise areas of town right where the storm hit because we lost a lot of line coming down. And then we had some intermingling with Commonwealth Edison cuz they had some line specifically down on South River Street going out to Cherry Park that got wrangled up. And so we had to work with them on some of that. and they wanted to turn some you may if you lived in certain areas you your power came on and then in 14 minutes it went off for a few few minutes and then it came back on but our electric utility I couldn't be prouder of the job that they did they were right on top of it and uh the gentleman we have sitting here in the room with us he was out there at the public works building running the show and making sure everybody knew where they were going and what was the problem and where it was and so We really did rise to the occasion. The same with the police and fire departments. They knew what was happening. And so I just wanted everybody to know how what a good job I felt the city departments did. The one interesting sidebar to this whole thing is is it came to the time to clean it up as far as the down trees and different items. And this is when we found out that not everybody that's in Betavia is in the city. And we have a situation down on South Pavia Avenue from the west side cemetery south on the east side of the street. You're not inside the city there. You're in unincorporated areas. And needed to say, I've gotten several calls from people down in that area dismayed because the city crews went by their house and didn't pick up their trees. Well, to the credit that the Battavia Township has a really good road department under Chris Long, and I believe he and his staff came in and helped right away in that area, targeted, knew where it was, and we got it cleaned up. But there's this thing about people all wanting to say they

live in Betavia. And you folks have voted on some stuff here recently where we've kind of forced annexed a few things, specifically over on the east side. We've got most of the east side now pretty well annexed into Betavia. It's just this one area south of Betavia on the east side of Battavia Avenue, south of the cemetery that's kind of the problem area and they're all well and septic down there. And that's a big problem because trying to get a water and sewer line down there and I've been party to some conversations about pay or extending it down there and the cost to take that down there given some pitches in the ground and other things that would have to be no no easements recorded etc etc. It's big money. And when you tell that to the residents down there, well, if you want our sewer and water, you're all going to have an annual assessment of way way big money. They all said, "Nah, forget it. We'll just keep the well and the septic." So this this again proves the lesson uh you know that you you when you can you should annex it all and you should annex it to the city standards of you know the streets are paved, the sidewalks are put in, the curbon gutters put in, the street lights put in and you got retention ponds and we got all that and any new developments now that we have being built in Bavia all have that as part of their deal and they're all paying the fees. And what we got here is some folks that back maybe right after World War II, there was some building programs that built you into Betavia, but not within the city of Betavia. And so that's what's still catching up with it because a couple of you have asked me some questions about that. And I just wanted to share that with everybody here that yeah, there are some areas of Betavia that are address Betavia and they call themselves Betavian and I'm not arguing that, but they're not in the city and they're not paying the fees or

they haven't paid the taxes or given the easements or whatever it needs be to be in the city. So there is those moments and the areas I just talked about is largely where those are at. So we we've got good things going and now if you want to build a subdivision in Bavia, you're going to build it with all those standards put into place and there's not going to be anybody not paying their fair share or not having the water in the sewer, which seems to be the big thing. And as you all heard here tonight earlier, we're doing a great job with those those departments and the cleaning water and the all the improvements at the sewer plant. We're we're kind of a model for the area. So, uh, we're doing it the right things, but not everybody with us is in the city. So, you just need to know that.

Um, just a minor point on that. Um, so a couple people who are watching this are thinking exactly what I'm thinking. Okay, so I am in full proper Bavia. I'm I'm Kitty Corner from the Franklin right on 31. No one would think I'm not in Bavia. Uh, I'm on septic. Um, I have city water, but I'm on septic. We do have We do have homes in town where they're full. They've been part of Betavia since day one, but they either have well water or septic. So, so it is a thing. So, just getting that out there.

I mean, there are those places and those moments where where things didn't happen many years ago. Now, it's pretty much a standard policy that if you want to do something, you're going to, you know, come into the city and pay all the fees and build it to our standards and whatever. I look at it. But but but if you currently have septic or wellwater and you're in incorporated in Betavia, we're not going to make anybody get on city. Have your grandfather. Yeah. Until you have a Until you have a catastrophic failure in your septic field, then you have no choice.

Septic is the really the only thing that we don't have control of because that's county permit. The permitting is and sometimes they will permit a repair, but if it's a full replacement, they won't do it. Okay? if it's if it's within a reasonable distance for you to hook up. I I will start saving now. Thank you.

I I decided the mayor's report needs to be kind of an education lesson for you as to why things are the way they are and why things can't be different and whatever. And we've got there's three or four of us sitting here been here a long time and we've heard most of it at some point in time in the past. What I still don't like is the fact that we have school district, library district, park district that don't match up. So you can literally be in certain spots in town and be I was Geneva Park District. I rode my bike from west of Randall Road all the way to the where the train tracks are on Western Avenue in Geneva. Don't forget Pavia Township. I know everybody that lives where Geneva Township

in the southeast side all the way down to where the toll road is. Yeah. Oh, yeah. They're in the city of Aurora north of Butterfield in a couple places, but they're all within the Betavia School District. And complain about that one.

Well, I know they don't, but I I I've talked to some people that have been involved in like the casino down there, and they're telling me, "Well, we we want to be in the city of Aurora, but we really like to be in the Bavia school district." So, there's people trying to ID the house where they can move into that gets their kid into the So, that's where these maps come in. And every now and then we'll get people in here wanting to get copies of the school and the park and the city's maps to see where they can go and where they can't go because, you know, again, our park and our our school district is held very high in the opinion of a lot of people that this is a good school district to be into. And now that we got state championship football teams and everything else, that's all selling Bavia, you know, in a big place that this is a great place to be. And I sat in recently in a program at Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning where I'm the chairman of the council of mayors and our staff in there presented some statistics of things that are what is making a very strong town and one of them is the school system. Another one is the public safety system that you've got in the in the community and another one is the proximity to quality medical care. And that's one of the things right now that the Tri Cities seems to be riding pretty high on. You got two hospitals in Aurora, you got two hospitals in Elgen, you got Central DuPage over in Winfield, and now you got Delnor, which is part of that whole system. And so the the hospital system is looked upon with great appreciation. And so that's why older people, specifically senior citizens, want to move move here is is that we've got this great medical care. And we talked earlier about the paramedics. I've had a number of them say, "Boy, I really like Betavia cuz when I call for an ambulance, many times there's a mixed

crew on the paramedics. One's a male and one's a female." And I really like it when there's a female on the on the ambulance crew. So you don't know what's going to really get people worked up and excited. But those are kind of some of the things that you learn as you get into this business of things that people really like. So, uh, all things considered, I would tell you that I think Betavia is looked upon by many of our neighboring communities as a place where we do things pretty good and there's not a lot of criticism of us and there's not a lot of weaknesses identified. It's just nice people. And another wholesome very strong point about Betavia is we are a total city of totally integrated personality. In other words, you got every race, religion, color, creed, nationality, whatever. All living in Betavian. There's no segregated neighborhoods for anybody. Everybody just has moved in and moved into what any neighborhood they want to move into. And that's a real healthy spot for most people that they I've had people tell me that's the reason they want to move here is you got a well integrated town and I want my kids to understand all the races, religions, colors and creeds that are out there and so you can get that in Betavia. So, um, another point for us, well, I've talked too much.