City of Lexington City Council met Aug. 22.
Here are the minutes provided by the council:
The regular meeting of the Lexington City Council was called to order at 7:00 P. M. by Mayor Spencer Johansen in the City Council Chambers at City Hall.
Mayor Johansen led the council in the Pledge of Allegiance.
Roll call was taken to find the following physically present: Mayor Johansen, Alderwoman Wilson, Alderman Mattingly, Alderman Franklin, Alderman Richard, Alderman Stover and Alderman Little.
It was moved by Alderman Mattingly and seconded by Alderman Franklin to approve the minutes of the August 8, 2022 regular session of the City Council meeting. Motion carried unanimously.
It was moved by Alderman Stover and seconded by Alderman Richard to approve the Treasurer’s Report and paying of the bills in the amount of $150,000.11. Motion carried unanimously.
Public Input: None
Old Business: None
New Business: Discussion Only Gaming Ordinance
The state has changed the law to where we can raise the gaming fee to $250 per machine. Mayor Johansen has gotten the ordinance back from the attorney raising the fee from $25 to $250 but feels we could do this in three stages over a three year period and do it with one ordinance. He felt doing it all at one time would be too much of an increase. We need to decide if we want to do the increase and how often we want to do the increase. He believes there are between 14-20 machines in town currently.
We make good revenue off of them, around $27,000 per year, so we do not want to discourage them from having the machines. They also have a fee from the state and the state makes money off of the revenue.
On 20 machines the amount played out for the month of July was over $614,000. This is good revenue for the business owners to use to improve their businesses. The city’s portion now goes to Main Street improvements.
The increase will be shared between the bar and the owner of the machines.
After some discussion as to how much and how often it was decided to increase it to $150 over a three year period.
COMMITTEE REPORTS:
Mayor’s Report: Mayor Johansen reported on the following items:
He is meeting tomorrow with the Street Department, Bill Elias, Billie DuBois and Mike Beard, and the school to explore their options for their expansion. Alderman Franklin and Alderman Mattingly will also be attending. They want to vacate Wall Street. He would like to see their plans for the area. They have bought Dick Slown’s rental house on the corner.
He has talked again with Carey Davis. Farnsworth is working on a preliminary plan and hopes to have something this week so they could meet again.
He had emailed everyone Karen Wingo’s response to his inquiry about her building. It was felt she does not want to sell very badly.
He did reach out to Terry Worth and he is thinking about it. He will try to get a hold of him again this week.
The Rt. 66 grant needs to be submitted by September. If they do work on Memory Lane they will need to get a price on redoing the billboards, paving under the Welcome Sign and Wright’s Tree Service for trimming the brush. Memory Lane gets a lot of traffic.
He would like to compliment Alderman Mattingly for all his help getting City Hall painted and Alderman Franklin for all his work on the Center Street project with hauling all the cans and tires. The chief talks with her every day and they have two weeks to get the property cleaned up. The dumpster is just about full. He felt that instead of putting a lien on her house, if they would give us permission to come in and check the property every so often that would work better.
The question was asked about the junk cars in the back? Ads are seen on TV that they will come and haul your old cars away. Why aren’t we paying someone to come and get her junk cars? The chief says we can not do that. We were able to get rid of the chickens, ducks and cats. She is showing an effort.
He was wondering what the next step was on the landlord/rental agreement. Alderman Richard felt we should send them a letter and a copy of the ordinance along with a list of future council meetings. Let them know there is a $50 fee. Alderwoman Wilson will get with Star to draft a letter soon.
He has gotten very little feedback from the sales tax. The ones he did talk too he cited last year's Water Plant power bill had doubled. The Ameren bill is an easy one as everyone’s bill has increased.
Alex is coming to get the keys to Christo’s and get started on that and move forward. She will be redoing the sign.
April Fritzen did send Steve’s obit. He will reach out to her on Wednesday. They are going to be putting up gutters on Lexington House. He will see if she would like to get a bid.
Police: Alderman Richard reported that Officer Kolat passed his physical. His last day at his current job is Friday. He will have his uniform and he starts at the academy on Friday.
Building/Insurance None
Finance /TIF None
Water/Sewer/Sanitation Alderwoman Wilson reported on the following:
The water leak detector is coming back Wednesday for Billie. What they thought was going to be a simple fix turned out to be something more critical totalling $6,400. It was noted that they are covered under an ordinance and didn’t need to put it out for bids because it was an emergency situation. Alderman Franklin and Alderman Mattingly were advised of the situation.
Street/Alley: None
There being no further business, a motion was made by Alderman Mattingly to adjourn at 7:41 P.M. Motion carried by unanimous voice vote.
https://www.lexingtonillinois.org/images/_Minutes_August_22_2022.pdf
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