The residents at 401 Water Street want to see 4 a.m. liquor licenses go away. Their first step in that process is to force any requests for a 4 a.m. liquor license to go to the entire City Council for a vote, thus allowing residents an additional public hearing, and possibly an override of a Liquor Commission recommendation.

Currently, if a business-owner already holds a liquor license, the Liquor Commissioner (Mayor Ardis) or Deputy Liquor Commissioner (Councilman Turner) can approve a change to a subclass 1 (4 a.m.) liquor license upon recommendation from the Liquor Commission. This new proposed ordinance would require the whole City Council to approve or deny it instead.

Also speaking in favor of this plan during “Citizen Requests to Address the Council” was Sandy Fritz of the organization Citizens for Community Values. She implied that if the council continues to give out 4 a.m. liquor licenses, she may try to organize a referendum on the matter to see what Peoria residents think of the practice, and predicted that 90% would say they don’t want to see any new 4 a.m. liquor licenses approved.

My take: I hope this doesn’t get me fired at church, but I personally have no problem with the 4 a.m. liquor licenses. They’re confined to a small area of downtown, and they’ve been in place considerably longer than 401 Water has been taking tenants. It’s not like the bars all had 1 a.m. liquor licenses and then, when the residents came in, the council changed them all to 4 a.m. licenses with a stroke of the pen and an evil laugh. The residents were fully aware of the bar/liquor-license situation downtown and they chose to live there anyway.

Janice Favus, a resident of 401 Water who spoke in favor of the motion, stated that residents only want the same rights that all other Peorians have, including the right to leave her windows open on summer nights and not have a lot of noise from bars outside.

Now, in one sense, I can understand her point. If there is a major disturbance outside — crowd-control problems, fights, generally rude and obnoxious drunks leaving the bars — that’s not acceptable. But there are already laws against such behavior, and from what I’ve seen from my days playing in a band at downtown bars, those laws are enforced.

But on the other hand, with all due respect, it is totally unrealistic for Ms. Favus and her neighbors to expect downtown Peoria to be as tranquil as the suburbs at night. This isn’t beachfront property. You’re not going to hear the silted waves of the Illinois River lapping up on shore as you drift off to sleep. And nowhere did the city promise any downtown resident the right to be undisturbed if they leave their windows open at night. They’re downtown.

If we’re going to have a downtown that’s “24/7” — like the Heart of Peoria Plan calls for, and like all the consultants recommend, and like the council has been saying they want for years — that’s going to mean having places that are open late. Very late. Maybe all night. And people on the street means noise. I’m not talking about disorderly-conduct noise, but more noise than one would expect in a suburban neighborhood, or even an urban one.

When people are downtown, they’re going to be talking at normal volume, not in hushed tones. They’re going to be laughing and having a good time. Their cars are going to make noise at odd hours of the night when they come in or when they leave. There are going to be places playing music into the wee hours of the morning to attract people down there.

I’d like to call on music legend Petula Clark to give the residents of 401 Water a description of what it’s like to be “Downtown”:

When you’re alone and life is making you lonely
You can always go – downtown
When you’ve got worries, all the noise and the hurry
Seems to help, I know – downtown
Just listen to the music of the traffic in the city
Linger on the sidewalk where the neon signs are pretty
How can you lose?

The lights are much brighter there
You can forget all your troubles, forget all your cares
So go downtown, things’ll be great when you’re
Downtown – no finer place, for sure
Downtown – everything’s waiting for you

Don’t hang around and let your problems surround you
There are movie shows – downtown
Maybe you know some little places to go to
Where they never close – downtown
Just listen to the rhythm of a gentle bossa nova
You’ll be dancing with him too before the night is over
Happy again

The lights are much brighter there
You can forget all your troubles, forget all your cares
So go downtown, where all the lights are bright
Downtown – waiting for you tonight
Downtown – you’re gonna be all right now

And you may find somebody kind to help and understand you
Someone who is just like you and needs a gentle hand to
Guide them along

So maybe I’ll see you there
We can forget all our troubles, forget all our cares
So go downtown, things’ll be great when you’re
Downtown – don’t wait a minute more
Downtown – everything’s waiting for you

Noise, lights, traffic, places that never close — that’s downtown, 401 Water residents. That’s what you signed on for when you moved down there. You want to sleep with your windows open and have the robins sing you awake in the morning? Maybe downtown living isn’t for you.

Adams Outdoor Advertising would like to put up billboards that change their message every six seconds. Right now, the zoning ordinance only allows billboard messages to change no more than once every hour. The Zoning Commission wanted to defer the request until March 1, 2007 — after the form-based codes are completed — because of staffing issues. The council thought that was too long to make a business wait for a hearing on this issue, so a recommendation will probably come back in December instead.

My take: I’m not sure what kind of sign Adams Outdoor Advertising has in mind, but from the discussion on the council tonight I get the impression that it’s an electronic billboard similar to Proctor Hospital’s relatively new sign at their Knoxville entrance, or the Civic Center’s sign at the corner of Jefferson and Kumpf, or this generic one above that I found on the internet. Can you imagine billboards like that all around the city?

Councilman Spears half-joked that putting up such billboards around the city would eliminate the need for streetlights given the amount of light that would be emitted. Councilman Grayeb suggested writing into any new zoning ordinance a limit to how bright such signs can be. Not a bad idea. Although, I’d be just as happy if they outlawed all of them. Electronic billboards are a terrible source of light pollution and energy waste, and do we really want drivers — already distracted by their cell phones and other gadgets — having one more thing to arrest their interest while they’re supposed to be driving? I mean, we don’t allow television screens in the front seats of vehicles for this very reason; how are electronic billboards different, or any less of a distraction?

The Journal Star’s headline this morning is a bit misleading. It reads, “Zoo money switched to demolition.” It was actually street improvement money that was switched to demolition:

The City Council took $100,000 once slated to help create a grander entrance to the new zoo and instead voted to use it to demolish vacant problem properties.

The council voted unanimously Tuesday to move the money since 3rd District Councilman Bob Manning said there are no longer plans for a grand entrance in lower Glen Oak Park. Manning, who represents the park and the Glen Oak Zoo area, said the money is needed for demolitions.

There were preliminary plans to update the Glen Oak Park entrance at the corner of Abingdon Abington and Perry streets to make it a “grand entrance” to the zoo. Manning set aside $100,000 to help in that effort by updating the city’s portion of the intersection, perhaps putting in a roundabout.

But when the zoo scrapped plans to put a “grand entrance” there, it freed up that $100,000 to be spent on a higher priority elsewhere. Manning recommended, and the council approved, spending that money on demolition of condemned properties instead.

So, I understand the headline, but it certainly gives the wrong impression. It makes it sound like the city is taking money away from the zoo, which is not the case. It was never “zoo money.”

Remember those underground storage vaults and pedestrian walkways that “encroach on the public way” downtown that was the subject of some controversy a couple months ago?

Well, there was some follow-up on that at last night’s council meeting. At the council’s request, staff reviewed the ordinance that charges fees for encroachments and gave the council some choices on what to do. They could (a) keep the current ordinance and fee structure, (b) keep the ordinance and modify the fee structure (to reflect inflation over the past 30 years), or (c) keep the ordinance but eliminate the permit fees.

The city, desperate for money, chose option (b) with little discussion or disagreement (although Mayor Ardis and Councilman Nichting voted against it). These updated permit fees are estimated to bring in over $100,000 per year into city coffers.

What happens now is city staff has to do an inventory of all the underground vaults in downtown and notify those businesses that they are going to start collecting permit fees on them again. Since these fees haven’t been collected since the early 1980s, the city’s records are woefully out of date and incomplete.

My take: This was the right decision. The city has been contemplating new public safety fees and raising property taxes because they are so short on funds, so collecting fees that are already on the books is a no-brainer. City staff should never have stopped collecting these fees in the first place, since they never received council authorization to do so. The council ought to enforce the ordinances they already have to raise money before they raise taxes or create new fees.

The Peoria City Council will not have a regular business meeting tonight, but rather a special meeting starting at 5:00 to continue discussing departmental budgets. However, there are a couple of unfinished business items on the agenda (health care coverage and janitorial services).

The departments who will be discussing their budgets tonight are Legal, Inspections, City Manager’s Office, Clerk’s Office, and Treasurer’s Office. Not exactly a hot time in the old town tonight.