Category Archives: City Council

City Council, City of Peoria, Form-Based Code, Heart of Peoria Plan

Council votes down Sheridan Road/Heart of Peoria improvements

19 Comments

UPDATE/CORRECTION 10/11/07: Below, I mistakenly cited the City of Peoria operating budget. In fact, the money in question was $200,000 from the capital budget set aside in 2007 for design and engineering of the Sheridan Loucks Triangle specifically and exclusively. $200,000 per year from 2007 to 2011 was requested, but only $200,000 in 2007 was funded. Sorry for the confusion, and thanks to my friend at the city who wishes to remain anonymous for pointing out my error.

In the 2007 City of Peoria budget (pp. 128-129), money was set aside for economic development. Here’s where some of that money was designated to go (emphasis mine):

2. Community Revitalization Activity – Activity cost $238,529

This program is responsible for undertaking projects which promote downtown Peoria and adjacent areas, including the Riverfront and residential neighborhoods, as an attractive location for working, living, and entertainment. Specific activities, to be undertaken, within the next five years, include:

  • Create and implement residential enterprise zone.
  • Identify and execute initiatives to revitalize the Warehouse District and Southern Gateway.
  • Finalize redevelopment plans for the former Sears block to create a cultural and entertainment destination for the Region.
  • Identify and redevelop blighted/contaminated property.
  • Continue revitalization initiatives in Council-directed areas (Sheridan Loucks, Prospect Road, Renaissance Park).
  • Undertake and complete public infrastructures improvements to support business and industry.

So, at tonight’s council meeting, Councilwoman Barbara Van Auken brought forth a motion to spend some of that money to enter into a contract with the Farnsworth Group, Inc. “for the DESIGN of the SHERIDAN TRIANGLE BUSINESS DISTRICT ENHANCEMENT from McCLURE AVENUE to HANSSLER PLACE, in an Amount Not to Exceed $183,750.00.” This is in the Sheridan Road form district that was created by the council back in May of this year.

In order for form districts to be successful, there are two things that need to take place. First, there needs to be a form-based code — a pre-planned area that provides a consistent and predictable development pattern. That’s the private investment side of the equation. Second, improvements need to be made to the streets and sidewalks in order to make it an attractive area both for redevelopment by investors and patronage by potential customers. That’s the public investment side of the equation.

Sheridan Master PlanPlans for improving the intersection and streetscape in this area were developed during a charrette hosted by Farrell-Madden Associates. You can see the results of that charrette by clicking on the picture to the right. You’ll notice the pictures show wider sidewalks, street trees, intersection changes, etc. The next step is to develop a project plan “splitting the area into logical phases for construction” with estimates and specifications for each phase. That’s what Councilwoman Van Auken asked for this evening.

But the council voted it down 6-5. Ardis, Turner, Gulley, Jacob, Montelongo, and Spears Spain voted against it. Van Auken, Sandberg, Manning, Spain Spears, and Nichting voted for it.

Why? I’m certain I don’t know. It appears they voted it down because it’s too close to the next budget cycle. Councilman Clyde Gulley kept talking about the Griswold Improvement Project — for which there is $0 in the 2007 budget — that the council voted against funding earlier this year because it would have been a budget amendment. He somehow thinks the two projects are analogous, and since the council voted down his street improvement project, he’s going to vote against everyone else’s. Other council members said we need to set priorities before spending that much money — as if they didn’t already set the priorities for 2007 in the 2007 budget.

So now, evidently the money set aside for improving the Heart of Peoria area this year will not get spent.

City Council, City of Peoria, Peoria Journal Star

$5.5 million bathrooms

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The Journal Star’s editorial today is dedicated to criticizing Councilwoman Van Auken and her remark that the city should sell the Gateway building because “Government should not own buildings or property except for government use.” Granted, that wasn’t the best argument she could have given, and the editors of the Journal Star have fun dissecting her logic.

But what the editors don’t do is give any good reason for keeping the Gateway building. Here’s the best they can come up with:

And we’d add that, in fact, Gateway does serve a civic purpose: That building and its restrooms were built for the benefit of the public, specifically visitors at riverfront events.

The Gateway Building is a convention and banquet facility. The only way the public gets any benefit out of it is if they rent it from the Peoria Park District for somewhere between $600 and $1,500. The public is not under-served for convention and banquet space. Besides the River Station, Packard Plaza, the Pere Marquette, and a host of other private places to rent, there’s always the gigantic expansion of the Civic Center. How much more tax-subsidized banquet space do we need?

The only things the “visitors at riverfront events” really “benefit” from for free are the public restrooms. So the question is, don’t you think $5.5 million is kind of a steep price for public restrooms? I think so. I bet if they could sell the building, they could use a small fraction of the proceeds to build some really sweet public restrooms elsewhere along the riverfront.

City Council, City of Peoria

Zoning Commission may meet at 6 p.m. in 2008

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The Zoning Commission currently meets the first Thursday of each month at 1:00 p.m. The Ad Hoc Committee on Commissions determined that this may not be the most convenient time for property owners to come down to City Hall and express concerns regarding a zoning change that would affect their property, and recommended the hold at least some of their meetings in the evening. The Zoning Commission voted to keep everything status quo.

So now the Planning and Growth Director and a couple of council members are insisting. On the agenda for tonight is a proposal that would change the meeting time from 1 p.m. to 6 p.m. on a one-year trial basis, just for 2008.

The city did solicit input regarding the time change from several groups, and these are the results:

Staff surveyed three groups – neighborhood associations, citizens who had received notices of CZC public hearings within the last three months, and current members of the Zoning Commission. We asked if they would be more likely to attend the 6 pm meeting and if they would be interested in serving on the CZC if it met at 6pm instead of 1 pm. The results of the survey are summarized below and included in the survey report, Attachment B.

  • Neiqhborhoods – 85 groups contacted, 16 responded (19%)
    • 13 (81%) favored evening meetings
    • 1 (6%) did not
    • 2 (13%) did not respond directly to the question
    • 3 were interested in serving on the CZC and 3 others needed more information
  • Citizens who had received notices of CZC public hearings the last three months – 253 citizens contacted, 7 responded (3%)
    • 3 (43%) favored evening meetings
    • 4 (57%) did not
    • 1 interested in serving on CZC
  • Current Zoninq Commissioners – 6 responded (100%)
    • 1 favored evenings meeting
    • 5 did not

In addition, Council Member input was sought. Three favored evening meetings, and two others provided comment or questions.

The neighborhood groups appear to have spoken loud and clear — almost 20% responded, and they were overwhelmingly in favor of the evening meeting schedule. Only 3% of those citizens who receive notices even responded, which leads me to believe that they don’t have a strong opinion one way or the other.

According to a Journal Star report, “If the City Council changes things on Tuesday, at least two members [Richard Unes and Greg Hunziker] say they will quit.” The reason? “We’d be sitting here until 9 p.m. or 10 o’clock in the evening,” Unes is reported as saying.

Well, of course I understand that sentiment; it’s not exactly the most exciting way to spend an evening. But it is only one evening per month. And frankly, they should value the time of the citizens they’re appointed to serve more than their own time — that’s why they call it “public service.” I don’t expect that argument to get them much sympathy from the council, either, since they meet at 6:15 every other Tuesday (on average).

Also, threatening to resign doesn’t carry a huge punch when you consider there’s no shortage of people willing to take their place. Since Chad Bixby resigned, the Heart of Peoria Commission has no representation on the Zoning Commission, so one or two HOP/C members need to be added, plus there are three neighborhood group members who have expressed interest.

In the absence of any good argument against changing the time, I think they should go ahead and try the 6:00 meetings for a year and see how they work.

City Council, City of Peoria, Peoria Police

Police want 5:00 security start time at Adams Supermarket

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Adams Supermarket owner Ahmad Abud (aka Hussein Alsalahi) insisted that his South Side grocery store needed to sell liquor to be successful, and was willing to agree to a number of conditions in order to secure his liquor license. One of those conditions was having an off-duty Peoria Police officer act as a security guard from 2 p.m. to midnight.

Sales haven’t been as good as Abud thought they would be, so he’s looking at reducing costs — and one of those costs is the off-duty police officer. He wants to only have an officer working security from 8 p.m. to midnight, and he has the support of First District Councilman Clyde Gulley.

The Police Department, however, thinks that won’t be sufficient and is recommending a third option — that the police security officer start at 5 p.m. They further recommend that this be on a 12-month trial basis, and that if there’s any trouble, the full 2 p.m. to midnight condition be reinstated.

Gulley and others will complain that this is unfair because it’s not required of any other grocery stores with liquor licenses. That’s a valid complaint. But on the other hand, Abud did agree to it. If he thought it was unfair, he should have stated that early in the process, like when he appeared before the Liquor Commission initially or when his license came up for approval before the council. Since he enthusiastically agreed to the conditions, and is now trying to get out of one of them, it makes people nervous that he will continue to chip away at the conditions until his store is nothing more than a glorified liquor store.

City Council, City of Peoria

Gateway building for sale

18 Comments

Sell It!

The City Manager reports that the Budget Committee has “requested that an RFP be issued for the sale or lease of the Gateway Building. The RFP will be issued in October with response due in early December.”

This is great news. It’s a pretty building and it looks nice on the riverfront, but it’s certainly not an essential service. The money the city spends on utilities, upkeep, and other expenses for the Gateway building could be better spent elsewhere.

Kudos to the council for being willing to put it up for sale.

City Council, City of Peoria

Policy session planned for tomorrow night

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Tomorrow night, October 2, the Peoria City Council will have a special meeting to discuss the use of Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) funds for projects such as ornamental street lights in the Orchard District. Since it’s during the regular council meting time, I wonder if it will be broadcast on WCBU and/or Insight channel 22. Anyone know?

Here’s the official agenda:

SPECIAL CITY COUNCIL AGENDA
POLICY/WORKSHOP SESSION
CITY HALL, COUNCIL CHAMBERS
6:15 P.M.

ROLL CALL
INVOCATION AND PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE
PETITIONS, REMONSTRANCES & COMMUNICATIONS

POLICY SESSION
ITEM NO. 1 Communication from the City Manager and Director of Public Works Regarding a POLICY SESSION Pertaining to SPECIAL ASSESSMENT GUIDELINES Regarding ORNAMENTAL STREET LIGHTING and the USE of CDBG FUNDS with These Projects.

EXECUTIVE SESSION
ADJOURNMENT

City Council, City of Pekin, Comprehensive Plan, Heart of Peoria Plan

Pick a plan, any plan

5 Comments

Confused manThe city council on Tuesday tacitly approved Craig Hullinger’s request to pursue his plan to put townhouses and a street between the Riverplex and Spring Street near the river. (Councilman Sandberg voted against having Hullinger spend his time on that project because he would like to see other projects that we’ve already started come to fruition before efforts are divided to work on other projects. Councilman Spain countered that, if we wait until all the current projects are implemented, we won’t be coming up with any new ideas for a long time; he used the warehouse district as an example of a project that may take seven years or more to complete.)

I got a chance to talk to Hullinger yesterday before the council meeting, and one of the interesting things I learned (though I had heard of this anecdotally before) was how various city documents are not coordinated. Case in point: this area bordered by the train tracks and river, Spring Street and the Riverplex.

  • If you look at the Zoning Map for Peoria (updated 2005), you’ll see that this area is zoned R-3 (single-family residential) from Spring to Wayne, and C-2 (large-scale commercial) from Wayne to the interstate.
  • If you look at the Comprehensive Plan’s Future Land Use Map (adopted 2001), it has the area from the interstate all the way to Morton Street (this area includes the Riverplex) designated as park land. From Morton to Spring, it’s designated as a mix of commercial and high-density residential.
  • If you look at the Heart of Peoria Plan (adopted “in principle” in 2002), it recommends the city “pursue development of a whitewater race course, utilizing available land to the north of the current recreational and fitness complex.” That would stretch from the Riverplex parking lot almost to Evans Street.

All of this leads me to conclude that the city needs someone somewhere to coordinate the many and various plans the city has adopted. I’m sure this isn’t the only part of town where plans conflict with each other. Who makes sure they’re in harmony? Which plan has precedence? Or are they all equal?

The city is currently in the middle of writing a new comprehensive plan. Hopefully these conflicts will be resolved during that process.

City Council, City of Peoria, Peoria Police

4 a.m. liquor license proposals flawed

17 Comments

I’m not inherently opposed to expanding the 4 a.m. liquor license area, which is on the council’s agenda for tonight. But the two proposals on the table — one from the liquor commission and one from the police department — have flaws.

The proposal from the liquor commission is a transparent attempt to grant 4 a.m. liquor licenses to two bars that cater to African American patrons. The reason is because black patrons perceive they are being excluded from current 4 a.m. bars by those bars’ dress codes. To me, if there is discrimination taking place, then the city should deal with that issue head-on, rather than try to resolve it through de facto segregated liquor licenses.

The proposal from the police department almost makes sense, except that it excludes the area bordered by Kumpf, Adams, Oak, and the river for no apparent reason. If you’re going to extend the area and make it easier to patrol, why not make the area contiguous? Is it to exclude certain bars that are located within the excluded area? The other flaw is that, if the whole point of extending the liquor license area is to include two African American bars, and those bars are not included in the police department’s proposal, what is accomplished? Nothing.

I recommend rejection of both proposals. The 4 a.m. area should be left as is for now. And I further recommend a full investigation into whether there is racial discrimination occurring at current bars with 4 a.m. licenses. If so, those bars should have their licenses revoked.

City Council, City of Peoria

Townhouses on riverfront deserve consideration

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At first glance, putting urban townhouses along the riverfront between the Riverplex and Spring Street seems like a crazy idea. But is it so crazy that it just might work?

I stopped by the Economic Development department and took a look at their proposal for this stretch of land. It would only displace about 100 feet of park land, which they plan to replace — yes replace — by using sediment dredged from the river to extend the shoreline. Thus, no park land would actually be lost. It would cause minimal disruption to the park, requiring only that the sand volleyball courts and Constitution Garden be relocated a short distance away and that a small portion of the bike path be rerouted. The city owns the land, one of the few parks not owned by the Peoria Park District.

The townhouses and home listings would face outward toward the park and the river, and a new road would be built (it could just be an extension of Water Street, or it could be given a new name like Riverfront Drive) between the Riverplex parking lot and Spring Street. The city itself wouldn’t build the townhouses or the road, but would put out bids to developers instead. The idea is to get private dollars reinvested downtown.

The development would not be merely residential. It would be mixed use. So the ground level of the complexes would include a retail component which could include things like a deli, restaurant, grocery store, etc.

There would be an added bonus to this development, too. It could help the city with its combined sewer overflow problem. The combined sewer intercept runs underneath the park. If the city were to put in a larger intercept pipe or additional pipe storage, it would have to dig up some of that land at the city’s sole expense. But if a private developer were building a new neighborhood there, the excavation costs could be shared to the city’s and developer’s mutual benefit.

Reaction to the idea on the Journal Star and Peoria Pundit sites has been negative because of two things: Taft Homes and PMP Fermentation. So that was one of my first questions when I visited the Economic Development Department.

The city has been in contact with the Peoria Housing Authority, and the PHA is planning to replace Taft Homes with River-West-style housing in the future. They may be able to move up implementation of that project to roughly coincide with the building of townhouses along the riverfront. As far as crime is concerned, the argument is that having up to 200 new residential homes will make the area safer because it will provide more “eyes on the street” in that part of town. It will combat the culture of “I didn’t see nothin'” that is prevalent among lower-income residents.

PMP Fermentation is owned by Fuso Chemical Co. of Osaka, Japan, and within the past year they’ve shut down half of their physical plant. They closed two buildings and laid off 16 workers in September 2006 because “the company can buy its chemical products cheaper from China rather than produce them in Peoria,” according to Journal Star archives. This has mitigated the impact PMP has on the livability of the area.

Furthermore, there’s a bit of inconsistency in arguing against townhouses here, but in favor of park land. If crime and industry are so terrible down there, one would think no one would want to play volleyball, ride bikes, walk around Constitution Garden, etc., in that area of town. Yet people do. Wouldn’t townhouses further improve the area? And couldn’t it be the start of more renewed investment on the near north side?

I think the idea has some merit and should be given fair consideration. I’m looking forward to Director Craig Hullinger’s presentation to the City Council this evening. I’m sure he’ll get plenty of tough questions about the location and its challenges.

City Council, City of Peoria

City recommends keeping Fleet Management in house

City Manager Randy Oliver has been looking for ways to save the city money, much to the chagrin of some council members. He suggested outsourcing the city’s Fleet Management services — the mechanics who maintain and repair the city’s many and various vehicles, like fire engines and snow plows. This caused several council members to balk. It also made for a very stressful situation for the mechanics whose jobs were on the line and their families.

That may be coming to an end Tuesday night. The City Manager is recommending that Fleet Management be kept in-house. The reason? It’s not worth the money that would be saved by outsourcing (emphasis mine below):

Cities contract out services generally to reduce costs and/or improve services. Seeking proposals serves as a measure to compare costs between in-house and private service delivery. While a change in service delivery may be justifiable on the basis of any cost savings, as a practical matter, however, the cost savings should be sufficient to justify the organizational change.

The proposals from Penske Trucking and First Vehicle Services are both excellent proposals and would exceed all the City’s fleet maintenance requirements and provide a higher level of service. Based on the financial analysis, however, the improved services do not justify the additional cost in dollars and the organizational disruption caused by changing to a private contractor.

Thus, the recommendation is to reject all bids and keep things in-house. I can’t help but think that this could have gone either way, and what tipped it toward staying in-house was at least partially influenced by all the push-back from certain council members. Nevertheless, I’m glad to see the mechanics won’t be losing their jobs (assuming the council approves this action, which I have no doubt they will) and this will maybe cause considering some alternative ways to use vehicles, like marketing and advertising (somebody, call Fleet Wrap HQ, it’s finally the time!).