City Council - Regular Meeting

Good evening, and welcome to the April 21 Naperville City Council meeting.

Roll

call. Worley. Here. Gibson. Here. Holzaur. Here. Jane. Here. Kelly. Here. McBroom.

Here.

Syed. Yep. White. Here. Wilson.

Here. Please rise and join me in the Pledge of Allegiance. First on the agenda are awards and recognitions. Councilman Kelly is mayor pro tem tonight, and we'll have the two proclamations.

Good. Alright. Good evening, everyone. First, we have a proclamation for Arbor Day, 04/24/2026. Whereas in 1872, J.

Sterling Morton proposed to the Nebraska Board of Agriculture that a special day be set aside for the planting of trees, and whereas this holiday called Arbor Day was first observed with the planting of more than a million trees in Nebraska, and whereas Arbor Day is now observed throughout the nation and the world, and whereas trees can reduce the erosion of our previous topsoil by wind and water, cut heating and cooling costs, moderate the temperature, clean the air, produce oxygen, and provide habitat for wildlife, And whereas trees are a renewable resource giving us paper, wood for our homes, fuel for our fires, and countless other wood products. And whereas trees in our city increase property values, enhance the economic viability of business areas, and beautify our community. And whereas trees wherever they are planted are a source of joy and spiritual renewal. Now, therefore, I, Scott A. Worley, mayor of the city of Naperville, Illinois, do hereby proclaim 04/24/2026 as Arbor Day in the city of Naperville, Illinois, and urge all citizens to support efforts to protect our trees and woodlands in support of our city's forestry forestry program and to plant trees to promote the well-being of present and future generations.

And from our forestry public works department, we've got Christine Schwarzhoff.

Do you want

to say a few words? Sure.

I'd just say that we're super proud of our forestry team and put a shameless plug in for our Arbor Day Tree Sale. You got one more day, Closes at five tomorrow, so buy some trees.

And then we've got Earth Day, a good theme tonight. Is anyone here for Earth Day? Angelique? Very good. So tonight, we are also going to proclaim Earth Day in Naperville as April 2020 I'm sorry.

04/22/2026, whereas the first Earth Day was enacted in 1970, engaging over 20,000,000 Americans through community service and responsible stewardship in support of a cleaner environment. And whereas, the city of Naperville is blessed with diverse native ecosystems from rivers and wetlands to forests and prairies, providing a multitude of services that support the natural environment and human quality of life, and whereas the city of Naperville is committed to the protection and stewardship of these precious natural resources, and whereas Earth Day serves as an annual reminder to all residents of their critical role in environmental protection, and whereas sustainability can only be achieved when the needs of the present are met without compromising the needs of future generations, and whereas Naperville is a leader in environmental initiatives establishing a long term vision for environmental sustainability while providing local government services to help ensure a higher quality of life for future generations. Now, therefore, I, Scott A. Worley, mayor of the city of Naperville, Illinois, do hereby proclaim 04/22/2026 as Earth Day in the city of Naperville and urge all citizens to find new ways to make a positive difference in our community and shared environment. And if you'd like to say a few words from the Nature Center.

Thank you. So hello. I'm Angelique Karshman from the Knock Knulls Nature Center. And on behalf of the Naperville Park District and the numerous organizations that we have worked with over the years, I want to thank the city for your continued support of our Earth Day efforts and initiatives. These annual events started about nine years ago and expanded from a week long roster to now more than a month full of sustainable and green activities.

To find out more about how you can get involved, please visit napervilleparks.org/earthmonthnaperville. You'll be able to view all the regional upcoming tree sales and plant sales, the film festivals, recycling events, volunteer opportunities, and more. Thank you, and happy Earth Day.

Next on the agenda is public forum. I'd like to remind everyone of the citizen participation rules in the city's municipal code for speaking at city council meetings. Speakers are asked to present their comments to respectful and courteous matter. Speakers should stay on topic and be cognizant of their words. Personal attacks on council members, staff, other speakers, or members of the audience are not allowed. If inappropriate language or comments are expressed during this meeting, you will be asked immediately to stop commenting. Also, for audience members, there is no cheering and no jeering. Actions such as applauding, cheering, finger stamping, booing, or any other noises during or at the conclusion of any remarks by any speaker are not allowed. If this occurs, you will be asked to stop immediately. And if it continues to persist, I will recess the meeting until the audience abides by the rules in our city code.

No speakers should ever feel intimidated by the crowd. Audience disruption is meant to intimidate those speaking, and I will not allow it in the chambers. Audience members with signs, signs must not block any other audience member's view. Speakers are given three minutes to address the city council. To help speakers stay within the three minute time frame, we have a timer located on the side dais to your right.

It will give the visual cue when three minutes are expiring. This helps speakers conclude their comments in a timely manner without being cut off. The timer will buzz when it hits zero, and we will alert the speaker that their time is up. If a speaker's name is called and they are not in the room, we will move on to the next speaker, and we will not go back. Speakers are encouraged to remain in council chambers until the conclusion of public forum in the event council members want to ask follow-up questions. Also, when your name is called, they'll be called in groups. Please come and have a seat in the first row. Mrs. Schotts, please call the first speakers.

There are three written comments that were submitted and posted to the city's website. Our first three speakers are John Doyle, followed by Radhika Tandon, followed by Karen Peck.

John Doyle, Naperville resident. You know, last session, there was some talk about defining some key words in our mission statements. I think we should start with affordable. Affordable

is

a relative term. It does not mean as cheap as possible. And when it comes to residential energy use, its meaning is quite well established at this point. If you have gas heat, like most of Naperville does, electricity becomes unaffordable once its costs exceed 3% of your household income. This is not my opinion. This is not some liberal opinion. It is and continues to be the position of the Department of Energy and HHS. It has been for the last four administrations and codified by a number of states and their utility boards. The Illinois Commerce Commission agrees with it. It's backed by research from Oak Ridge National Lab, the University of Michigan, Georgia Tech, and Carnegie Mellon.

And that alphabet soup you see up there represents basically every policy think tank and advocacy group on both the right and the left who use this framework. No one who is serious about energy policy is debating this meaning of affordable, even if there are some slight disagreements on what the percentage should be. What is up for debate, however, is what to do about it. Here's ComEd's solution. If you make under a certain amount of money, they will give you discounts on your bill to ensure the final cost is under 3% of your income, affordability guaranteed.

Now, I'm not going to pretend like ComEd did this out of the goodness of their heart. Like every other single affordability program in existence, this only exists because there's a law requiring it to exist. Unfortunately, that law doesn't apply to Naperville. The state doesn't regulate our rates because they expect you to do it. If they did, approximately 10,000 households would be eligible for these programs.

10,000. And instead, you've given us a program that can support 500. Affordability is a policy choice, one that has very little to do with how the utility purchases power. If you're genuinely concerned about it, make it a requirement, not a goal. Pass an ordinance that gives us the exact same affordability mandate that already protects 90% of the state. This is a solved problem. We just need you to pick one of the already proven solutions and apply it here. And I also think it's important that a lot of people could use a reality check on what we're talking about here. This chart shows your electricity burden at various annual incomes and monthly energy uses calculated using the rate from my most recent bill. And I've emphasized Naperville's averages for both of these.

For context, my burden is 0.8%. I'd invite anybody else who's speaking on this topic to share theirs. Because when we talk about affordable electricity, it doesn't mean keeping my number under one. It means getting all of these numbers under three. And you can do that. You can require it by law with five votes. It really is that easy. The rest of the state already has it. So I say put up or shut up. Give it to us or don't. Thank you.

Thank you. Next speaker.

The next speaker is Radhika Tandon followed by Karen Peck.

Next speaker.

The next speaker is Karen Peck followed by Derek Adam Hoover and Ashley Penick.

Good evening. The Naperville due process and municipal property use ordinance is narrowly focused on regulating the use of municipal property and resources. It falls within a home rule municipality's power. The ordinance does not conflict with the supremacy clause. Illegal behavior is never the supreme law of the land.

My name is Karen Peck. Thank you for your nine zero vote to approve staffing council to review the ordinance and report back on the May agenda. ICE presence costs cities millions in overtime expenses, strains police resources, increases call response times, and hurts local businesses. Nationwide, councils have passed ordinances to preserve order and constrain government overreach and ICE violence. DHS is more likely to be sued than cities and ordinances with ordinances.

Over 200,000 petitions or lawsuits are currently filed for warrantless home entries, refusal of due process, and civil rights violations during raids and in detention by ICE. Investigations of ICE are increasing for kidnapping, physical and sexual abuse, including of children, the murder of US citizens, and deaths in ICE custody. The federal government cannot compel local municipalities to enact or enforce federal will. The National Immigrant Justice Center and the ACLU successfully def defend municipalities. We can prepare for potential lawsuits by documenting ICE activities.

An ordinance can't stop federal agents from committing all atrocities, but we must legally do what we can to prevent the high police costs of managing them. Ordinance or not, people in the crosshairs know how unsafe we are. The movie Nuremberg about the international military tribunal holding Nazi war criminals to account explores evil and legal justice. The warning, evil can happen anywhere as long as people choose to do nothing. Every level of government must set boundaries with authoritarians.

The state did. The county did. Democracy prevails with courage. Autocrats lose power when we use ours. We must use the legal avenues we have now or we may never have them again. I urge support for our legal right to this ordinance. Thank you.

Thank you. Next speaker.

The next speaker is Derek Adam Hoover followed by Ashley Penick.

Good evening, everyone. I was here about something else, but I'm back here about the e bike. I spoke to someone this afternoon about it. And apparently, the state's looking at passing Senate Bill 3,336, which is going to completely ignore everything that I think we came to an agreement on at the last board meeting. What I'm here for is I'm imploring you and begging you.

I've already tried to reach out to the state with no luck. I'm asking you guys to try to reach out to your contacts at the state level and try to get them to look at what I had proposed and what you had agreed upon and see if we can get it worked into the bill because it's going to completely take away, again, everyone's right under the age of 16 to ride an e bike. It's just, again, completely industry it's completely discriminating against all good people in the state who ride these things responsibly. We don't take away everyone's cars because some people speed. We don't take away everyone's knives because some we we just we live in America.

We don't do things like this. I think after what we came to an agreement upon, I think it could very easily be with your help presented to the state and get put into this bill so that, again, my kids don't lose their right to ride responsibly with their parents. The law also doesn't do what I think we were in agreement on, and that's anyone under the age of 16 should be wearing a helmet for their own safety. And the the state, again, has nothing in the bill that's proposing anything about helmets. It's just simply saying if you're 16 or over that you have to get it licensed and put plates on it, which does nothing to, again, stop the problem, which is the way people are using these vehicles.

So that's why I came here today. I've already reached out to as many news channels as I can. I don't expect to hear back. I'm asking you as a board and maybe we get some of the other communities involved, Wheaton, Warrenville, some of the other good communities in this area. Let them all know that there's a right way to go about this bill.

And simply letting 15 year and up ride these bikes recklessly and treating out all the rest of the the kids, the 12, the 13, the 14 year olds, and the fathers like me who enjoy riding with our kids to just take that away from us and tell us, well, we know you spent all this money, throw them away, is I just don't understand the bill. The bill is not it's not reaching families the way it's intended to. So that's why I'm here today is I ask you guys to please reach out to your contacts, see what you can do about getting what we were going to, what I believe you guys were going to enact in the village, see if they'd be willing to put that into the state bill. Because obviously, again, I do agree that there has to be some better legislation. This is not it.

This is completely not it. Just saying 15 and up can ride however they want, but all the rest of us are SOL. I literally just brought my bikes home yesterday to get them cleaned, get them parked, get them ready for the kids, pending you guys enacting this. And now this might not go into effect till 2027. So I I would just like it if you guys could get to the state before they enact it because once it goes into effect, it's not gonna get changed. And I can't I don't have the ability myself to do it. So thank you.

Thank you. Next speaker.

The next speaker is Ashley Penick followed by Joe Huss and Sina Gleason.

Ashley Penick here with Affordable Naperville. Before I moved to Naperville back in 1993, I lived in the suburbs of New York City in New Jersey and actually born in Manhattan. Attending Broadway musicals was something I loved. Two of my favorite were Horace Line and South Pacific. I'll explain how this relates later. The first city council meeting in April included proclamations for autism acceptance and Earth Month. Public comments followed with many thought provoking perspectives from different cultural points of view. Two days after the city council meeting, the PUAB, Public Utility Advisory Board met. The actual audio recording of the meeting is saved on the city's website. I listened to it.

I hope you did too. It's very informative. Included in the meeting was the school district two zero three's assistant superintendent of administrative services, and he addressed the carbon action plan. Both the city council and PUAB meetings are on the city's website, and I very much appreciate the transparency in all of this. Listening to the remarks of the two zero three school district official made me wonder why so much information have been left out of the board of ed's proposal not to support IMEA.

Listening to those meetings made me think of my grandfather who served as a Navy CB in the South Pacific during World War II. He was a very well read independent thinker who influenced my point of view immensely. I was actually going through other things the other day and found my Dale Carnegie course book and he was the one who told me to take the class twenty years ago. One of my favorite songs from South Pacific was or I should say one of his favorite movies was South Pacific. And he knew many of the words to the song you've got to be carefully taught.

You've got to be taught to hate and fear. You've got to be taught from year to year. It's got to be drummed in your dear little ear. You've got to be carefully taught. You've got to be taught to be afraid of people whose eyes are oddly made, of people whose skin is a different shade.

You've got to be carefully taught. You've got to be taught before it's too late, before you were six or seven or eight. And I'm remembering great conversations with my grandfather when I was a kid, times when he asked hypothetical questions to inspire me to critically think. Let me add that many of us in Naperville have jobs have local jobs, and we value watching the costs of living and working here. And I'm thinking we've got to be taught the affordable truth about staying with I M E A.

Process will happen when we follow the scientific method to observe, question, hypothesize, experiment, and test, test, test. And considering the Arbor Day proclamation just presented, I realized I was carefully taught that money doesn't grow on trees. Thank you.

Thank you. Next speaker.

The next speaker is Joe Huss followed by Sine Gleason and Diana Torres Hawken.

Good evening. My name is Joe Huss. I'm a twenty five year resident of Naperville. And I'm here on behalf of NEST in our role of sharing information about the environment. And I'll briefly touch on three topics tonight.

The first is at the last city council, a question was raised about what we meant by sustainability. A commonly used definition comes from the United Nations, which describes sustainability as meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs. And that idea aligns well with Naperville's focus as a family friendly community. Second, we wanted to comment on something that was said at the last PUAB meeting. When discussing climate impacts, someone said, quote, many scientists disagree with what one side says versus the other.

While there was more debate years ago, the scientific community is now aligned. Today, change is understood as something that's measured, observed, and documented rather than an ongoing disagreement. The UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change representing thousands of scientists from over a 190 countries states with, quote, unequivocal certainty that human activity has warmed the atmosphere, oceans, and land. In fact, we can measure it directly. As of 2024, NASA measured the global average temperature to have risen about 1.2 degrees Celsius.

According to the National Oceanic and I knew I was going to stumble over that Atmospheric Administration, the last twelve months have been the warmest twelve month span ever recorded in The United States. Heat waves are becoming more frequent and deadly. Extreme rainfall and flooding are intensifying. The US Department of Defense and the World Bank recognize climate change as a risk multiplier affecting food security, infrastructure, public health, and economic stability. Every major National Academy of Science in the world agrees on these findings.

So while you can find people who don't agree, the scientific community considers this settled science. The third topic is a more positive one. The Will County Board recently approved a two sixty megawatt solar project. The project expected to power about 50,000 homes will create more than 300 union jobs and generate approximately $2,300,000 in first year tax revenues for local governments. The board also approved six smaller solar projects near New Lenox, Wilmington, and Shorewood. Together, these projects add capacity close to Naperville, helping to meet rising electricity demand and improve system reliability for the region. Thank you for your time.

Thank you. Next speaker.

Next speaker is Signe Gleeson followed by Diana Torres Hawken and Amy Phillips.

Good evening. My name is Signe Gleeson. I want to thank you for the opportunity to reiterate the need for the Naperville City Council thanks. Okay. To join other Illinois municipalities that have acted with courage and character to stand against the lawlessness and cruelty of ICE agents and the Department of Homeland Security.

On the April 7 when I was last here, I heard two primary concerns about the draft ordinance that we proposed. The first is fear, I believe, I heard was a fear of legal challenges. I acknowledge that there are no guarantees in any area of life. I've been around enough lawyers and enough courts to know that anyone can sue anyone anytime and for any reason. I believe, however, that those feel fears will be assuaged with information.

I urge this council to direct Naperville's legal staff to reach out to the legal staff at the municipalities that have passed similar ordinances. I propose the following questions, although I'm sure you intelligent people can come up with other questions. Number one, asking these attorneys, what did or do you see as the main legal ops close to prohibiting ICE use of single city property for staging purposes? How are those obstacles addressed and circumvented? Do you or did you fear that your municipality was is under threat of a lawsuit?

And if so, how was that fear addressed? How do you see the Illinois Home Rule Act protecting eligible municipalities who choose to safeguard city property from ICE use of city ICE use? Did you work with other municipal attorneys as you studied the ordinance? Can you suggest one or two attorneys who is most helpful? And finally, has your city or village face lawsuits on the basis of the ordinance?

As the council has directed the legal staff to review and advise the council on the Naperville due process and municipal property ordinance, I urge that outreach to and responses from other municipalities legal staff be provided before or by May 19 city council meeting for timely consideration. As I said, answer to the above questions will be instructive and I believe assuage fears of legal action. With that information, I anticipate that the council members will have the courage and character to pass the draft ordinance, which communicates the resolve of our city to protect all who live and work here. All of us have the intelligence that to realize that no law or ordinance can prevent bad actors from committing bad acts. The ordinance calls for documentation of violations, which as we know have been effective in calling attention to the lawlessness of ICE.

Thank you.

Thank you. Next speaker.

The final three speakers are Diana Torres Hawken, Amy Phillips, and Marilyn Schweitzer.

Good evening, mayor Worley and council members. My name is Diana Torres Hawken, and I'm a Naperville resident, a Colombian immigrant, a mother, and founder and vice president of ADMAS, Alliance of Latinos Motivating Action in the Suburbs. I also serve on the city's Human Rights and Fair Housing Commission, the Naperville Education Foundation, and formerly the Naperville Police Foundation. I'm here to talk about the Naperville due process and municipal property ordinance. This council now has the opportunity to do more than review this ordinance.

It has an opportunity to act with clarity, courage, and a true commitment to what is best for this community. This ordinance is not about federal immigration enforcement. It is about Naperville controlling its own prop how its own property and resources are used that is within the city's authority. The legal groundwork is sound. The community need is clear.

The will to move forward, to draft it carefully, communicate it clearly, and commit to good governance, that's what this moment requires. And as May Day or a day without an immigrant approaches on May 1, it is worth asking a hard question. What would happen if the people who work in our restaurants, kitchens, hotels, landscaping, crews, and childcare simply did not show up? Where would that absence be felt? The answer is in every part of this city.

That is a reality this council should keep in mind. Power used only for the powerful is not governance. It's neglect. For there are so many people that wanted to be here tonight and cut it, and not because they don't care, not because they don't think this is important, but because walking into this building, being seen, being recorded feels like a risk they cannot take for themselves or for their families, but they're your constituents as well. Naperville values are people of respect, trust, and pride. Please show these values. Protect the residents, workers, and visitors who rely on this city to govern fairly and responsibly. Thank you.

Thank you. Next speaker.

The next speaker is Amy Phillips.

Hello everyone. My name is Amy Phillips and I was here about a month ago to accept a proclamation that you guys gave on behalf of our thirty fifth annual DuPage RiverSweep. And I wanted to give you just give some updates and give take a moment to celebrate our community that cares in honor of Earth Day. So last Saturday, approximately a 175 volunteers came out in Naperville alone at seven different sites for as part of the sweep. A 167 bags, more or less, we're still collecting all the data of trash with five which is approximately about 5,000 bags or 5,000 pounds of trash.

Oh my goodness. Plastic bags, cans, bottles, gardens, pots, a sleeping bag, car parts, so many bottles, you know, just all this kind of stuff that you don't even see until you go out and you start looking really closely at the edges of the ponds and the edges of the water. And it's astonishing what you can actually pick out. And none of this would be possible without the amazing collaborators that we work with. The Forest Preserve of DuPage County, the Naperville Park District, so many community volunteers, our own Ben Mulesness from the city of Naperville, he led a site at Wildflower Park, and Councilwoman Gibson was there to help us out.

So we're so appreciative of all of the collaborations, the businesses, the churches, the scouts groups, the school groups. They all came out to make our community better. And across all of DuPage County and Northern Will, hundreds of volunteers, again, I will get you the data at some point, almost 30 different sites. All of these people came out. And, you know, if this is just the spirit of Earth Day. So, you know, we just thank the community for these environmental cause, you know, for supporting these environmental causes from simple cleanups to really complicated energy topics. All of these things and everything in between helps to make our community better. This is our home. We're proud of our past. We're looking forward to the future.

And let's just make the world better. Take care of what we have so that we can leave it better than we found it. So happy Earth Day. Thank you.

Thank you. Next speaker.

The final speaker in public forum is Marilyn Schweitzer.

Good evening, Marilyn Schweitzer. And yay Earth Day, but that's not what I'm going to talk on. The core values of the city of Naperville are people, trust, respect, and pride. People are the foundation of the community regardless of their race, religion, sexual orientation, or heritage. Trust inspires community cooperation, stability, and effective decision making.

Respect strengthens community relationships with elected officials and all levels of staff, including law enforcement. Civic pride fosters a sense of belonging, responsibility, and shared purpose. A government that uses fear as a tool for control undermines these values. It creates division, erodes trust in civic institutions, and stifles open dialogue. When the government ignores entities that create fear and division, it undermines these core values.

Failing to address such harmful practices weakens unity and safety, eroding the foundation necessary for a thriving, highly functional community. The stories shared by our community regarding intimidation, discriminatory profiling, and lack of due process are real. The impact is harsh and long lasting. It is deeply hurtful to the community community we love and the government we trust. I am lucky, but I feel my good fortune does nothing to ease the ill fate of others.

Now whenever I see a missing poster, I wonder, is the person simply missing, or have they been disappeared like so many during the human rights violations in South America during the nineteen seventies and nineteen eighties? Ironically, we had neighbors, American citizens, who chose to immigrate to South America last year because they were so fearful of our own US government. So please move forward with a Naperville due process and municipality ordinance. It's a small step, but one forward but one forward creating a community where compassion and understanding guide our actions. Thank you very much.

Thank you. Our next part of the agenda here is City Council Public Forum. As a reminder per the code, council members have three minutes to speak during public forum and can speak up to two times. Any council members? Councilman McBroom. Thank you, mayor. I've a question for director Kreger and or city legal.

You know, as far as our legislative priorities and bills that come out of Springfield, I'd like to address two two bills, h b fourteen twenty nine and h b fifty six twenty six. I think you're familiar with those. And I I guess I'm looking for if you could just explain to the public, you know, this the the process. My my assumption is when a bill comes out of Springfield, if it appears to undermine our our local control or take away local control, that's a trigger to oppose or maybe, you know, submit witness slips. But I know there's also behind the scenes work that's that's done as well, you know, working with the other mayors and and things like that.

So if if stay safe, could just kinda, you know, maybe briefly tell us, you know, about these bills, the discussions you've had, if we are or not going to oppose, and and then just in general, how you how you do make that decision on bills.

So I think special assistant Marcy Schotts would be the appropriate person to respond to your questions relating to the city's positions and how we file witness slips.

Absolutely. So starting with House Bill fourteen twenty nine, what we do with all of our, when we're reviewing all of our legislative processes, one is we work very closely with other governmental partners, including DuPage Mayors and Managers Commission, our conference, as well as the Will County Governmental League. We follow our legislative review process that we brought to the council. There are a lot of bills, hundreds of bills that you serve municipal authority. And we take a look at those and we say which ones are are maybe violating some of our legislative principles aren't in line with our legislative principles but also are going to impact the city and have a decent impact.

I don't know if the right adjective to use associated with that. That's not to say that we're not part of the conversation. We sit in the conversations. We work with bill sponsors. We listen to those. But we take positions on those that maybe have a little bit more of an impact associated with the city. So on 1429, we did not see, while it does usert municipal authority, we did not see that having a significant impact on the city and took no position on that bill. That bill did not make it out of the house last week and is back in rules and is not anticipated to move forward this session. House Bill 5,626 is the mega bill on the build legislation. I think that's the number associated is the one you're talking about.

So there are there's one bill on the house side that's the mega bill. There are six separate bills on the senate side. I will tell you that we are in deep conversations associated with all of those bills and have facts and data sheets associated with those. Our biggest concern with that bill is that that bill usurps local zoning authority while saying by allowing essentially duplexes, triplexes, quadplexes, and up to eight units on all single family zoning sites. It allows by right accessory dwelling units.

It defines permitting processes and allows for changes in permitting processes and allowing to go outside. Our concern with this is this is a dramatic shift from local zoning authority to state zoning authority. So we are on top of that. None of those bills have gone to committee yet, but we are well positioned to take action on those when they do because they would significantly affect the way that we do business here in Naperville. With both of these, and I want to clarify the phrase of usurping municipal authority.

One of the things that we strongly believe in is local control and that you as the mayor and council are the closest to our constituents. You do an amazing job of engaging with the public and listening to their opinions. The planning and zoning commission does the same on land use issues. We believe you guys are closest to the problems and are able to understand the challenges that are unique to Naperville. So that's one of the reasons why we will often take in positions on bills of usurping municipal authority. But there is nothing that's been gone to committee yet on any of the bill legislation. We know there's a lot of discussion out there and we are working very actively with our partners on that.

Thank you. Councilman Wilson.

Thank you, mayor. Just to follow-up on some comments Ashley Penick had with regard to PUAB. This past PUAB board meeting, District 203 did indeed give a presentation. Not to speak for the PUAB board itself, but just, you know, being liaison, being there, I think some folks on the PUAB board were maybe dismayed, may not be the right word, but a bit surprised that two or three did not seem to reach out to them regarding their opinions for some sort of climate action plan. So that was a bit, I guess, a bit disconcerning myself.

And then there was still, I guess, some surprise lingered, I guess, just from counsel's response to saying no to I'm I mean, we obviously have a response going forward, but I guess there was still just some surprise at the time of saying no to IMEA and then not coming up with a direct plan with regard to energy. And then the other thing too was I know councilwoman Jane had been interested in trying to get more of a preview, I guess, with regard to Director presentations. So not to speak for you, but I was wondering, Director Groth, would you be able to I know you had talked about trying to have some sort of post because the POA board meetings are between the next presentation and the one that would come after it in June, so beginning of May and the first week in June. So I know you had tried to talk about giving some sort of possible summary. So would you be able to give or be able to provide counsel with what you'd be able to do as far as that goes?

Director Groth.

I think the question that arose at PUAB, the Public Utility Advisory Board, was around posting the presentation slides or the materials sooner than the traditional council packet that goes out. To that, I would say I'm continually revising the slides, still waiting for data. I have multiple requests out to multiple entities for pieces of data that are included in my presentation. So I would say we work on this literally until the night before that they're due in the council packet. So I would say that that's generally not possible. Thank you. Councilman Alzar.

Thank you, Mayor. I had a couple of questions, while, I'm sorry, a couple of comments. But while I'm making the first one I was hoping someone from staff could pull up Mr. Doyle's slides. I wanted to refer to one of those.

While Ms. LaCloche is doing that, regarding Ms. Penick's comment about having a grandfather who was a CB in the South Pacific, it actually made me think back to my days. I served on a Pacific Island in the Air Force and there were a lot of CBs there, so I wonder if your grandfather ever made it to Guam. And we tried some of the same ground perhaps.

So if you could go forward to the chart that was maybe the last slide or, there we go, perfect. Director, I'm not sure which director would know the most about it or Mr. Kreger perhaps, but I was wondering mayor if a city staff member could address how Naperville's program works for lower income rate payers and how it differs from the state standard that's set up here?

Mr. Krueger, you want to start?

Yeah, you know what, actually Director Munch is probably best positioned. Do you want us to refer to both kind of like city programs as well as like the LIHEAP program that's administered by the townships?

Well actually, no. I think I would probably focus on what the speaker talked about which is at least according to what the speaker was saying, something like 10,000 Naperville households would have qualified for affordable energy credits, a discount under the Con Ed standard, but under the Naperville standard it's more like 500. And I just wanted to verify with staff if that's true.

Mr. Krueger. Thank you. You know, from our customers, one of the things that we do not obtain from them is really household income. So there is, we would need to kind of cross reference this chart with census data. We have not done that. It's the first time I've seen it. But that is something that we could do. For director growth, I believe approximately $8.50 is what we've been using for our average residential use. Is that right? Exactly. 844.

Alright.

So, you know, we do not we do not have those count information available. It would take us a little bit of work to kind of sort through that.

Okay, well just to follow-up on that. This is quite striking to me if true, right? I think one thing we can all agree on across the spectrum is that our citizens have asked for affordability to be a top issue in our energy policy. If we're this far behind a state standard on delivering, then I think that needs to be a top priority. So another follow-up question I asked Mr. Kreger is, in an energy workshop, could we address this exact chart and this exact question to see if this is actually accurate?

Yes, we can. I just wanna remind counsel that, you know, the electric utility is run as an enterprise fund. And, you know, if there are gonna be dollars used in a case to lower someone's rate, Those are gonna be dollars that come from someone else's rate to increase it.

Sure. And just as a follow-up, would imagine that's true in ComEd too, They can't print money. But I guess where this is going is for me, if this is accurate, I'm probably at a future meeting I'm gonna be asking for an affordable guess an affordable Naperville energy ordinance to have something more in line with the state standard. Thank you mayor.

Thank you. Our next item is the consent agenda. May I have a motion to use the omnibus method to approve the consent agenda? Councilman White.

May I move to use the omnibus method to approve the consent agenda?

Second, Kelly. We have a

motion and second to use the omnibus method for the consent agenda. All those in favor sign aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion passes nine zero. May I have a motion to approve the consent agenda? Councilman White.

I move to approve the, consent agenda.

Councilman Kelly. Second Kelly.

A motion and a second to approve the consent agenda. Missus Schotts, please read the consent agenda.

Approval of the March 2026 cash disbursements for a total of $36,000,827.27. Approval of the 04/07/2026 regular city council meeting minutes. Approval of city council meeting scheduled for May June and July 2026. Receiving the year to date budget report through 03/31/2026. Approving reappointments to various boards and commissions.

Approval of the award of the first two year extension to the contract for banking services to Wheaton Bank and Trust an amount not to exceed $295,000. Approval of the award of the cooperative procurement for multifunction printers cost per copy program 2026 replacement group to Canon Solutions America for an amount not to exceed $284,859.25 for a five year term. Approval of the award of the cooperative procurement for advanced distribution management system infrastructure and professional services to Continental Resource for an amount not to exceed $557,532.17. Approval of the award of cooperative procurement for electric meters and gatekeepers to Westco distribution for an amount not to exceed $360,760. Approval of the award of the cooperative procurement for large wire trailer equipment replacement to global rental company for an amount not to exceed $247,831.

Approval of the award of option year one to the contract for Allerton building automated automation system maintenance services to Cicerco Midwest for an amount not to exceed $212,301 for a three year term. Approval of the award of option year number one to the contract for heating, ventilation, air conditioning, and dehumidification services to Berry Heating and Cooling for an amount not to exceed a $160,000. Approval of the award of option year number two to the contract for engineering services for the Springbrook Water Reclamation Center to CDM Smith Black and Veatch Corporation, Carollo Engineers, and Donahoe Associates for one year term. Approval of the award award of work order for construction engineering services for Odyssey West water main improvements to Crawford Murphy and Tilly for an amount not to exceed 188,540 for a fifty seven month term. Approval of the award of work order for construction engineering services for the Springbrook Prairie sanitary services sewer rehabilitation to Crawford Murphy and Tilly for an amount not to exceed $304,980 for a fifty seven month term.

Approve the award of change order number two to the contract for 2025 Southeast Water Works generator replacement to William T Connolly Incorporated for an additional amount not to exceed $144,838.41. Approval of the order change order number four to the contract for Harris radio system maintenance agreement to l three Harris Corporation for an amount not to exceed $53,526 plus any additional as needed cost defined in section c and d of the addendum and for an additional one month. Approval of the award of the bid for Odyssey West water main improvement to h Linden and Sons Sewer and Water Incorporated for an amount not to exceed $930,410. Approval of the award of the bid for 2026 pavement marking to to maintenance coatings company for an amount not to exceed $109,179.65. Approval of the award of the bid for 2026 pavement crack fill program to Dentler Incorporated for an amount not to exceed $556,201.44.

Adopting the IDOT resolution in the amount of $556,201.44 to allow expenditure of state motor fuel tax dollars to fund the 2026 crack fill program. Adopting the resolution approving an intergovernmental agreement between the city of Naperville and the Illinois telecommunicator emergency response task force. Approval of the award of the single source procurement for VTS VT SCADA upgrade to Trihedral Incorporated for an amount not to exceed $134,040.60 for a five year term. Approval of the award of the single source procurement for power assist outage management services to to Utilisys for an amount not to exceed $128,000 for a two year term. And waiving the first reading and passing the ordinance amending section eight dash point five, Naperville Public Utilities customer bill of rights in Naperville municipal code to add outage management services as a permitted third party service.

There's a motion and a second to approve the consent agenda. Roll call.

Worley.

Yes.

Gibson. Aye. Bolzauer. Aye. Jane. Aye. Kelly. Aye. McBroom. Aye. Syed. Aye. White. Aye. Wilson.

Aye. Motion passes nine zero. Councilman White m one.

Mayor moved to approve the award of bid 25Dash009SpringbrookPrairieSanitarySewerRehabilitation to Visu Sewer Incorporated for amount not to exceed $5,230,000 $148 plus a 3% contingency.

Councilor Kelly. Second Kelly. We have a

motion and a second on m one. Roll call.

Gibson? Aye. Holzhauer? Aye. Jane? Aye. Kelly? Aye. McBroom? Aye. Syed? Aye. White? Aye. Wilson?

Aye. Worley?

Yes. Motion passes nine zero zero one.

M o one is recommendation to receive the report and direct staff to prepare an ordinance amending section 11 dash two a dash eight of the Naperville Municipal Code, all night parking, to allow parking between 2AM and 5AM on one side of the street. Three statements of opposition and seven written comments have been posted to the website, and we have two speakers tonight. The first speaker is Marilyn Schweitzer, followed by Tim Messer.

Good evening, and thank you again. Please maintain the current overnight street parking policy without further consideration by staff until more pressing community issues are addressed. Most municipalities in the Chicago area have stricter parking regulations or more complicated permitting requirements. Some require proven hardship, valid Illinois license plates registered to the permit address, and fees ranging from $50 to $1,200 annually. Only three municipalities, I found out of 30, have more lenient policies than Naperville's current one.

Social media comments and city council discussions suggest many garages and driveways are being used for storage rather than operational vehicles. This is not a hardship, but rather an avoidance of a $150 to $300 a month cost for a storage unit. The inconvenience of moving cars to accommodate varying work schedules also does not qualify as a hardship. Complaints about parking seem to come from cul de sacs or streets already with limited street parking. Relaxing these regulations may not resolve the problems for these residents even if a genuine hardship exists.

The coordination of street cleaning and leaf pickup is already challenging. Leaves that aren't picked up are left in the street clogging storm drains, which then require frequent cleaning during fall, winter, and spring to prevent flooding. The proposed changes would exasperate this problem as DPW vehicles would likely need to make additional passes or post signage similar to the practices used in Chicago, further complicating the process. Visitors, contractors, landscapers, and residents will all complete for limited street parking. Access vehicles will only need to be moved once per day, creating less incentive to use garages properly or limit the number of vehicles per household.

The April 16 city manager's memorandum references an initiative to reduce the overall off street parking requirement, presumably to help address housing affordability. However, many cities that have reduced parking requirements have been forced to implement an on street parking systems to accommodate the resulting increase in demand. These two initiatives must be considered together as implementing a permit system would likely have a fiscal impact far beyond the proposed $2,000 cost per signage. The overnight parking ordinance warrants broader discussion and more thorough consideration than what has been outlined in the agenda. Please leave the overnight parking policy unchanged for now.

Our policy our community faces more important issues that require staff's attention. Thank you very much.

Thank you. Next speaker.

The final speaker on this item is Tim Messer.

Good evening mayor and city council. Tim Messer, 25 resident. My comments are my own not those of any board or group of which I'm a member. I did happen to catch councilman Kelly's Facebook post about this ordinance being considered over the weekend soliciting feedback from residents and acknowledging that there are pros and cons to changing this ordinance. And I think that's important to acknowledge and emphasize that allowing overnight parking is not a universal win for the community.

It may immediately improve life for a subset of people, but I don't believe it improves the community as a whole. I mostly want to echo some of the written comments that were submitted, particularly those from Chris Antucci recognizes some of the challenges with allowing overnight parking in the older parts of town with narrower streets like the historic district near where I live. Streets already have cars that are left for days at a time, particularly around North Central College, even with campus parking supply being added recently. There are multifamily properties in my neighborhood where I would expect cars to start appearing on the street all day every day if overnight parking is permitted. I think allowing overnight parking at all on certain streets around the college effectively permanently reduces the on street parking supply and also reduces the potential for enforcement.

Others have rightly noted that where and then in towns where overnight parking is permitted that garages tend to turn into storage units and streets fill up with cars we know that this happens now and I think it's only going to increase as far as the existing overnight parking program goes it seems to work well for townhome communities. But I have some hesitation about the idea of sticking voluntary HOAs in the older parts of town, which are primarily single family, with the duty of deciding who's worthy of getting a hangtag and who isn't. Once one person gets a hang tag, I think everybody is going to want one for convenience rather than actual need. You're leaving the HOAs to kind of play cops. And then within the boundaries of my neighborhood association, you'd need more than 600 permits.

If the city wants to do this right rather than take the easy route I think they'd have to acknowledge that taking on the administrative burden and the associated staff time and cost would have to be part of this and as Ms. Weitzer has noted, it's not insignificant in towns that have chosen to take this on. I think whatever option is chosen, enforcement is still going to be needed. I think at times this has been lacking during the day in my neighborhood where cars are routinely parked on the street for far more than the four hours allowed by ordinance. I also encourage residents to solve this problem on their own.

I have a neighbor who asked me last summer if he could park on the drive in my driveway on occasion when all of his kids were home from college. I was more than happy to oblige. He offered to pay and I gladly declined. I realize this is a difficult issue. You're not gonna make everyone happy with whatever you decide. But thanks for your time. Thanks for your service to this community. Thank

you. Alright, members of the council. We have before us item o one and the write up and recommendations from our professional staff. Anybody want to start with a conversation about this particular topic? Councilman Wilson. First to go, I guess.

Yeah. I I share a lot of Marilyn's concerns and would tend to agree with most, if not all of her her comments. You know, around the fiscal impact, I would foresee it exceeding the the $2,000 amount just with regard to enforcement, particularly. I could I realize people have called in about this, but I could see people calling in more about it if, you know, it's not done on a particular day. And then exceeding the days, I could I could just see it possibly being overwhelm overwhelming our our police for trying to get it enforced.

So I'd I'd I I guess I just echo a lot of the concerns and sentiment that that Maryland shared. Thank you.

Councilmember McBroom.

Thank you, mayor. So I'll just share my personal experience. I've got drivers at home. I've got we've got four drive or four drivers total, and I've got two car garage, and it can be a pain. We play musical cars in the morning. You know, sometimes one of the boys rolls the dice and leaves the car out in the street, and, you know, I don't pay the ticket. They pay the ticket. But for the most part, we we manage to not park on the street at night. And I but we do have a lot of people who have an issue with this. And I sympathize with it.

I do think that we I'll just say it. I think we have an officer that maybe was more proactive than some of the that we've had in the past in enforcement. And and we had a plethora of complaints about tickets. No. I I would prefer that we have the rule.

I I like the fact that the streets are clean at night. I do think there's risks. I do think that if it's normal to have vehicles on your street, I don't think it's crazy to say it's easier for someone to case a house when it's normal to have a lot of cars on the street, emergency vehicles, things like that. But, you know, I prefer to keep the the the ordinance and and not proactively enforce it, I guess. You know, I I think that it's one of those things where if someone's abusing it and you have a neighbor that's you know, after you've talked to them, they still keep parking behind your driveway.

And they you know, that that's a case where, you know, you contact the city and and then there's enforcement. I think that works well. But it's also not a hill I'm gonna die on. I don't think it's the end of the town if if council has decided to lift it or choose one of these options. I I think probably, you know, some of the suggestions having to go through TAB first, our transportation advisory board first to get up, you know, their thoughts and deliberation and a recommendation from them. And then and then if council did choose, I I one thing I didn't see here is is maybe a maybe a fee, you know, a permit fee to to have that privilege would would be something that could be incorporated. So those are just my thoughts. Thanks.

Councilman Wilson, second round.

Sorry. I forgot. Just to add one more anecdote. Similar to Tim, I do have a neighbor who had parked on the street for significant number of days. And they I think, from my understanding, they consistently got tickets.

They were relatively close to a stop sign and just with kids riding their bikes, walking, it's somewhat hard to see not somewhat. It is hard to see oncoming traffic because there's not a stop sign on the other direction. So I guess to both, you know, Tim and Marilyn's points, I could I could see potential safety hazards being exasperated if it were allowed. So thank you.

Councilman Kelly. Thank you mayor. Echo pretty much everything that councilman Wilson, councilman McBroom said so far. It's a tricky problem because I think on on something like this, we're trying to improve the quality of life for our residents. And and what I'm hearing from a lot of folks is that if you try to improve the quality of life for some people, it might arguably decrease the quality of life for others.

And it's hard to say in which direction it leans if you go with either option one or option two. So I I find it to be a difficult problem. I don't think I'm comfortable with any of the options on the table in front of us tonight. I do think if we're gonna do something, and I'm not sure what that would be, I would definitely want it to go to the transportation advisory board to get some feedback for one on a permitting. I I don't personally see how this could work without some type of permitting system, but I'm not I'm not the one to figure that out.

So I'd like some feedback from staff and or tab on how that could work logistically and financially, what the cost would be for residents, and what the cost to operate it would be for the city. And just in general, at a high level, I'd be interested in more financial information. I mean, got to talk about enforcement in the q and a. The answer came back that there have been, in 2025 there were 9,334 overnight parking citations issued. You know a huge number. Some people could look at that as a revenue generator for the city. What's the cost per citation? I think, Gregor.

Are they 15 or 25? 50, but you can pay 25 at the time.

Yeah. So say just say roughly, say if it was $25, that's, you know, a quarter million dollars in in citation revenue coming in. That might go away, which would be fine. Maybe you'd have the same number because people would still be having citations potentially based on the concept in the in the write up tonight was to alternate sides of the street every night. And I don't know if that's based on other municipalities where they've done that and it works.

If so, I'd like to know a little bit more about that. Just at first glance, that seems to me like that's gonna be ripe for confusion and and problems where you're going to have cars on both sides and you might have emergency vehicle problems and or people just forgetting and getting citations even though they've been told that you can park overnight now. So I think that's right for frustration as well. So if we're gonna do something, and I'm not sure that I want to do anything at all, but if we're gonna do something, I would wanna have all those issues vetted through tab and come back to us with a kind of a menu of options of what we could look at. If council doesn't wanna even do that, it's also not a hill I'm gonna die on to try to do something.

So I'm curious here what the rest of council thinks. I I do think, you know, times have changed economically and and family wise. You do just have people living in more people living in homes, more generations. And so it's kind of a newish problem. And and if it's a problem for the city, we should try to look at solving it. But it's a

tough one. Thank you. Councilman Holzor.

Thank you, Mayor. So I'm going to take a different view here. For me, when it's a close call between government cracking down on people's freedoms and the way they want to live their life versus not, I think we have to have a really good reason why we want to get in the way of what people feel is right for their family and their situation. When I hear that 9334 people were cited in a year, I don't look at that as a cause of celebration, I look at that as a sign that the way people want to live in Naperville is not aligned with what we up here are thinking. I think it's easier for somebody with a three car garage to kind of set a way of life for everybody.

But for those who have a one car garage and two kids in college or people who are just trying to get to their job, I think this is a significant hindrance on their ability to live. I don't feel like you go around America and find the majority of cities have an ordinance like this in place and yet somehow they survive. I think the quarter million dollars of revenue that maybe this generates, if those are paid, I would guess there's probably first of working officers, sworn officers or community service officers to do that work. We're paying legal staff to follow-up on that. I would rather that those people like protecting the community as opposed to citing college kids for parking tickets.

So I you know view this in the same way that I view like other cities are proud that they charge small businesses to do you know permitting fees to start. I'm really proud that as a Naval business owner I don't have to pay that because I think it's stupid. And yeah,

so

I will certainly be voting for allowing you know what's proposed on the agenda thank you mayor

councilman white thank you yeah I've been really bringing this up for a while. I think miss Lauten knows that. I I I recognize that the specifically, family dynamics have just changed. And we're not where we were twenty, you know, thirty years ago, whatever it might be, because a lot of our young adults are coming home to live at home, and it's, you know, it's just the way where where we are right now as as a community. And you can talk about affordability and, you know, how much it cost to buy a house now and jobs on.

That's another issue, but it's it's affected what we're dealing with right now. So I I think something needs to be done. I don't know what the right solution is. We have to recognize, first of all, that I don't think a one size fits all approach is going to work because Naperville is made up of different, you know, types of streets. Different we've got the historic district. We have downtown. We have I live out in South Naperville. The streets are wider down there. So all those things are, as far as I'm concerned, are things that need to be considered. You know, think about speed limits.

Our speed limits aren't the same on every street because it's a different condition and and and different environment and so on. So those are types of things that when it comes to overnight parking, in some places, I think it will work and we're and especially where it's needed. If you're in a tight street, it's probably not going to be something that we should be able to do or from a safety standpoint. I think we can address that revenue piece that came up. It may something to consider would be fees.

If you want to have overnight parking and and and you qualify for it, maybe you pay a $50 fee, whatever that is, and they and that helps to make up for some of that that revenue that was discussed earlier. I I think Marilyn said something about garages and so on and people using their garages for storage when they could be actually putting their cars in. Maybe that's something that should be considered as well as we go forward with this. And I agree. These are some things I think that TAB should be able to help address and help staff out and and give you some feedback on that.

In keeping up and and as part of that coordination with staff, think there's I mean, with TAB, I think there needs to be coordination as well with our HOAs. K? So as we discuss these different neighborhoods in in what makes them special, what makes them different, those HOAs should be able to weigh in as far as what their particular neighborhood looks like. So that's basically my approach for it. I think we need to do something. I'm not for just keeping the where we currently stand because, like I said, those conditions have changed, and I think we just need to to address it to without, like, councilman Kelly said, messing up the quality of life for those individuals where this, doesn't affect them. So all those things need to be considered. Thank you, mayor.

Thank you. And to councilman White's or or excuse me, councilman Kelly's recommendation, I agree that this really needs to be heard at the transportation advisory board, and there should be some public hearings on this particular issue. I heard from a lot of residents over the last week regarding this particular issue. There is a lot of information that some of it's true and some of it's not so true. There's a perception by several of the persons I heard from that they have a right to the space in front of their home and that this ordinance would allow them to use their space in front of their home.

Well, that's not necessarily the case on a public street. You can't reserve space in front of your house. That would be up to whoever got there first. And in some cases, there's people who have four and five cars that would label. They literally wrote me who they would like to park on the street. So there's a lot. I think Mr. Messner brings up a great point that particular college district and the other older parts of town that don't necessarily have the width of the streets to accommodate some of the parking issues could turn into something that we don't necessarily want. And it's certainly worthy of further discussion. But I'd also like to throw into the mix that we do have a lot of ordinances in our municipal code.

And some of those ordinances, the city uses a complaint based system for enforcement. And perhaps this could be one of those that we throw into that category. I know the police department gets overnight parking complaints all the time. And rather than us going out proactively citing for overnight parking, perhaps we respond as a complaint based mechanism just like we do on code enforcement issues. Councilwoman Gibson.

Thank you, mayor Worley. I I agree, especially with councilman Kelly's comments. I think this warrants more discussion. I've also have heard a lot about this from the community just this past week, But also I know councilman White's been bringing this up since last summer. Throughout the year, I often hear.

And one of the compelling arguments for looking into this is that times have changed. There's more multigenerational households, more kids coming back to live at home. So I do think it's worth reevaluating. One of the things I'd like to hear more from staff, maybe the police department, doesn't have to be now, is the safety concerns. What I'm hearing from residents, there seems to be this perception that, you know, it's more dangerous to have cars on the streets, kids darting out in between them.

And I I just wonder if that's really the case. One of the compelling arguments I heard was actually when there's cars on a street, the street's more narrow and it forces drivers to slow down. I know in my neighborhood constant complaints about cars going too fast. So to me, that's kind of a compelling argument. If we have more cars parked, could that actually make our roadways safer?

I don't know. Don't get mad at me for suggesting that, but I would wonder if we could look into that. To Marilyn's comments, I'd love to hear more about what works and doesn't work in other cities. And then I'd also I know in the q and a, we talked about the 9,000 citations, but another interesting number I see in here is 10,776 requests for overnight parking allowances. I just pulled it up.

I know back when I was 16, lived in Lyell, you had to call the police department, the non emergency line, to get permission to park over overnight. Now calling is still an option for those who don't wanna go online, but we actually have a form that makes it really easy to put in your address, your license plate number, and then the police won't take you that night. You can even put three nights. The current overnight code is three nights. Maybe we could explore making it a couple more nights.

I mean, if there's families that want have four cars and that's the issue, you know, if you have five nights that are allowed, it's a little bit burdensome to go online and fill out the request form. But maybe that's a solution that I don't think we're going to a solution that makes everybody happy. But maybe that's an option. So I guess all that rambling is to say, I'd like to look into it more. Maybe tab, maybe more options from staff. But I'm not ready to make a decision tonight. Thanks.

Alright. It sounds like there might be consensus to send this to the TAB Commission and it would require a motion to do so. So Councilman Kelly, you wanna try it?

Sure. Thank you, Mayor. I will move to receive the report and direct staff to to consider the Naperville municipal code all night parking ordinance further with in conjunction with transportation advisory board and city staff at future meeting dates to be determined and second white

so we have a motion and a second to send this issue to tab for public hearings and everything else that goes on there Discussion? Roll call. Holzaur? Aye. Jane?

Aye.

Kelly? Aye. McBroom? Aye. Syed? Aye. White? Aye. Wilson?

Aye. Worley?

Yes. Gibson? Aye.

Motion passes. Nine zero. Item o two.

Item o two is our recommendation to receive the report of funding options for the Indian Community Outreach Organizations twenty twenty six India Day Parade and celebration and direct staff accordingly. There is one written comment posted to the website, and we have eight speakers. The first speaker is Rakhna Prasad, followed by Judith Brothead.

Hello, everyone. My name is Rajnah Prasad, and I've been a CECA commissioner since March of last year. However, today I'm speaking on behalf of myself. By way of background, I spent five years at the Illinois Bureau of Tourism working to evaluate the Illinois hotel motel tax and how it's distributed across Northern Illinois, including Chicago. And these funds were awarded through a competitive grant process that balanced objective criteria with professional judgment.

That experience shaped a core belief I bring to this role. Public funds require transparency, consistency, and a respect for process. While I when I evaluate a process proposal, I look at three things. The strength of the event itself, the organization's ability to execute upon it, and the benefit to the local economy or to the community. I have learned that many events funded through CECA and the city council are deeply meaningful to many people.

They create traditions, celebrations, and community. At the same time, as stewards of tax dollars, an equally important principle is that no event is entitled to funding without proper review. Over the past year, a couple of CECA funded events had to be canceled. In each case, organizers informed, notified staff in writing along with an explanation. That information was then shared with the commission.

In contrast, I learned that the India day parade run by ICO had been canceled through social media. There was no formal communication or reasons provided to staff and no outreach to the commission despite CECA being the event's largest funding source. The issue here is not the cancellation itself, but how that cancellation was handled. When ICO applied again in the 2026 cycle, there were multiple opportunities to address the situation and offer remediations for the challenges it faced within the application, through the staff, or during the commission's q and a process. Those opportunities were not taken.

Given the organization's long history of receiving taxpayer funded support, that lack of engagement is very concerning. This is an organization that understands the process and expectations. The genesis of the India Day event was an attempt to help a growing community find visibility and connection within Naperville. The contribution of this event is very real and the event was and can be a very meaningful cultural celebration. But the landscape has also changed.

In the 2026 funding cycle, Sika reviewed over 80 applications with 12 specifically tied to Indian heritage or culture more than any other group or community. This is evidence of a community highly engaged in Naperville Civic Life. Ultimately, this decision, my decision, came down to accountability and process. Together, we ensure we work hard to ensure that funding decisions are made fairly and not based solely on history, emotion, or entitlement, but on clear and consistent standards. I welcome the future application for iIndia Day that fully engages with the process and allows the event to be evaluated on its merits. But ultimately, public trust depends on a simple principle. The same rules apply to everyone. Thank you.

Thank you. Next speaker.

The next speaker is Judith Broadhead followed by Viral Shah and Vandana Jingan.

Hello. I am Judy Broadhead. And although I have been chair of the Sikh Commission for five years, I'm speaking for myself rather than the commission as a whole. You've heard in previous meetings from the staff about why ICO's application for $398,000 for a combination of the India Day celebration and India Day parade was not recommended. That number was a huge ask since CECA only had $1,200,000 total and, I believe, 88 applications.

So that ask was more than a third of our total funding ability. And giving one organization a number close to that was very unlikely. As you've heard from staff in previous meetings, since it was canceled the previous year despite receiving an allocation, the commission and staff assumed a representative would attend a Saturday meeting where they can speak or be available for questions. Those with large requests typically appear to explain their needs as well as what worked well in previous years and what could be improved. Unfortunately, ICO did not attend.

A number of commissioners raised questions at various public meetings about ICO's proposed budget, but we could not get those answers. The CECA grant process is very different from many applications that nonprofits work on because it requires a combination of in person public meetings and a written online application. It's not a quick process. It takes a period of months. An event that requires substantial city services, like a parade or festival, requires additional meetings with staff so that they can secure a slot on the event's calendar.

There are lots of hoops to jump through because the process is public, and the commission tries hard to make sure the events can really happen and provide the most bang for the taxpayer's buck. The SECA commission as well as the council is aware of the importance of legacy events like the India Day Parade and India Day itself. One solution, this is just mine, although there's a version of it that you'll see in May for the Memorial Day Parade, could be to use some food and beverage funds to make the city services for parades. And for instance, I might suggest including the St. Patrick's Day parade, Memorial Day parade, Labor Day parade, and India Day in that.

And right now, about half of the approximately $2,000,000 in SICA funding is not even reviewed by the SICA commission because those are half of that goes to city obligations. Because of the rising cost of city services as well as other costs, the commission has not been able to fully fund the city services required for some events. The nonprofits receive the estimates that they include in their budgets from the city departments that will provide them, like the fire department or the police department, early in the process. If the estimate turns out to be too low because costs have risen, then the city has covered additional city services. Those organizations are not required to suddenly come up with a larger number for city services beyond the estimates they were The

speaker's time is up.

Thank you. Next speaker.

The next speaker is Viro Shah followed by Vandana Jingan.

Hello, mayor and esteemed members of the city council. I'm here to talk about India Day funding. Much like the previous two speakers, I'm talking in favor of this event. Indian Community Outreach respectfully requests that city support option two, which includes $83,963 in total funding, which is $49,000 from city services and 34,000 for operational expenses, which is less than 8% of our overall cost. Much like and I'm going off script at this point.

The previous speaker did mention that, yeah, our amount that we had requested was large. Yes. There was a reason why it was large because of various additional security requirements that were to be factored in. That's why our budget had gone drastically up. City service number that was given to us initially was also high. When we went back and reworked the numbers as part of this presentation, that number was brought down to 49,000. Much like that, we also brought our operational budgets more in line from from that perspective, which is why the number of 34,000 now represents just less than 8% of our overall cost for the event. India Day is a partnership with the city, as we all know. People prior to me have also acknowledged that. It is not just an ICO event anymore.

It has been a signature event for the city of Naperville and a reflection of the vision established by Mayor Prelude. This is not an entitlement. The city leadership has created a more integrated, inclusive, and culturally vibrant community by supporting this event. It has become one of Naperville's most iconic cultural events bringing together thousands of residents and visitors from all backgrounds. The total cost based on our rework numbers exceeds $400,000 in addition to the and then on top of that is the 49,000 in city service costs alone.

The requested sicker funding represents very small fraction much like I have mentioned already. It is completely free to the public. This is not a ticketed event. There's no admissions fee, and there's no paid entry model either. We raised the entire amount through sponsorships outside of operational support that we get from the city and corporate partners.

Over the years, Anchor sponsors included Patel Brothers, North Central College, Naperville Bank and Trust, which is a WinTrust Bank, Bank of Montreal, Mall of India, and many other businesses and organizations that believe in the value of this event. The last year, ICO was awarded $91,000 through Sika. Yes. We did get the funding. However, ICO was unable to execute India Day.

Now one of the speakers did say that, oh, we had not provided an explanation, and she just saw it on Facebook or social media. I think she didn't say Facebook. We did tell the city the coordinator that because of these additional requirements, there is no way we are gonna be able to execute. This was brought up in April or May itself when the police department had put the requirement for getting fencing and metal detectors in place. So I'm surprised that that information was not passed over. Thank you.

Thank you. Next speaker.

The next speaker is Vendana Jingen followed by Marilyn Schweitzer and Arthur Zards.

Next speaker.

Marilyn Schweitzer.

Good evening. Please choose option three, zero funding for the twenty twenty six India Day event. Years ago, city council chose to step away from evaluating and voting on individual requests. It shifted that responsibility to the SECA commission, which has struggled to develop balanced and clearly understood policies for grant applications. It has been and continues to be a bit of a mess, though there have been exceedingly good intentions.

Staff notes indicated in the February 17 agenda, city council, quote, no longer reviews applications or individually recommends funding prior to approval. So why is city council now potentially recommending funding for an individual organization after the fact? Is this a troubling precedent, and at this point, is an affront to the SECA commission? Rather than continually waving on just wavering on discussions excuse me. Rather than continually wavering on decisions regarding CECA, city council should reclaim some oversight.

It should thoroughly evaluate how over 2,500,000 of in food and beverage tax revenue is allocated regardless of whether the funding is categorized as an obligation or a grant. Acting on whim and showing favoritism towards certain groups or topics is neither good governance nor sound policy, nor is the lack of sufficient attention to these funds. Thank you very much.

Thank you. Next speaker.

The final three speakers are Arthur Zards, Munish Kaithsa, and Badrush Patel.

Council members, mayor. I'm Arthur Zards, long term resident, founder, executive, administrator of TEDx Naperville, and a CECA commissioner. And tonight, I'm speaking on my behalf. A number of years ago, daughter was trying out for the volleyball team for Lincoln Middle School. And we're out by the Santana Beach playing volleyball.

And this is in August, and we heard like a thump, thump, thump of music. And after we're done practicing volleyball, we went out to the Rotary Hill, and we discovered on our own the Indian Day celebration. It was an amazing experience, the sound, the smells, the culture. And I remember telling my daughter, this is what makes Naperville so special. And because I care so much about this event and what it represents, I wanna share some prepared remarks about the recommendation I made as a seeking commissioner.

And it pained me to recommend $0 for the ICO outreach organization for the event. I made the decision carefully based on the information available to me and the consistent standards I apply in an evaluating funding request. I take seriously my responsibility to protect taxpayer dollars to ensure that events are prepared to succeed and apply those standards fairly across all applicants. This year, more than 80 organizations requested funding, and my duty is to steward these resources responsibly. I also want to clarify one important point.

After last year's event was canceled, I personally reached out to Mr. Krishna, who is in charge of the the point of contact for the ICO, to understand what happened, and we had a direct conversation. During that conversation, we discussed the cancellation of the event, and I understood that security and fencing were only part of the reasons that was given to me. Other factors were mentioned but not fully explained. I also explained that when an event is canceled, that these funds cannot be redirected to other organizations.

Ultimately, they ultimately return to the city's general budget. Following that conversation, I met with the chief of police to better understand security planning for community events. The discussion reinforced my confidence that our city has a thoughtful, structured, and timely approach to event safety. Our recommendation ultimately reflected ongoing concerns about communication and whether the planning and budget were proportionate to a request of a significant size, 30% of the entire CECA budget. These concerns remain unresolved. I want to celebrate I want this celebration to succeed in our community. My decision was not about the value of the event, but about readiness, accountability, and responsible stewardship of public funds. Thank you.

Thank you. Next speaker.

The next speaker is Munish Kesa, followed by Badresh Patel.

Hi. So Monisha to leave for an emergency, so I'm going to speak on behalf of him. So my name is Isha, and I wasn't prepared to speak today.

Ma'am, I don't

Can we

not? You weren't signed up

He just had to leave.

Yeah, that's not allowed, unfortunately.

The final speaker is Badrush Patel.

Good evening, mayor, distinguished council people. My name is Badrush Patel, twenty seven year resident of Naperville, longtime volunteer, part of the organization for for ICO. And I'm just here to kinda speak from my heart, and and I am one to truly believe in process. I believe process is is valuable in in all things that that that are being created from a from a community perspective. But I think in this particular case, the Indy Day celebration and parade has always been, and it's been collectively, it's been spoken for for many times in front of this this community, that it's been a community partnership with the city.

And when when I hear partnership, that partnership started from a from a time back when mayor Pradle really felt there was an opportunity to help bring our two communities together, help parts of the community better understand who the Indian community was and vice versa. Since then, the the amorphous of what this has been what this has created to me has been one of the the the key signature components of what's made Naperville, you know, the the number one city to live in this country. I mean, we've gotten that award repeatedly year after year after year because this event is not only it's not secluded to Naperville alone. It's been widely attended by folks outside of the Naperville area, by our joining states, and people outside of this country. People outside of this country have spoken to me when I've traveled, and they said, oh, you're from Naperville.

I saw Naperville because we got to see the parade. Got to see the activities that were going on. We see that Naperville is an inviting community. So I wanna remind that listen. We are here because we've the $0 allocation was a bit of a surprise. We're asking that that be revisited and see if there's the opportunity to to bring the the the festivities back to Naperville to continue to showcase to the the community and to the rest of the world outside of Naperville that Naperville is supportive of what we've tried to do. Thank you.

Thank you. Councilman McBrew. Thank you, mayor. I was

just curious. Am I able to motion to allow the other young lady to to speak?

Yeah, so we would need a majority of council members to allow the speaker who is replacing another speaker to speak. So those in favor of allowing the woman who I said couldn't speak to speak, signify by raising your hand. Okay, ma'am, if you want to come back to the podium, we will authorize you to speak. And you'll have three minutes as a reminder.

Okay. Thank you so much.

And state your name for the record, please.

Yeah, so my name's Isha. And I know I wasn't prepared to speak today, but since before all those people before me have kind of given you the facts, I kind of wanted to just give my experience with this event. And around two years ago when we had our last India Day, I actually emceed the event and I opened the event by reminiscing our ten year anniversary. And I kind of mentioned that that was when the iPhone five just came out. And this year, we're celebrating the iPhone 15.

And what a long way we have come. So I have genuinely grown up with this event. And those of you who have attended in the past may have seen how involved I am and how I genuinely look forward to it every year. It has shaped my career, my interest. It is actually the reason why I am in the work that I am in today and I do hope that it continues to inspire others in the future.

So throughout the past eleven years, I have also left Naperville. I have went to college. I've went to different cities for work. And this has been a constant in my life. And I've been able to get so many different friends from cities, from places around the country, and even around the world to come and experience this event and see that a city like Naperville can have such a huge, a beautiful, and a community focused event that's also completely free and so unheard of anywhere else in the world.

While I don't doubt that this event will continue to be successful anywhere that it would be, I do hope that we are able to carry this long tradition of having it in my hometown as well as my team and all my family's hometown. I can give you numerous other reasons why and how good this event has done for me and for the city, but I do wanna say that for the 14 year old girl that was able to experience such a grand event celebrating my culture, my community, to see that same city that was able to give me and so many like me a feeling of pride and hope and just so much happiness, To deny our funding is truly heartbreaking, and I do hope that this doesn't happen. I also do hope that we do have this event this year and in Naperville, and I'm able to announce the future releases of the iPhones and for many years to come as I was able to do past years. So thank you so much for your time.

Thank you. Any more speakers? Council?

Councilman Alzar. Thank you mayor. With regard to the final way that council wants to go on this, I've actually got an open mind and I really want to hear what my colleagues have to say. I had a couple of big picture thoughts which I hope are carried forward for future years. One is I wonder if in the future, and I think former councilman Brodhead brought this up, but maybe India day could be thought of more in the framework that we think of like Memorial Day.

Know when I don't when I think of Memorial Day I think we're gonna do a parade and I think there's gonna be events but I don't think there's like one organization where it's just make or break the entire weight of it falls on that one organization and then if that one organization has an issue with a request to CECA or something like that, that it's going to make Naperville not have a Memorial Day parade. So whether that's involving multiple organizations, noticed that Varol and Mr. Shah pointed out that it's not just an ICO event. Maybe we explicitly kind of point out in the future we're going to have an India Day parade but it could be four or five organizations that are sharing that so that maybe we don't have a repeat of what's happened in the last two years. And I am interested also in the point of having maybe a food and beverage tax allocation.

I thought that was an interesting point that Councilman Broadhead brought up. But the big picture thing I would say is maybe long term we can just be thinking about how to make this event sustainable without resting on just kind of like like having a one legged table where everything just depends on one thing. So thank you mayor.

Thank you councilman room.

Thank you mayor agree with all that councilman holzhauer I think I mentioned that last time that you know certain things that maybe we don't want to risk them getting a zero maybe they should be city obligations I appreciate the SECA commissioners coming tonight and those that aren't here. This is my new business to bring forward, so I kinda wanna defend it. In in in my new business, I didn't I didn't suggest that that that nobody made mistakes. And and we've had conversations about that. That's you know, I I think the timing of the review on CECA is timely.

You know, I I I think that, you know, this is maybe an example of of something that could be cleaned up or communication breakdowns or ambiguities or and, you know, so I think mistakes were probably made. You know, do do Sika applicants ask for more than than what they think they're gonna get? That that happens all the time. I mean, I think mayor mentioned that. I mean, that's maybe gonna be a discussion when we talk about, you know, if you know you only need 25, why are you asking for 50?

You know, I I think that the communication, there had to have been maybe some maybe the truths in the middle as commissioner Zard mentioned. He did talk to at least last year. Krishna Banswell can can get a hold know, people can get a hold of him. So, know, I I find it hard to believe for for an event this big that they're just that someone would have denied a meeting or a phone call or or, you know, it could be Donner. Just maybe the effort wasn't there to, you know, anybody can you know, Viral would take a a meeting and answer questions.

I don't think anyone would have ignored that request. So but, you know, I understand the precedent. You know, I I understand the concerns, but I just I just elevate this event to a a different level. I mean, it you know, Sika does fund and and give grants to Indian American groups. This is the biggest one. This is their biggest celebration. This is hugely important to a huge demographic in in our community. I don't wanna see another town get this event. And and I think there's a risk of that happening. It'll show up in Oak Brook or Aurora, and then it'll never come back here.

So, you know, as far as reviewing CECA and making changes, you know, that's what we're gonna do moving forward right now. We're working under, you know, what what we have now. I don't wanna lose this event. You know? And I I don't think it's an affront to someone said to the Sikha commissioners.

I think you're hardworking. You do your job. I I do think maybe there was an under appreciation for how important this event is is to all of our community and and really specifically to our our largest immigrant population in Naperville. So, you know, I I'm I'm gonna be supporting, you know, giving them the allocation that they would have gotten last year, you know, the city services and the and the operations as well. Moving forward, I think that's gonna be a discussion.

Do we give out operations? Do we give out cash anymore? So but, you know, I think it's important enough, you know, for a city that talks about inclusion all the time. I do I do think that that it would be a bad look if we if we if we give a zero and we don't have any a day here for our largest immigrant population. So I don't want them to be punished for mistakes that probably some of the leadership made at at ICO. So thank you.

Any other council discussion? Councilwoman Gibson.

Sure. Thank you, mayor. I echo all the comments about what a valuable event this is. I know it's been in our community for a long time, and I'm grateful for all the years of work you've put into India Day in celebrating in our community. I think, you know, it's one of the reasons we have CEQA, the one young woman that came to speak.

These are really meaningful. They're community building events. And we're really lucky in our community that we have so many groups and so many events. 88 groups that came to CEQA looking for funding. So, you know, my thoughts on this are not tied to India Day itself, but more to what I heard from the SECA commissioners about process and equity when we're dealing with public funds. CECA process isn't perfect. I know we've discussed on this dais about reviewing it. I believe next meeting we're gonna get a report on that. But it is pretty thorough. So my preparation for tonight was going back and really digging into the process, listening to the CECA meetings where this was discussed.

There was a Saturday meeting where all the groups presented and made their case. And a lot of the stuff I heard tonight including, you know, the reworking that maybe we need less money than we originally said, it's that would have been a really helpful discussion to have with the CECA commissioners. So that way, in the process of this pot of $1,200,000, it could be equitably be equitably discussed between the 88 applicants. The December meeting where CECA actually discussed the allocations and set the allocations, it was also discussed on the dais that if a group was unhappy with allocations, they could come speak to counsel before the February 17 meeting. So being involved in the CECA process, you know, that that also was mentioned multiple times.

All my colleagues up here, we all voted for the CECA funding on February 17. So, you know, I would have hoped that we had seen that allocation number. So it seems a little unfair to the other groups that didn't get any funding to now, you know, months later come back and question the process. So I would like this event to stay. But I think in terms of good governance, I think it sets a dangerous precedent to give individual groups post decision to changing the process we do have for individual groups. I don't think that's equitable to the other members of our community.

Councilman Kelly. Thank you mayor. So on this one I'll echo everything councilwoman Gibson just said. I think all of that is absolutely correct that we all, everybody in the community and everybody on council values the event to a significant degree and we also value the commissioner's work and and honest thoughts. It takes a lot for them to get up here.

It takes a lot for them to do their jobs in general, but to come up tonight and talk about a specific event in a way that typically we don't see. Takes a lot. It also takes a lot from ICO to come in after the fact and kinda hat in hand and and maybe, you know, just trying to salvage their event. I will say I I wish I would have heard a little bit more tonight about maybe some answers to some of the questions that the commissioners raised. We heard a lot of good things about the event itself and I don't think anybody questions the value of the event and what it would be and what it has been.

I thought maybe tonight was an opportunity to hear a little bit more that it was what it was assuaged some of the concerns about the viability of the event regardless of what the amount may or may not be from counsel. And I I didn't really hear that. You know? So there was December. There was February. Now there's last month and and tonight. And I think there's still some of those questions that haven't been totally addressed. Having said that, I do think that the practical realities are are concerning. You see totally aside from India, Jay, just in general, I mentioned the last meeting events are going by the wayside, but parades in particular. You know, we lost the holiday parade in Naperville this year.

I saw a neighboring town, the Swedish Day Parade was on life support in Geneva. And last second, that came back around in a very smaller way, may or may not come back in the future. These these events and parades in particular are getting harder and harder to run. And I think if you take two years off, it's even that much harder to come back the next year. I, you know, I've I was before being on council helped with Saint Patrick's Day parade, Labor Day parade, and those things are not easy, and they were a lot less expensive then than they are today.

So I am I am pretty sensitive to the risk of in particular with the prey that it might not come back if it doesn't happen again. And I also do think there is something to be said for I think there's two very different buckets between the city services and the operation expense for a variety of reasons. But one important practical reason for the city is that the city services dollars really just come right back to the city. You know, it's not money out of pocket. It's coming from food and beverage tax going into a different bucket.

But it's silly that city dollars that we are charging event organizers to have their event, and then we get the money right back from them. So it's not really a hit to the city. And that doesn't solve for some of the process concerns we heard that are very valid. So I I struggle to even give anything, but what I would be comfortable with myself would be some award of city services so that we can try to ensure that at least from the city's perspective, we are not an impediment to the parade happening at least this year. What that exact amount would be, I'm not totally sure when you go through the seek allocations for '26.

Pretty much, I I don't think it may be with only one or two exceptions, almost every event that requested city services did not get a 100% of the city services that were requested. Even the Memorial Day parade, maybe the ultimate legacy event in Naperville did not get a 100% of their city services. And to a couple council members points that maybe is something we should look at, I think, when we when we have this overall discussion. You know, if we're gonna have only three or four or five parades in the town, in the city that says we love a parade, maybe we've gotta fund our portion of that city services for security. So but this year, we're not doing that.

Almost every other event is taking some haircut. So I don't think I'm comfortable with the full city services when any other event isn't getting it to say we'll give you a 100% after the fact in a in a one event scenario doesn't seem quite right. But I would be comfortable with giving something between the parade city service amount and the combined city service amount for the parade plus India day is where I can live with. So I don't know where the rest of council is, but that's that's where my thinking is at the moment. Thank you.

Thank you. Councilman Wilson.

Thank you mayor. Yeah. I'd I'd like to sort of echo a previous thing that councilman Holzhauer said where perhaps looking into the future, this would be a good idea to put this into another, you know, category like you had said with regard to Saint Patrick's Day and and other events and such. You know, that being said, I guess just dealing with the the current issue, you know, sort of echo councilman McRoom's comments. Just, you know, the Sika commissioners are certainly hardworking and really appreciate their their their service.

You know, that being said, I'm I'm sure mistakes were made. And I don't know, both sides, I guess, like council member Broom said. I I I guess I kind of view this, like approving this would, in my view, would not set a precedent just because I view this as a unique category similar to making its own thing. And, you know, certainly, you know, just echoing people's comments, like councilman Kelly said, if if it were to go away, it to me, it would seem harder to do it in the future, particularly lapsing. Guess this would make it two years now.

So I'd I'd certainly be in favor of of supporting the the whole amount to make sure it is is operational. So, yeah, that's my comments on it. Just a yeah. Thank you, mayor.

Councilwoman Jane.

Thank you, mayor. I really appreciated mister Zard's comments today in acknowledging the value. I think everybody up here is trying to make this event happen somehow because we know its value and I think that speaks a lot to ICO's hard work to bring something that people have never seen. I know for me, it's always been a special day. But at the same time, if we are making an exception here, I want us to be really explicit as to what puts this event in a different category that recognizes an exception.

Former Councilwoman Brad had mentioned, used the phrase legacy event. How do we define that? Would we put India Day into that category? Those are some of the things that are on my mind as we're thinking about process and precedent because I know Swadesi Mela also came and asked for a revisit what differentiates their ask versus ICO's ask. I think we can make arguments for why that may be different or not. But I think we need to be very, very intentional with carving that exception if we were to apply it here.

Councilman Syed. Thank you mayor.

I want to hear from the staff about the process from August till date and then I wanted to have my comments. Jake? City staff, Jake. Yep.

Jake. Jake, theatre of special events coordinator. We are in the process of Sika. Sika applications open in September for the next year. So for example, September 2025, Seeker applications open for 2026.

In October, they closed. That led us to our next step in November 2025 where we mentioned that is the the meeting on Saturday where applicants can come to council chambers and discuss their application. The next meeting followed by that is that December 11 meeting where the unified recommendation recommendations take part. And then the last point on our important dates that's listed on our website is typically between January and February is when those allocations are approved by city council.

Thank you so much, Jake. Can I have the representative from ICO? Any one person who can answer or take the questions.

Mr. Shah? Yeah.

First of all, thank you so much to all the speakers who are supporting our, know, sharing the facts and everything. Thank you to the commissioners who have spent their time today to come and speak. ICO, thank you so much for coming today and speaking. Absolutely. So, mister Veral, what is the budget you have applied for?

So what we had applied for was I I don't have the exact numbers with me, but it was, I think, north of $600,000. Okay. At that time, from an application perspective.

Yeah. And how much you have raised as of now?

So as of right now, we are at about 175,000.

So you have already raised? Yeah. Okay. And why it took so much long time to come to city council?

Alright. So I'll go from a historic perspective. Usually, once we've attended the initial SIGA, the workshop, after that when it comes down to November or December over the past twelve years, maybe not the first two or three years, if there were any questions because it's a cookie cutter approach at this point. Right? Every year, it's the same event except for one time when the location changed for us.

It's a cookie cutter event. So usually, we've never had to come back and re explain the entire event because everybody from a staff perspective as well as from a commissioner's perspective knew what to expect. So what used to happen is whenever there was a question asked by commissioners, city staff would basically email either Krishna or myself or sometimes both of us and say that, hey, these are the questions that the commissioners have. We would basically respond in an email itself explaining the piece. And there was in the initial years, we they were asking us to come in, but after that, we were not asked to come in.

So we can sort of assume that that that was the same process that was gonna happen this year as well. So that takes us to the December 1. The $0 allocation did catch us by surprise. We did not notice that until actually the day of the council the city council meeting itself. So once that was approved by city council, Krishna had sent an email in February itself to city manager, miss Krueger, and the mayor requesting a meeting so that we could basically talk about what happened and, like, we were completely shocked from from that $0 allocation.

We did not actually were I if I'm not mistaken and mister Kruger tell Kruger, correct me if I'm wrong, but it took us till March to actually get a meeting set up with the mayor and the city manager. And at that point, that was, I think, I wanna say it was late in March or the last week of March when we met and we talked about it. And they said, okay. You need to come into the next city council meeting, which was on April 4, which is why the timeline is as expanded as it is. Just because we were not able to get meetings together to to meet and figure out what we needed to do because we didn't know that we were supposed to come and talk to begin with.

Okay. Fine. Thank you so much. I know ICO very well. I have attended many parades and I have seen how the community come together for such events. I love events. The people who knows me, they know I had done so many events. And there have been 84 applicants who has applied for this, Sika. And on December meeting, almost 90% of the people were there. I met with those people. I heard them. And the person who has applied for 400,000 Sika funding, that application was not there. So a lot of commissioners, they had a lot of questions just because last year you have canceled this event. Yeah. And that has trigger the commissioner to ask a lot of questions.

Sure.

But nobody was there. I was there in that meeting even I had a lot of questions so that I can get a question. Based on that we all can take it forward, but there was nobody. So my only concern is, Biral, that such a signature event, you all have carried for so many years. And last two years, things have completely changed. As a leader in the community, it's a signature event for you, for the community, every Indian community. Everybody looks forward for it. I was looking forward last year to attend this event and you know, it was cancelled. This year again I was looking forward to attend this parade and the event. Again, know, we got into this situation.

So how do we manage this for future events? What is a guarantee that, you know, this will not happen again?

So from if you were to talk about the history of the event, if you look at it starting 2015, the only year where we did not have a mega event other than last year was during COVID times, at which point, even though COVID was on, we were able to at least do a parade. It was a small parade that happened through two neighborhoods, but we at least did something from that perspective which shows the commitment of the organization to doing an event that's of quality. If you've noticed from 2015, each year, the event has become bigger, bigger, bigger, bigger. Right? All the way up until except for last year, the year prior.

I mean, you've seen the crowds. We've you can see any picture at any point in time. We are a volunteer organization that's able to pull all of this off without any extra funding from the admissions perspective. No participant is coming in or the people who are attending, no attendee is paying anything for it. So from I understand.

I'm getting to your point. Right? So last year, in April, when we met with the city so like I think one of the commissioners did mention that from a from a meetings perspective, come March or April, a bunch of meetings start getting set up. There are tons of tabletop meetings that happen. And in each of those tabletop meetings, we go through each department, fire, police, park district, to talk about what issues need to be covered for the most part.

We talk about and there's also post event we have a debriefing session to say, what happened? What worked? What did not work? So on and so forth. So in April or March or April of last year, that's when we were informed by the police department that, hey, this last year your event was was big.

We have concerns. We would like you to put a fence around it. And we need you to have metal detectors to to check, you know, people going in and out of the park. And we would also need you to have a clear back policy because now that's become a standard across all events from a Naperville perspective. So when we found out about it, and I believe Don, Krishna, you and I had had that conversation at City Hall itself right after that meeting, that there is no way because the pricing that we had gotten for fencing, metal detectors, additional security, as well as imagine the lines of we've got 10,000 people that show up to our event.

We are gonna have three ingress egress points which means you have to have multiple metal detectors at each of these points. You've got to think about the food vendors. Are we gonna scan all the food carts that are coming in because they're gonna prepare food off-site and bring it in? There was no way we could raise another $120,000 in April for an event that's happening in three months.

Fine. My Okay. Let's move forward with this So you have asked for 8% of your total budget. So by chance, city council does not approve. What will be your stand? Like how do you move forward? Forward?

So we are essentially gonna have to go to another city where we might be able to get the support that we are looking for. And I'll I'll I'll give you I'll play all my cards here. So Oak Brook, like I think councilman McRoom mentioned. So Oakbrook Police Department does not have any fencing requirements. They're okay with an event of our size.

Right? They've got their park district, and the police is able to support the event of our size. From an Aurora perspective, we've already started having conversations with River Edge Park. It is fenced, but it comes with the facility itself. And so basically, we've got this we are also starting to talk to other places so that we know where do we stand because come this meeting or whenever, you know, the city council decides to make that decision, we need to know what our options are. We want to do the event no matter what. Right? Like we've got to make that event happen. Our hope is that we can actually perform those functions here in the city where we know what we are doing and we've done this, you know, for ten years.

Fine. Thank you so much, Firal. So my on my my the thing is, you know, like I love we all love having events in Naperville. We don't want to lose any event because of Sika City or any other reason, definitely, you know. But we have the best commissioners on Sika.

One of the finest commissioners I met there with rich experience who have been engaged in the community for twenty five years, thirty years, who have served on different positions. They have spent six months reviewing your application and other 84 applications. And out of that applications, around six people have got zeros. And rest of them, they all got it because they have done their homework, they came, they spoke, they answered all the questions, everything was perfect. Only the six we missed, we were not able to fund those people and all those things. How fair it is to fund only to you and not to fund to rest of the five units?

Right. So I wanna answer that question in in two question form. Right? As an organization that's based on volunteers, we don't believe in lobbying. And I believe that that should not be the case for any organization. We shouldn't be expected to lobby commissioners or council folks to say that, hey, hey, my event is coming. Hey, can you please support my event and make sure that I get some funding? That should not be the case. Right? Your point is valid that yes, we did not come.

Now traditionally, we've not gone to the to those sessions because we don't wanna waste anybody's time by taking up time to speak about the event that everybody's already known about, which is okay. It's our mistake. We should have showed up. We should have known. But when somebody says that, oh, we were not able to reach the organization, I do have a problem with that statement. I am available 247. Krishna is available 247. Everybody knows, including city folks, whenever we've received an email, we've responded to those emails. If somebody had said, hey. We have questions. Can you please come and attend this? We would have 100% been there. So it is surprising that when commissioners are saying that, oh, I personally tried to reach Krishna and Krishna was not reachable. I I don't I cannot believe that statement, unfortunately.

I I respect commissioners. Yeah. I I stand with my commissioners who have been in the community, serving this community, serving the city. So fine. That's it. Thank you so much. Absolutely.

Councilman White. Any other questions or You can stay

there please, Mr. Shah. I appreciate it. I guess for me, I'm not I mean, the event, we all appreciate what the event brings to the community and all that. For me, it is it is about process.

Given that the event I mean, you all are asking for maybe basically a third of the overall amount of money that is in that CECA has been allocated. I'm I'm finding it hard to understand why you guys would not go to those meetings. I mean, you said you didn't wanna be lobby lobbying. Essentially, that's what you're doing right now, though. You're lobbying the the city council.

Yes. And it's it's not going to those meetings is not a lobby. It's it's the responsibility of the organization that's requesting that amount of money to be there to answer questions to for you to ask questions in case you don't understand something. So I'm not I'm not I know I just I'm I'm just not getting that piece of it. I mean, you guys had a responsibility as the leaders of the organization to be there to just for that.

And and we and because of we weren't there, we're finding ourselves in this position right now. Right. Councilman Kelly mentioned it before. I would I was kinda hoping to hear some concerns or get you all to address some of those concerns from the from the process standpoint.

Yep.

Yes. I I I don't I mean, I don't know if anyone's available 20 47. So I get your you're saying that you guys did not get messages, but I also know that at least two commissioners specifically said they reached out and just not did not hear back. So that's that's concerning for me. I know I don't know if councilman meant McBroom meant to say it this way, but, he mentioned that the events underappreciated maybe by the that that's that's so far from the truth.

I think everyone appreciates the event. I just wanna make sure that we all understand that. And it took you how long did it take to meet meet with the the mayor after the December decision? You said it took almost three months to meet with No. We well, I'll just say mayor, but city leadership is you couldn't get

So we sent out the note to the mayor's office, I'm gonna say, in February, at the end of February after the meeting had happened. And we met with the mayor's office and mister Krieger at the end of March, and that's when the April 4 meeting was the next one available for us to come and talk. Okay.

Okay. I think I see mister Myers Tom back there. I know he's one of the commissioners. Can can I have him?

Sure. Thank you. Can we hear from Tom? If he's willing. Mister Myers, do you wanna come up for you?

Yes, sir.

Yeah. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Myers. So a question a lot of questions have been around the process and so on. I'd like to hear your perspective as far as how that process went as a SICA commissioner.

Well, it's a, I think, a very well defined process. As stated, we have a mandatory meeting in which we tell everyone, here's the rule and here's how you're gonna present your application. Everyone has to be at that meeting. And I think everyone was, right, Jake? Everyone attended the mandatory meeting back in the fall.

And then from that point on, those applications are then distributed to the commissioners who start to review the various request. And at that point, we have a meeting in December here in the council in which we have the opportunity to ask questions of those organizations. And they also have three minutes to kinda give a quick synopsis of their event. The India Day group did not show as you've heard. My my biggest question there is we made recommendations in December, and it's public, what was the result of the allocations, and it was a zero.

And then it came all the way to the council. It was still a zero. The council approved it. Still, no one from ICO was there to defend that. Now all of a sudden, the last minute, they're in requesting support. So my biggest concern is it's a slippery slope. I think we've already had one other organization that said, they're going to get some funding, then we want to get some more funding. It's a concern. I, too, like the event. I've been supporting it from the bank in the past.

I've attended the event. I was sorry that it didn't happen. I think it's unfair that that group has put you and put the Sika Group in this position. We shouldn't have to be here because that organization didn't follow along. And I think it's unfair to put that burden on the city council at this point to amend it. Did I answer your question? Absolutely. Thank you, mayor. Anybody else have a question? Okay. Thank you.

Councilman Alzer, our second round.

Thank you, mayor. Very briefly, yeah. I I appreciate commissioner Myers' points. The discussion of the importance of process, when we're talking about something like allocations from CECA, I think what we're talking about is laying a foundation to build upon. And when the foundation is frankly this horribly set, it kind of reminds me of the discussion we had about Century Walk a few years ago where instead of answering some fundamental questions, just allocated money and then years later we were still undoing the problems that came with that.

I was trying to count basically votes as I was listening. I don't have this mathematically figured out but by my count this may get a zero. So I would float out there that with regard to what Councilman Kelly said, I would be comfortable with funding city services but only for the parade. As I mentioned at the last meeting, as an April JC, I know what it's like to organize both a parade and event. Think it's not feasible to try to shoehorn in an event when already the planning has been this delayed up to this point.

So the amount I'd be comfortable with if it gets to five, it would be 20, I'm sorry, $24,738 which is what would fund the parade. So thank you mayor.

Councilwoman Jane, second round.

Thank you mayor. A question for mister Viral Shah, if I could ask. Mister Shah, I know there were several options presented to counsel. And then a fourth option that Councilman Kelly offered. Of those floating four options right now and also Councilman Holzelser presented, Is there an option in there that would guarantee it happening in Naperville since you're looking elsewhere?

Or if we do agree to 25 ks or 49 ks, is that still gonna meet your needs to do it here? Or has decision already been made?

No. The decision has not been made. But at the same time, I do know that if we have to pay the full city service amount and the other $34,500 that's just basically going to increase the burden on us to raise that much more, which means we are looking at another 35 plus 24, so another $60,000 on top of the overall 400,000 that we have to raise. Right? So there was a year where whatever allocation was given and all the money that we had raised, we as volunteers had to pay out of a pocket.

We had to land up paying about $1,800 per board member times 22 board members that we had at the time to basically fill the void. So now the question becomes that we as a volunteering organization, should I put the burden on my board members to fill that void or not? So again, like I said, the decision has not been made but it would be extremely difficult for us to raise another 60,000 on top of what we have to already raise. I mean if, you know, purses have gotten tighter over the past few years. We've been lucky enough where Patel Brothers has been our, you know, grand sponsor year after year.

But to get an additional $60,000 that you know, 2,500 or $5,000 from a sponsorship perspective, I've got to get another 15 people lined up to be able to give me another $5,000 per organization. It's going be extremely hard. So I cannot guarantee that it'll happen if you just give me the city service money for the parade. But we haven't made a decision that yes, if it's not the 83 then we are going to do the event in Naperville at all. We do want to figure out where we'll land up.

Yeah, I guess my question is trying to get to if an amount is given like 25 ks, is that going to help you at least better than a zero, right, move forward given the process and all the things that were discussed, right, the alternative being a zero, that be enough to keep it in Naperville or is is that not gonna,

you know, I don't kind of think what I'm gonna happen. And I'll I'll be honest, right, we cannot do just the parade in Naperville and do the the concert and the rest of the things in a in a different city. It has to go together because it's a day long event. There's no way for us to slice and dice it from that perspective. Right? So and just doing the parade by itself, it's, you know, it's it's a day long celebration. By just doing a parade in in the morning for two hours, people were coming and and, you know, we have got a lot of people that come from outside of Naperville. It's they they come for the entire day's festivities. They come for the food. They come for the concert. And now if you're not gonna be able to to do all of that, it's gonna be an extremely hard spot to be in.

So there's no interest in just doing the parade if finances?

We've not talked about just doing the parade and canceling the rest of it. That we've not discussed it internally. That's something that we will have to discuss before I can give you a 100% answer on that.

Okay. Thank you.

Councilwoman Gibson, second round.

Thank you, mayor. I was just hoping for clarification from staff. In option one, the funds listed for city services, that's the full requested amount, correct? The 24,738 for the parade? It's the full requested amount.

The 24,738, that's the amount provided, I believe, from the special events staff for what their estimates for city services would be.

And then For

the parade.

Clarify on something councilman Kelly said. Is it correct that the other events that got city services funding, we didn't fund most, if not all of them at a 100%? They all got less than they asked for for city services as well?

Correct.

Okay. So I would have concerns with giving a 100% of the city services funds to a group outside of the process when all of the other groups went through the process. You know, I'm sympathetic to a volunteer organization having to, you know, the burden of filling that gap. But every other group that's gone through the Sika process is also a volunteer organization that is funding that gap. So I would not support that. Thanks.

Councilman Kelly, second round. Thank you, mayor. I thought maybe it's time to start pressure testing some ideas on this, if that's all right

with you. Yes.

I'd just

like to get a couple of comments in before you So do back at the last meeting, mentioned that this is a event that has been very successful over the last several years. And the success of the event is what ultimately drove the decision last year from the police department to require more public safety elements to be inserted into the event. I was invited in part of the special events meeting where that information was shared with the organizers of ICO. It was it was a significant surprise, I think, to the extent of what the requirements were. And they wanted to discuss that at length.

We had meetings afterwards. And had it not been for those increased security requirements, I think the event probably would have gone on as was originally planned in 2025. And you're nodding your head, mister Shah. Would that be accurate?

Yes, that would have been accurate. Because we had already raised funds for it as well. Yeah.

Right. So think there is some legacy to this event. It's gone on for a long time. If it was not a successful event, if it was a failing event, there was declining attendance, or anything else, we wouldn't be here right now. Right?

I mean, it would be a totally different thing because we wouldn't be having the security question. We wouldn't have a lot of this here I'm before the also a believer in that the original intent behind the food and beverage tax back in 2004 when Councilwoman Ellington brought it to the city council was to provide for city services for these large scale special events. Not to provide operational costs and subsidize events, but to cover the costs of police, fire, public works so that these organizations could go out, do their thing, leverage their fundraising, and then donate back into the community and create even more good. I thought it was really an outstanding step in the right direction from a woman who I had a real great appreciation for how she thought about things in the city. So with that in mind, my philosophy on all of these CECA grants for special events is that we should only be in the city services business.

That's the one thing that we can control. I mean, have the city employees. We pay the city employees. And we can ensure that they get paid. And we don't have to worry about organizations taking operational funding. And maybe they gave a contract to a relative or something else that we can't control. So with that in mind, I think I'd be supportive of the city services funding. Basically, it was option one on our recommendations here from city staff. And Councilman Kelly, I was just going to take kind of a straw poll amongst the council members as far as where people were on the different options. Is that fair to what you

were thinking as well? Yeah, yeah. I was ready to make a motion even if you wanted that. But if you want us to kind of gauge interest, that's certainly okay with me.

I think I'm not hearing a lot of support for option two, which would be the full $83,963 I think there were two or three people that would be in favor of that. So that's likely not go anywhere. Is that accurate? Sure, ma'am. All right.

With regard to option one, on the funding the city services only for both the parade as well as the event. Is there any indication from council members on if you would be supportive of of that? And we could do a show of hands or or something just to get a sense of of where this goes so we have some direction. Councilman Kelly.

Thank you, mayor. So almost for me, my my what I was going to suggest in on this particular option is to not elevate this organization over the others in terms of the proportionality on the city services. I was gonna suggest 22,500 for both the parade and the event respectively. I think it's $24.07 38 and $24.07 25 would be the full freight. So this isn't scientific, but just looking at the other similar similarly situated events, if they were to have them, I was going to suggest that we would fund and then back to the city, of course for city services 22,500 for each. That's what I would be

supportive of. So with nothing for operations. 45 total?

Correct. A total of up to 45,000 for city services only.

Okay. So I guess in our straw poll, we'd be looking to see if there was support from council members for the $45,000 total recommendation from Councilman Kelly. Hands in the air. Counting four? Okay. So that's not gonna was there five? I couldn't tell. Can we do it again? Hands in the air.

You explain it one more time to me what the numbers is and what it's for?

Councilman Keller, go ahead.

Sure. So this is what I'm thinking. But for city services only, I'm not talking about operations whatsoever, but for city services, the current request was $24,007.38 for the parade and $24,007.25 for the event. And I was suggesting that they would receive up to a maximum of 22,500 for each, twenty two five for the parade, $22.05 for the event if they were to have both. If they only had the parade, for example, they'd get a maximum up to $22.05. If they had both, could get up to 45,000 for city services that would be reimbursed to the city.

Okay. There was, I believe, a question about the number of hands in the air there. So you want to try it again? This is the $45,000.22 5 and $22.05 based upon councilman Kelly's suggestion. I'm counting four. Accurate? Okay. Alright. So you wanna try just the parade only at this point?

I would propose that, mayor.

Okay. So parade only at what amount? I believe Mr. Fiedler, that was 20 fourseven 38 was the parade amount. Is that accurate?

Correct.

Okay. So the parade only funding at 24,738, can I get an indication of hands in the air for supporting that? Excuse go ahead, councilman White. Question.

Saying full full amount or, like councilman Kelly said, with the other one to have, like, 22,000 since it wouldn't be funded fully.

Councilman Kelly

Which is what I

I guess

I I would like to test the the $24.07 38 just to see where it goes. And if it doesn't, then we can keep working. So the $24.07 38 amount is there support. $1.02 $3.04. Are you in here? There's five. Okay. So it sounds like there would be support for 24,738 for the parade only. Do we want to test anything more? Any other council members? Councilwoman Jane, you got your light lit.

All

right. I think we've tested as much as we can test. So I entertain a motion. Thank you, Councilman Holzhauer. It just is presumed. Excuse me. One second. Councilor.

Thank you, mayor. Council, if you're making a motion, and I understand it sounds like it's coming together to move to award $24,738 to the Indian community outreach for the proposed twenty twenty six India Day Parade from Sika funds to be awarded from the $20.25 Sika balance. I think it's important for the sake of the motion that it identified the funding source, and I think it's most appropriate for that funding source to be allocated from the 2025 unspent balance. That seem okay

would it be okay for me to say so move to agree with what councilor de Sano just said

I think it would and councilor that would be for the purpose of city services

for let me may I restate the motion yes

and if

you agree that you respond

but yeah

move to award $24,738 to the Indian community outreach for the proposed twenty twenty six India day parade to fund city services and for that amount to be funded from the $20.25 Sika balance.

So moved, Holzhauer.

Is there a second? Second, White.

There's a motion and a second to fund $24,738 from the 2025 change order. Roll call. Jane?

Aye.

Kelly? Aye. McBroom? No. Syed. Aye. White. Aye. Worley. Yes. Gibson. No. Holzhauer.

Aye. Motion passes Seven two. New business. Okay. Can we do a complete recall? We apparently missed a council in person.

No. We didn't. Okay. Jane?

Aye. Kelly? Aye.

McBroom? No. Syed?

No.

White?

Aye.

Worley?

Yes.

Gibson? No. Holzhauer? Aye.

Wilson.

No. Mayor, as a point of order, I may have miscounted in my head. Did the vote actually change between the first rep?

Yes. Okay

I'm not even sure what that means. Can we maybe get a clarification which vote is the binding one? Councilor?

There is a provision in the municipal code which allows a council member to change a vote if it is done before the next agenda item is called and so I think in light of the missed called role I think it's appropriate to be able to vote freely on that second vote and effort to be recorded.

Motion passes five four. New business. Councilman Jane? Seeing none, may I have a motion to adjourn? Motion to adjourn. Second, Kelly. Motion to second. All those in favor sign aye. We're adjourned.