At scan, that's right.
She's still in ER.
Keep us posted, we'll be ready.
Thank you.
That's why I told Jodi and Rob I had to leave.
That's why I left this on.
So you could fire her in the door.
Well, good luck.
Good evening.
Evelyn, could you please give the invocation?
I just want to say it's a good, good, good feeling here tonight.
It's peaceful and calm and I thank God for that.
What did you say?
She said we haven't got started.
Oh that's true.
Let's keep that.
Let's bow our heads.
Father God, as the City Council meeting begins tonight.
I pray that Ephesians 4 and 3 which says, make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace.
Let peace prevail over this meeting tonight.
Father God, I pray that the discussion of the Greater Freeport Partnership be accurate and straight on point.
And let the memorandum of understanding discussion be an honest discussion.
And last but not least Father, let every public comment, if any are spoken tonight, be with respect on every topic that is brought to the Council Floor tonight.
In the mighty name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, I pray, Amen.
Amen.
And we will officially call this meeting to order.
Madam Clerk, could you please take the roll?
Mayor Miller?
Here.
Alderpersons, Klemm?
Here.
Johnson?
Here.
Simmons?
Here.
Parker?
Sanders, here, and Sellers, here.
If you could please stand for the pledge led by Alderman Simmons.
To the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.
Item number four is the approval of the agenda.
Is there such a motion?
I move.
Second.
We have a motion made by Alderman Klemm, seconded by Alderman Sellers.
All those in favor signify by saying aye.
Aye.
Opposed?
That motion passes.
Item number five is approval of the minutes from the Committee of the Whole held on November 10th and December 8th, 2025.
Is there a motion to approve?
So moved.
Second.
Motion made by Alderman Shadle, seconded by Alderman Sellers.
All those in favor signify by saying aye.
Aye.
Opposed?
That motion passes.
Item six is public comments.
There's no one signed in.
So move on to item number seven, which is the Greater Freeport Partnerships Porter Leap Report.
Thank you, Curt.
Thank you.
Good evening.
Happy New Year to you all.
Tonight's presentation will provide a more detailed information around some small business Huffines.
We also have a number of business support efforts that occurred in the fourth quarter.
However, a full summary of all the partnerships detailing of our strategic plan focus areas is provided in the quarterly report that Nicole is distributing now, as well as what was linked in the agenda for this evening.
Before we dive into business support, as you will see on the front page of the partnerships Quarterly Report.
We have hired a new Economic Development Manager and a new Membership Director.
Leslie Mastroianni and Mercedes Joiner have joined the partnerships team filling vacant positions that were in within the staff.
Curt, am I doing something or?
Yes.
Okay.
Do you need me to.
All right.
Perfect.
Thank you.
All right.
Report laid out in the strategic focus areas, as mentioned before, small business support efforts.
So we're going to walk through three specific items.
One, the local shopping campaign, which Nicole will highlight in just and others.
The second will be the workforce connection with talent.
This is an ongoing issue that all of our businesses are having.
We'll talk about some efforts and programs that we've participated in.
And the last but not least, some grant support that we've offered to small businesses.
I'm going to turn it over to Nicole.
Again, these are just highlights of the quarterly report.
You don't want us up here talking about eight full pages, so we just pick out a specific We also started something new this year with a countywide cross-promotion postcard.
We had 23 different businesses interested in creating a, I call it a postcard, but it wasn't sent out.
It was actually placed at all 23 different distribution locations.
We also started a new project this year, which is a new project.
We have a new project that we're going to be doing in the next few weeks.
We're going to be doing a new project that we're going to be doing in the next few weeks.
And so on.
In addition to those, there were also holiday events.
Mistletoe Walk was held in downtown Freeport on November 22.
New features for Mistletoe Walk this year included six Living Windows, which were really well attended and a great addition that we hope it continues to grow, as well as starting to utilize the Karcher Block Pocket Park.
That's where Santa was, a s'more station, and you could fill out letters to Santa and place them in the box there as well.
Lena had their hometown Christmas and lighted parade on December 5th.
Weather didn't cooperate with them quite as much this year, but they still had almost and a great array of businesses that stayed open and then brought vendor booths downtown as well.
Then an additional event this year was a last minute shopping opportunity with Holly Day Hustle.
We had about a dozen participating businesses for that promotion and we highlighted different items that each store picked out.
McDonough, and so on.
So if you are looking for a particular item for that last-minute person on your gift list, this would help you see what each of those merchants could provide.
I'll turn it back over to Andrea.
As we talked about, one of the other things that we have worked on to help support small businesses was around workforce development.
So always going back to the data and taking a look and tracking our numbers here.
Again, this is information that's reported from Illinois and I'm going to talk about the employment security and this is September 2025.
I understand this is a few months dated but as we might remember a couple of months ago, late last year, there was a government shutdown.
That had a ripple effect in terms of reporting out some information on employment data was one of those.
So as you will see that there were within Stephenson County in September of 2025, and the City of Freeport.
The unemployment rates within Stephenson County and the City of Freeport were pretty comparable to the state.
Within the same month, there were over 1,300 unique job postings in September by 327 different employees.
And the employees.
The median wage for those positions, again median, was a little over $35 an hour which equates to a salary of $73,000 a year.
Again, just for a frame of reference, and this is data reported by the census, medium household income for 2025 in Stephenson County is $33,000 a year.
And I'm going to go back to the slide here.
The top 25 in Stephenson County is just shy of $62,000 a year.
As you can see, what's on the slide here, those were the top employers that were posting and those were the top occupations.
We have tracked this data pretty much for most of 2025 and I would say that those top and so on.
They all have their own significance.
They stay very similar.
So this information was key in terms of as we go and talk to our educational partners, which I'll get to in just a second, but I want to just emphasize that even if 921 people were employed, that would not fill all the open positions that's in Stephenson County.
So retaining our workforce is critical, which leads to other efforts that the partnership Bader, and Mary.
So there were three different events all in the fourth quarter.
Manufacturing Day, Highland Community College in conjunction with Freeport High School puts on a career and job fair.
And then Highland does an Ag Expo.
Again, Manufacturing Day.
You're targeting students who are interested in entering into a manufacturing career or working with a manufacturer.
It's a great opportunity for students to get out of the classroom and to get into and to get into some of the facilities that they drive by every day, but they might not have any idea what they do inside or what they make.
Students are able to tour, they end up back at Highland where they're able to meet an employer expo.
Highland Community College and Freeport High School Career Fair is something similar to that just at a larger scale.
With over 637 attendees, you had 10 area high schools represented.
So it was a great opportunity for area high school students and some Highland Community and other individuals.
We are also working with the community college students and members of the public to interface with employers from all different industries throughout Stephenson County.
And again, Highland Ag Expo, which happens at the beginning of December, you're looking at something very similar in format to a manufacturing day, but it's specifically to the Ag industry, connecting college students who are already in an Ag pathway and area high school students who probably are also are connecting with employers, their understanding about their opportunities at Highland so we can keep that talent local.
And last but not least, a recent win that we were really happy to have played in a critical part is the beginning of 2025, the state of Illinois put out a small business infrastructure grant.
This is a tad bit unusual in the fact that small business support grants don't often, outside of COVID times, and others.
They will come directly to small businesses themselves.
Often they will come to other entities, but typically not directly to a small business.
And part of the reason for that is state grants can be somewhat cumbersome or complicated to apply for.
But the state of Illinois, in receiving some feedback, put together a small grant program.
We held an informational seminar for any business that was interested in applying.
About 22 attended.
This is in January of 2025.
We worked then with five businesses who were very serious in their application.
We were able to work with them, put together the documentation, get them SAMS qualified and Gattaport and all the things you need to do to become qualified to apply for a state grant.
From those five businesses that applied, there were three local grants that were awarded.
So in total, the grant award in sum from all three businesses is nearly three quarters of a million dollars.
So $725,000 is coming back between these three businesses to help them grow.
We are continuing to work with each one of these businesses to provide them grant administration, project assist experience as we can.
They have two years to expend grant funds in what they outlined in their project scope, but we're very excited that we were happy to play a part of that.
And looking to the future, Basecamp, if you know someone who is looking to start a business or has a small business but would like to grow or maybe need some resources, some support, our Basecamp is starting January 20th.
Again, that program is designed for small businesses and entrepreneurs who are looking to just deepen their resources, get a little bit more education.
It runs for 12 weeks, 6 classes, Tuesday evenings at the Partnership Office.
Feel free to contact me or Nicole or the Partnership Office.
Just call our main line and we were happy to give you more information.
We continue to work with Freeport High School and the Foundation for Northwest Illinois on the CEO program, which is under development.
And Michael.
We're going to launch this year, but it's set to launch in fall of 2026.
Again, this is almost similar to a base camp type program that runs a year long, but it's targeted to juniors and seniors to help them understand the skill set that they need to develop small businesses.
And in conjunction with that, they're not just sitting in a classroom.
They're going out and interfacing with small businesses.
They're meeting with business leaders, on another grant application that, if awarded, would expand our small business support efforts, enhance those, and expand the partnerships capacity.
So thank you for your attention.
Happy to answer any questions.
Thank you, Andrea.
Thank you.
Any questions, Council?
Thank you.
All right, thank you.
Thank you.
Did you have one?
Yeah.
Alderman Johnson.
I did.
Alderman Johnson.
I was looking in the report that was given out to us.
Yes.
And it was saying regarding the six leads for industry that we could not respond to as we have no existing buildings that meet requirements or can't meet water sewer demands.
And I was wondering, will well number 12 help that at all, the situation with water and sewer demands to get more industry in here?
Yes and no.
In terms of Oftentimes, sometimes it's because the manufacturer, typically it's a manufacturer, uses so much water that it would tax the city's system.
It's very possible that with the new well, I don't know the exact numbers in terms of the capacity, that that would help with that.
It would alleviate that burden.
The other thing to think about, too, and that's, you know, in working with conjunction with community development and the city leadership, is making sure that the well, the water capacity might be there, but making sure that we have land available for that manufacturer.
That was kind of my other question, because I wondered if there were buildings, is it because the buildings, they weren't able to restore them to the point where they needed them, or there wasn't enough room for them to expand where the existing buildings were?
Typically it is not, it's, everyone's a case by case basis, so I'm going to say in a little bit more generality, is it's not that they don't have room to expand adjacent to the existing facility, it's oftentimes manufacturing is looking for a much higher floor to ceiling height to accommodate their equipment and machinery than many of the existing facilities we have today.
Yeah.
Okay.
Good question.
All right.
Thank you.
Item number eight is discussion regarding the MOU with the Illinois Department of Transportation for South Street.
Manager Boyer.
Thank you, Your Honor.
Go ahead and hit the lights.
I'm pleased tonight to discuss an MOU between the City of Freeport and IDOT related to mill and overlay of South Street.
That's one of our main corridors through town.
It's also in a pretty significantly deteriorated status.
Staff has been meeting with District 2 for years, probably every, up to every quarter, but at least twice a year.
And we've always been told that's a state unmarked route.
There's nothing we're We're going to do with it.
You're going to have to deal with it locally.
However, what they say genius is when preparation meets opportunity.
Fortunately, Representative Cabello and Rick Barco had a conversation.
I think Cabello oversees IDOT District 2 in some part or fashion with the state level.
And they were discussing how difficult it was for them to deploy all of the millions of dollars that they have to deploy because it just can't get enough staff.
And Representative Cabello said to him, well why don't you just give the money straight to the communities.
So that's what's happening on South Street.
So we're planning to receive approximately $5 million from District 2 for the mill and overlay of South Street.
The bid letting goes out this June and things should be moving forward shortly after that.
I will mention that part of the deal here is that we need to reconstruct the ramps in the corridor and we have budgeted for that and they are, will be coming before you for Bid approval and construction before the time before June comes.
We want to make sure those are all completed before June.
So there's nothing holding back IDOT from resurfacing South Street.
So essentially, this conversation tonight is just that we'll be receiving at least $5 million in outside funding to resurface South Street.
This will be starting in 2026.
So thank you.
Any questions on the MOU?
I would just like to know about how long do they think that that will take?
I hate to promise anything or speculate but I would hope we could get it done in 26 but if it doesn't get done in 26 26, but if it doesn't get done in 26, it'll certainly be done in 27.
Okay.
Good job.
Alderman Stacey?
Will the ramps be done by Freeport staff?
No, they'll be done by a contractor.
Anything else?
Item number nine is discussion regarding ordinance amending codified ordinance to add incentive pay for lead copper samples to be taken for lead service line replacement grant application.
Thank you, Your Honor.
As everybody knows, we've been doing lead service line remediations since probably the fall of 2020.
To date, I think we've remediated 1,600 lead services and we have a few hundred left to go.
The problem here is we're still regulated by our total number of lead services, which means we have a certain sample regime that we have to do and we're at a place where we've got so few left in the system that we're finding it difficult Fowler, and so to get adequate sampling, we need to help that.
This will be temporary though.
Once we get all the lead services done, we will go to copper monitoring at that point.
And we can open that up and we won't have nearly as a challenging time getting the samples taken.
So that's all I've got.
Thank you.
Any questions?
Alderman Johnson.
I just wondered what sections of the city are the eligible homes located in that could do the testing?
I can't tell you eligible areas, it's address by address at this point, so which addresses haven't had the lead services remediated yet, and like I said, it's getting to be a very few of them at this point.
So we've done work all over town, now in one specific area or another, but it's just address by address at this point.
So, yeah.
If there's no further discussion, I'll need a motion and a second to move this forward.
So move.
Second.
Motion made by Alderman Sellers, seconded by Alderman Shadle to move this to Manager Boyer.
Would there be the next meeting or you got something further down the line?
I think it'll be coming before the next meeting.
The next meeting?
Yeah.
Okay.
All those in favor?
Aye.
Opposed?
That motion passes.
Item number 10 is public comment.
Is there any public?
Tommy.
I want to tell you, the Police Chief is doing a good job of working, and Jodi Miller, when you're going to come and see a house where we live?
Not sure, Tommy.
Because we do, they cook us food and everything.
Police.
And Baron, do you sign all about the cleaners in Freeport?
The what?
The cleaners downtown.
Oh, yep.
We're still waiting for the approval to take it down.
Approve it.
I'm trying, sir.
Any other public comments, Linda?
I just want to thank the Lord for all the grants and all the money we've gotten and all the people that did all the work because I know it's a lot of work to write to get all those grants.
So I just want to say I'm really thankful for the grants and everybody who's worked on them and thankful to the Lord and I just decree unity, prosperity and peace over the and the City tonight and we're moving forward in 2026 and I'm really thankful for that.
The other thing is there is a Martin Luther King Breakfast at St. James CME Church on this coming Saturday.
So if anybody is interested in going, I think you can just contact the Church because you do have to have a ticket to go.
Alright.
Thank you.
Any other public comments?
And I will entertain a motion to adjourn.
So moved.
Second.
The motion made by Alderman Sellers, seconded by Alderman Shadle.
All those in favor?
Aye.
Have a good evening.
Thank you.