and John. Show you by our heads. Dear Father God, I pray for the City Council meeting tonight. I pray for unity and respect be among the members. Father, give every Council member your wisdom and as they discussed and passed every item on the agenda tonight.


I pray that every decision be righteous in your sight for the benefit of the city and for your glory only.


Father bring unity where there might be disunity. Father bless each council member's family. Help every member to listen well, speak truthfully, and act justly.


Alderperson, Klemm, Alderperson, Johnson, Simmons, Parker, Stacy, Shadle, Sanders, Sellers, We have a quorum. If you could please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance led by Alderman Johnson.


Item number four is the approval of the agenda. Is there such a motion? So moved.


Second. made by Alderman Shadle, 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 meeting on October 14th, 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. Darren, can you see if there's any sign in for a public comment okay but he'll wait until the next yep I did receive one you did just hand them to me yes okay dear council members as the city of Freeport's tourism I'll first say it's from Nicole Haas with the Greater Freeport Partnership as the city of Freeport's tourism promotion agency the Greater Freeport Partnership would like to express our enthusiastic support for for establishing a sister city relationship between Freeport, Illinois and Lilditz, Pennsylvania.


This partnership represents a unique opportunity to celebrate shared heritage, foster cultural exchange and strengthen tourism initiative that benefit both communities.


Freeport and Lidditz share a deep-rooted German heritage which is evident in local traditions, architecture and culinary history.


Freeport cities proudly embrace their connection to the pretzel, a symbol of German culture and craftsmanship. Freeport's legacy as the pretzel city and Lidditz renowned pretzel making tradition create a natural bond that can be showcased through joint festivals and future cross-promotion.


Beyond pretzels, this sister city designation opens doors to broader tourism opportunities. Freeport offers visitors a vibrant mix of attractions, including historic sites, scenic parks, and a thriving arts community.


Lidditz, celebrated as one of America's most charming small towns, brings its own rich history on cultural vibrancy.


Together, these destinations can collaborate on marketing campaigns, heritage tourism initiatives, and Appeal to Visitors Seeking Authentic Small Town Experiences Steeped in Tradition.


We believe this partnership will not only honor our shared history, but also create meaningful connections that drive tourism potential and economic activity.


The Greater Freeport Partnership is committed to supporting this initiative and looks forward to the exciting possibilities it will bring.


Thank you, Nicole Haas, Greater Freeport Partnership Marketing and Tourism Director. Thank you. 7 is presentation of potential Sister Pretzel City, Lidditz, Pennsylvania, Tim Connors.


Hello, everyone. I'm Tim Connors, 2082 Chelsea Avenue, Freeport, Illinois. What Ms. Haas just said, I 100% agree with. A while ago I went into an antique store and I saw a pretzel Hicks, and I worked on that. I was a pretzel pot holder. And that pretzel pot holder, all kinds of pretzels around it, I turned it over and it said, Liditz, Pennsylvania, home of the pretzels. Now I looked at it and I'm not going to say what I said when I looked at that. I said, that's not the case. We're home of the pretzels. I need to call the mayor. So I contacted the mayor of Liditz, Pennsylvania. His phone number immediately came up on Google. And I chatted with him for four minutes.


and the rest of the board. He's been in the business for 40 minutes. With the conversation, he told me that he was in, he owned the oldest commercial bakery in the United States of America.


And along with that, the Sturgis Bakery Company. And his brother-in-law owns the Tom Sturgis Pretzel Company that has been a part of, of Littice, Pennsylvania and around the area, as we spoke we talked about how Freeport and Lidditz were so much alike when it came to the German heritage to the point that Mayor Snyder said to me when can I come up and visit and I said well do you want a big activity and he goes I want a big activity I said I it I invite you to Pretzel City Brewfest and he goes can I and Mary.


I come the entire weekend. So, basically, what happened was I jumped very high in the air and got an appointment with Mayor Miller as quickly as possible and let her know that this was a possibility of someone who was quite interested in our town.


As we spoke, he said, I think we should become Sister Cities and I said, I think so too.


He's like, let me come in, take some pictures and see what this is all about and see what He loved Freeport. He loved Freeport so much from the standpoint that he said this town has so much potential. Now, Lidditz, Pennsylvania is a 9,000 populated borough that is in between Hershey, Pennsylvania and Lancaster, Pennsylvania. What's the largest thing in there? It's a 25,000 soundstage that all of the big concert individuals come in and play.


Taylor, Taylor Swift, Katy Perry What Mayor Snyder did was he put together a PowerPoint that's right here and he basically took pictures of us and I always think it's wonderful, I always think it's wonderful when someone who doesn't know you or isn't really comfortable with you shows the beauty of the The town that you live in, and here's his PowerPoint.


and he also wanted to be on the big pretzel of our astroturf for the football field but for some reason didn't want a picture I thought it was really it was interesting on Friday I was with him for about five or six hours telling the story of Freeport and showing everything and you saw the picture of the old Van Buren bridge and I thought it was so wonderful that when we walked down to the Van Buren bridge he looked down to his right and he said around the corner and I said, you already know our town, Mayor. You already know our town. So they a few weeks ago, he did this presentation and to his board, his city, his city council, his city board, and they all fell in love with us too. And they immediately said, let's create a resolution for us to become sister cities. So now it's our turn.


Police. So now it's our turn. And I wholeheartedly am excited for the fact that there might be new pretzels coming into this town. There might be more tourism coming into this town.


I've developed a new friend. I'm, my wife and I are going in May to Philadelphia for for a couple days and then staying with Mayor Snyder for three days.


and then staying with Mayor Snyder for three days for Lidditz. Along with that, if everything works out here and we have a resolution and we are Sister Cities, we're going to have a big Zoom meeting.


I said a few of us could go down and visit him and he said the weather's too bad in in Lidditz during December, so no.


So we would come together for a group Zoom meeting and basically Do you have any questions?


Yes. Cool. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. So, if there's no other discussion, is it agreed upon that we'll move this resolution to, I'm guessing, Tim, December 1st?


Thank you very much. We appreciate it. Item number eight is Discussion of Engineering Agreements with Fehr Graham for National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System, Permitting Services and Design Engineering for Phase Two of the Wastewater Treatment Plant Upgrades. Manager Breuer. Thank you Your Honor. Just moving forward we're in the process of completing phase 1 down at the wastewater plant and if you would haven't been there and like to go please let me know. I'll be happy to take you. That includes the chemically enhanced primary treatment, that handles the inundation of stormwater that comes in through the sewer system so that we don't flood out our wastewater plant. It It also includes new headworks that'll have grid separation and bar screen that'll be much more effective at removing constituents from the waste stream before it gets into our pumping equipment.


We'll also be finite. We're working on the lab building and offices at this time, and I think we're very close to completing the UV treatment process, which will allow us to get away from chlorine, which creates disinfection byproducts that are harmful to aquatic life.


With that being said, we're moving toward phase two at this time. Phase two is sludge handling.


We recently submitted and received our national pollution discharge permit that requires us to reduce our, what they call, we need to do nutrient removal. That's phosphorus, nitrogen, dent type of thing. In order to do that, there'll be more coagulation that goes on at the plant and that coagulation will cause solids to drop out in the treatment process and that We'll end up in the sludge handling process. It will roughly double our sludge handling needs. So at this point, the next phase is to be upgrading our gravity belt thickener and our other process handling equipment and also our sludge storage area. But this time, that's kind of the high level summary. And at this point, I'd like to turn it over to Darren to kind of go through some of the details. Sure. We put together a small power plant. We put together a small power to give us some basis. So Kurt, if you can go to the next slide, please. So phase one is what we're currently constructing. It was approximately $60 million upgrade. It started in 2023. As Rob said, we're working on the Headworks, which is the facility that brings all the waste into the facility and screens it. It does also grid separation, chemically enhanced primary treatment is is a facility that handles overruns of the plant, so we no longer discharge directly to the river.


UV disinfection is a big upgrade at the facility, so we're no longer feeding chlorine, and the goal is to have that operational for next spring. And then the lab and administrative building are being constructed right now. Phase two, and let me step back for a moment, I just want everybody to know this project process has been going on since 2015 is when we started the wastewater treatment overhaul.


There was a two-year planning effort that was put together to lay out the steps and stages as USEPA let us know that the affluent discharge limits would be changing in Illinois specifically to impaired streamways due to primarily phosphorus and other items within and our waystreams. So the three phase approach has been put together. Actually, originally, it was a five phase approach. But with EPA requirements, things had to be advanced. So we are about 12 to 15 months away from completion of phase one. So phase two is the approximately $45 million of construction. We need to start Robert, the construction in 2027 in order to meet our discharge limits.


As Rob stated, it is the sludge handling and digestion portion of the process, which I'll get into a little bit more later.


In order to reduce and remove phosphorus from our waste stream, it will more than double our sludge handling efforts that we remove at the wastewater treatment plant every day.


So, our facilities are not large enough or equipped to handle it. It should be known that the last major upgrade at the wastewater treatment facility was done in the 70s.


There was a biological activated filter that was installed around in the 80s to enhance ammonia removal.


But so it's been, you know, many, many years since we've seen upgrades at the plant.


I've got a map that I'll show you but the site is very tight to work on and there's not a lot of space left on it especially since the solar panels were added I believe that was in 2018.


Phase three is yet to come but is part of the process. Phase three includes primary filtration systems which will enhance the phosphorus removal but phase three and two we have strategically split in order to basically go after more forgivable funds from the Illinois EPA by splitting the project into two different times. The plan right now is for primary filtration to occupy the space that the digesters actually occupy now so until we get that cycle built we can't move on to the primary filtration. So Kurt, can you go to the next slide please?


I forgot to mention, right now it's thought that Phase 3 construction will be around $25 million.


To give you some history of the NPDS permit, so it's the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination Permit.


It is approved by the Federal EPA and enforced by the Illinois EPA. This permit sets the regulations of our discharge to the Pecatonica River.


River, and without this permit we would actually have to shut the water system off because we can't discharge without this permit.


So it's a very important piece of what we do as a city. The city is the primary owner of our collection system for wastewaters and currently in Freeport we have segregated systems which means that we don't have stormwater and sewer water combined.


They're all separated. We don't know of any connected points that would be illegal at this point.


I'm not saying there might not be some that exist currently, but none that we know of and we're constantly searching for those annually in the reduction of our I&I efforts.


The last NPDES permit was just issued October 24th of 25. There was a draft permit that was issued and a public notice that went out for any comments.


In the new permit, it is required that phosphorus will be down to 0.5 mg per liter by January 1, 2030.


As I stated before, we knew as a city that that requirement was going to come.


They've been telling us for over 10 years that these requirements would come down. Currently we discharge phosphorus at about 2 to 3 mg per liter.


Leader. So that's just a, you know, more of a trivia question to show what our reduction needs to be. Modifications for phosphorus removal in the small footprint that we have will be chemical removal. There's also biological removal. It's a much larger process and needs a lot more equipment. So the city has the basis to do chemical removal. When you do chemical removal, it adds a lot more sludge to Waste Stream as we remove the phosphorus in the sludge. And I think we mentioned it before, but it will over double the capacity of our sludge, if not, it might not triple it, but it will definitely be over double of what we create daily. And we're going to have to do more pressing operations and longer. Right now, we only press usually four days a week, we'll probably have to press up to six days a week. Once once we go to phosphorus removal. Concurrently, U.S. EPA and Illinois EPA continue to look for other phosphorus reduction methods. Phosphorus also comes off of farm fields and other contributories, but we are the main contributor to the Pecatonica River from the Freeport waste stream.


and a river from the Freeport waste stream. So we are one that really is being focused on for the Peck River.


Next slide please. This is a, in the NPS permit, there is 20 special conditions.


It's 25 pages. Anybody that won't want to see it, you know, you can FOIA.


It has a lot of special information in it. There's two specific items that I wanted to point out that we're talking about tonight.


So, the, excuse me for a second, special condition 20 is the requirement of the phosphorus removal and there was a schedule put in here for phase two.


This is actually part of the permit and it basically states that we need to get under design and have design completed by June of next year with a bid with a final completion date of June 30th, 2030.


The reason this is important is in order to meet our sludge removal and our phosphorus removal capacities, we need to get design two underway so we can bid this next fall or summer, excuse me, in order to be able to also construct phase three in time to meet the permit requirements.


Again, this is a very large process, very large construction and a very small footprint.


Special Conditions 17 and 18 have also came out in every permit that we're aware of in our class of facility that we have to also monitor our favorite term in Freeport, PFAS.


That is a new requirement as part of this permit and that's why we brought it up in this discussion.


So PFAS, obviously we all know that we've been dealing with that on the water side.


We have to also test out all of our significant industrial users, our landfill, and our regular waste streams to identify where we can reduce and or eliminate phosphorus. And that is a very important part of what we're trying to do with our waste water supply and our waste water supply and our waste water supply and our waste water supply and our waste water supply.


for the next five years that we have to do that testing, which that ultimately means that there will be rule coming down for PFAS reduction within the next permit cycle or the next two permit cycles.


So that's an important constraint that they're putting on everyone. Next slide, please. I really wanted to just present this slide to discuss that we have been working on this project since 2015.


The plan was approved in 2017 and sent to the EPA. They have approved the wastewater upgrades at the facility.


Again, we went to a three-step process due to some of the changes within the permits so we can meet our limits.


I believe within the permit, it outlines that if we don't meet our permit by 2030, we will be fined for every day that we do we do exceed these limits. So it's very important that we move forward with this.


Next slide please. So just as a refresher, I wanted to give you a slide of the wastewater treatment plants so we we can all see what we're dealing with here. So this specific facility right there.


The sludge handling facility, this is where all of our solid waste goes into and is stored before it's scooped up and taken to the field and land applied.


The two digesters here are really original and integral to the plant. Most of the concrete on these structures has failed.


The methane system that is currently on this plant system, sometimes at night you can go by and see it burning off.


off, the methane system is worn, we can't even really run any of the boilers or anything off the methane system, currently our industrial waste patterns are not strong enough to provide enough methane to actually run equipment off of.


And then phase three, which is getting very tight back here, was made for new clarifiers, instead of using the space because it's getting very full of piping and constraints, the new New Primary Clarifiers will go in this digestion area once demolition is done.


Again, right now we're doing the lab building construction, the headworks construction is going on right here, and the UV construction is going on back here.


So the site is completely full, and I just want to point out, these are the solar panels that were installed many years ago, and these really border and perimeter the plant, so we're kind of running out of room.


Next slide please. Again, this is just a quick design photo of what's going on at the site currently. I know Brian Bridges put out some videos if you've seen those of the construction. Next slide please.


Again, this is the Headworks facility that's being built. This elevation down here at the bottom is 55 feet below the ground level. That's how far we have our waste being pumped up into this building.


and the building. This is a big screening room and this is a grit removal. This is one of the reasons these these projects are so expensive. Next slide please.


This is the sept. So the sept. I don't know how else to describe this other than it looks like a giant Olympic swimming pool waste is conveyed into this, and it is what they call a short cycle treatment.


so when we get access flows in Freeport which is our I&I season this facility will allow treatment to handle and still meet our affluent requirements. Next slide please.


This is the UV disinfection building. This will have a UV equipment in it that's redundant that will again eliminate our need for chlorine. We will still have a little bit of chlorine in for We're cleaning in the plant, but this will eliminate 99% of all chlorine that's being discharged to the river as part of our disinfection process.


Next slide. This is the lab building that is just currently starting to go up.


This will house a new laboratory for all of our wastewater staff that does our testing daily and a couple of administration offices.


A very important building because Freeport saves thousands of dollars, actually more More Than Thousands annually by doing as much of the testing as we can with our own staff.


Next slide, Kurt, thank you. So what I want to point out is again, here's the existing sludge handling facilities.


This will be moving and eliminated in order to move over to this side of the solar panels.


This is where we're projecting the digester and the sludge handling buildings going in and the future. And the pipe conveyance will be along the frontage of the solar panels to get here. This is the only space available left for the size of equipment. And then phase three, you can hardly see it here, it'll be right where the digesters are here. That's where the primary filters will go after they can be demoed. Next slide, Kurt. So I just wanted to give you a quick explanation of the So our waste water comes into the plant. There's a lot of fancy equipment that does removal of hard objects, toilet paper, rags, material people flush. And then through that process, it goes into clarifiers. And the clarifiers allow settlement of the waste and skim off, excuse me, scum and oils off the top. And then from that process, it goes into and then to our digesters. Through our digesters is where the waste really gets thickened. And heavier solids are provided out and it goes into our dewatering systems which Freeport we call, I call them the pattycake presses. It's a machine driven to actually squeeze the water out of the waste and make it more solid.


and then, um, then it goes into our drying building at the sludge process. And then, um, as, as that's hauled out approximately four times a year to land applications, that we have a third party contractor that does the land negotiations and the, the sludge spreading.


Cecelia, I'll remind you that it only goes on animal fields, not human consumption fields, right?


We had that discussion before. Um, but that's the process for, for waste. Um, it's not unique to Freeport.


It's the same everywhere we go, and it's the simplified version of what we have going on at our plant. Next slide. So this is a picture of our existing digesters. As you can see, much of the concrete is starting to crack and have control joint issues. The equipment that's inside this control room is very aged and old.


We've had numerous issues and repair problems with these digesters. Next slide please. This is existing photos of the patty cake presses.


This is how we dewater and squeeze the solids out. This building is very acidic and we've had to go to great lengths to secure this facility.


As you can see back in the corner here, you can see like we put up tarps.


They're almost like shower curtains trying to They're almost like shower curtains trying to keep the acids within the perimeter of where the material is pressed so it can go back into our RAS system, which is return activated sludge that that squeezed out portion goes back into the head of the plant and is returned back for biological material to eat and reduce our waste. Next slide, please. This is our the interior of the sludge storage building. This is This is what we call cake. This is what our sludge turns into within the waste building. There's conveyors that take it out in here. You can kind of see the lines on the walls. This building will fill up probably eight to 10 feet in the air with sludge. We push it in with big wheel loaders. And then when Cinegro, our land applicator comes in, we scoop this out. I believe it's somewhere around 20 semis at a time that are taken out to the field and then land applied. This facility is antiquated. It's old new facilities, new technology allows for semi back ends and different kind of a conveyance and new types of structures. This particular facility is looking very worn. As you can see, a lot of the old structure inside has wood, which is not a component that's used anymore in this type of construction due to the acidity and the gases and things that are put off within these buildings. Next slide, please.


So I wanted to give you a couple examples of other projects that we've done.


This is actually a new style press system. This is a belt system. There's different types of systems that can be provided, but you can see the difference between the controls, the floor grating, things like that, that keep the acidities and also the cleanliness of the facility to a steady constant.


You also see in everything that's done in the wastewater system now, It's required that you provide redundancy, so you'll have two of everything. That way, if anything goes down for maintenance or failure, you'll always have a backup to keep running.


Next slide please. This is a picture of another unit that we did with new digesters and a new control building for the sludge handling material.


This project was done in 2023. It just gives you kind of an idea of the footprint and the magnitude of what new digesters that are the appropriate size would need to be for the City of Freeport.


The ones that we have currently are very undersized for the amount of waste that we take in.


And with that, I will take any questions on either one of the proposals. again I'd like to state this shouldn't be anything too new to most of you we've been working on this project again since really 2017 phase one is I would say about 60 65 percent complete with construction I don't know if anybody's been by there there currently is probably up to 75 people working there Dayley. We've had little issues with the property outside of the contamination issues that we ran into. We've had little issues with the project, some, some, you know, incurses that you run into with projects of this size, some code changes that have been made along the way over a seven year design period that we had to update a few things for but but very little problem with that Project. I don't know, Rob, did I miss anything?


I think you pretty well covered everything out there. Oh, one point you need to remember too is the sludge handling at this point is fully depreciated. The digesters were built in the 30s. The concrete is basically falling apart. And the equipment in the dewatering shed and the dewatering building is Very old and is breaking down frequently and the as Darren mentioned the sludge Storage building is made of wood, which is a problem So even without any requirements from the EPA coming down the pike for phosphorus removal It would be necessary to replace these structures Very soon if not in the kind of similar timeline. So yeah One other, I guess, thought or statement that I'll throw out is this is not unique to Freeport.


Many communities our size and greater are going through this. The tough problem for this type of project is, I'll give you the comparison, just Rockford to Freeport, right? Rockford has to have the same treatment plant that we have to have here to treat our waste. They have a lot more and more people there to pay for it. It's a bigger plant, a bigger size, but they get to share the cost amongst more people. So your DNA is how many people you have in your city. Your waste streams are similar. The equipment is similar for all this. Most of the equipment that is at our plant now, with the exception of the things that have been constructed, is fully depreciated. You guys see that coming through with emergency repairs and pumps and things continuously throughout the process. The waste stream is a 24-7 business.


in this town. It never goes away and it never stops. We have operators that run 24-7 there, seven days a week. This is not something that we can run from and the permit requirements are very solid now about what needs to happen and there's several facilities just in our local northern Fripport has been ranked as one of the top projects on that list to be done because they know the gravity of what we're facing here with the permit limits.


Thank you. Don, could you turn the lights back on? Any discussion on these updates? Alderman Sellers? Yes, I'd just like to know what is the total amount that you said that the sludge, this new thing that's coming from the EPA, how much is just that costing? I know we have to do all the building work and all that, but all this new... Oh, I'm sorry, the PFAS testing?


Yes. You said every every city has to do this with their water plants. Everybody that's getting an NPS permit like us will have to do the PFAS testing.


It's it's we haven't seen a permit that was issued that doesn't have it in it now.


What we're going to do is we're going to do we call it a cost share project with the city.


So the city is going to do the sampling themselves through the labs and their operators and get the results.


and then Fehr Graham is going to have our engineers write all the reports and their reduction plans. So that cost is going to be $41,000. I just got that completed today. And that's one of the work orders that will be coming forward. And then the design of the wastewater treatment plant facility, I'm waiting on one of the partners to come back to MEP to get their final number, but it'll be approximately it'll be just under $3 million for that design portion of the 45 million.


Okay, one more question. Alderman Sellers? And so with that, so are you saying that we are going to have to come up with the 45 million, or you're looking for grants and you're pretty sure that we're gonna be able to get some of this refunded kinda through some of these grants that are already, you're already out there looking for, correct?


So on the 45, the phase two only project, we are confident, can't guarantee anything, but we're confident that we'll qualify for $5 million in forgiveness on that. Rob and I have made a commitment to try to chase other funding for that project. I'm not going to lie to you. I don't know where that's coming from right now. I don't know of any program out there or any other opportunity at this moment to chase funding for the wastewater treatment plant. Part of that process, Alderwomans are and others is that the EPA gave all of these cities plenty of notice that these requirements were coming down the line and, you know, due to the age of the facilities.


So that's where planning and utility costs and user rates, that's where that kind of is developed on this.


So our intent on all three of the phases from the original start, because we know the city can't flow the cash to fund all this, is to go through the revolving state process, which we have done for many of the large projects. We qualify for some forgivable funds. We also plan to contact our congressional direct people to see if there's any funding available that direction. But the bearer of a lot of this is going to end up being user rates for the utility because that's how these projects work.


Any other discussion? Thank you, Darren. We will move on to public comment. Is there any public comment this evening?


Hi, my name is Cheryl Alderman. The first time there's public comment, there's not much on here to even speak about.


speak about, I mean, face it. Second of all, we're talking about the partnership with the other Pennsylvania.


That's super. But if they really saw how bad the crime in this town was, I think they'd run.


Nobody here wants to face the crime. There's nothing even on here about the crime.


I mean, let's face it, the crime's worse in this town. It was never like this before.


Also, second thing, why is Pete Elber still down that building? He's now using taxpayers' money. He was supposed to be out at the end of September. It's way past that. Why is he still here? Why haven't you guys made any attempt to kick him out? He's using, getting it for free now.


and Rob. I'm still waiting for all that paperwork that was promised to me. The one paperwork that you supposedly sent me, it was dated on the 9th, but then you caught that you didn't put that paperwork up until the 13th on my building. So you tried to cross out that 9 and put a 13 there and then head upstairs, you know, notarize it. You're wrong. And I still haven't heard anything about Albers. Why were they there? They weren't certified by the state of Illinois to be tearing this building down. No action has been done against them yet. But there will be.


Any other public comments this evening? Yes. Good evening, Council and members of the public. Before we close tonight's meeting, I would just like to take a brief moment to recognize a very special occasion that takes place today.


the 250th birthday of the United States Marine Corps. Before our nation even declared its independence, a small group of men gathered in Philadelphia and formed a corps of Marines.


From that day forward, the story of the Marines has been tied to the story of America itself.


250 years later, Marines remain ready to fight, ready to win, and ready to uphold the trusted places in this country since 1775.


75. To mark this milestone, I would like to share the official 250th birthday message from General Eric M. Smith, the Commandant of the Marine Corps. 250 years ago, before our nation declared its independence, a small group of men gathered in Philadelphia formed a Corps of Marines. From that moment, our story has bound to the story of America itself a quarter of a Millennium Later. Marines remain at the center of our nation's defense, ready to fight, ready to win, and ready to uphold the trust placed in us in 1775. According to centuries, across centuries, Marines have fought on distant shores and in desperate battles, earning a reputation for discipline, toughness, and valor. From the Revolution to the World Wars, from Chopultepec to today's operations across the globe, every generation has proven worthy of the Title Marine. They secured liberty, defended allies and carried forward the promise of a free nation and a free world. We are their heirs of that legacy and we are its stewards.


This anniversary reminds us that our standards are the foundation of the Marine Corps. Honor, courage, commitment are not abstractions, but the code that binds us to one another and to all who went before. Every Marine, every climb and place must hold true to these values.


The conflicts ahead will demand nothing less. I cannot be prouder of the Marines I see serving today, at home and at sea and across the globe. You carry forward our proud tradition with skill and ferocity. It is your disciplined initiative and fighting spirit that anchors our Corps.


The battles of the next 250 years will be a challenge to us in new ways, but I have no doubt We will prevail. Happy birthday, Marines. Thank you, Your Honor.


Thank you. With that, I will entertain a motion for adjournment. So moved. Second. Motion made by Alderman Sellers, seconded by Alderman Shadle.