Town Council - Regular Meeting

Roll call. Don't need one. Noticing that council members Lorenz and Preston are in route as we've been told. So Pam, I'm going to turn it right over to you.

All right. Thank you, Mayor and Council. Um, tonight is the time of year when we're going to use a couple hours of uh your precious time and go over our proposed budget for fiscal year 26 27. Um, you did receive a memo from me that we staff prepared highlighting some of the more significant items by department. Um, we'll be happy to answer any questions you might have as we go along. All the appropriate department heads and staff are in the audience and everyone is eager to answer any questions you might have. In the meantime, the most um important thing to kick off our evening is Mr. Hume from our finance director who's going to give you a pretty detailed summary of what the proposed budget looks like and then we'll go from there. So, Mr. Hume,

thank you, M. Ree. Um, yes, we're always pleased to get to this point in the budget process. It starts in late July and it means it's almost over for us, which is always nice. Today, we're reviewing with you the town budget for 2627. Uh this first slide shows a really nice graphic of the overall budget in terms of its relative size by fund. In total, we have 233.5 million of expenditures for 2627. As you can see from that, the lion share is general fund, underpass, water, sewer, and so forth. $105 million.2 for general fund, which is I think the first year we've actually pierced the hund00 million mark for general fund in terms of budget. And you can see down the line there the other significant funds but clearly general fund is the most significant operation that we have in terms of budget uh size. Just discussing the general fund itself. Um we have several operating departments in general fund. We manage uh payroll costs. There are several components of payroll that we budget for and manage in the general fund. Uh we have pay operating costs, maintenance contracts, some minor capital. As the council knows, we do a fiveyear look at the budget. Uh we have about 1,500 lines of budget we match each year. Um for that in terms of uh general fund departments we have 15 operating departments. You can see the general size there. Obviously police, fire, public works, parks and recck are our our major departments in terms of budget activity and budget size. Uh they're also our public facing departments in terms of what we provide. Citizens direct service. uh culture also of course is also a public facing fund or department and the rest of departments are are more for internal service fund structure and control management. You can see at the very top of the list there general government as a department 27.3 million a very sizable operation that's that as the council is aware is kind of our non-dep departmental department where we put things in there

that are not specific to a department per se more more townwide um items. I'll break it down a little more for you. Uh so $27 million in that in that general fund, that general government department. Uh two million for liability insurance. That's for the entire uh townwide. Uh we have about $4 million in contract payments. The largest in that section is our state our shared sales tax for the county. Uh also the general fund in addition to its operating departments and those costs support uh several other funds that are ticked off there on the on the slide uh in transfer out $17 million of transfers out go out of the general fund to support those departments. The line share goes to roadway fund 9.3 9.6 for this fiscal year or 2027 and then the open equipment reserve to purchase our police vehicles and fire vehicles and waste trucks and then debt service payments too go to those funds. The general fund supports not only its own operations but several departments in terms of capital and so forth. Some other transfers that general fund moves money over to health and dental fund 5.5 million and of course police and fire pension funds 9.3 contribution this fiscal year or that fiscal year 2027. Uh this slide here is one you're familiar with. It shows the blue bar represents the general funds projected fund balance for the current year the adapted budget year 2627 and the out years. Uh we look at this very very closely. It's one of our most significant financial strategies to ensure as part of the budget process. We have a 15% fund balance all the time in in the reserve. Uh you can see we're fairly we're going to end this year fairly high in terms of reserve level. We'll spend all that down next fiscal year mostly on one time item and I'll show you that later on in the presentation. But to see for the budget this year we're we're very comfortable at our 15% fund balance. Year five is 14.6 But it's close enough in terms of that outyear. So we're feeling good about where we're stand for general fund right now as balanced. In terms of revenue for general fund, uh

we have several to cover. This this slide gives you a sense of what those revenues are. Obviously the line share is going to be sales tax at 42% or almost $42 million of general fund revenue is supported by sales tax. That's combined. That's the local 2.5% sales tax and the 1% shared sales tax from the state. uh property tax is second in line income tax charge for services and so forth. In terms of a total revenue picture uh for the general fund, the slide you're seeing here now, the blue line represents our adopted budget for total revenue for the five-year budget. What we knew as of this time last year when it was approved, uh the red line is the new proposed budget for five years. We like to see that line above the blue line. That's a good thing. Um, in terms of revenue, we have seen a recovery of revenue from the this time last year, mostly in sales tax. So, year-over-year on average, we're about $3.8 million more in revenue per year on the general fund and about 19.1 in total for all five years. So, that's a good position to be in. I'll go into a little more detail later on that breaking down the actual different revenue sources. That last slide was total revenue, everything in general fund. Uh we look at sales tax alone. Sales tax was most of what drove that revenue uh bump up for the five-year budget. 3.7 million uh for the whole for all for every year on average and about 18.6 over the fiveyear period. In terms of sales tax, um this this prices from last year this just shows the sales tax from 20 1819 to our 2728. Last year, as you as we noted, we had a significant decline in sales tax. Our state shared sales tax was 8.4% below the prior year and our our local stacks was a little better than we about 2.6 2.8 uh for year end, but we had some conservative sales tax. So, we had a

significant drop when you combine both those local and state, we had a 2% drop in sales tax. That's significant uh for a town of our size. Could we rise to have sales tax? And this time last year when we were seeing that, we we were fairly concerned about where things were going. Um they have recovered significantly since then. We're seeing a pretty big growth um back in sales tax. A lot of the previous year was just recession fears, consumer spending down, and that's kind of receded in terms of the minds of the consumer. So we're seeing kind of a recovery there, a significant recovery. But if you look at that that chart there, it just kind of shows if you took that year out, it just kind of flowed up in terms of a nice regressionary line. So, it's good to see that we've recovered from that that one-year dip and that has helped the general fund in terms of its budget projection for this year. We're at 10.2% for both. Then, in those the green bars are represent projections, of course. And then we're back down to 2% and 2.3 for the outyear growth. Again, staying fairly conservative in our estimates for the outy years. Property tax, uh, again, pretty pretty stable. We we do a pretty good job kind of budgeting for this in a five-year outlook. It's a function of what the actuaries tell us for the next the coming years from basically now to 2040. We have an idea what they're what we might be presenting to them in terms of projections. Uh we try to track IRV closely in terms of staffing and the rate we pay for them. So generally speaking, we stay pretty close to our planning in terms of adopted budget year versus proposed budget for this year. Income tax also had a nice bump. um not as sizable as as state sales tax, local sales tax, but it also didn't drop uh significantly in the previous fiscal year. So, we continue to see a strong uh labor market there. We're seeing continued growth, which is helpful to the fund balance to the general fund. Uh last trim I want to discuss is waste

collection. Uh as as the council knows, we we collect um waste for we collect a refuge fee to collect on waste and garbage recycle. Uh we do an analysis of that every couple years to see where we stand in terms of is that program paying for itself in terms of the rate. Um the waste analysis that we have completed recently indicates it is not. Just as as a as a refresher, we have a weekly service of garbage, recycle, bulky waste, brush, and landscaping. That's weekly service for that and a seasonal leave service. In terms of the numbers, um, in terms of annual revenue, we're about 4.6 uh million per year. That's at $32 a month per resident to pay monthly. That that rate was affected back in uh April 1st, 2021. Has not changed since that time period. Our expenses are 5.6 in terms of running the program. Now, this is a program that's a cost center in the general fund, but we like to align those costs with the actual revenue to support the service. So currently we're running about a million dollar deficit in terms of that service to pay for it that is being made up by general fund other taxes and other revenues. As I mentioned we like to align the revenue for the service with the actual cost of the service. We are a bit short right now about a million dollars right now being subsidized by general fund other revenue sources. We'd like to kind of get a sense from the council either tonight or or later on uh where where your thoughts are on that and give us feedback at the end of course. Uh the options to limit this to limit the the subsidy would be one we could modify the service level which would represent a change in service that hopefully would represent a cost savings. Um we would also increase the rate to to eliminate the subsidy. If we were to do that right now for this current fiscal year, the rate have to go to $10 a month and that would cover the million dollar subsidy payment there. If we do do a rate increase, uh which we're not suggesting right now, but we will come back to you with more information on that once you have some more feedback. Uh we would like to consider some kind of an index rate. Uh

when we originally did the $3 a month, that was changed back in 2018. And it went from every year for five years we increased the rate from 18 to 20 to 24 to 30 and 32 and the last rate increase was in 21 for $32 a month. So we could do something very similar to that a fiveyear rate increase an index rate. Um but again we're offering this as information to the council to get a sense of staff would like to keep that the service for that program being paid by the actual cost of it by the actual fee uh versus having to subsidize that service from general fund resources.

If I could jump in Mr. Just for council's awareness, this is just information for discussion purposes again tonight or in the future. The proposed budget doesn't anticipate any rate increases. We wanted council to be aware of this particular curbside service, which is very valuable um and where we're at with cost recovery um in terms of the fee for service versus the cost for the service and have a discussion that at some point in the future we need to consider a rate adjustment or something or make a determination that we will continue to subsidize the service. Either way, we're presenting this because it's important for you to know and but the proposed budget does not anticipate any rate increases.

May I ask a question at this point? I was under the impression because this is a Oh, it's not an enterprise fund. Yeah. Okay. Correct. So, it's not an enterprise fund. So, you are able to pull from general fund. Correct. It it could be an enterprise fund. It's not un unusual for places to have that waste collection service as an enterprise fund, but we we don't do it that way. There's nothing wrong with it either way. Uh but we can we it is a cost center that we track both revenue expense internally to see if we're recovering all the costs to the rate itself, right? And that's why you're able to subsidize from general fund. Okay. Thank you.

It'd be a transfer from general fund if it was enterprise fund to make up that subsidy. If it if it was an enterprise fund, it' be a transfer out a million dollars from general fund to basically support it to keep it whole. So, it's all kind of internal. Can you do that to an enterprise fund? Yeah, we it's it's doable legal and all that good stuff. Okay. Uh just a question. don't want to go down the rabbit hole on this um especially in light of the fact we're here to talk about the budget but uh if and when some proposed solution to waste collection comes to us uh at least part of the data I hope uh would include estimated usage of and frequency of usage of you know bulky waste and brush and some of the others so we can have full analysis as to what we're talking about.

Absolutely. Thanks. Moving off revenue into expenditure general fund as you can see the lion share is as we you predict salary and benefits about $50.2 million uh contractual payments and services around $30 million. The transfers I discussed earlier in terms of supporting debt service and capital uh 17 and then down the line there. So $ 105.2 million of spending in general fund for the 2627 fiscal year coming up. Uh in total again this is the slide that shows total expense as from adopted budget to to proposed. There is some some significant adjustments that we're making there. Most of them are kind of one time in in next fiscal year transfer out for some funding capital needs which I'll explain in a bit and then some contractual payments and service that have also increased over all the years about $22.7 million in total over the fiveyear period. So you can see it's helpful that we have additional revenue to support this increasing cost uh to help us balance the budget. In terms of salary and benefits uh again just some illustrative information here we have police, fire, public works and parks and rec are major departments in terms of staffing and staffing costs. Again our public facing departments as well as cultural arts uh some inspections too. So you can see the line share of the spending is all in those public facing service departments. The remaining departments are again internal service fund, HR, you know, finance, inference, technology, communications, and leadership and so forth. Salary and benefits. We we do a pretty good job keeping track of this in terms of our five-year budget to the current year budget. So, you don't we don't see a lot of deviation here. U typically between the adopted budget, blue line, and the red line proposed budget. Uh we have we have made some staffing changes this year in this budget uh that we can we can call to your attention. Uh we have removed some positions uh from the

general fund. Uh departments communications and facilities uh have essentially streamlined some of their operations. These are positions that weren't filled. Uh they that they feel they no longer need. So we pulled them out of the budget. So we've removed the positions. Uh we've also added a couple three new positions to the budget. Um as you can see their assistant fire chief. There are currently two. We're going to add a third one that's going to be a temporary position in terms of for succession planning. Uh information technology or innovation technology is a very demanding area for service and need. Uh it was felt that uh some more support was needed there. So we've added a position technology operations manager um for that role and we've also had some scaling up of of duties in terms of CDM uh for cultural arts and part-time office associate contractual service. This is this is the big one we have that's in terms of besides salary and benefits. A lot going on here in terms of types of spending that we see here. This is in these lines. There's some several lines that make this up. Uh this where we spend a lot of our police and fire contributions. Uh we also this is where we spend our our our payments to the county for state share sales tax or for sales tax. uh liability insurance for the town and connect transit and then just a variety of contractual agreements and obligations across departments are in this budget lines. In terms of the current year, uh as the council's aware, we have we we're over last year's budget. This is mo comes from the the axon contract. That's a 10-year agreement that's new to the budget that'll be programmed into the system. Uh we also moved up some expenses that were in the outy years to kind of frontload for the capital campaign for the CDM and for public art. So that was that wasn't necessarily new money. It was just money we moved from out years to the current year to make those those funds available for that those activities. Uh we've had some metcom increases that we've uh programed into the budget also and some carryover. And then of course with the increase in our sales tax from local, we've seen an increase in how much we're contributing

to the county for state shared sales tax. Uh same for the outy years. Um Axon contracts going to go for for number 10 years, but it's obviously in the five-year budget. We have experienced some utility cost, some inflation cost and utilities for the general fund and the water and sewer. And again with our increase in base for revenue for sales tax, we've increased our payment to county as well as some netcom increases and a small increase in public safety, public pensions in that in that first year. So that kind of gives you a bit of an overview. There's a lot of lines in this budget. That gives you a sense of kind of what some of the major items were that that drove up our cost this year. Transfers out. That's kind of a big spike there that you might have recalled from the the very first slide showing total expenses for the town or for the general fund. Uh the types of spending here again is we're we're moving money out of general fund to support roadway uh to support debt service payments to support waste vehicle equipment uh replacement. Uh this first one here, we moved about $4 million out of general fund. A lot of that was to pay for um the replacement of the London London pedestrian bridge, which is a project for next year. Also, we have uh as the count as the council's aware, we have a $12 million bond issue we'll be doing in April or in the future to help support the underpass. We have a new additional transfer out from general fund to support that debt service payment that we'll be loading up in debt service funds.

[snorts]

So kind of to summarize, I kind of mentioned that a little bit earlier. You know, last year we we had some concerns about the budget cycle in terms of seeing revenue drop off and we took appropriate action there uh to balance the budget. Last year we had to reduce a fair amount of capital. We had to back off on our some of our funding for economic development. Um we did reduce our extra pension payments. Now, we made our regular pension payment 100% by 2040. If you recall, we've done last couple, we've done some additional extra payments there. We still made extra payments last year or this year, but we had to back off a little bit on those. Uh we have no contingency per se in the program in the budget. We have always have fund balance and reserve, but nothing specific in the department for for a non-EP department contingency. Uh we didn't have to reduce operations uh staffing or programs in the general fund. we mostly did kind of reductions in capital. We kind of were in a wait and see um position. Uh we spent down our excess reserves to kind of help us during that kind of floatus during that during that time period and we wanted to see what happened this year. Um this year as I mentioned revenue has recovered and that that's that's been very helpful and it's helped alleviate a lot of our concerns from the previous fiscal year. Uh it helped us kind of balance the budget kind of naturally through our revenue growth. We didn't have to do any kind of operational cuts. We restored some capital, but we were also able to uh take on a new project with the pedestrian bridge. It would have been more challenging if we had had a recovery of revenue. Again, I discussed the staffing changes already in ter general fund with new positions and the removed positions. Uh all of our our targets for general fund are being met. Um we did discuss the waste fee. we do want to talk about that needs to be addressed um in terms of having revenue cover the service or having expenditures um decreased to kind of cover the current revenue source. Uh that's kind of it for general fund to move on to the open equipment reserve fund. Again, this fund is completely subsidized or completely funded by general fund. As in terms of reminder,

the general fund moves money over there annually um to the to the vehicle and equipment reserve fund and that fund holds that money until we make purchases for useful life of the equipment, of course, ambulances, waste, trucks, police cars, and so forth. Uh we like to keep that target at 75% of total spend for the 5-year average. Um so this is a fund balance report showing we're currently at 2026 in the out years. That red line of course is the target. So we're at at or above our target for all five years. So with that being the case as well as general fund 50% we we feel comfortable with those funds in terms of the financing capital spending um that we we've covered fairly significantly on the fifth. Uh this is just a quick reminder slide um of what we're spending. $188 million is our capital plan for uh the next the current year and the next five years. Uh we discussed this at length so I won't go into more detail but we we feel comfortable with what we're doing in terms of spending. The biggest of course is transportation um followed by other which is our asset purchases and then sewer and water. Our debt position uh remains pretty good in terms of that remains pretty status quo with exception of a couple things. Uh as a reminder the the town's debt is funded by general fund resources uh available tiff water and sewer as a piece of some of those debts because they're revenue related bonds. We have a small federal subsidy we get back that helps us pay for that debt and what's been programmed into the budget um for the five years and frankly every every budget cycle we have sufficient funds to for it to match our existing debt in the proposed budget. A quick overview where we stand at the end of this fiscal year about $60 million in total debt. At the end of next fiscal year it's going to drop down about 51.4. Uh we are making a pretty significant payment next fiscal year and that payment is uh in relation to our our debt restructuring program we've done

for a number of years. Uh it's kind of coming to an end actually which is nice. What's not on this chart is the proposed um refunding that we have not done yet for multiple of our bond issues that we'll do in April as well as the new money issue that we're going to propose in April too to help support the underpass funding. Just as a reminder, our debt service structure restructure we developed several years ago. It's it's been going very well in terms of uh paying debt off early, paying an entire bond issue off and doing multiple refundings. Uh it's all kind of gone as planned and and kind of coming to an end as we get closer to as you as you know with the part of the funding for our debt is our tiff money from uptown. When that when that agreement expires in 26, we'll we'll lose that revenue source. We've known this for a number of years, of course, and been planning for it for a number of years. Uh, this is kind of the last part of that planning. So, that's been going very well. As part of that planning, we we paid that off early. We didn't we refunded debt. We didn't we didn't issue new revenue or new taxes for it. We didn't expand or extend the debt. We kept it kind of vanilla. So, it's been a pretty good plan in terms of how it's been well. And, um, we're very pleased how it's been moving along. other funds. Uh water um spent a little time on this one to give you guys some background and and and share some thoughts um for the future. So the the slide we're looking at right now shows the water funds fund balance projections for the current year. Uh the water fund has essentially four funds that make up the water operation. Uh the uh the purple fund balance is is the fund balance for the operating fund. It's main fund. Uh the blue is the capital fund fund balance and then the red and green are our debt service fund balance and and replacement fund. Um as you can see from this we have a target fund balance of 20% for the operating fund. We are achieving that in all fiscal years. You can see that we're not

achieving the capital reserve target of 1.5 for all fiscal years. Um, in order to achieve a a fund balance target of of 20% or above in the operating fund, we've had to essentially spend down the capital reserve we have and also essentially cut back on how much we're transferring from operating to capital. As as a recap, the operating fund contains all the all the operating activity of the water fund, but it also has a transfer out to the capital fund to spend for major capital. we've had to reduce that transfer and reduce trans and reduce capital spending to maintain the operating fund at at a reserve and that that's concerning to us uh in terms of kind of a recap on rates. Um we would like to have a a rate discussion with the council about water and sewer actually uh in the near future. As a recap uh the rate structure is we have a currently it's $711 per thousand gallons and 648 system maintenance fee. That's the current rate. the council has approved up through 2829 a 2% rate increase and then we also put 2% in for the years four and five as a placeholder. Um to give you a sense that's the additional 2% rate increase is about $200,000 of additional revenue when we do that rate increase each year. Uh looking back on the last three fiscal year closes, uh we've seen increases in operating of almost $600,000 a year. So we're we're not keeping up in terms of that revenue rate to the cost of of business. Uh we've had significant inflation with chemicals. Uh annually chemicals go $220,000 a year. Uh parallel of course with cola goes up and then utilities have also gone up. So we're seeing uh fairly significant operating cost increases over the last few years that have made the 2% essentially inadequate to cover. Uh what that also creates is is a problem for capital. there's probably $5 million plus of capital that we have not

programmed in the budget because we can't currently afford to to make those to make those capital contributions. So, we will be coming back to um in the near future to talk about a necessary rates to help us both satisfy the operating reserve need for operating and then also making sure we can program into the capital needs for for the water system to maintain its high quality. Uh very similar situation with with sewer. Uh sewer is going to spend down quite a lot of its capital in next fiscal year in 2627. You see has a pretty sizable balance there right now in 2526. Um however in the out years there's virtually nothing in the capital reserve fund. Now we're still spending money out of there. It's just as the money comes in we spend it and we haven't got that cushion or reserve. In terms of recapping the rate discussion for sewer, same thing. The council approved a 2% rate increase all the way through 2829. That rate increase only gives us about $100,000 a year in co in in new revenue and operating costs are going up by twice that from our from 22 fiscal year close to 25 fiscal year close. The situation is actually a little more significant for for sewer. Um there is some significant capital projects that we need to program into the budget in the next five years that are not there now. Uh mainly enforcement replacement. There's three enforcements that need to be replaced or or addressed. Uh our estimates are about $12 million for that. Um that would not be something we could accumulate in terms of cash. So we would do a rate increase that would support the annual debt service financing for those assets to be to be rebuilt and replaced. Uh there's about $4.2 million of sewer line that that that sewer would like to do. They are doing sewer line in the in in the fund now. They would like to do more uh which we could not program in because of the because of the revenue source and then about 2.4 million of lift lift the station and other utility improvements. So at this point we we have the system

is not is fine. It's it's it's it's in good shape right now for the year end. Uh we just perceive out years as being challenges to fund capital that is going to be definitely needed and we want to give the the council kind of a preamble to this discussion next fiscal year about looking at how we're going to address the rates. What rate might be needed to satisfy the capital needs that we see that we're not covering in the budget right now. Uh and storm water uh also has a similar problem. That's a unique rate. It's $4.60 per month uh per ERU, which is equivalent residential unit. Um it has not changed since 2006. There are several unfunded projects that we'd like to put in that system in terms of several million dollars. Uh but again we're having struggles meeting the resource need from the revenue side. So again water sewer storm water will all be part of a future discussion in terms of what options are available to to satisfy the capital and operating needs that we're seeing in terms of escalating cost. Uh some good news in terms of that process. So water uh health insurance fund uh is in a very good position. This fund over the years I've been up here talking about it. It's been a difficult fund at times and and not so difficult. Uh right now the health insurance fund is healthy uh in terms of the fund balance. Um we try to predict best we can the claim activity. It can be it can swing wildly and it can impact the fund balance uh pretty significantly but for now uh as you can see we're actually above our target which is a nice comfortable place to be. Um year year five is a little below but we've tried to estimate the claim costs in a very conservative manner. So for now, health insurance fund has typically been a ch a problem child off and on over the years. Uh not so bad these last couple years. Uh in terms of kind of just running our our fiscal strategies, uh these are strategies that the council is well aware we use to kind of guide us and

where we stand in terms of our financial roadmap and our financial position. Um general fund target balance is is being met. Our debt service coverage ratios are in good condition. We're managing our debt well. We have sufficient resources to manage that. The elemental fund as just mentioned is in a good position and vehicle reserve also again keeping our assets turned over and and and reliable and available uh is all in good shape. Um discussed at length the the water capital and sewer capital funds and storm water. Uh we have some concerns there that we want to share with you uh during this budget cycle and to talk about uh likely next year early to discuss possible rate options there. And then of course we don't have anything in general fund contingency which is it's problematic. It's not the end of the world but it's problematic not to have something set aside available in operations right away. Now of course we have fund balance and we have a strong fund balance. We have a reserve there but we prefer to have kind of a first reserve of contingency which we're not doing right now. So really just to kind of summarize uh fund reserves are strong with the exception of some outy years in terms of water sewer storm water for capital and we'll address that in the future with you in terms of options and recommendations. Uh we had a nice recovery of sales tax. This year that was kind of a one-year blip last year that that that created some some angst but that that's been resolved. expenditures have generally remained stable year-over-year with the exception of contract stuff and some new stuff and some inflation but uh it's been manageable given our current budget resources for revenue. There's been some streamlining with departments in terms of uh eliminating positions which is always encouraging to see department heads always do a good job looking at what their needs are and what can be streamlined and what can be eliminated and what can be added. As you can see, we have added some positions for demand in terms of need and resources and also for succession planning with fire. Uh we would like to have a little more flexibility with general fund capital spending on development. We haven't been

able to restore all that yet. Um but we feel hopeful for the future. Again, the waste fee needs to be dealt with in sort of subsidy and just get the council's thoughts on what they want to do with that. Water, sewer, storm water, camper projects. we do need to manage the rates. Uh there somewhere to help us resolve some of those concerns. Economically, from what I'm hearing and reading, um you know, we're still above our target inflation, but it has moderated down. Uh and and employment slightly up, but still fairly stable from what I'm hearing. So recession recessionary fears for 26 are are are less likely. And most of what I've read and seen, the economy is looking to be fairly fairly stable 26. So, we've tried to budget in accordance with that in terms of outyear spending and outyear revenue. Um, and we'll certainly monitor how it goes, but we're expecting a kind of favorable stable econ economy next year for next calendar year. Uh, this slide just shares with you some some pages you might want to look at in the budget that kind of is driven on certain key topics or certain key indicators financially for us that are useful. And of course, you can spend your time to listen to the budget any page you want, but these are some page you might want to look at if you have time. With that, that concludes my comments on the presentation and take any questions that the council might have.

No, just thank you, Mr. Hune. In summary, um you I'm going to regurgitate a few things that Mr. Hun has um shared with you. The proposed budget that we're presenting you tonight, we will come back with you for formal approval in March. Um and then of course the fiscal year begins April 1st. So what we hear from you tonight we will incorporate into our final budget document. The the financial picture here is we remain strong and confident as we move into fiscal year 2627. We do think that there are some important topics we need to cover with you so we get direction on funding of our capital needs in the future. um and even funding of uh curbside collection services and what council would like to see in terms of cost recovery in the future. So, important topics yet to come. Um but we did want to plant the seed tonight, be able everyone's here to answer any questions you might have if you want to discuss that. Um but this picture I think is a strong financial picture for all of our funds for the upcoming fiscal year. We don't want to kick the can down the road, which is why we want to have conversations about rates and capital and in council's direction for future. Um, but before I forget, I do want to thank the town's budget committee led by Mr. Hune and the finance staff and Miss O and Miss Keeer and Mr. Day and administrative analyst Jacob Smith. And I I don't know who else I may have missed, but I think that's the primary budget committee. And then of course, every department head here in the room participated um in internal numerous internal meetings and and discussions to get us to this point. So, um we're opening up the floor now to mayor and council for discussion and we'll respond

to questions. Thank you, Miss Smith. Go right ahead. If we can, if you can go back to slide 20,

this one. Yes, that's the one. So, I I had noticed that the expenditures were about 22 million more than the revenues. And as you're explaining on here, some of that is simply carrying over and making expenditures from prior years that are just now happening. And you give that breakdown in in here. Um because I did not see any tapping of reserves as we intentionally did in prior budget years. Did did we go into reserves in any of the funds?

Sure. So we we are spending our excess reserves in general fund to about $5.7 million I believe uh which contributed to $22 million you referred to $22 million is all funds so capital debt service enterprise everything uh general fund is spending down some of its reserves excess reserves um for for capital and then the outy years continue on with operations other funds that contributed that $22 million is the underpass fund uh the equipment they're mostly capital related funs we built funds over many years and now we're spending them in a certain fiscal year typically year one. So general fund did have some excess reserve spend down but the majority of that $22 million we refer to our other funds that are capital in nature and those funds have built up over several fiscal years and now being spent on projects

and and then on page 17 because I'm trying to going to take these in order so you don't have to hop all over the place. Okay, went too far. There you go.

When when we're looking at waste collection, I've been following the discussion in the Chicago Tribune about the what they've been dealing with and their waste collection was a big target of discussion because apparently there are some rates in Chicago that are have been held flat and other people are paying more. um that subsequently came into service and somebody who was living in an apartment complex knew that he was paying more for u compared to what those city residents were paying who were fortunate enough to be under that fixed contract. When it comes time to look at at the um su water and sewer and waste, I would appreciate if there's could be some data on what we are charging for single family residents or people in a duplex or multif family but um town home uh compared to what commercial rates are for residents in an apartment. So if if if you could just keep that um as as something that would be appreciated for a comparison.

Absolutely.

Um and then on page 32 I you're showing that the um townwide debt outstanding at the end of 33127 um Oh, okay. is is at the 51, but it it doesn't include the the $12 million bond issue or what could be refinanced. And when when you've been talking about uh the refunding, would the principal amount on that debt then stay the same? So the difference between what you're showing here for 331 20227 theoretically it would only increase by 12 million or

correct. Okay. Yeah. Um on page 36 you've got a discussion of the water rate. Um, and one of the other council members asked about the subsidy we're providing for sewer rates out of general fund revenues as water is is an enterprise fund. Am I correct? Correct. Is it permitted to um have subsidies from other sources that the town generates?

The intent for the water and sewer fund is to be supported by its own revenue sources, the rates that each people pay. Um what happens typically is if those aren't sufficient um you cut back on expenses. If you can't cut back on expenses then there would have to be a transfer from the general fund to support that. That's that is that does happen. Um it's it's kind of a case where if you get that point you've got some significant issues that you haven't resolved in the water and enterprise funds. Um sometimes it can be typically a loan to the fund for a while to pay back. Um those are options that are available. They're kind of worst case options in terms of that. So we prefer to have a a reporting rate for the costs versus general fund kicking in tax money to support that. It's not the intention of the fund to have that happen.

And and to be clear, we haven't operated that way. We have not operated, we've always operated our in our enterprise funds as independent funds. Okay? And we have not taken money from general fund to support or subsidize the enterprise funds. Okay. Page 38, looking at the sewer rates. In a prior presentation, um, I had asked the question about what is the percentage of completion on our projects of doing taking the camera into the sewers and then doing sewer lightings and the televising. Correct.

I believe at the time it was 8%. Do we have that number now? What it is currently? I believe we're closer to 11%. Yes, I'm seeing a lot of nods. So about 11%. So we have improved. And what is the purpose of this sewer lining? What are we seeking to achieve by pursuing that? Mr. Otto, Mr. Comfort, somebody who understands the sewer mains better than me, you could respond. Thank you.

Thank you for the question. We have found sewer lining to be the most cost effective way to rehabilitate a sewer. Um, it essentially involves pulling a resin impregnated sock through the sewer and rehabilitating the pipe without digging. So that means you don't have restoration of the pavement, the buildings, whatever's above the sewer. So it's a it's a very cost-effective method. And if allowed to deteriorate to the point where we have to dig certain sections of the sewer, we found that we could probably line an entire section of sewer depending on the size for the cost of digging say and replacing say a 10-ft section. We could do the whole block um and rehabilitate it if we get it in time. So we're trying to proactively televise our sewers, understand where our problems are at, and then proactively go in and rehabilitate them with this cost-effective method. That's great to hear that we're up to 11%. And on a related issue, and forformational purposes, even if a a wipe says flushable, those are not to go into the system.

That's correct. Okay. I I need to tell my exchange student who brought some over from Europe, and I'm like, no, no, no, no, no. [laughter] Um I'll I'll wait for round two because I've got separate questions, but thank you, Mr. What's the uh extended life from a relin would you say? We would say at least 50 years and potentially up to 100 years. Wow, that's significant. Thank you.

Thank you. Thanks for uh putting this together. I've uh just been running crunching numbers and fun fun stuff to to go through if you're a nerd, I guess. Um I had a a couple of questions. So on page nine, I just want to make sure I'm I'm reading correctly. So u proposed fiscal year 2026 2027 were are what was what was our increase over last year from the general fund to this year a as actually happened uh for current year the proposed budget the adopted budget had 94.2 million of total revenue uh and we're estimating now 97.8 sorry about about $3.8 $20 million more on average for all years.

Okay. And so the the general fund revenue then as we're looking at for this year is what I mean about 1.8 or$ 1.7 million up from last year from looking at the proposed fiscal year 2026 27 line. Um 95.5 to 99.5. So yeah. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Right there. And if I read my my the sales tax revenue sheet, it seems like the vast majority of that is from sales tax revenue, which would be a positive thing because that signals increased economic activity. Is that fair to say? Absolutely correct. Yeah. If you looked at this slide, last year the red line was below the blue line. This year it's above. So we've kind of recovered. So it's all been sales tax.

Yeah. Okay. Thanks. That that's helpful and that's that's positive um to see. I did have a question on uh page 14 and and maybe this is I'll tie two things together that uh maybe a couple things that I'm just interested in in conversation on. So on on page 14 um we're we're seeing I guess how do you guys kind of model the the increases to property tax revenue and general fund? Are you guys forecasting projected property value growth um in addition to you know new development new growth? I mean can you talk through how the modeling of how you put that together?

Sure. Sure. We we have they're all kind of all cost centers there. The police, the fire, IR, social security, Medicare are all cost centers. We have a pretty good idea of what it's going to cost us to fund those things in the current year and the out years. The actuary gives us analysis to show what the pension contribution might be in the out years. We use that as our basis. uh we we predict we ask IMRF to give us what their rates are going to be in the outy years and we apply that to our total payroll costs that we generate for the year in all the out years. So we we have a pretty good idea of where we stand in terms of those costs and what we need to do in terms of levy information to to levy that to cover that cost. Um it's a bit of a guess where assessed value will be. We do we usually contact the county multiple times as we get closer to that that October, November, December date to say where are we at? Where we at? where we at uh and then we make a final dimension of what the what it might the growth might be based on their information and we're usually pretty close because we can get information that's pretty accurate from the county so that that so we know the cost of of it based on analysis for out years for payroll for pension fund contributions for IMRF uh we we have a sense of we guess at essentially educated guess at the assessed value and that that produces a tax rate ultimately that we have

okay so so it's fair to say then u and I know that We've talked before at these meetings about um trying to get towards especially on the the pension funding. We have some goals we're trying to to meet over the next 14 years um or so to to be adequately funded. So, it's fair to say that this is where we kind of need to be. And then in terms of where that plays out in the real world in terms of where assessed values are at, is that from existing uh property um or is that from new property that's been built? That that's kind it's kind of hard to say until we get there. Is that kind of fair to say?

Sure. We have a base of property that we that we're aware of. We know what's being added in terms of property. We know what's being increased in terms of property values. So if that that's a number we we look at very closely and see we know what new properties coming on and so forth. So that's all part of the equation to calculate the overall rate. We know what we need in terms of levy. Uh but it's a function of the rate and the assessed value that drives from those. Okay. Certainly it helps if we have new growth and new development that expands the tax base. And so we know that we need to hit

we need we're going to need to spend this money in the future years to adequately fund the pension system. Then it's just a question of how do we pull that money from our EAV and are we growing the EAV or is it staying steady essentially.

Okay, that's fair. And then I had a kind of a zoom out question. Um in the the kind of intro city manager budget message uh we talk about um a 233 million fiscal year 2026 2027 uh which is total expenditures and transfers and I think last year if my notes serve correctly was about 211 million is the number that that we put out. Um, I know we went through the general fund and kind of the questions I asked and kind of where that general fund um is increasing, but can you talk about kind of the rest um and I know you've covered it in individual slides throughout the presentation, but maybe can you just kind of summarize um you know for for looking at total 233 million in in re uh in expenditures and in transfers u from last year's 211 less the general fund. Could you just kind of talk about where where that where on both the revenue and expenditure side that comes from?

Sure. Um I might need to get back to you on that in terms of specifics. Uh a lot of it a lot of that um up and down of that total spend is related to capital projects

and and and as you're well aware as certain years we have lean years in terms of the capital projects have come to pollution or we have a couple come through that are significant. Uh the underpass comes to mind immediately as being an expense that was essentially new to the budget in terms of the the cost increase. So that contributed to the the increase to 233. Um water sewer sewer has some pretty big increases in their spending for that current year. Uh the equipment reserve also has some pretty big spending up. Again, capital funds drive a lot of that up and down. Operationally, we stay pretty stable to be quite candid in terms of the spend and that capital size where most of that happens.

And and I'll jump in and and say same thing only maybe a little bit differently. Um the the budget message pertains to what we're presenting and proposing in the budget. And often times when we get to the end of the current fiscal year, we find that we didn't spend all those capital dollars and they get carried over year to year, which is why the next year then looks even bigger when we put the budget together and put that message together.

Sure. No, that that makes total sense. Um then I want to go to I like the the red light, yellow light, green light page. Um just a couple of thoughts. I mean, on the the water and and sewer funds, I know I think I uh we had discussed a couple years ago and we put together kind of a flat 2% um annual kind of escalator essentially, which I just see as a you know, an inflationary escalator to make sure that we're keeping up, but it sounds like that that's not keeping up. I mean, uh, and we certainly we'll have discussions, but I mean, is is there a a a percent increase that's not 2% that you think is is going to hold true more over time over the next 5 to 10 years that's more appropriate? Um, is that two and a half? Is it 3%? I mean, what do you think would kind of adequately get us to where our our water and sewer capital funds need to be?

We've done some modeling, but I'm not really prepared to say what that might be. I can say with 100% certainty 2% is not going to be enough for sure. Um, but I I'd hate to throw a number out now, but we will certainly give you a lot more options and and data when we talk about it.

All right. And I would just say philosophically, I would uh I I like the the philosophy behind the approach of the 2% flat increases. And if we're going to change that 2% number, I'd rather us do it the same way where it's it's a flat steady increase over time instead of kind of kicking the can down the road and then having to do, you know, if the cost of everything increases. So, I'd rather us try to find a number that we can all agree on, keep it flat over time, and we certainly can re-evaluate as we're we're doing now. So, that's just my my two cents philosophically. And and then can you can you touch on again and and I I know some of it's related to expenditures that are coming up on on the financial strategy and general fund contingency. Can you just kind of maybe resummarize kind of your your points there on uh kind of why you have that one as red light?

Sure. I I think it makes it's a best practice to have uh something loaded into the budget that we recognize as contingency as as funds that have not been necessarily allocated to to department yet, but would would be available if it if if it needed. Um you we like to have about a million dollars of contingency sitting in the budget all the time. So what would happen there is if uh police or fire or public works need additional funding for something unexpected, we would just pull from that that department, that community department. Um without it, then we're essentially just going into kind of a deficit spend and the general fund reserves pick it up on on the on the back side. So, I'm not overly concerned about not having contingency, but I think it's a best practice to have uh kind of in your pocket cash available for certain operations versus what's in the bank, you know, in total. So, it's it's just basically a level of contingency available to us that we like to do because of best practice.

Okay. Thanks. And I want to go back to just for one I think the final comment I wanted to make on on page 14. Uh thanks. So I I appreciate Mr. Hume's notes on this is kind of where we're going to need to be in terms of revenue coming out of uh property taxes in order to adequately fund our pensions. And I think that to me like that that provides a mission to the town as an organization, but also as us the council. um that I I want to see, you know, as this revenue increases over time, I want to see that driven by new development and new growth um to our EAV um and not sticking that on existing homeowners and having them pay higher property tax bills. So, philosophically, I'd like to make that a goal. And I know that there's a lot we're working on on the economic development world, but um you know, I'd really like to see us finding ways to have new industry and new growth um driving how we're going to meet these pension obligations in the future and not saddling that on uh residents and homeowners who are, you know, getting stuck with with higher bills and just about everything. So, that's just a philosophical note. Uh but appreciate it. Thank you. And I think an appropriate note that's always kind of been our overarching goal is to cover some of these cost increases with what new growth in that. Um the one thing we can't control is the EAV what what the EAV is going to do on that and that's been an issue in the near term I think we've seen some significant increases in EAVs because of demand for housing and that but you're spot on that that should be our primary driver is to do it for new growth and new activity Next,

Mr. Rober. Hey, uh um thank you very much. Excuse [clears throat] me. Thank you very much for your presentation. Um was very informative uh very easy to digest and I appreciate uh making it putting in layman's terms so we can all understand it. Just want to go to uh slide number 36. Um had a question regarding the uh annual increase uh the 586,000. did some quick math on the numbers you have split out there and that comes to 486. I'm just curious if that was a if something was not included.

There were other there are other operating costs. I they were not super significant. There were increases but I wanted to at least capture two or three of the big ones that you can see. Okay. There in total it was 586 but I didn't include all those that were at average. They were like $50,000 here and so forth. Just wanted to reconcile the $100,000 difference. That's all. Yep. It's it's there. It's just not on the slide. Okay. Thank you. Questions. What are the procedures? Do we only have two times to speak?

No. Okay. Um, so in summary, it sounds like revenue in the general fund is going is is healthy. Has recovered? Correct. Yeah. largely because of sales tax. Correct. Have we seen some increases in sal I'm I'm losing track of of our fees and our sales tax. Have we seen an increase sales tax? No, we haven't. The the rate has not increased for sales tax. The that's coming soon. Um not for sales tax for hotel, motel, and food beverage tax. Yes. Okay. Um and grocery st tax is staying in place. Correct. That never went away.

Um So, so it's it's looking pretty robust and and yet we are also increasing parks and wreck fees and museum fees from what I could tell and after well I guess it's parks and wreck but after school care and things like that correct why did we decide to do that? Um I'd have to default to Mr. Damry. I think it's a function of the cost of those programs and and meeting the goals of those. I think of those costs we like to keep recovery and total cost for the for the programs. Do we have a threshold that we try to recover? It depends on the program. Um I think some program 60% or 80% or

Yes, I think I think again globally difference like for pools it's there's a certain subsidy target you want to hit but for programs like before and after school program I have to default to Mr. Dry to kind of explain what their reason is for that typically is to recover the cost from the program. That's okay. Um but then general fund reserves not but and general fund reserves are also strong. Correct. Caveat being the the um reserve for water and sewer are not strong. Correct.

Okay. So how strong what what's the total amount of reserves that we have unallocated? Um, you know, there's there's fund balances, but there are are there other line items in the budget that are dollars parked somewhere or unallocated?

Not unallocated in terms of where we have program expenses. Um, the fund balance is where we have all our reserve money. So, general fund, we keep 15% fund balance always available as our target. So, that's money we try not to spend into unless we have an economic issue or an opportunity. Uh, water and sewer both have got their own reserve policies. 20% for water, 25% for sewer and operating. We try to keep at that level. So when we end we begin the year and end the year, we want to keep that at at those percentages. Uh we try to keep a a dollar amount of reserve in the capital funds for both water and sewer that we're not meeting is part of our discussion there. But I've heard you say before that you've parked money somewhere. What does that mean?

Um sometimes it means that we might move money over for a capital um fund that we didn't necessarily have. By way of example, we we did put some money over in uh the fire station fund years ago that had some surplus in anticipation of needs for that. Um we Yeah, I think that was one that you recently referenced that there was $3 million parked somewhere, right? And and is that not part of the fund balance? That's separate of fund balance. That that's in the capital fund that's available for that fund or for any purpose really because it's money we put over there in anticipation of needed expenses for the future. in Ellison several years ago that would be included in that particular funds fund balance we say that

say that again that would be included for example if if Mr. would say, "Well, we moved three million. We parked three million in the uh fire station fund for future fire station. That would be included in the fund balance." Let's say the fund balance showed us 4.5 million. I don't know what it is, but let's say if it showed at 4.5 million, that would include the 3 million he moved over there and parked it there. Okay. So, when So, what I'm trying to get is what's our cushion?

Sure. Well, it depends on what the fund is. For general fund, our cushion is 15% which is approximately that balance is about about $15 million on $100 million operation. Um, we have some cushion in the vehicle and equipment reserve of 75% of the average spend. We always keep it fund balance. We have 20% cushion in the water fund.

We have 25% cushion in the sewer fund. There's no real cushion in the capital funds for water and sewer. Um, basically capital fund the cushion is basically above zero. You know, we we would like to keep something for emergencies, particularly water and sewer. So, we have a a $ 1.5 million cushion that we that we're not keeping in the water fund for all years and I think a 500,000 cushion for for sewer capital. So we have a lot of funds that we set aside depending on what fund we're talking about to give us this uh first to give us economic to deal with an economic issue in general fund or a capital overrun in one of the capital funds. Guess what my point that I'm trying to make here is, you know, before we raise any fees, um, we really need to make sure that we we find all these cushions and feel comfortable with what we have in reserve and not a penny more. Because you know the description here in one of our introductory letters is something to the effect of the economy is great and people are spending. People are spending but it's on essential things that just are costing more and the cost of living is getting worse and worse. I don't share the view that the economy is, you know, a gay all time. I just don't see it. I don't see it at all.

Yeah. I'm not suggesting that. The economy I'm hearing is it'll be stable in 26. Uh we had some recovery from last year. This time last year, we were concerned because it was challenging recessionary fears. People were cutting back and entrenching. Uh that has been somewhat alleviated in terms of what people are seeing and hearing. I'm not saying that it's going gang busters, but we have recovered to more of a stable environment. As far as we know now, anything could happen in 26. It could be challenging the economic environment, but for now, what we're forecasting is a fairly stable economy.

Stable and bad. I mean, stable and expensive, you know. So, okay. A matter of opinion. Um, can you walk us through um more of the details on the debt service? That slide I think is misrep mis not representative but it's not complete. Um what will be all in once we do the additional underpass bond?

Um sure we the reason we didn't include in this slide is it's it's just not haven't done it yet and I wanted to demonstrate in the slide that we're kind of addressing our debt service structure repro reprogramming by showing that $7 million decrease. Uh that's why I put the note there saying if this does not include the pending refunding which we haven't done yet which have minimal impact on the principal but the new money bond issue will certainly increase that. So basically the the the math is the 44.7 and 26 of general fun will be increased by $12 million. So what will be the the final number that when when people say the town is in debt four?

Well it'll be it'll be 44 * 12 is 56. So 44 + 12. Yes. Correct. And we we represent in the budget, you know, we were showing that debt service payment. We're showing the schedule. I we just chose not to put in this because I wanted to kind of keep it consistent with our existing debt picture. We're certainly not trying to hide the fact we everyone knows we're issuing $22 million of debt. And we I wanted to make sure it was that you understood it was in the slide just to show that we have a decrease in our existing debt based on our restructure plan. But yeah, you're you're 100% correct. Um we the debt will be if we do make that issue, which we will, will be $12 million higher.

Okay. Lastly, I want to talk about economic development that was talked about a bit ago. Um and this would be probably in the contractual obligations. Um, are we funding economic develop the EDC? Uh, yes. Let me see. Let me find that in my budget. I think it's in it's in general government expense. Yeah.

Um, generally found on page 119 120 of your budget big budget binder. Um, refund general and refund economic development council. I don't remember what category and I don't have it up on my computer right now. So I can look for it real quickly. We are proposing in this 2627 budget funding EDC at the 50,000. Is that down from previous years or is that correct? We have funded at 100,000. So we're looking at a 50% cut to the EDC. That that would be our proposal. Yes. And why is that?

Um our thought was to take the remaining 50,000. We would still have 100,000 budget toward economic development count or economic development, but use the remaining 50 to support local business more targeted local business support programs. I've asked Mr. Duffel to put together some ideas of what that could look like. Um but we do have the full 100 grand in the budget. It would just be allocated. So is that what on the conclusionary u slide 43 a bullet point about a halfway down use more flexibility on general fund capital spending and economic development. What do those words strung together mean to you? Uh what they mean to me is in the past budget we had set aside uh I think about $2 million in economic development that would be available for economic development. It was unc uncommitted to uh we had to remove that uh last year and weren't able to restore it.

So that that represents $2 million, correct? That was cut last year to make the budget balance. Okay. But then we are going to cut uh our normal funding of the EDC. We're it's been proposed we're going from $100,000 to $50,000. That's correct. Um okay, I want to pivot to smart city. Um what what in all in total have we spent on smart city historically or just in this proposed budget for 2627?

I guess where would I find that in the budget? might ask that would be there's several lines in the budget for uh innovation and technology for smart city and then I would need to default to Miss Gretu to kind of give us a sense of what defines those expenditures and where they are. I know there's um significant funds set aside for that but I wouldn't be able to tell you off the top of my head how much it is without

I'd like to see that unless she wants to come forward. Well, she's our expert. So, if it's okay, we'll ask her to come forward and talk a little bit about that. [clears throat] In the meantime, I I've logged back into the computer. I'll see if I can find some information. Good evening. So, [clears throat] smart city is not just one um one line item. It typically covers uh applications, technologies, and data related projects. um that kind of make up our overall uh smart city journey.

Okay. And so maybe a specific question for this budget. Uh what are you budgeting for smart cities this year? Um I should have uh brought my um uh notes with me, but I typically when we uh talk about smart cities, I kind of aggregate multiple line items uh to make up for that. So uh any uh project that talks about um uh when we talk about data uh related decision making those um are counted towards smart cities so applications that help enhance business operations uh those would fall under that.

Okay. Yeah. I'd like a little more detail on that. Okay. Um in specific uh one one application that Miss Reese has spoken about is the traffic signal preeemption. Is that being budgeted this year? Um so some some of the smart city applications uh we don't get too specific just yet because we uh have some opportunity projects. So depending on um what comes up there are some uh aspects of uh data applications that we could be using towards that but not specifically on uh traffic preeemption. We have not budgeted for that.

Um but uh it could also come from uh a different department. Okay, I'll pause there. I do have two other topics, but I'll yield my time to another time. I'm sorry, not quite ready, Mr. Not to cut you off, we'll be over there.

Thanks, Mayor. Uh, thank you, Mr. Hun, and the budget committee and budget team. This is always a very insightful and informative, and it's been a some great questions and conversation so far. Um, I think I'll start with where my colleague left off on smart cities, although I don't think I we need Miss Gutterizer at the mic. Uh, I don't think um Uh, I know we'll probably talk about it later, but congratulations uh on your recent uh uh award and status uh achievement. Um, I know that uh the state of Illinois is planning to do a large uh Main Street 51 project coming up. Um, and there's some potential for some uh smart infrastructure as they redo. Do we have plans for that in our zero to fiveyear budget? that I can't answer.

Auto I thought it might be you, but I wasn't sure. There are funds budgeted in the roadway fund to cover not only um upgrades to all the traffic signals, but also the other portions of the project that the town would be responsible resurfacing everything from parking lanes to striping and parking lanes. Um we're responsible for a certain percentage of all the traffic signals and the equipment that'll be replaced as part of that. And then uh a portion of the sidewalks. Um we would take a look at that although the state is primarily responsible for those as well.

So as as that comes upon us I don't know what opportunities that presents between the conversations between our enterprise technology department and and Mr. your group around uh while it's all dug up, is there opportunity for us to at least put conduit in in the rights away or underneath the ground or across uh the roadways to get from one side of the road to the other with uh uh technology infrastructure. I'll just leave it at that high level without trying to go down to any detail. Uh because it seems like a ripe opportunity when do we it's once in a long while that the state decides to tear up a long stretch of our major thoroughare and that uh that seems like a ripe opportunity for us in that infrastructure plan.

Yes, there yeah there there's definitely an opportunity there and we are looking at that. Um the signals a lot of the conduits will be completely removed and replaced. Some of them are antiquated to the point where installing some of the features that we have to have now, including uh accessible um APS systems for our signals aren't possible because the conduits are seized and cannot be um you can't pull wire in them. So, we're looking and we will be replacing a lot of those conduits. There is conduit along most of the corridor right now uh because of the coordination system that's currently in place. So, we'll be either upgrading or replacing that as needed part of the project.

Thank you. As I anticipated, you guys are already thinking about that, but uh I hadn't heard it mentioned or specifically called out anywhere. So, I know that's a good opportunity for us. Um could I ask a question related to that conduit? Uh is there design on on installing newer conduits for excess capacity down the road? I don't I'm gonna have to look into that. I don't know the answer to that in terms of what the state's plans are there in terms of brand new conduits. Back to you.

Um uh excellent question. Um in terms of uh just to level set I know we there was um back to you Mr. Y. Um uh talking about our our uh funds that capital funds that we're uh concerned about. I just want to make sure we're clearly stating in the public. I know we've been throwing around operations and capital and that uh what we're talking about principally um is um the fund the amount of money that we're collecting for water and sewer is not meeting the needs of both operations and capital. Correct. and that we're funding operations currently with the amount of revenue, but the capital projects, our ability to reinvest in our water and our sewer system to maintain it, grow it, expand it, replace it. We are not charging enough money to be able to afford that at our current rates.

Correct. We're we're sacrificing some capital projects to maintain an operating system. You you've got it right. So eventually that will if we don't act that will bite us, right? That's not a long-term sustainable action. We'll have deferred maintenance such that will cost us, right? And those those costs we don't avoid those costs by they are going to happen. It's just a matter of paying for them now, paying for them later and structuring a capital plan that can address those with the race they can address them too.

Okay. Um I'm going to echo my colleagues comments. Um I appreciate the the and we've been on um I did make comment when we instituted the five-year 2% that that wasn't going to be enough and here we are. Um not for any other reason, just you know for public consumption that these services are expensive to run and they're getting more and more expensive to run and every community across the United States is dealing with increased chemical costs, increased costs of of pipe, of man-h hours, of of all the work it takes to maintain them. Um, but I do favor a more flat, well-known um, increase as well rather than kicking the can down the road that it's programmed in on a regular basis. It's published. The citizens know what we're up to and how we're planning to address the increasing capital costs of maintaining, you know, drinkable, healthy water for the community and and wastewater system that works appropriately. That's all I have for now. Thanks,

Mr. Bars. Back to you. Mr. Why don't you let Mr. Press go? He hasn't gone yet.

I'll take it. All right. Um, first of all, thanks Andrew to you and your team as always. Appreciate the, um, depth and the long-term scope that these come to us with. Obviously, the five-year budgeting process um I think is a uh is a model uh and I'm glad that the town has been operating under that and looking far out and uh making strategic long-term decisions um so that we can avoid surprises as much as possible and glad to see another strong budget with us here. So, thanks to your team again, finance and to the budget committee overall. Uh with that, uh a couple different questions. Um, one on personnel, it was noted, I think on page 22, uh, slide 22, that, uh, there's an assistant chief, uh, position in fire that is, um, budgeted, but that that is temporary. Uh, can somebody define temporary? I mean, are we talking a one year or two year? Like roughly how long are we anticipating temporary being? Well, um I'll try and answer that and we can always talk to Chief Humer, but um not not longer than five years really. Um I would expect um the purpose of this position is for succession planning and currently we're in a position where all of fire administration have um enough years of service where they could choose to retire, which is not a good position. So, we want to plan for um future assistant chiefs and chiefs.

Okay. All right. That answers that. Um uh the sales tax probably not on the revenue side, but thinking of sales tax is um does the budget reflect continuing to make shared sales tax payments to the county without any pause over the next five years? Yes.

Okay. Um should there be a pause to some extent that um gets approved? Has there been your discussion as to you know how those funds would uh be utilized that savings would be utilized at this point or not until we know if that's even going to be reality.

We have we have not planned for anything a what if in that particular scenario. We included um our funding obligation in all five years of the budget per the intergovernmental agreement as it's currently written in hopes that we can all three parties can negotiate some alternative and then we would come to back to council at that time.

Sure. Okay. Um different topic the uh picking up a little bit on the economic development. So the uh the reduction of 50% to the EDC from 100,000 down to 50,000. Have there been conversations with EDC leadership about that or is that something that they will be caught kind of by surprise um in this budget that that is uh what's the town's anticipating doing?

We haven't talked about that yet. So, like I said, that line item still has 100,000 in it if we choose to direct the money that way or we can divide it up as we would recommend, but we have not had any conversations with EDC about that. I can say Mr. duff his ideas regarding what could be done. Well, two things. Um, as an investor in EDC, an investor gets the same benefit for 50,000 as you do for 100,000. So, we would it would be no different for us, just a budgetary impact. Um, but in terms of our what we would like to do with the 50,000, if we fund economic development council in the amount of 50,000, Mr. Duffel's ideas of how to invest those $50,000 to support specific local small businesses is in response to some information that we've received through his business survey and what um some of the small businesses have indicated to him would be useful in terms of um small business loans etc. So we have some ideas but yet working through those.

Okay. Um A personal uh note on this. I would um with the information I have now uh be a proponent of maintaining a $100,000 allocation to the EDC specifically. I think that uh Mr. Duffel's uh program and um some of the feedback that he's received from businesses uh sounds great. And if uh you know there's another 50,000 to make both work where EDC would stay at 100 and there would still be 50 um for a small business program in house uh that would be something that I would certainly be supportive of. Uh and then switching gears last question I have at this point just want to reiterate something that I asked and uh earlier. So slide page 17 um talking about waste removal. As that conversation comes to us uh for a decision um I would uh feel very strongly about um having data and looking at the utilization and the frequency for bulky and uh brush and landscaping. I guess um beyond the garbage and recycling because my hunch is that garbage and recycling are used by most residences every week. Uh bulky brush and landscaping is much more hit and miss. And if there are um some uh you know ways that save considerable money without having considerable impact if they're not being utilized uh by that many people that often. I mean that's the obvious first place to look. So, I hope that it doesn't just come to us with a well, we recommend going from 32 to 42 type thing.

Thanks. Absolutely.

Now, Mr. U. Thanks. So, so yeah, one I I I realized something I wanted to say earlier, which was I I'm looking forward to the discussion on um the bulk pickup. I mean, I think that's a service everyone loves and I'd like to uh make sure we could find a way to continue to provide that service. Uh the second point I honestly I was kind of a little a little caught off guard still processing from a question that my colleague asked on EDC. I mean earlier when I made a comment about economic development. I saw everyone up here's heads nodding that we all agree economic development is important. Personally, as a council member, I've you know reached out to EDC different times as a council member and have found valuable feedback and insights from them. So, I truly have no idea why we'd be cutting that funding. Um, I mean, that doesn't make any sense to me. So, I mean, I I'll be very black and white. I mean, if we're going to cut funding to EDC, I'm going to know on the whole budget, which is disappointing because I like a lot of what's in here and there's a lot of good things going on. Um, and I think that that's a conversation that we may need to take, you know, offline here because I don't understand why that's going on. And, you know, I' I'd like to get a better understanding of of why that's happening. Uh, and honestly, I I feel a little I won't say offended, but the way that the summary was put together, it feels a little bit like it was a slight of hand. Whereas, if Miss Loren hadn't asked the question, is this in the budget? There was a very vague note there that said, well, we're going to rework the e economic development. I mean, there's a chance that several of us would have gone into voting on the budget in the future and have had no idea about that. So, I don't appreciate how this has been presented and I think that this is worthy of more conversation because I I think we're going the completely wrong direction here. So, I'm disappointed.

Well, if I could just jump in. As council knows, I've asked to meet with all of you later this week. There's lots of things to cover between now and council's final budget. So, um it was not specifically identified in the 11page memo I gave you. I apologize for that. There's nothing hidden. And even Mr. I'm not sure what you're suggesting as a slight of hand. Mr. Hun's slide is referencing the $2 million that we had budgeted historically for economic development support. Um, it's been included in the budget. I I think that's what you just indicated, correct? Yeah. When that

So, a $50,000 difference between EDC is certainly something that we would discuss with you. Um, and I apologize that wasn't highlighted in the memo, but nothing intentionally hidden. And so I, you know, lots of things to discuss with council between now and March, but certainly supporting our small businesses will be one of those topics. That's fair. Just to close, I mean, intentionally or not. I mean it it you know it feels like there's conversations or things that we're not being party to as council members and u generally don't like being caught by surprise because it's an organization I really support. So I'm just surprised that you know there's something going on behind the scenes that I'm not aware of as a council member. So that's disappointing.

Thank you. on page 20 39. So um this is part of the water bill, correct?

The utility bill, correct? Yeah, it's a component of that. So I have seen articles discussing alternate techniques to deal with strain um rainwater. Um some of those include minimizing pave paving um using permeable materials like gravel or other kinds of of paving material where the water is allowed to seep back into the ground and not need to go into the storm water system. But it it um by by by the absorption is absorbed back into our groundwater. Um another thing to minimize cost is to ensure storm drains remain clear. Um and I I've noticed that some of the new developments are going for a so-called dry detention basin. Um because I guess they got tired of chasing geese away. Um, but I I want to point out that if if we when we're looking at the garbage collection, part of the reason we want to pick up leaves and yard waste is to keep it from blocking the storm sewers. And um if anybody had neighbors that took advantage of the uh late second pass at leaf collection, I I know you can appreciate there's not as much dry leaves blowing around the street towards the storm sewer. So it even if it's not heavily used, it it does bear a purpose. And then uh again going back to the slide where you had the discussion of the outstanding debt um you're stating on there uh that it doesn't include the anticipated issue of 12 million in new bonds for the connector project. But by leaving it out you're highlighting that there's a $7 million decrease in

outstanding debt. So even with an issue of 12 million, there's only a a net increase in outstanding debt of five million. So uh I appreciate that that distinction. And then um in looking at the issue of parking funds, uh if if we could just review the process that we're here tonight looking at a projection of the budget for the upcoming year and this will not necessarily be the actual events that occur in the next 12 months, but historically the town comes back to us later on with a a a discussion of here what here's what our actual was here's what our budget was and then recommendations are made as to how to reallocate those funds am I correct in that that is what occurs over the summer so for the for the current fiscal year that ends in March 31st as the auditors come in and do their work and compare the actual to the budget. There will be some adjustments made to to bring the actual expenditures in line. Um and and so in prior years we've done things like say we do have a surplus now. Let's take that service and surplus and apply it towards the pension.

That is correct. that usually happens in July where we come to council and ask you to approve all of the budget adjustments that have occurred throughout the fiscal year. Um the fiscal year ends March 31. So usually in July when finance is closing out the books, we can track exactly all the budget adjustments line by line. We come to council, you approve that. And when we have ended the fiscal year, on occasions where we've ended with a surplus beyond what we planned or, you know, any kind of surplus, we've directed those dollars somewhere. In recent years, um, one year we took $3 million each and put $3 million extra into each of the public safety pension programs. And we've also had situations where some of that excess built up the reserves in the fire uh department funds as well as the library giving the library the flexibility to not have to borrow um when they did their renovation and did we have to borrow when we renovated when we built the new fire station number two? Um, we we did because we borrowed we issued bonds a number of years ago to cover headquarters, old headquarters that opened in 2017 and some money toward um new fire station 2.

So, was covered by bonds, but when the actual costs came in, they were higher than what we had budgeted for. But those reserves gave us the ability to not cut corners on what we wanted to see in that new fire station. Correct. Right. Cost of construction was more much greater than we had anticipated.

And and just just to clarify the the the forecasting process, I had asked the question about when you mentioned that there were number of retirements anticipated and generally businesses that are anticipating retirement are happy to see older people that may have reached the the the tops of the salary limits being replaced. with younger people who at at a lower pay scale. And so, um, when that happens, um, I had asked whether or not it was built into the forecast to adjust the salary cost and and I was told, you don't feel comfortable doing that until someone actually turns in their retirement papers and is gone from the budget. So there may be some cushion in in salaries, but it it's because we cannot forecast just exactly when someone's going to leave or have to tap somebody on the s on the shoulder and say, "Hey, you got to get out of here. You're not budgeted for anymore." Um, so those uh reserves that are created happen as a matter of routine in the budgeting process. It's not meant to be any any nefarious effort to to mislead anyone.

Yeah, correct. I I guess I would add to that that it's always our goal to be transparent and honest with council. Um when we have years of of surpluses, the council probably recalls that we took those funds and uh we paid off debt. We contributed more to pension funds. We contributed more to to to payment um operations. We contributed more. We've set aside money for for economic development, the $2 million. So th those parking, if you will, uh we're we're putting those funds aside. We're not spending them immediately. We're making sure they're available for capital projects that might be needed in the future. Uh a lot of those funds have been having to been eliminated uh because we don't want to program into the budget operation that we want to program in the budget for something anticipatory like the fire station, debt payoff, economic development. That that's the eb and flow of those of those years of significant surplus. uh nothing we're trying to hire. We're simply trying to put money where we think we might have expense in the future and and indeed it does come to fruition sometimes. Other times we have to pull it back.

Um and after I had gone through your slides here, I had some questions on the 11page menu memo that came and um in terms of the after school and before school programs, those rates were for the entire ninew week session. That wasn't a per week session price. Correct. That's correct.

Okay. So, I I was paying close to that a month per week. Several well, when my kids were little. Um and then I did see that there were some increases in park and wreck fees and um and the children's discovery museums. Uh but I was told that there have been some nominal fee increase in each budget cycle, but there's also scholarship programs. Um would it be possible to ask Miss Wisman to talk about um how she communicates the availability of those scholarship programs?

Sure. Or Mr. Damry, Mr. Damry, do you have information about your scholarship programs for those that can't afford the program fees? or Miss Wisman for um your services. I think do you guys use the same scholarship? Yeah, I think we're separate.

We have uh our our process is um we advertise it within our programming as well as in our activity guide. And um really it's it's it's a fee assistance program. So, um, individuals that qualify will get, uh, 50% off on certain programs, which is basically, uh, day camp, uh, before school, after school, and I think that might be it. And then, um, it's 25% off of other programs, and they get an aotment of money that they can use throughout the year. Um, right now it's I think I want to say we adjust it a little bit. I think it's 750 to $800. would be a cap and and really that's just lost revenue is what that ends up being. We don't have any fund actually reimbursing that um that lost revenue. So it's it's impacting on the the net of that program in the end. So that's kind of how it works. Um we have a lot of people take advantage of it mainly for those two programs which is why we we we that's kind of the target. We want to be able to provide that uh that those child those programs that are taking place at those those critical times uh for the Children's Discovery Museum um Illinois Station as well. We actually do have uh fundraising that happens to try to offer those scholarships. So, it's a little bit different. It is a loss revenue to some degree, but we try to fill that bucket in with the help of the nonprofit foundation that is fundraising. Um and we also are able to use funds um uh that come in to support museums for all which is our program that offers halfp price admission for families who are on nutrition assistance. Um so for instance very recently uh both Amaran and Nyore gas donated to support that access program. We have individuals who do that as well. Um it's pretty traditional for museums to to offer that kind of access. And so

what it does is it means that families opt in voluntarily to sign up for that program. it's free to sign up and then they get that halfp price access. Then it also means we have their contact information so that we can then um reach out to them with scholarship information. And um I understand that the uh state mandate that minimum wage be increased to $15. Is that now fully implemented and your your entry level staff are all at that $15 rate? And Andrew, then in the budget, are those positions now just getting a general cost of living increase in your forecast?

Um, well, we've got them all at the appropriate rate for the minimum wage increase. At times, we might go a little higher than that depending on the need for lifeguards and so forth, but we program in there, but we think the market's going to desire. And human resources has a separate um pay scale for nonregular part-time like seasonal work, summer employees, things like that with the baseline of the minimum wage and working up from there. So it's not necessarily applied with a cola or anything like that. And um as individuals have been speaking to specific passions of theirs, I was disappointed to see that sore funding level has been flat for quite some time. Uh but that's a joint program with Bloomington. Have they also kept their support flat?

Uh there was probably a slight there there will be a slight increase in that. Um mainly based on services that we've been providing uh through Soore. Um a lot of inclusive services have been provided. So um that's generally one-on-one aids which is our highest demand here in normal. Um, and that's where we have a staff person come over and work one-on-one with a participant that might be in one of our programs like day camp specifically is a is a really we have a a few in that program. Um, so it's a it's slightly higher just because of I think the the expense of that demand, but u for the most part has been fairly flat. Um, yeah,

I know there's a mad scramble on every registration day to get your Yeah. your loved one into their programs and unfortunately um they're they close some of the more popular ones close rather quickly and they at times have created a waiting list but but there is a lot of need and demand for those kind of services. So the the city of Bloomington provides the programming and schedule the activities and then they notify us of our cost share. So that's how we determine um our budget dollar amount each year is based on what the city of Bloomington has indicated they need from us to operate the program.

Okay. Um bear with me. Oh, in in the uh budget there was mention of purchasing a second set of gear for um the firemen currently employed. Um could someone explain what the rationale is behind that uh concept of providing each Thank you guys. um each uh staff member, each firefighter and an EMT with two sets of gear. Chief, do you wanna and Denny, you want to come up? Um I don't have a good good amount of information. I know that we budgeted for a second set of of bunker gear, but I'll let the experts talk about about that.

Sure. Um, this is something that we, um, have been talking to the budget committee about for the last couple years. Um, we did go ahead and split it over two years because it's pretty costly. It's about $100,000 each year for that to get us up to the two sets of bunker gear. Um the reason for that is that if a firefighter responds on a call that's a fire, structure fire, whatever, um they get all wet in the middle of the in the winter time, they get all wet, they get covered, you know, in insulation and you know, uh anything that they could get covered in or whatever, they can take it back to the fire station, take it apart. We have extractors there that they can wash those in and then they put them on a drying rack and it takes about a day for all that equipment to dry out and everything like that. So then they'll have a a second set of gear that they can put on so they can continue to work throughout the day instead of trying to borrow somebody's gear that doesn't fit them or something like that. So that's the that's the main reason for it. And I think the language in the the uh the memo was referring to the initial plans. Are the second set of gear for existing personnel or is it for a specific shift?

All existing personnel. Once once we're done with the two-year project, everybody will have two sets of gear. Um we were slowed down just a little bit. Not to get into the weeds or anything, but there's a POS issue, which is a cancer causing agent. um that is in bunker gear. Our current bunker gear is 98% uh POS free, but we are triing some bunker gear that is 0% POS. So, we have uh 10 sets of gear out there now that people are wearing. They're going to get back to us, let us know how it wears and all that kind of stuff as we move forward with this project and that type of thing. So, in are you replacing some of the the gear that they currently have and then having to get two completely new sets?

It it it just all depends on um the age and what shape their gear is in. Um bunker gear is supposed to last 10 years, but that's kind of a myth really, especially as much training as we send our people to to the fire academy and and different training classes. It's really hard on the on the protective gear and everything like that. We we see that our gear probably only lasts about eight years. But what we'll do is we look at that that in that gear independently. We inspect it, you know, monthly, yearly for sure, you know, to take a good look at everything, send it in for repairs or whatever we need to do. And um on a related topic, I've been answering a lot of of emails that I've received about people inquiring about um station the existing station two versus the new station 2 and some reference to the uh increase in population, but actually um our population declined since that 2013 analysis was done. Um, can you remind me of how long it took for um, the planning that went into deciding upon and building fire the main headquarters and how how long that process took for station number two.

Sure. Um, that process started um, in 2013. um if I'm correct, that's when we first met with the council and you know laid out a plan for moving and replacing the three fire stations that we had. Um you know, it's been a work in progress. Obviously, uh the headquarter station went much quicker. We were able to get the the land acquisition and move with um the university to to make that happen and build that project and and everything that like that. And then we started this project um with current fire station two. We did uh multiple open uh hearings and everything with the neighbors and and everything like that because there was some current concern about the noise and everything like that. And then COVID happened. It slowed us way down and everything like that. And so this project has been you know ongoing for like the last four years. But as as I recall, I think even before I s joined the council, the land acquisition didn't occur till what late 2018 2019.

That that sounds correct. I I don't have that right in right in front of me now. Okay, that that sounds correct. Yeah. So laying the groundwork, excuse the pun, um really is more like six years ago.

That that that that's correct. And so basically there's been a lot of things that have gone on during that that six years. Like we said there was COVID which really slowed us down and everything. We uh you know we uh design started um to work toward a design build type situation instead of an architect build. Um we were lucky to partner with core construction and they they partnered with Farnsworth. So we worked a lot with Farnsworth and Core Construction. We worked with our administrative staff. We had a group of firefighters from, you know, each shift um, you know, weigh in on, you know, the kitchens, the bedrooms, the the lighting, the different things that go on in a fire station, the the creature comfort type things and everything like that. Pulled all that together, you know, put it out for a bid, you know, did uh, you know, had three or four different companies come in and give us proposals and everything like that. Ultimately went with core. Um, and you know, the project has has really gone well. Um, and now we're ready to move forward. The the station will open uh January 29th, you know, so this month um is moving day. Two moving days maybe. Um and so yeah, that's that's kind of how we got here.

Sure. And and Miss Smith, I'm sorry if I could add just a little bit of detail to kind of um set the stage for how some of these decisions are made. Um we're we're constantly reviewing the data. The sorts of things that we're looking at um include our CAD system data, internal fire records, um our real world emergency vehicle drive times and GIS modeling. Um we're very lucky and in just a little bit we'll be recognizing Vizu and some of her staff. Um, we've got a fantastic INT staff with lots of very well-qualified data analysts um who who are digging in and are um are really looking at these things like drive times and response times and call volumes really really carefully. Um so so that's how station locations are decided. Um and all of that is within our framework of the four to six minute response. Um that's a goal that's set by the MLAN County area EMS. Um and that has been in place from from inception of the of these phased um this phased approach of of relocating stations. So um just wanted to add a little bit more detail and and kind of how we look at that and how that process moves forward. Um I actually asked Miss Garaju to come forward um to just give a a small example of the sorts of GIS modeling that we do um because I think that her team should be proud of all their efforts

given all the emails. I am presuming since we're here to talk about the overall budget and each department's budget in anticipation of question questions um I think Miss Garaju and Miss K are prepared to answer questions but you know depends on if council yeah want specific information or not. So I'm going to ask that we kind of back away from this so we're starting get to get on a completely different topic that not related to the budget. I just assume not

go there. Well, um I I had sent um a link when I was responding to to give them access to the town's information um on the website and I had encouraged those concerned about um the coverage issue and the town did mention the the cost. I encourage people to come to this budget session where we would have it and I was disappointed to see that we didn't have um many new faces in the crowd. But will this budget session be recorded and available on the website? Yes.

Um will there be any kind of transcript of this budget session on the website as well? Uh will it will be on our YouTube channel which I think has transcription. I'm looking at Miss Olivesson. I I think so. And then any information regarding data concerning fire department services and operations is also on the our website. Okay. Thank you. [clears throat] Mens

um I do think that in whatever time we have remaining we would be remiss if we didn't talk about what what uh accounts for about 45 almost 46% of the budget and that's police and fire. Um, you know, we've been teasing out things about public works and parks and wreck and and so on and so forth and all of that's important, but uh let's let's talk meat and potatoes. Um, so I guess a general question for both the chiefs. Um, do you have enough in your budget for what you need?

Yes, Chief Petill. You don't have anything more to say?

If we if we stay status quo, yes. If if we if we keep three fire stations, if we keep 63 people. Yes. Yeah, sure. Come on up, Chief Pati. And could somebody maybe get the doors back there? It's a little bit loud. Thank you for your help. I mean, I'm just looking at some of your, you know, both of you have, all of the departments have performance measures and so I was looking at that and um, you know, just maybe speak Chief Petrilli to, um, looks like you've got a metric as far as number of calls over sworn staff strength. Um, you know, have you have you increased your your staff? Do you have enough staff? uh how do you feel about meeting your metrics?

Yeah, so I think overall the budget uh process for us was was a great one. I know I just kind of gave you a thumbs up there that doesn't tell you a whole lot, but I think in in relation to staffing uh training, technology, equipment, um this entire council has been supportive of us every time we've brought uh new technologies, emerging technologies in front of you. Um, our budget this year reflects some improvements in infrastructure for securing uh large events with some some barricades uh that we've gotten for the uptown footprint uh drone as first responder programs. Um, we've added uh some needed uh training and and some other techn technology. Um, so yeah, I mean overall our budget is sufficient um and it's providing us what we need to do our jobs.

And you have 92. Are you fully staffed? Uh we've got a couple gaps uh just based on retirements and we've had um a resignation here recently as well. Okay. So you're feeling pretty good. Yeah, we're in good shape. You are 25.6% of the budget. You're 25 You're the You're the largest slice of the pie and so it should be among first responders, right? These are our two largest departments right here, right? That's why they need to be here, right? That's why it's like we couldn't stop this budget hearing without hearing from you guys.

All right. So um similarly, Chief Humer, I was looking at your performance metrics as well. And could you explain the turnout uh metric and and is your budget um supporting where you want these metrics to go? Turnout metrics. I'm not following you, I guess. Uh you've got a you've got a performance metric called turnout time. Turnout turnout time is the

5 minutes 41 seconds. that that is the response time with the turnout time added to it. So when uh when Metcom uh uh puts out a call to puts out a tone for a call, that's the time between we receive the call to the time that we arrive on the scene. Oh, so this is really turnout and disp turnout and response. Okay. Right. And so we are at um Could you break that down? Is that uh Sure. the turn the turnout time is we we would like for it to be a minute or less okay of that time

and then uh you mentioned something about you you've got adequate for saying status quo um your your analysis for future needs of the department total calls you see that reducing I mean by a little bit but reducing to we're at 861 you see it going down to 845

sure we we we are in the process process right now of uh discussing it with the legal department and administrative staff to look at uh reducing the amount of lift assists that we do with the local nursing homes and everything. The uh the state addressed that in in a new law that says that you know we can charge nursing homes and assisted living facilities for the lift assist. And so we will um hopefully be assessing them a charge for that which will in turn reduce the amount of calls because that's that's the that's the ultimate goal is to reduce the amount of calls that we have to go to the nursing homes and the possibility of injury to our firefighters when we're picking people up off the floor and put putting them back into their bed or their chair or whatever like that. And we really feel like and so did the state um that that is the responsibility of the nursing home or the assisted living uh uh professionals to do that, not the firefighters.

And so with those changes, you don't see you still don't see the number of calls going up at all. No. No. Okay. We're still contracted with um Hudson and Tanda, right? Hudson Fire Protection District, not the village of Hudson. Okay. And does that money that we get on those contracts, does that come back and any of these other fees, does that come back to support the fire operations? It goes to the general fund. Does it come back to you sufficiently? It it comes back to me through the purchase of ambulances and fire trucks and um all the equipment that the fire department receives through the general fund.

All right. My last question will be is about this addition of a temporary assistant chief. Sure. Um, so we want to add another assistant chief for potentially up to five years before existing assistant chiefs might retire.

So the two current assistant chiefs that I have have 28 years and 29 years. Usually 30 years is the top end for the pension for for firefighters. Um, I've been in the fire service, pensionable fire service. It'll be 23 years this year. Um, and you know, had a 22 year career with Carl Foundation Hospital before that. Um, so one of us is going to leave here before too long. And so we are just trying to get ready for that.

Yeah. with all the additionals of all the foyas and everything that we're doing, all the uh run response times, all that kind of stuff. Um obviously we need to be able to take care of the regular business of the fire department as well instead of instead of um all the things that we're keeping busy with now. Fair enough. Um I I disagree with adding an assistant chief. I understand the importance of succession planning, but to bake it in for five years seems excessive and especially in light of I don't think I said that. I think I said it would be less than five years.

Okay. baked in for up to and through four years is is excessive. And um given suddenly um I think a lot of interest even just present right now um about uh having enough boots on the ground um for fire protection and and and EMS coverage. This is a really bad look if nothing else. So that's all I have. One more and I think we need to wrap this up. Um question here.

When you're talking about response time, I think we we cut off Miss Kger. Um when when the town of Normal is discussing response times, it's it's actually looking at more than just two points on a GIS map. Um, and our actual run times would factor in um, sirens on, lights, lights going, the ability to go through red lights and intersections at at above the speed limit. So, uh, and I understand that the fire department is not permitted to share information that might potentially identify individuals. Miss Smith, I'm under HIPPA.

Mith, I'm going to ask that we not go there, please. Uh we're we're talking budget issues here tonight. Thank you. I think at this point, unless council member would like another item to bring up, I think we should adjourn this work session. Take a five minute break.

No, I No, thank you for council's comments. Um we've taken lots of notes. Like we said, we'll bring the final budget document to you. Uh I believe your first meeting in March is our target. Um and so we'll once we're done with this, we've got a bunch of other things on your plate. We've got public hearing, liquor commission, and then um some presentations. So let's come back at oh let's say 710. Give you seven minutes to now six minutes.

We've got a very busy schedule tonight and we've got a number of things before we go into our regular meeting. Uh the first is a public hearing pertaining to the Uptown North TIFF district. Call to order a public hearing for the Uptown North Tiff District. Please call the RO. Mayor Cous here. Mr. Preston here. Mrs. Loren here. Mr. Buyers here. Mr. Roers here. Miss Smith here. Mr. McCarthy here.

Is there anyone here wishing to speak pertaining to the Uptown North TIFF district? Is there anyone here wishing to speak uh pertaining to the Uptown North TIFF district? And I'm required to ask this question three times. Is there anyone here wishing to speak pertaining to the Uptown North Tiff District. Motion for adjournment, please. So moved. Second, please call the RO. Mr. Preston, I. Mrs. Loren, hi. Mr. Buyers, hi. Mr. Roers, I. Miss Smith, I. Mr. McCarthy, I. Mayor Cous,

I uh are adjourned from the public hearing. Uh, call to order a meeting of the normal local liquor commission. Mayor Cous here. Mr. Preston here. Mrs. Loren here. Mr. Buyers here. Mr. Robers here. Miss Smith here. Mr. McCarthy here. We have two items of business tonight. The first is approval of the minutes of the special meeting of October 6, 2025. Motion for approval. Approval. Second. Any [clears throat] changes or additions? Please call the RO. Mr. Preston, I. Mrs. Loren, I.

Mr. Buyers. Hi. Mr. Roers. I. Miss Smith. I. Mr. McCarthy. I. Mayor Cous. I. Those minutes are approved. We have a a liquor license application for Oak and Ember Kitchen LLC. Doing business as Oaken Ember Kitchen. at 169 Northbrook Drive. Second. Thank you. Uh this is a license for a class C liquor license which is here in Wall. Correct. Discussion on that item. Please call the RO. Mrs. Loren. I. Mr. Buyers. I. Mr. Robers. I. Ms. Smith. I. Mr. McCarthy.

I. Mr. Preston I Mayor Cous I that liquor license is approved a motion for German please. So moved second please call a roll. Mr. Buyers I Mr. Robers I Miss Smith I Mr. McCarthy I Mr. Preston I Mrs. Loren I Mayor Cous

I the liquor commission is adjourned. We have two recognitions tonight. The first is a recognition of the CIMS certification for facilities and staff management. So, mayor and council, we were going to use a few minutes of your time this evening to recognize two departments that recently received awards. One is I'm going to invite the facilities management team. Uh Eric Heg is going to come forward and and explain that and then after that will be Miss Garaji. Uh thank you M Reese and mayor and councel. Um yeah so this was uh the sim certification um falls under the uh cleaning industry management standard GB uh representing green building um and also that was completed with honors. Um it's a huge lift for for our department. Um specifically Ladine Finley, our custodial supervisor. Um she really does a great job. There's there's a lot of uh paperwork, documentation. Um but then also, you know, kudos to the staff. We we're fortunate we have a few few folks here tonight. Um but that's you know implementing those those policies and standards um you know just throughout their everyday practice. Yeah. Um there's there's significance to the to the certification but it also just has become um our daily practice. So um you know again kudos to them. Um, SIMS again, cleaning industry management standard, but uh, you know, one of the some of the main highlights of that is healthy environments, um, efficiency and how we how we, uh, carry out our duties. Um, quality, quality control, you know,

making sure that, uh, what we're doing is actually effective. um you know where where's we always say Mark's said it you know multiple times um if you've talked to him about it but we clean um for for health and the byproduct is just things look nice you know the primary goal is to make sure that things are healthy and sanitary and then um sustainability too um the GB green building that's that's kind of falls under lead uh but we're also still trying to use as many uh green products as possible. Um and you know, that's just part of what we do. Again, it's just kind of built into our uh day-to-day. Um and uh again, I just wanted to highlight staff. Uh Leine, she's she's developed a great rapport with our uh the assessor that comes through and does this. Um and it's like I said, it's takes months to compile all the information, all the data. um re review everything and make sure that it's uh ready to go for when the assessor does come through. So, appreciate the time. Thank you.

And the only thing I'd like to add to that is that I [clears throat] am very thankful as director of the department, the overall department. This is a top tier standard that is quality management, Mr. Hegy, Miss Finley, and actual real life execution of what we're doing to make this thing work. So very proud of staff. It is it is no small task to achieve this to get this designation with green green and honors exceeds the fundamental baseline to achieve sims on its own right with the green elements plus 85% of the voluntary required items which we exceeded that. So, thank you for giving us the opportunity to celebrate this and acknowledge staff.

Great. Mayor Council, you we've recognized the water department and Mr. Burkheart quite a bit with his uh water designation. So, if if council doesn't mind since we're recognizing, could we do a picture with you like we usually do? Um, and I think some of your team is here.

I was going to suggest the team stand up and come forward and we'll do a a photo opportunity. Shift this way a little bit. Get cozy. Look at me. Thank you. [applause] Very impressive as well. [clears throat] And while she's coming forward, I think recognize professionals and everybody. We get awards like this repeatedly. We get awards like this repeatedly and it just shows the professionalism, dedication of everybody that works. So, thank you for that.

Good evening everybody. Um I typically don't have prepared remarks but today I do because there is a lot to cover about what cities. Um town normal is now a Watworth cities silver certified city uh joining only a handful of other communities in Illinois to earn this international recognition. So what does this mean? Um in short this international certification from Bloomberg Philanthropies confirms that normal has been doing data right. uh from strong data practices to measurable outcomes for our community. This um achievement um as many of you know did not happen overnight. It reflects a long journey that began with our 2017 comprehensive plan that called for the town to incorporate smart city thinking in all aspects of community building. And at its core, smart city thinking um incorporates data into decision making and drawing meaningful insights [clears throat] to solve real community problems. So the certifi certification is a testament to Tonormal's intentional and disciplined uh approach to data. We focus on ensuring that our information we collect is accurate from the start and most often we know it is it doesn't always start uh at its greatest. So we make sure it is cleaned, documented and understood in context. Uh in other words, we trust our data but we definitely verify it. Um what does this look like in real world? Uh it shows up in our everyday decisions such as improving efficiency for our public works and engineering operations. Um grounding sustainability efforts in our measurable outcomes. Advancing campus and pedestrian safety through regional collaboration. uh tackling strategic plan, tracking strategic plan uh implementation and aligning budgets, increasing transparency through our open data portal, and last but not the least, strengthening community engagement that directly shape programs like our public arts initiatives. So the WWorks uh city

silver certification is not about a single project or a single platform or a single department. It is recognition of how the town of Norma works. Um a significant driver of this success is our data IT team which is a cross departmental team that was appointed by our city manager Ree in 2021 to launch the town's open data portal. What began as a transparency initiative quickly evolved into something much more impactful. So today the data I team works across departments to improve data quality and build data literacy and ensure information is shared rather than siloed because we all know that data is much more useful when it is not stuck on somebody's desktop. Um I also want to recognize uh innovation and technology staff who worked uh in uh in the background to strengthen data governance. When we talk about data governance, this is the stuff that people usually don't um uh think about. It's making sure that we have a comprehensive inventory of our data and making sure that we know where our data is and how to protect our data. Um connecting to back-end systems so that we can um break down data silos in the back end. So things that are not glamorous but essential without which uh everything else would fall apart. Finally, I want to thank town leadership and council for treating data as a strategic asset rather than an afterthought um and for empowering staff to prioritize this work. This level of alignment both across departments and vertically between staff and leadership is what Bloomberg recognized as best practice for data and uh really what uh truly sets normal apart from its peer communities. Uh at this time I would like to invite our data IT members many of which are in our audience to uh stand up and be recognized. And I also want to invite uh INT staff to stand up and be recognized. And I want to give a particular shout out to Sarah Rogers who

spearheaded this initiative on behalf of INT department. [applause] Please come up. All that come on up. [applause] All that IT members, please come up.

Mercy bet. Can somebody else take the break for a second? I have to get in front. You have to look at me.

[applause] [applause]

Call to order a meeting for the Normal Town Council for Tuesday, January 20th, 2026. Please call the Mayor Cous here. Mr. Preston, here. Mrs. Loren, here. Mr. Buyers here. Mr. Robers, here. Miss Smith here. Mr. McCarthy here.

Before we start, let's have a flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it stands nationy and justice for all. [clears throat] So, we're going to start this meeting on a little different note tonight. Anybody recognize that? [laughter]

So, I'm wearing this hat as a friendly wager with Mayor Mayor Terry Cunningham of Boseman, Montana on the outcome of the national championship game between Montana State Redcat, the Bobcats and the Illinois State Redbirds. So, congratulations to he his team won and I lost the bet. So, tip of the hat to the mayor and Montana State. Uh but also thank you to uh the community to the Redbirds team. Uh they gave an incredible performance at that game. It's one of the best uh football games ever played, I think. Um thanks to all the fans who went to Nashville to support the Redbirds in in their attempt to get a national championship. Uh you played well. Hold your heads high. It was an incredible incredible game. And my message I had sent a hat, Redbird's hat to uh Mayor Cunningham. And my message to Mayor Cunningham is hold on to that hat and we'll see you next year. We'll move to the omnibus agenda. Items considered routine and would be handled with a single vote unless a council member would like to pull an item.

You know, mayor, I'm going to have you pause for just a second. You skipped over public comment. I don't know if there is any or not, but we don't have public comment at the beginning of the meeting. We have do have public comment at the end of the meeting. Approval. Oops. Um, I'd like to remove item C as in Charlie. Have a motion for approval. Do we have a second?

Second. Items considered under omnibus tonight are approval of minutes of the regular council meeting of January 5th, 2026. A report to receive and file town of normal expenditures for payment as of January 14th, 2026. a resolution to authorize the mayor to execute a design contract for exhibit updates at the Children's Discovery Museum with Roto Group LLC in the amount not to exceed $90,000. A resolution [clears throat] to approve executive session minutes to release certain executive session minutes and to retain confidentiality for certain executive session minutes. Please call the RO. Mr. Preston,

I. Mrs. Loren, I. Mr. Mr. Bers. Hi, Mr. Robers. Hi, Miss Smith. I, Mr. McCarthy. Hi, Mayor Cous. I Those items are approved. Item C is a resolution accepting quotes and authorizing the purchase of two 2026 Chevy Chevrolet Equinox EVs from Sam Leven Chevrolet in the amount of $58,74526. Move for approval. Second. Second.

Smith. I I removed this item from the omnibus agenda because I wanted to highlight um that the funding is pro to purchase these is being provided by Amaran and that's $100,000 in total. Um but because of uh the Sam Layman Chevrolet's very attractive offer where they continue to apply $75$500 of a program that expired last year. Um we're getting this very favorable price. So what happens to money that we do not spend out of the hundred,000 that was made available to us by Amory? We can continue to use those dollars for other things such as additional EVs in the future or charging stations.

That's all I had. Thank you. Further on this item, please call RO. Mrs. Lauren, I. Mr. Buyers. Mr. Roers. I. Miss Smith. I. Mr. McCarthy. I. Mr. Preston. I. Mayor Cous. I. That resolution is approved. We have no general orders. We have one item of new business tonight. A motion to approve an appointment uh to the Human Relations Commission. Move approval. Second. Thank you. Mr. McCarthy, would you read that?

I'd be happy to. Um the mayor is appointing Mr. Brian Henman to the human relations commission. Mr. Himn has been a resident of normal for 15 years employed by uh Chestnut Health Systems as the associate director of court treatment programs. He also has a side business where he takes small number of private clients via teleaalth as a practitioner. Mr. Henman holds a master's degree in clinical psychology with a background in philosophy from EIU. He is passionate about serving the community and lifting the voices of those that are not always given a platform to be heard as shown through his volunteer work at Prairie Pride Coalition Chest and Health Systems DEI committee and outreach programming at local colleges, churches, and other v venues. Mr. Henman looks forward to serving his community as human relations commission board member. He will be filling a vacant seat with a term expiring on March 31st of 2030. Thank you. Please call the RO.

Mr. Buyers, I. Mr. Roers. I. Miss Smith. I. Mr. McCarthy. Hi. Mr. Preston. I. Mrs. Loren. I. Mayor Cous.

I. That appointment is approved. We move to public comment. And we have five speakers in public comment tonight. I'll just go over the rules very quickly. Uh, some of you have been here before, so I think you understand them. When you come forward, I'd like you to state your name for the record, and you have three minutes to make your comments. Our first commenter is Chris Coats. You can take any of the chairs up here. All the microphones are live. Uh, Mayor Cuz, uh, city councilman, members, uh, I appreciate the opportunity for you guys to, uh, listen to me speak tonight. Um, as you said, my name is Chris Coats. I'm the vice president of the Associated Firefighters of Illinois, uh, 26-year professional firefighter in the city of Pein and the, uh, bargaining agent for, uh, normal firefighters local 2442. Um, and what I wanted to come to speak to you guys tonight, uh, was to briefly go over some of the, uh, articles I've read and things I've seen online and in the paper and just dispel a few things. The first thing I want to, uh, touch base on is I've seen in several times where there's been comments in the media and things about the firefighters not bringing the station to change or increasing the number of fire departments to the collective bargaining table uh, at their last negotiations, which wrapped up, I think, just this past fall. Um, the Illinois Public Labor Relations Act specifically excludes management type rights from collective bargaining agreements, which is the total number of people that are employed by this a city municipality as well as number of fire station, those type of things. Those are inherent management rights. We don't have the right to collective bargain about those issues. So, I did want to

make that public to be known that it's not something that the firefighters haven't asked to talk about. Um, they've requested labor management meetings in the past, starting with the fire chief, with the city administration, and I believe even up to the city council, and they've been met with no response. So, that's the only avenue they have to be able to have a discussion outside of a public hearing of this type of thing. Um, and uh, I guess I would just ask that all they really want is a seat at the table, to have a discussion, to have a frank, honest discussion on on what they see as issues regarding the fire department. Um, and unfortunately to this point they haven't had the ability to to be able to have those those comments. So I'd ask that respectively that you uh consider having a conversation with them. Um, I also wanted to touch base on there's been a lot of discussion over uh response times in regards to where station locations and stuff are and and I want to touch on why those response times are so important. Um, but I also want to touch base on in the two 2024 annual report that the fire department presented to you guys, the average response time was listed as 5 minutes and 41 seconds. And then there was recently a fact sheet that went out to public entities where that number all of a sudden became 4 minutes and 28 seconds. Um, it doesn't seem like a whole lot. 45 seconds doesn't seem like much to a lay person, but when you're talking about a fire, a fire doubles in size every 30 seconds. So when these members are talking about how important it is to have this response time and be able to be as close to that four-minute response time as possible, you can see that even at a 4-minute response time, how fast a fire can grow, add another 45 seconds to that in the ability to have that fire grow again and double is a a definite uh detriment to the citizens that you guys serve in ensuring that they have the most uh safe environment as possible. Um, so I I see my time's running out. Um, I just the one thing I'm going to come to you guys tonight is we just as

firefighters, we just want to have the opportunity to talk to you um to share [snorts] a conversation as to why we think these things are important and I respectfully ask that you have a seat with the firefighters and at least talk about these things. Thank you.

Uh, our next speaker is uh Chuck Sullivan. We We don't make it easy, do we? Oh, thank you, Mr. Mayor, and and members of the council. My name is Chuck Sullivan and I truly appreciate the opportunity to speak with you tonight. Um, I'm the the president of the Associated Firefighters of Illinois. Now, AFI represents over 18,000 professional firefighters and paramedics in 238 different locals across our great state. Obviously, one of them is your local 2442. And I really want to make something perfectly clear tonight and and that is that the AFI as a state association is not out promoting a willy-nilly expanding fire stations or or personnel. Um what we've always promoted since our founding in 1935 is that each of our members took a oath. They swore to protect the individuals and property of our respective communities. So, in other words, we realize as firefighters that we have a very dangerous and uh demanding job and that when your firefighter paramedics in normal raised their right hand and swore an oath, they did so knowing that they're sacrificing their very health, their very safety, and ultimately their life, knowing that they're going to risk it all for others. So we as a state association and as local 2442 we deal in facts facts. We

deal in real world where our decisions are based in truth and consequence. This is not fear-mongering. I want to make that clear. This is not fear-mongering. This is not an attempt by the AFI to gain more members. I just mentioned we have 18,000. We deal in facts based on experience, data, science, and history. And what we are simply suggesting to you tonight is after a very deliberate and timeconsuming research and updated fire station location study with superior computerized models using GIS is that the town of Normal is providing a less than adequate deployment of stations and personnel. We all completely completely understand and appreciate the cost of providing adequate fire and EMS. We are all taxpayers, but this local and this state association are not going to stand by quiet. We're not going to go away when facts, data, and science indicate an extremely stark difference in what this town is telling their constituents and their businesses. We are unapologetic when it comes to public safety, and we hope that you share that same sentiment. So I have the opportunity to travel across the straight state and meet with various locals and their various city governments. This is a first. This is a first as I understand it that town staff has refused to sit down with the local to at least hear their concerns or meet to better understand the updated studies. And I apologize, my time is running out. I hope I'm conveying exactly how our local and our state association feels. I'll wrap this up and be very very direct. If you do not take into consideration what local 2442 is trying to share with you, the normal

fire department will not be able to meet the level of service this community expects and deserves. Thank you. I'll I'll I'll just ask please don't applaud or or or call out in in the course of the meeting. We'd appreciate just a little bit of decorum in the meeting. I understand your enthusiasm and appreciate it, but please don't do that. Uh our next speaker is Blake Chsy. Good evening, council members, mayor, city manager, and fellow citizens and visitors of Normal. [clears throat] My name is Blake Chssey. I'm a member of Normal Firefighters Local 2442. I've met with many of you to present our community needs study. Uh, and tonight I want to address the town's fire station relocation and answers document and recent comments made by town staff regarding regarding fire and EMS coverage. First, four minutes versus 6 minutes. NFPA 1710, the standard for a career fire department, is four minutes. The NFPA, an internationally respected century old organization, does not set that number arbitrarily. It is based on extensive research from organizations such as the national institute of standards and technology, UL's fire safety research in Institute and the American Heart Association showing that outcomes for both fire and medical emergencies are significantly better when response times are within four minutes. The town's document cites a six-minute standard taken from our EMS system, which is mainly made up of volunteer agencies in rural settings

facing very different challenges. The people of Normal employ a career fire department and deserve the level of service backed by national standards and scientific research, not a slower rural benchmark. Expecting volunteer level response times from a career department is unacceptable. Second, the town has still not provided any modeling or documentation to the public to support its claims. We have seen no administrative planning documents, no aggregate reports, and no detailed analysis to review. Instead, we have been given an FAQ style summary that selectively highlights over a million data points without letting anyone see how they were actually used. When our local attempted to obtain this information through foyer requests, we were denied. and only after we publicly released our community needs study did any recent planning documents start to appear. Finally, the town's document says that we are requesting resources costing $100 million over 10 years. We've made no such request. Those numbers are based off of recommendations in the study, not demands. Our actual request is simple, to work collaborative collaboratively with the town and to help plan responsibly. This same town document that I am referencing says that the town is committed to a positive working relationship with the union. Yet, there has been a refusal to meet with us. And this refusal to simply meet with your community's first responders directly affects the safety of everyone in Normal. And as a citizen of this town, I find the hesitancy to meet with us concerning. Normal firefighters Local 2442 wants to partner with the town to solve these challenges, not create unnecessary costs. We want to use our expertise and real world experience to help make normal a safer place in a way that is responsible with taxpayer dollars. I want to thank those council members willing to meet with us to address these issues. Those of you who are hesitant to meet with us or advocate for a work session, I politely ask you to reconsider and offer an open line of communication to address your concerns.

Please call for a public work session. Thank you. Uh, next speaker is Eric Hall. Good evening, mayor, council members, and citizens. My name is Eric Hall. I am a citizen of Normal. I spoke to you last month. Uh I currently live just a few short blocks away from the station 2. I am also currently the president of Bloomington Firefighters Local 49. We stand here tonight uh in support of our brothers of 2442. But I speak to you tonight as a citizen of this town. On December 3rd, during a WGLT discussion, Council Member McCarthy outlined the town's analysis behind the proposed relocation of fire station number two. In that interview, Council Member McCarthy stated, "We are not just dropping push pins on a Google map and made references to route driving analysis, CAD data, vehicle tracking, and trial runs. These comments imply the decision move the station is data driven as outlined in your award you received this evening. Following that interview, I submitted a detailed email request to Mr. McCarthy and the council through the town's website asking that the data referenced in those remarks be made publicly available on the fire department's page. To date, I have received no response to my email and no supporting data has been released to the public. The materials I requested were neither unusual nor unreasonable. They included route driving and travel time data, historical CAD responses, GIS call density maps, and modeling assumptions. These are the very tools the town has cited as the foundation for relocating station number two away from my family and neighbors.

Yet residents have been given no opportunity to see the data. If this decision is truly data driven, then the data should be easily accessible on the town's website. Front and center, transparency builds trust. Withholding information, especially after has been publicly referenced multiple times, raises questions of integrity of this council. Recently, I saw a town staff member had stated that a 4-minute response time is the platinum standard under NFPA 1710. That is not accurate. 1710 is the standard. There are no tiers, platinum, gold, or silver. What further complicates the issues is the inconsistency in how the council defines what is acceptable. When it came to infrastructure, half the council voted to pass a premium underpass plan instead of a more modest atgrade crossing. But when it comes to emergency response and public safety, when it comes to the safety of our families in our neighborhoods, residents are expected to settle for less. That inconsistency should alarm everyone. Public safety is not negotiable. If the data justifies the decision, then make it public. Currently, the union's data is the only one residents have been able to see. Rather than attacking their data in the media, the same manager, mayor, and council should want to release the town's data and plan and to show how it improves emergency response and public safety with the move. Finally, to my fellow citizens, local government only works when elected officials remember who they answer to. Transparency and public safety are not favors to be granted. They are obligations. When a mayor and council refuse to listen, refuse to share information behind their decisions, and refuse to put public safety first, they forfeit the trust of the people they serve. At that point, our silence is not an option. It becomes our responsibility to hold them accountable and ne necessary replace them with leaders that will. Thank you.

And our next speaker is Mickey Stapleton. Thank you, Mayor Mayor Cous, and council members for let allowing me to speak today. I'm not a very good speaker, but I'm speaking from my heart. I went around s Friday and Saturday in 13°ree weather to find out what the neighbors wanted for this town. and they wanted station two to stay where it is. They had no idea that station out further out on Shepard Road was going to replace the station two at College and Blair. They thought you were just adding one. So, and what I heard from a lot of them is why could you not just use your, and I don't know if this is accurate, $4 million for the underpass. Take that and put it towards the fire station. It does need some upgrades, and I'm sure the guys will admit to that. Uh, because I walked in there looking for somebody to talk to them, and I walked in the back door. It was not locked. And I'm yelling at the top of my lungs for somebody. Nobody was there because the guys were out on a call. So, you know, lock needs to be replaced at least there

and a doorbell that works. And, you know, I got a petition signed and I have four pages of signatures here and I'll leave it right here for you. I did not fudge any of the signatures. A lot of them were elderly people and they said, you know, they appreciate the fire station being where it is because they were able to get to them in time for their situation that they had. Thank you very much.

That concludes our public comment before taking a motion for German. Are there comments or concerns? Um, I will make a few comments of an observation on the commenters that we just heard tonight, but I also want to draw attention to another public safety matter um that actually is good news. As many of you know, I work at Home Sweet Home Ministries and um as of today, I think about 40 people who previously were uh living outside in a tent in a car unhoused are now in a warm cabin. Uh one of the 56 um residents that will be part of the bridge uh new shelter village. So, um, thank you to I see representation from both Bloomington Fire and Normal. Um, I'm sure the tent encampments have been a strain on on some of your resources and I personally thank you for um all the attention that you've given them. Uh, a special shout out to Bloomington Fire for always uh very regularly attending to the needs at the shelter uh campus in general. So, um, so good news on that and let's not, uh, lose sight of a win of of this magnitude. Um, as far as, uh, our commenters, I've been a frequent commenter at this juncture in most of our meetings. Um, I will once again ask for uh what I think others said so eloquently tonight and that is that we sit down and have a conversation, invite the firefighters, the representatives of local 2442 to be at the table to share the data from the town and their study and um be civic leaders. And I am once again asking my colleagues or at least a majority of my

colleagues sitting up here. It takes four of us to put a work session on the agenda. I'm asking I think I'm at this point begging for a work session. Thank you, Mr. Briers.

Uh thanks, Mayor. Yeah, just as a quick comment in in response to some of the comments tonight. Something that I think uh could be a reasonable step because my view on the question of how many firefighters should we have? How many fire stations should we have? The answer to both is fundamentally driven by data. And if the data says we should stay the same, then that's what we should do. If the data says we need more, then that's what we should do. And finding the funding in the case of needed more is that's a a financial problem that we could find a solution to. So where I'm coming from on this to me a reasonable approach based off of just a lot of the feedback we've gotten the community and I think wanting to uh add to the data that we have and just provide reassurance to the community as well is would it not make sense to authorize um as especially as we're talking about budget season to authorize a um a a a updated third-party study that would look at this issue um provide a report that we as the town would have and then certainly we could put that side by side with the one that the union has authorized look at the methodology in both look at the outcomes in both and maybe we'll find hey there's a lot of overlap in in these two studies or maybe we'll find there's differences and we could rectify those uh but to me more data is a good thing I understand and appreciate that administration is working with a lot of data currently but to me having an additional data point especially that a third party consultant type would put together um to me that could be something that's beneficial to everybody involved in this issue um it's something that I would certainly support um could be something that could um come part of the budget conversations we're having here in the coming weeks. Thank you.

Motion forjourn. So moved. Second. Please call the RO. Mr. Roers. I. Miss Smith. I. Mr. McCarthy. I. Mr. Preston. Hi. Mrs. Loren. I Mr. Buyers. Hi. Mayor Cous. Hi. We are journed. Thank you all for coming.