Carlinville holds State of the City presentation
By ERIN SANSON
Enquirer~Democrat Reporter
Carlinville held its first ever State of the City presentation on May 22 at 6 p.m. The council room was full of constituents with questions and various city representatives to answer those questions.
The meeting was broken down into four parts, public works, public safety, economic development and the budget.
The majority of the meeting was spent fielding questions regarding public works, such as road conditions and improvements, the lead service line replacement program, and, of course, water and the Alluvial Regional Water Company.
Street Work
Woodard and Curran provided an update on the Lead Service Line Replacement project. For fiscal year 2024, 167 lines were investigated and 47 lines were replaced. The service line replacement project will continue this year beginning in June and 84 lines are set for investigation and possible replacement.
Questions regarding who was responsible for which portions of the lead service line replacement were asked. Woodard and Curran is doing the investigating, which could include investigation in the homes to determine what kind of service line is present. The homeowner must give permission for this investigation or the line will not be investigated and replaced on their property, while the line would be replaced on the public side, if needed. As of now, the State and IEPA are covering the funding for the replacements both to the City and citizens, but this could be subject to change based on funding the State receives in the future.
The West Main and Shipman Blacktop road projects were also discussed. Woodard and Curran says that their planning has all followed as closely to IDOT’s plans as they could to get their work done, being water main replacements, before IDOT began their work on the roads.
A list of all roads and intersections to be repaired, oiled and chipped was presented including North Broad, College Ave, and blocks of Sumner, High and Johnson Streets.
Alluvial
The Alluvial Water Company Board is working on getting a $110 million dollar grant from the State to cover a gap in funding. Mayor Doug Downey, says that, as the mayor, that gap in funding does concern him. However, he knows the board is working to fill the gap. If the funding is approved, construction should begin in the fall and the new water system will be operating in Carlinville in 2028. The delivery rate for the water is currently anticipated at $10.98 every 1,000 gallons. Carlinville is estimated to pay $95,20.39 per month.
Public Safety
Police Chief Derek Graham spoke to the citizens present about nuisance properties and code violations and what the department is doing to get “more teeth” behind the ordinances. They are currently working with the City Lawyer Don Craven to figure out a way to have consequences, other than a fine, for ordinance violations. Graham also discussed the potential of having a dedicated code enforcement officer, who will only be doing code enforcement, whereas currently, all officers are also tasked with code enforcement, which takes time from their investigative duties.
Graham asked the citizens take their ordinance complaints to the police department, so they can be logged and dealt with properly.
Economic Development
Bobbi Bates, the economic development, zoning and grant administrator spoke about some projects she has been working on to get more funds into the city and how they are spent. Currently, the city and Carlinville School District are working together as recipients of a grant intended for use in city’s within a 30 miles radius of a closed coal mine, called the Energy Transition Grant and a smaller grant from Ameren for $50,000. The Ameren grant is for an electrification plan and Bates hopes to put in an electric vehicle charger in a city lot or might do something different based on the decision of the city council.
Bates received a grant from Apex Energy which was used to purchase new signage for the town, directing visitors to popular tourists spots around town.
Other goals for the current administration are to update the National Register of Historic Places in Carlinville, which was last done in 1976 and working on preserving the Square and preparing it for the 100 year anniversary of Route 66.
Budget
Downey briefly went over the city budget and provided the city audit for the 2024-24 fiscal year, which is the most recently available report.
The City this year has a budget of $10 million which Downey says barely covers basic operation of the city. He also stated that the City used to receive a 10 percent distribution from the State for sales taxes, which was then lowered to six percent in 2017, and has since risen again to 6.4 percent, but it is still $4-5 million in funds the city no longer receives. Downey then asked the crowd to call the state legislators to bring that number back up so the City had more funds with which to work and make improvements.
