Transcription
Meeting October 28th at 7 p.m. Start with the pledge of allegiance. Pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, and justice for all.
Please do. Alderman Johnson, here. Alderman Montoya, here. Alderman Ruthberg, here. Alderman Barmore, here. Alderman McGee, here. Alderman Carr, here. Alderman Roll, here. Seven. President.
Public comment. As a reminder, the public comment period is not a time for dialogue. The purpose of the public comment period is for the mayor and aldermen of the city to receive input from their community. It is, in fact, a one-way communication to city council. The city's administration and department heads are available for discussions after the meeting. Is there any public comment?
Hello. Good evening. Uh, my name is Pua Tempa. I am from the United Worker Center, a nonprofit organization on the southeast side of Chicago. Um, we just began our after-school program here in Blue Island this month of October, and we were just here just to pass that information along to you. Um, our after-school program has cooking and baking, arts, um, and soccer. On Wednesdays, once a week, um, the sheets that I provided for you guys have a registration code on there if you need any more information. Um, our contact info is also at the bottom. Um, our office is open Monday through Friday, and we invite you guys to call if you need any information. Um, it's a really great program. All the children receive a meal before beginning the program. Um, and they're very well taken care of. Um, and then you guys also have a sheet with the other uh programs and resources that we offer at our at our organization. One of them is a free legal clinic that we bring over to Blue Island once every two weeks. Um, so that's also a really great resource if you guys would like to take advantage. And once again, if you have any questions, just give us a call. Thank you so much.
Thank you. Are there any other public comments? Not moving on.
Motion for a motion to approve pay date October 24th, 2025, the amount of $520,464.50. Is there a motion? Car on the question, please. Roll call.
Alderman Johnson. Aye. Montoya. Aye. Alderman Rutenberg. Aye. Alderman Farwell. Aye. Alderman McGee. Aye. Alderman Carr. Aye. Alderman Roll. Aye. Seven ayes. Motion carries.
Under B, a motion for approval of accounts payable dated October 29th, 2025, in the amount of $433,943.15. Is there a motion? Motion by Alderman McGee. Is there a second? Alderman Montoya. On the question. Clerk, please do roll call.
Alderman Johnson. Aye. Alderman Montoya. Aye. Alderman Ruthberg. Aye. Alderman Farwell. Aye. Alderman McGee. Aye. Alderman Carr. Aye. Alderman Roll. Aye. Seven ayes. Motion carries.
There is. We'll come back to see bid openings for 1513 Sacramento, 13701 Sacramento, 13711 Sacramento with three adjoining pins of vacant land. The city's own for 10 years.
This is for 13701 Sacramento. Okay. October 5th to the city council. Patrick Kill is representative of PJK Inc. 10552 Like purchase 1371 Island for $1,500. Intend to use the property listed as a commercial airspace for storage construction equipment for PJ Daniel. We intend to property of any debates anywhere on the property security purposes. You have any questions or needed.
All right. This one is for 13713 Sacramento. Yeah. Uh, Kel representative PJK Hill 52 would like to put in bid purchase 1373 Sacramento for $1,500. Same reasons intended property commercial space construction equipment to clear the property of any freeing cleansing property. This one is for 135 and 11 Sacramento to the city council. Island representative PJ Health would like to put in purchase 1371.
All right. Sentence illegal for review. Is there anything else? Yes. All right.
Under D, a resolution for the city of Loyala County, Illinois, authorizing approving proposal from Axon Enterprise Incorporated for the purchase and installation of Axon Fleet 3 in-car camera system for police department vehicles. Is there a motion? Alderman Carr. Is there a second? Alderman McGee. On the question. I just want a little clarification. There's some different language used. Sometimes it's called a renewal and sometimes it's called a purchase. I just find it.
Yeah. Probably the best to describe this. Uh, currently we use a different vendor for our in-car systems. They're dated. Um, we have some that don't have any. So, we're going with Axon because of the proprietary technology. Um, they work with our body cams, they work with our tasers, everything activates together. Um, this will be all the new purchased installations for it, but it is the now third agreement we'll have with Axon because we have their other technology. So I think that maybe where some of that came in because we were offering renewal with body cam taser or something.
There wasn't a I didn't see an attachment. Is there a total amount of money that we are specifying? So, it's a little over $29,000 a year. Uh, like $3 per car per day or something like that. Uh, it's $147,000 roughly for the five-year cre. One more question.
I'm sorry. How many cars are currently equipped? How many cars and release?
Yeah. So, uh, ever since we took over, we're kind of trying to do better fleet management. So, we've come down to where we need 16 fully marked patrol vehicles, and that will support our patrol division, which are the ones that get the in-car cameras. Uh, of those 16, we have about 11 right now with functioning cameras. Three that have um malfunctioning cameras that we're having a hard time getting back up and running, and the remainder don't have cameras at all.
Any other questions? It's not for it was from the last from the bid. I just had a question. See that construction company. It's just equipment, right? They won't be putting like, you know, the construction trash or garbage or anything of that nature.
We have the attorney look into it. It's a sewer and excavating company.
Yeah. I just didn't want, you know, making sure they just don't use it like a, you know, a landfill or dump. So we'll have to be more specific on use.
All right, back to Axon. Any other questions? Please do the roll call.
Alderman Johnson. Aye. Alderman. Aye. Alderman Ruthberg. Aye. Alderman. Aye. Alderman McGee. Aye. Alderman Carr. Aye. Alderman Roll. Aye. Seven ayes. Motion carries.
Under E. Arrest County, Illinois. Oh, I'm sorry. All the roll.
Under E, a resolution for the city of Wa County, Illinois, authorizing when approving the execution of a fourth amendment to the traffic signal maintenance agreement by and between the city and me. It's for traffic signals. I believe there. Motion Montoya. On the question. Follow.
Alderman Johnson. Aye. Montoya. Aye. Alderman Lutenberg. Aye. Alderman Farwell. Aye. Alderman McGee. Aye. Alderman Carr. Aye. Alderman Roll. Aye. Seven ayes. Motion carries.
The next four are all related, but I'll do them separately. It's the offer from the Cook County for zero interest bridge loan until the tax bills come out and the money is paid removed right from the taxes as they come in. So, the first one, I'll read the first one. It's an ordinance authorizing the issuance of tax law tax anticipation warrants in anticipation of the collection of taxes levied for the year 2024 by the city council of the city of County, Illinois, for corporate purposes, directing the county treasurer and ex official county collector of the county of Cook, Illinois, to deposit amounts collected from said tax directly into a fund held by a tax escrow agent and authorizing the sale of said warrants to the county of Cook, Illinois. These are all individual funds, but they're not listed in your administration. Do you know what the first one's for?
Well, it's for different letters.
Okay. I know. I saw the packet. It was listed by like library and.
So there's for the different levies. So, it's for corporate purpose.
I see. I missed it. Yep. Corporate fund. Okay.
Corporate fund. Corporate fund. Corporate police fire.
Is there a motion? Alderman Carr. Second. On the question. Roll call. Can we speak to how these dollar amounts were uh derived? I I understand that like many municipalities, we need to borrow to cover the gap, but I'm just wondering how is the the amount to borrow determined?
I think the county tells us, but Mark, do you want to go into detail?
I mean, it's it's based off of percentage of taxes levied and collected.
Okay. So, it's it's just literally uh for what we would have collected.
What you would have expected. Any other questions? Now, please do the roll call.
Alderman Johnson. Aye. Alderman Montoya. Aye. Alderman Rutherberg. Aye. Alderman Farwell. Aye. Alderman McGee. Aye. Alderman Carr. Aye. Alderman Roll. Aye. Seven ayes. Motion carries.
So next three without reading the entire thing. The next one is for the police protection purposes. Um, same language as before. Is there a motion? Alderman Carr. Second Alderman McGee. On the question. Please do the roll call.
Alderman Johnson. Aye. Montoya. Aye. Alderman Rutherberg. Aye. Alderman Farwell. Aye. Alderman McGee. Aye. Alderman Carr. Aye. Alderman Roll. Aye. Seven ayes. Motion carries.
Next one. Same language for fire protection purposes. Is there a motion? Motion by Alderman McGee. Second by Alderman Johnson. On the question. Please do the roll call.
Alderman Johnson. Aye. Montoya. Aye. Alderman Ruthberg. Aye. Alderman Farwell. Aye. Alderman McGee. Aye. Alderman Carr. Aye. Alderman Roll. Aye. Seven ayes. Motion carries.
Last one. Same language for library purposes. And as you know, and I'll say to the public, the library is a branch of the city of Little Island, appointed by the mayor, but they're tied to our levy. So, we have to do the legal motions for them. So, that's why it's under here. Same language except it's through the library fund. Is there a motion? Alderman Farwell. Second by Alderman Johnson. Please do the roll call.
Alderman Johnson. Aye. Montoya. Aye. Alderman Ruthberg. Aye. Alderman Farwell. Aye. Alderman McGee. Aye. Alderman Carr. Aye. Alderman Roll. Aye. Seven ayes. Motion carries.
City clerk. Uh, Sierra Crows are almost all up and they will be judged soon. I will be contacting all the schools in Blue Island so the children of Blue Island can vote. The Day of the Dead is this Saturday. We have right now we've changed it up a little bit. We have three Mexican bands. We have a Blue Island dance team. We have several vendors. We have an altar. We have a photo section. Eisenhower High School is doing an art exhibit and their teachers will be present. We have a Mexican puppets and we have a Mexican art exhibit. We have a lot more. That's just some of the things we have. So, it's from 5 to 9 on Saturday. So, hopefully you all can attend. Um, the Blue Light Parade planning has begun. Um, can contact the clerk's office to take part in the parade, sponsor, or even be a vendor for the Chris Pringle Mart. If you have any questions, please contact me or stop in my office in the city. It's all I have.
Thank you. Under city treasurer. And we did this before. These monies are not going directly through the city for the green alleys, but they want us to be aware of it and be okay with the amount spent. They don't want a motion or approval. They just want you guys being aware. The Green Alley is asking for another payment, pay request number two for the Green Alley program. Again, money's not coming through us, but one of their things is to make sure it's in our minutes that this is being paid for. I believe without them here, public works in here, the alleys are completed. They might have some punch list stuff, but I believe the green alleys for this season are done. Um, as you know, we awarded three more for next year, but that's going to be next year. Any questions regarding this? It's not a motion. It's just a one-minute record. All right.
See attorney, you go back executive. Great. City administration. Uh, one quick item before I get to this wonderful document here. Alderman Johnson, just to answer your question in regards to the vacant lot that we just uh just uh accepted a bid for. Um, just because they wanted to bid for the process, you still have to go through the use process. You still have to go to the building department itself and tell us what you're going to do with it. Then we'll still have plenty of opportunity for feedback before, you know, before anything happens there, right? So, just the bidding process is one part of it, but you still have to tell us what you're going to do with it and everything. So, um, you have a, and I apologize, this is not the easiest to read chart here in front of you, but, um, I'm happy to grind an electronic version. It's much easier to read. Uh, this represents uh uh the this year's um best option we believe uh for our health insurance renewal for 20 uh for 2026. So Mark and I met, Mark Task and I met with uh with our broker. Um, also Mark provided uh some news articles, some homework that we've been looking into. Um, just to give a reflection of that the health insurance market is very difficult right now and no one is doing particularly well in it. So, uh, while we were hopeful that we, you know, might be, um, not dealing with too much of an increased cost this year, we are fortunately looking at our best option still includes, uh, what will be, you know, some some hiked costs here. Uh, so this option, kind of probably the most important thing to pay attention to here is that we have uh, four separate health insurance plans that we offer our employees. We have a PPO, an HMO, an HSA, which is a health savings account, sort of a different method of of doing your health insurance. And then we have a uh what's called a a Blue Choice Select PPO, which is a Blue Cross specific product. Uh, that's a variation of a PPO. So what you're going to see is that depending on the which which program that our employees are enrolled into, they're going to be seeing, with the exception of the HSA accounts, going to be seeing anywhere from a 6 to 12% increase depending on what you sign up for and what your options are. Uh, it looks like some of the biggest hits on that are going to come obviously with higher deductibles and with increased prescription drug costs. Again, this is um, you know, across the board in terms of health insurance in the country right now. So we believe this is the best option. We're still kind of working through with Blue Cross Blue Shield. You have any more specific questions about it right now? I I'm happy to let Mark dig into it a little bit deeper since he likes to live in his world more than I do. Uh, but, um, you know, this is something that does affect our employees and it's going to affect everybody, um, our retirees as well. Uh, so this is what we're looking at. I want to make sure that everybody's fully aware. So that's all we have for any questions at this bar.
Just a kind of a general thing. I don't expect an answer at the moment, but just, um, when we're presented with whatever the final decision is, um, and there's a lot of pieces here, I understand that, but I'd like to just kind of, what are the kind of the primary, probably hits most of the people, um, based on what we do. I, obviously, we have a city to run here and we only have too much money, but at the same time, and I'm sure we're all that with this, uh, we want to treat our folks as as well as we possibly want to. And it's unfortunate that we this environment where this what we have to deal with is, but anyway, I just couldn't get. So we're going to work to um translate because obviously this is pretty technical stuff, right? We're going to translate what the real world impact looks like, you know, so like I said, when it boils down to, you know, the difference between a $2,500 and $3,500, uh, high, you know, he's a ceiling on your deductible. You know, that's a real thing. And and with how some of those prescription drug costs are going to um be calculated with some of the out-of-pocket costs are going to increase, there's kind of no way around it, but we just want, we want people to be as eye-wide open as possible.
Okay. Paul. Yeah, just to to piggyback on that, I think, you know, in particular, we've been approving loans, approving new vendor contracts. Uh, you know, given this cost increase, I I think speaking for myself, it would just help to see the financial background so that we know we're prioritizing the right things. Uh, you I guess I'd like to know for sure that we cannot absorb the increased cost to make sure that people get the benefits that they need. So I guess that's that's all I'm asking for is just some context, uh, to the extent they had anything provided. All good.
Um, this here just shows optional one, Cross Blue Shield of Illinois. I do see here that United Healthcare also. Yeah. In that format, is is United Health in there?
So, yeah. So, there are a couple of things. Um, happy to show you. Like I said, I want to give you stacks upon stacks of tiny print, right? So this is going to be most likely, uh, the the what what the administration, what the admin will ultimately recommend that that the that we approve. Um, so that's why I wanted to start with this to see that this is where, uh, I can tell you we did consider what what a move to United would be. City's had Blue Cross Blue Shield for some time now. Um, it's a heavy lift to change providers. So that factors in, and the savings were still in that 12% area without some of the dip in the in the uh, in the PPO section. So, but you, if you really want to dive into this stuff, please stop by Mark's office. We've got some binders about yay thick that have foldouts that have all the scenarios and all the things. And like I said, talk a lot better than I can. But, um, you know, what we are doing, we're working on trying to find because there's areas you can customize some of these plans. We, the city of Blue Island has traditionally had a very customized plan. It's historically kind of what we inherited. Um, but that customized plan, it speaks back to how the city first adopted this uh Blue Cross plan back before a lot of us were probably here. Um, that, uh, that customizing the plan gets very expensive and it was getting more expensive, and so they're pushing us back towards more standardized plans, which will still have some customizable aspects to it depending on, but, but the standardized plans are.
Yeah. And for what it's worth, I I've had my own business for my virtually my entire life. So, I've always bought my own health insurance, which is truly a miserable experience to go through. Um, and, uh, and I've had several different plans from several different providers and costs aside, my experiences, my own individual experiences that Blue Cross Blue Shield provides fantastic customer service and that is very helpful. Um, so it's just a data point there for you. It's from my personal experience as well. Any other questions regarding this? Okay. Anything else? Administration.
All right. We have a brief follow-up. All the manic announcements, reports, or comments?
Uh, yeah, I just want to mention that I saw a newspaper article over the weekend concerning an offer for Forest View. So, just wanted to speak to that a little bit. Um, specifically when it comes to private equity where money is pulled for the sake of buying assets. It's drastically changed property markets in recent years. Forest is one such example where homes that people live in are treated as depreciating assets to be resold or squeezed for all the remaining value. The rent stays the same. Services and investments disappear. We as a city have faced this issue with private equity and asset ownership elsewhere as well, like with the hospitals and other rentals in time. I believe we have an opportunity, maybe even a responsibility to ensure that access to housing, not just be affordable, but clean and safe and worth living. My ancestors came here as immigrants long ago, and my family has put down roots where each generation has been free to pursue the American dream. All the while, while generations of my family had those rights and privileges, others, black folks, women did not at that time. Looking around us today, the American dream must seem almost completely out of reach for many folks who have not benefited from that same generational stability. Let alone looking at how recent immigrants are being treated now with mass agents abducting mothers and fathers, sons and daughters from quiet neighborhoods. I do believe it is on us to find a new way to ensure an old promise and to extend it to all people who want to be part of a healthy and free community. And I think we do this by looking out for the least privileged of us as a community because that is what community is about. Thank you.
Thank you. Any other?
I'm sorry. If I just may add, I would like I understand they have a presentation they would like to give us, those who are making the offer. So, I'd like to ask that we add that to the next adjournment, please.
Johnson. Yes. Um, wanted to just let everybody know that uh Friday is Halloween and uh at the John Deere Rec Center, there will be trunk or treat from 4 to 7. Also a movie and of course, uh treats. You. Any other real quick? I just want to say thank you to public works and everyone else that helped out with our truck event at park district on on Saturday. Um, it was a success. So, thank you to everyone that helped out there.
Now we have a one-time brief executive. Um, we vote executive. In second. Roll call. All in favor say aye. Motion to return to regular session. All in favor say aye. Aye. We discussed imminent and probable litigation. Executive. Is there a motion to adjourn? Johnson. Second by Alderman Roll. All in favor say aye. Aye.