Peoria Standard

Village of Swansea Village Committees met May 19.

Here is the agenda provided by the board:

Attendees: Board President Jeff Parker, Treasurer John Walter, Village Clerk Gloria J. Collier, Village Administrator Ben Schloesser, Trustee Brian McGuire, Trustee Sherman Pochek, Trustee Matt Lanter, Trustee Natalie Jablonski, Trustee Brian Thouvenot, Trustee Cary Lewis V, Police Chief Matthew Blomberg, Chief Doug Little, Director of Public Works Rick Tucker, and Building and Zoning Director Dan Thomas

PERSONNEL COMMITTEE: Held 6:00-6:47

Chair: Trustee Jablonski; Vice-Chair: Trustee Lewis V.

Members: Trustee Lanter, Pochek, McGuire, Thouvenot

1. Request to Hire - POC FF - Thomas Sandage

Chief Doug Little said that to the best of his knowledge, Sandage passed his physical agility and his physical fitness test. I hope to get him on board.

Motion to Forward: Made by Trustee Jablonski, seconded by Trustee Lewis

Trustee Votes: All ayes

2. Request to Hire - POC FF – Vincent Scott

Chief Doug Little said that Vincent Scott is currently a security forces member out at Scott Air Force base with the US Air Force. He's been coming around for the last couple of months, looking to help his community. He lives out on the Creekside. He brought some other security forces members with him. Unfortunately, they live too far out, but he wants to stick it through. He's been in a couple of our meetings and seems very interested. So, I'd like the recommendation for him as well.

Motion to Forward: Made by Trustee Jablonski, seconded by Trustee Thouvenot

Trustee Votes: All ayes

FINANCE COMMITTEE: Held 6:47 - 6:51

Chair: Trustee Lanter; Vice-Chair: Trustee Thouvenot

Members: Trustees Lewis V., Pochek, McGuire, Jablonski

General Fund Analysis

Trustee Lanter: We have our preliminary end of year numbers in the general fund analysis. I don't know if Carrie has anything specific that you want to point out or talk about.

Carrie: We had a little bit more money this year, just sales taxes were up. We had a lot of investment interest this year as well. So general funds, we finished the year to the good 1.5 million. For sewer, we finished the good a little over 1.1 million.

Trustee Lanter: Those numbers as always will change as we do accruals and all that, but it's generally close. So, still looking very good, solid financially. There are some notes on there about the sewer debt continues to be paid down on those two, IEPA loans and maybe look at MFT. We spent a little bit more money than we had, I guess, revenues versus expenses, but versus the budget, we spent quite a bit less than anticipated. As I remember correctly, we thought we were going to get Rosewood started this year, but that hasn't happened yet. So capital projects, we were close to budget. We spent a little bit less than we anticipated.

Same with non-home rule, that was spent less than we expected. Some of that was due to some road projects. So overall, decent year financially. I don't know if anybody has any specific questions or comments.

Trustee Thouvonot: Just refresh when we must have the 1%.

Village Administrator Ben: By October. We will pass a local ordinance, and we are happy to bring that. I mean sooner, rather than later. I will just say sooner, meaning, in case there's any unforeseen kick outs. The sooner we get that done we'll bring it to you here in June.

JUDICIARY COMMITTEE: Held 6:51 -6:53

Chair: Trustee Lewis V.; Vice-Chair Trustee Thouvenot

Members: Trustee Lanter, Pochek, McGuire, Jablonski

Trustee Lewis: Nothing is on the agenda currently. I would like to bring up or remind the board quickly about signage, in reference to Ambrose terrace. I just wanted to remind the board, as well as to get further clarification on whether I need to go through the Judiciary Committee, or can we just put up a sign?

Village Administrator Ben: Am I correct to assume that the mayor and board are generally in favor of placement of that sign.

Board President Parker: I will say I am.

Trustee Lewis: I went and looked at it, and I will say it's needed. It's a weird turn, a very sharp turn. Prior to that, I will include pictures and things of that nature so that we can move forward with it, and everybody will be well

informed.

COMMUNITY & ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT: Held 6:54 - 7:30

Chair: Trustee Lanter; Vice-Chair: Trustee Jablonski

Members: Trustees Lewis V., McGuire, Pochek, Thouvenot

1. Trustee Lanter: The first item is a redevelopment agreement between the Jarvis companies and the village of Swansea for a fence.

Building & Zoning Director Dan: So, Jarvis Electric is wanting to install fencing in a gate along the three properties they own here up the street, 1600, 1604 and 1610 North, Illinois. They've been dealing with several issues with vagrancy and other criminality, for lack of a better term. These improvements will hopefully help with some of that to create a little more esthetic appeal to the three buildings and then be able to pitch those to proposed tenants in the future with those upgrades.

So ultimately, including the packet was the original business district application, the three bids Jarvis got. We did get a positive recommendation from the business district commission back on May 9.

Trustee Lewis: Okay. I have a question about the barb wire.

Joe Jarvis: So, there's barbed wire properties, the vinyl fencing would cover up all of that. We're trying to match what we've already had and then use vinyl fencing. Originally, when we came to Swansea, 108,000 was given for us to utilize on the property for esthetics and upgrades. We utilized 120 of it. So, the only reason I asked for that amount was just because that was the last portion.

We want to stay here in Swansea, but we have had so many problems in the past four to five years. Just today, a guy half naked with the police department was in front of one of the buildings. I can't lease out those buildings. So, what we did with our funds, our personal funds, was purchased the two extra buildings on each side of us. When we came to Swansea and created the Swansea crossing signs, which you guys paid for, we wanted to utilize all three buildings. However, the guy that owned the two buildings on each side didn't have that same concept. So, we utilized our money and funds to purchase those two buildings, and now we've been waiting to see what we can do. We've just been battling with homeless, criminal activity all over the place. We have countless police reports breakdowns. It doesn't matter. They're sleeping all over the place, not saying the fence is going to compete with that, but it's going to help bring tenants to Swansea. And we need business, right? We need good business. I can't get good business with half naked people undressing at two o'clock in the afternoon on Friday two weeks ago, both on the property.

Trustee Thouvenot: Sir, I apologize for that happening at your place of business. I can't imagine. Really, this lays bare the fact that we must start doing whatever we can to address this growing issue, because it's not just Jarvis electric. So, I just would say we need to look, as a community, into what we can do to start to address this issue. It's something that this board needs to understand that what's included in the request is shocking. It's happening in our community during the daylight hours. So, I'm fully on bored in helping you invest in trying to bring activity to your place in business. So that's where my comments are.

Joe Jarvis: No, it's not appealing. But at the same time, Dan has been great. Ben has been great. All the administration through the time we've been here since 2017 has been great. There's just no perfect answer. I did offer to be a part of a committee of some kind, if you wanted help with that, because it is, becoming every day, instead of just once a quarter. We have cameras all over and we help the police out. They view them all the time. There's just so many different people. There are so many different camps all over the place. I know that there's not one answer, but I thought if enough business owners and maybe residential owners can come in and help, maybe someone has a good answer.

So, I thought if we could get some funds together to put the fencing in, make it esthetically nicer, bring more activity to one building and then the other building in the middle. We don't really need to utilize our 60,000 square foot building, then the more traffic we have, the more customers we have, maybe the less problems we will have. Our goal is to try and get better tenants in these buildings, and that's one option we were looking for help.

Motion Forward by Trustee Lanter, second Jablonski.

Trustee Votes: All ayes

2. Trustee Lanter:

So, the next one is an ordinance amending two sections of village code. 154.018 is the definitions portion of that session, and 154.059 is just another section that calls out a lot of different things for exterior property maintenance.

Building & Zoning Director Dan: So, I wanted to add several definitions in and additional code text relating to the parking storage of vehicles, recreational vehicles, commercial vehicles, utility trailers and vehicle coverings, handling complaints, seeing them come in, and the constant issues that the residents are describing. To me, it just seemed that we didn't have the code backing to address these issues. So, I think that this ordinance does take care of that.

Trustee McGuire: I have one under the commercial vehicle. By the way, this reads, I got a one ton dually for my business. I can't park it in my house.

Building & Zoning Director Dan: Yeah, it can be okay. Not exceeding three. You have a one ton. Three quarter ton was generally the cap. The idea around that was to put a number on the size of the vehicle. Three quarter tons seem like, generally, a stout vehicle. It's really to eliminate an Ameren line truck parked in front of somebody's house or in the driveway, or some other massive, just esthetically unpleasing vehicle constantly sitting in front of somebody's house. We've had a litany of complaints about commercial vehicles parks. We just didn't have any code backing. Nonetheless, I hear the concern. I'm open to adjusting as anybody sees fit, but I thought three quarter ton is just. There are a lot of people in construction that drive a one ton daily because they pull an enclosed trailer or something. I could be on pace, but maybe you can put it as a pickup truck.

Trustee Thouvenot: Yes, that's what I was thinking of as a pickup truck style vehicle. Because I think what we're doing, if we're looking to eliminate any of the built vehicles that would be like that Cameron type truck, in fact, the one that sits in front of the house on lotus, the vacant home, has a commercial vehicle that sits out in front of it every day from a neighboring property.

Building & Zoning Director Dan: Something to keep in mind too is just the definition for the proposed definition for commercial vehicle is that the vehicle used primarily for the transportation of goods, materials or passengers for compensation, are in the furtherance of a business or commercial activity. So, if the dually is not marked accordingly for business use, it's not technically a commercial vehicle. If it has so and so's handyman service, then I would be deemed a commercial.

Public Comments were made about a one-ton dually and trailer attached to it, which is bigger than the truck time two. It's parked across the front of his entire house and blocks the view of all the neighbors who live across the street from him. As citizens input, and someone who has seen this, if it's a commercial one ton dually, then where do you draw the line?

Trustee Lanter: So, if I want to encourage you to review that, if you have comments, to send those to Dan.

3. Building & Zoning Director Dan:

The next proposed ordinance here is just a rewrite of its retitling and kind of reorganizing chapter 91 in our code, which now is just titled weeds. It doesn't give us what we need to properly enforce, dead trees lined limbs, piles of debris, wee trees and other various things that weren't properly or not properly defined in our code. So, I think this ordinance is written, with the backing that we need to address the larger ticket, issues of vegetative overgrowth, dead and dying trees, deposited limbs and so forth.

Public Comment was made regarding snow allowed to be discharged back out to the road because of a past incident where snow was put out into the street and it caused significant trouble because it remained there.

Dan said that he would look into that and get an answer.

Trustee Thouvanot: One last thing, from a conservationist standpoint, there are going to be some issues that are raised, but I'm going to sit down with them, and we're going to raise the issues and see if there's a way we can phrase things that will get both sides what they need to get. There are some issues, and we'll go into that without boring you guys with the details. I'm kind of representing the local tree huggers.

Building & Zoning Director Dan: I do want to mention to the board that now is the season that all this stuff takes off. So, it's timely to be able to implement this immediately. It is really my goal. So just take that into account as we move on.

Motion to forward: Made by Trustee Lanter, seconded by Trustee Thouvenot

Trustee Votes: All ayes

4. Trustee Lanter: Next we have a redevelopment agreement for 1803 North Illinois.

Village Administrator Ben: if you recall, we approved a liquor store with a billion for gas pumps as well as fast casual restaurant up here at the former CVS site 1803 North Illinois. We pushed this redevelopment agreement through legal, worked closely with our consultants at PGAV and Stroud to draft this and bring this forward. This represents a 15% investment on the part of the village through combined TIF and business district funds. I think it is an important thing to remember, similar to the Triple Lakes redevelopment agreement that this board just passed as well. This is a performance-based contract. They will only be eating what they kill, so to speak, that 15% investment of their total project costs, or $615,000 whichever is less, will only be generated. It will only be shared with the applicant if those funds are generated through their property into the respective TIF and business district funds. This does not restrict any of the revenue that the village gets from normal other means of revenue sharing, primarily, sales tax. I think it's a straightforward agreement. I'm happy to take any questions. Again, this has been reviewed thoroughly by legal and our redevelopment consultant.

Motion to Forward: Trustee Thouvenot, seconded by Jablonski.

Trustee Votes: All ayes

Trustee McGuire: Have they done any preliminary drawings of the properties.

Village Administrator Ben: They have. The applicant had submitted a building permit. It didn't include any of the pertinent information, including the plans, though. So, I of course, reached out to him and asked for those immediately. He said they were still in progress, so I hope to have them ASAP. We'll be happy to share those.

5. Trustee Lanter: Next, planned business submittal for Jennings Station.

Building & Zoning Director Dan: So, this is phase one here on the south end of the development. This is what this is discussing. It is moving forward on phase one. It's the single-family Villa portion; 41 villas are proposed from lots ranging in size from 8000 to 32,000 square feet. The property as a whole, including the concept plan, was already approved for annexation in March. So nonetheless, they seek to move forward in the first phase of development. So, including in the packet here on the screen are the full set of plans we've had, including the drainage calculations and all the other pertinent information reviewed by a third-party engineer and approved. So, this is as we continue to scroll the final set of patents that have already been approved. So, any questions and concerns we can take, and we also have the developer here as well.

Building & Zoning Director Dan: Yes, there's a better visual of the entry here on Kellerton Road, the existing step Street from stone field. But again, the developer has said that he will have a temporary access there for the infrastructure portion of the development.

Public Comment

During **public comment**, Laura voiced concerns about the **designation and use of Kellerton as a stub road** for access to a new development. She argued that **Redfield does not meet the criteria for a collector street**, as it functions as a ** *cul-de-sac on both ends**, making its use as a primary access route problematic. She questioned why an **alternative route through Frank Scott** was dismissed and emphasized the **significant traffic impact** on her home at Redfield and Ranch Field.

Laura also noted that **construction traffic for 41 new homes** would likely pass through the subdivision for several years, raising **safety and congestion concerns**. She urged the board to **re-evaluate the designation** of Kellerton and Redfield and ensure **lawful classification** before granting final approval. Additionally, she requested **confirmation that the removal of the Frank Scott access option was justified**.

Building & Zoning Director Dan: Obviously, I was not here for that initial plan and zoning meeting. I believe that it was June of 2023. So, a bit of an excellent explanation could be provided on how we got away from the Frank Scott Parkway entrance. If you'd like to hear, he can kind of talk about that a little bit.

I would just remind the board, section 150, 3.046, designing dead end streets, temporary stub streets, or to the adjacent property is undeveloped, and any street must dead end temporarily. The right of way shall be extended to the property line, and no strip that would prevent connections with future streets shall be reserved. The village has always interpreted that and used that language to suggest that we do it is mandatory that we connect to stub streets when further development occurs.

Motion Forward by Trustee Lanter, second by Trustee Thouvonot.

Trustee Votes: All ayes.

6. Building & Zoning Director Dan: Vacant Building Registry

So, included in the packet is the vacant building registry that we have. The ordinance was put into place September of 2024, to start utilizing this. The ordinance calls out the managing of the correspondence sent out to vacant building owners to be handled by a third-party entity. So that's Muni Rig. Every month, they send reports about various vacant buildings that have been submitted to the registry. So, they submit to the registry, pay the fee. The fees, typically or the registry, are good for six months, and then something is to take place with that building, improvements to some sort, tenancy, something along those lines. They can request extensions up to a two-year period. But then ultimately, it's up to us to decide what we do.

Ultimately, in digging into this, reading and reading the ordinance, speaking with Muni Reg, the ordinance and the process that Muni Reg is now doing, it has just not been built out properly in terms of timelines and so forth. So that's kind of up to me to work through that a little bit. But the ordinance is good, and the process is good. It's just communication with third party entity; it just needs to be a little better, a little more specific, and so that's what I intend to do. But the document here does generally speak for itself. We are identifying vacant properties that need to be addressed. They're going on the registry. We're collecting that initial fee. It's just going to take some work developing the proper follow up procedures, but I'll continue to provide this registry month by month basis. When I get all the specific details hashed out, the document will reflect all that accordingly.

Trustee Lanter: Inducement resolution to Triple Lakes Farm

Village Administrator Ben: Thank you, Trustee Lanter.

This board, as you'll recall, passed a redevelopment agreement for Triple Lakes development last month. I believe, included in that is an obligation on the villages' part, to create a new Tiff and business district for that area over there for the new development. This induced resolution essentially starts the clock on reimbursable costs for the developer. So, even though the districts do not exist yet, once they are in place and revenue begins accumulating costs that are incurred before the actual creation of the districts with this resolution can still be reimbursed for the

developer, which we are glad to hear. This is the standard process regardless. They're ready to arrive and roll.

Motion to Forward: Made by Trustee Lanter, seconded by Jablonski

Trustee Voters: All ayes

Trustee Lanter: Resolution supporting for MEPRD grant for Master plan on Clinton Hills

Village Administrator Ben: Yes, if you recall the plan that we passed with Heartlands included in that is a 40% note, essentially from any PRD to pay for that portion of the study. This is a resolution confirming to any PRD that the board understands the obligations included in the application for that grant and the cost that it will incur as a result.

Motion to Forward: Made by Trustee Lanter for approval, seconded by Trustee McGuire.

PUBLIC SAFETY COMMITTEE: Held 7:30-7:34

Chair: Trustee McGuire; Vice-Chair: Trustee Pochek

Members: Trustees Lanter, McGuire, Jablonski, Thouvenot

1. Trustee McGuire: I'll open up public works at 7:30 for a road closure for Caseyville Avenue on 11/27/2025 for the Belleville East Hockey Thanksgiving Day 5K

This is just a formality that I have to notify the board, so it's been approved and good.

2. Muni road speeding complaint.

Police Chief Blomberg: Apparently, we all got an email. Yeah, apparently y'all got an email last, beginning last week, about Muni Road from one of the residents. So, we put our speed trailer out there to capture data to see, is there a certain time, and then what the actual speeding looks like. That's the graph that you got. Unfortunately, it is very bad, from about seven in the morning to seven at night, maybe eight at night. I will caution you about that data. So, the speed limit on that road is 25. If someone goes 26 it's a speeding vehicle, and that's how the trailer gets it. So, when you look at that, and it looks like 90% of the traffic speeds, you can see that the average speed is 31. So, it's six over. So that's not too bad. But you can see there the high score for the week was 84. So, somebody was flying, that was somebody that was trying to register the high score. If that was an urgent call, I don't know.

So, at least we captured some data. It is a problem. Back in the day Smelting Works Road was a 25 mile an hour speed limit, and the board elected to raise that to a more appropriate level. I believe that probably is the case here, where we need to raise it to 35. If you do that, those numbers drop, they'll still be speeding. We will address that, but it wouldn't be as awful as this graph looks.

So, I would think 35 would be a consideration if the board was interested in that. However, now that we have this data, the troops have been informed, and we're going to try to make a dent in it. So, we'll certainly be addressing it. But I just wanted to bring this back to you, let you know how we got it, what the numbers mean and what our plan is.

Trustee McGuire: Anything else for public safety?

Motion to Forward: Made by Trustee McGuire, seconded.

Trustee Votes: All ayes

PUBLIC WORKS COMMITTEE: Held 7:34 - 7:37

Chair: Trustee McGuire: Vice-Chair: Trustee Lanter

Members: Trustees Pochek, Lewis V., Jablonski, Thouvenot

1. Trustee McGuire: I'll open up public works at 7:34. Resolution authorizing the purchase of a new SCAG TIGER CAT II at a price of $10,451.22, from Erb Turf & Utility Equipment, Inc., 1500 Bowl Avenue, Swansea, IL 62226.

These are all budgeted items for this year.

Motion to Forward: Made by Trustee Lanter, seconded by Trustee Lewis

Village Administrator Ben: Quick note, particularly for the new members of the board, you'll see in the resolution that I called out that these are all Source Well, prices. Source well, is a consortium of state and local government procurement, so there's a formal bidding process at the state level to help alleviate the burden of doing that at the local level. So, we have an account with Source Well. When we get a Source Well price, then it has already been competitively bid.

Trustee Votes: All ayes

2. Trustee McGuire: Second item a resolution authorizing the purchase of a new SCAG JACKAL at a price of $34,787,22, from Erb Turf & Utility Equipment, Inc., 1500 Boul Avenue, Swansea IL 62226.

Motion to Forward: Made by Trustee Lanter, seconded by Thouvenot.

Trustee Votes: All ayes.

3. Trustee McGuire: Third item is a resolution authorizing the purchase of a New SCAG WINDSTORM

BLOWER at a price of $11,192.22, from Erb Turf & Utility Equipment, Inc. 1500 Boul Avenue, Swansea, IL 62226.

Motion to Forward: Made by Trustee Lanter, seconded by Trustee Thouvenot

Trustee Votes: All ayes.

CULTURAL COMMITTEE: Held 7:37 -7:47

Chair: Trustee Lewis V.; Vice-Chair: Trustee Pochek

Members: Trustees Lanter, McGuire, Jablonski, Thouvenot

1. Trustee Lewis: We have a Presentation from Victorious Life International

This is an upcoming educational institution. She asked me to give a presentation to the public as well as to the board. We welcome new members. So, I would like to give her the opportunity.

I'm Dr. Warletta Brookin. I am the founder and the CEO of Victoria Life International. We also have World Changers Prep Academy with me. I want to introduce you all to Doctor Nicholas Jakich. He is the principal of World Changers Prep Academy.

He lives in Swansea, and he was doing his school today. I reminded him that he needed to come out and meet you guys to talk a little bit about what we're doing and where we're going, what we're hoping to do within the community and partner with the community. We just had our high school graduation, our fourth high school graduation.

We're an alternative school for high schoolers, and we graduated six individuals who may not have been successful in other school systems. Our keynote speaker was Senator Christopher Belt. He was there.

We've been there about a year now, and we have, we've been promoting our preschool for all programs. It's funded by the state of Illinois. It's a free preschool program.

So, if you know somebody, please encourage them to get involved and take part. We provide certified teachers; we provide quality education and wonderful opportunities for our children. We're moving forward to offering a summer camp. Camp Victorious is what we call it. We're looking at sports, recreation and different things like that. That camp is paid, but we do take cash for those people who may have it, and our camp is $120 a week, affordable. We're promoting that, and we came to you for partnership, to let you know we want to work with the community.

We're asking you to work with us, partner with us. We have a facility we will sponsor. We'd like to sponsor a breakfast for our leadership in the community and invite you all out to see what we're doing, and maybe we can give an official presentation and get it right this time.

Dr. Nicholas Jakich gave a brief overview of his background experience.

Trustee Lewis: So, what are you asking?

Dr. Warletta Brookin:

We are asking for support to work with you, and you ought to see this as one of the businesses in your community, as a school that will help benefit people who are in need and refer them to us. We are asking for referrals and support and just to help make this business to truly work with us and make this a business that benefits, not just individuals, but benefits this community, a business that you can be proud of, to say that we have this in our community. We're applying for grants. We have an after-school program that we're implementing. We purchased the bus to pick them up and different things like that. We want you to work with us and be a part of something that is powerful and something that would be beneficial to this community.

Board President Parker:

The last thing I'd like to say, as the mayor, you have a good one. He understands probably what we're trying to say about getting them now before we see them behind bars.

Trustee Lewis: We appreciate you. I personally will get back with you as being chairman of the Cultural committee. I also work within specialized education, creating IEPs, workforce development and things of that nature. I very much appreciate you coming out. I believe that we will have future conversations.

Motion to Forward: Made by Trustee Lewis to close Cultural Committee at 7:47.

SWANSEA REPORT COMMITTEE: Nothing

Chair: Trustee Jablonski; Vice-Chair: Trustee Pochek

Members: Trustees Lewis V., McGuire, Lanter, Thouvenot

https://www.swanseail.org/AgendaCenter/ViewFile/Minutes/_05192025-109