200 West Fourth Street, P. O. Box 177, Pleasant Plains, Illinois 62677 (217)626-1024
9:00 a.m. - 1:00 p.m.
Monday through Friday
February 3, 2014
The Village Board of Pleasant Plains met in regular session on Monday, February 3, 2014, at 7:00 p.m., at the Village Hall. President Jim Verkuilen called the meeting to order and roll was recorded:
Nicholas Bodine present Ian Magerl present
William Riggins, Jr present Duey Blair present
JD Harris absent Wayne Heideman present
President Jim Verkuilen declared a quorum present.
Staff Present: Jim Verkuilen, President
Judy Reiser, Village Clerk
Brett Keyes, Treasurer
Kevin Kesselring, Chief of Police
Greg Miles, Streets Superintendent
Visitor(s): Mrs. Bohlen and Mr.Don Anderson
The agenda was reviewed and approved by a unanimous aye vote.
Minutes from the special meeting held on Monday, January 27, 2014, were reviewed. Trustee Darrell “Duey” Blair made a motion to accept the minutes as written and Trustee Wayne Heideman seconded this motion. President Verkuilen declared the motion carried by a unanimous aye vote.
President Verkuilen asked for additions or corrections to the January 6, 2014, minutes. Trustee Bill Riggins, Jr. asked that revisions be made to the last paragraph on page 3 and asked that it read, “Trustee Bill Riggins, Jr. expressed his concerns since the water fund is down this year, 100% of the increase in sales tax revenue from the referendum needs to be committed toward the water tower to avoid raising water rates”. Trustee Darrell “Duey” Blair made a motion to accept the January 6, 2014, minutes with the above mentioned revision and Trustee Ian Magerl seconded this motion. President Verkuilen declared the motion carried by a unanimous aye vote.
Treasurer Brett Keyes presented the treasurer’s report. Treasurer Keyes responded to a question from last month regarding the franchise tax line item. (Trustee Bill Riggins, Jr., reported that in the past under the receipts in the General Fund there was a line item for franchise tax that had brought in over $10,000 last year. However this item has not been on the report the last few months. Mayor Verkuilen stated he would make a note of this and bring it to the Treasurer’s attention.)
Treasurer Keyes advised there is a separate general ledger number for franchise tax 400-110-800 but we haven’t got into it in FY 14 so it’s at a zero balance this fiscal year. Once we get that money again it’ll be on the report again. On the reports for the Board, Mary Pat had it set to not show any accounts with a zero balance to condense the report a little. This line item, as well as others throughout the year, will appear once we actually receive a check. The board reviewed the report as of January 31, 2014. Balance Sheet, Statement of Receipts and Disbursements of the General Fund, Receipts and Disbursements of the Special Revenue Fund, Receipts and Disbursements of the Water Fund and the Receipts and Disbursements of the Sewer Fund. Trustee Bill Riggins, Jr., felt the report does not reflect an accurate budget amount without these line items being listed accordingly. Treasurer Keyes indicated the more he becomes comfortable with the system his reports can be more detailed.
We are in the process of renewing our line of credit with the sewer fund with INB at 3.75% plus interest. We do have some extra money that can be moved and we do have the ability for water to loan money to sewer to take that down to zero, “Do we want to do that instead of paying the 3.75% and interest?”
Money Market is at.15% and CD are at 2.75% until the end of this year. If we have extra cash we should use it instead of using the line of credit which would be available to us in the future if we need it. Right now we have $82,000 line of credit under sewer and we are three quarters of the way through this fiscal year.
Motion was made by Trustee Bill Riggins, Jr. to accept the Treasurer’s Report and Trustee Darrell “Duey” Blair seconded the motion.
Ayes: Nick Bodine, Bill Riggins, Jr., Ian Magerl, Darrell “Duey” Blair, Wayne Heideman
Nays: N/A
Abstain: N/A
Absent: JD Harris
President Verkuilen declared the motion carried by a roll call vote.
The Board reviewed the bills that were presented for payment.
Motion was made by Trustee Wayne Heideman to accept the payment of the bills as presented. Motion was seconded by Darrell “Duey” Blair.
Ayes: Wayne Heideman, Darrell “Duey” Blair, Ian Magerl, Bill Riggins, Jr.
Nick Bodine
Nays: N/A
Abstain: N/A
Absent: JD Harris
President Verkuilen declared the motion carried by a roll call vote.
Police Department: Police Chief Kevin Kesselring reports he has hired a new officer, Laura Howard from Williamsville. She currently works for the Appellate Circuit Office and is versed on the statutes. Chief Kesselring did work with Carl on an agreement regarding reimbursement to the department for the $1900 training fee if the applicant does not complete/pass the certification training. This training is scheduled to begin in March. After she has completed ¾ of the PTI classes she can work with supervision until certified. Other situations recorded in January were fairly routine.
The PPPD office phone was transferred over to a cell phone keeping the same phone number of 626-1351 which should eliminate approximately $56 a month in long distances charges through Frontier. The second PPPD cell phone was upgraded to an IPhone which the officers can carry with them and respond to voice mails more efficiently. The data package for this phone will be an additional cost of $30 per month on our current cell phone plan. The activation fee was waived. Kevin indicated the current village data package of 1400 minutes per month shared by five phones was $80 per month. For the last three months the village averaged 360 minutes per month, we have 10,000 plus rollover minutes and dropping 800-900 minutes per month. We can go to a 700 minutes per month package for $60, saving $20 per month. However it is questioned if changes are made to the current plan if our $10,000 plus rollover minutes will be dropped. Kevin will investigate this further to determine additional savings in our cell phone plan.
Water/Sewer Department: Mrs. Bohlen and Mr. Don Anderson were present. Both live on
Lehman Road and are interested in a city water hook-up being brought down Lehman Road. There is a total of seven houses that would benefit however at this time six of the seven have expressed an interest (seventh resident is out of state at this time). The line would run approximately .4 of a mile. The family that has new construction on that road has two small children and very interested in acquiring city water instead of operating from a well. The other residents have had to deal with hauling water in the past and would prefer a water connection with the village if possible. From past history Mayor Verkuilen indicated a family had run a water line to their home at an expense of approximately $50,000. Mrs. Bohlen felt that was a little steep. Mayor advised we have sent their request on to our engineers to get the grade and will be able to provide more information upon receipt of their report. Trustee Bill Riggins, Jr., indicated he had spoken with Allen Klein and states he has no immediate plans to develop the property he had the water line run to that is close by, he is using this ground strictly for farming.
LOCIS has indicated Microsoft will not continue supporting the Windows XP operating system we currently have on our water/sewer computer. If our system is not upgraded to Windows 7 or Windows 8 we will run the risk of attackers and viruses to the system. We need to upgrade our computer by April 8th to either Windows 7 or Windows 8 to be compatible. We do own the license for the LOCIS Program. Trustee Ian Magerl will work with Judy to determine what avenue we should take in getting our equipment up to date. Costs will be shared by sewer and water as this is the only function this particular computer is used for.
Streets Department: Due to Superintendent Greg’s absent from the December meeting, busy plowing snow, he presented his written December report as well as the January report. Greg and Neil have been working closely together with tree clean up, servicing and/or repairing equipment, helping with the mass mailing of the water surveys, and most important snow removal. Greg and Neil were commended for a job well done in the snow removal this winter. In the spring Greg states there will be some driveway and property repair done due to water leak problems we have sustained this winter. The department’s pick up has been having transmission problems with it wanting to go into four wheel drive. The truck will eventually have to be taken to the dealer for some other repairs as well. Greg reports he has also been taking some on-line safety classes at no cost to the Village. Trustee Bill Riggins, Jr. asked Greg to provide in his March report his projected list for sidewalks. Trustee Duey Blair asked if there was anything we can do to alleviate
Old Business
Update on Emergency Water Hook-Up Property: Attorney Carl Draper is still working with the property owners on a purchase/easement arrangement. One of the problems we have encountered is that we have a 4” line going down there but that easement has never been recorded. Information received from Curran Gardner’s engineer, Max Middendorf, regarding a copy of the free flow design a copy of the free flow design and this has been forwarded to Benton & Associates for final review and approval. A meeting is being planned with Max Middendorf, Curran Gardner and our engineers. We need to determine:
Where the pump is going
Is there going to be enough room on the property designated for the pump
Have we gotten approval from the property owner
Trustee Bill Riggins, Jr., questioned why Benton & Associates is getting involved as they have already done the flow test and indicated it was ok. It is Riggins’ understanding that we are paying engineer fees to Curran Gardner’s engineers and feels paying Benton & Associates is an unnecessary duplication of payment. Mayor Verkuilen states that our engineers have questions on the layout, where they are going to tie into our lines and what type of pump is needed.
Update on Retail Sales Tax Referendum- The Trustees approved the final draft of the newsletter regarding the sales tax rate increase. The newsletter will be mailed this week to village residents only.
Mayor Verkuilen reminded the Board of the public hearings on the retail sales tax referendum set at Village Hall for Tuesday, February 11th at 7:00 p.m. and Monday, March 10th at 7:00 p.m.
Update on Emergency Siren- Trustee Wayne Heideman had the landline disconnected from the siren box. The only way to activate the siren now is by the a handheld radio. Heideman took the radio to GTSI who checked the program and showed him how to use the radio to activate the siren. The radio will be charging at village hall for the time being. If this works we will deactivate the phone line and possibly all radios, police and firemen, will be programmed to activate the siren in an emergency.
Radio Water Meters—Decision was tabled until next month
Aggregation- One of the topics at a joint meeting with the coalition was regarding aggregation. The question was raised should we bring Pruitt back in, their vote was to continue with Mark Pruitt. Besides himself, he has four other individuals to get out in the community to answer questions. Some rulings have been changed and will need to be addressed by the next carrier. They are leaning towards staying with FirstEnergy Solutions. The Board was given a draft recommendation memo from Mark Pruitt for review. The committee may look at a 24 months pricing period this time.
Trustee Ian Magerl indicated since Ameren sold out how can FirstEnergy Solutions guarantee cost savings prices with a company.
Trustee Bill Riggins expressed his concern that the board members were not aware of this meeting and felt they should have had the opportunity to attend. Riggins states he has several questions for them and feels FirstEnergy Solutions gave out false rates for Ameren using their old rate of 5.4 instead of waiting for Ameren to publish their new lower rates. He feels they had been dishonest the first time around. Trustee Ian Magerl also stated the information FirstEnergy Solutions put out on opting out of the program was suppose to give people a month notice but only gave them a few days. Trustee Magerl stated FirstEnergy changed their office address without notifying people. Even the phone number was either incorrect or at least no one answered the line when people tried to call in to opt out. It was noted that FirstEnergy did not honor customer requests to opt out of the program even when written notification had been mailed in.
Amy Uden, Project Manager, Sangamon County Electricity Aggregation Program provided material for the Board’s review pertaining to the Commerce Commission rules and resulting changes to aggregation program management and other a draft recommendation for Program Year 2 for the Aggregation Program. Trustee Riggins asked that the board be notified of such meetings in the future and given the opportunity to attend so their concerns/questions can be addressed.
Mayor Verkuilen indicated he could arrange for Mark Pruitt to address the board’s concerns. Once again Trustee Riggins indicated he would have liked to have attended the meeting to hear what everyone else had to say and to address his concerns prior to the new rulings being approved. The next customer enrollment period will be in March. We should begin seeing the shadow bids soon. The pricing FirstEnergy submits will only be estimates. Trustee Riggins indicates from their past history their pricing estimates are worthless.