Here are some agenda items of interest:

• The City is going to try to get a state grant to help pay the lion’s share of road improvement work for Phase I of the Sheridan Triangle project. “The funding request for this $975,000 project would be $748,800 ITEP [Illinois Transportation Enhancement Program] funding, with the city’s local match being $226,200.”
• Also being funded through ITEP: removal and replanting of trees in the downtown business district. I don’t quite understand this one. The background states, “In honor of Earth Day 2007, Governor Blagojevich announced the new Replanting the Prairie State Initiative to further reduce greenhouse gas emissions in the state.” But I fail to see how replacing presumably mature trees with new twig trees is going to accomplish that goal — in fact, it seems like it would do just the opposite. Why would you replace trees? Why not plant additional trees where they don’t already exist? Unless, of course, we’re talking about palm trees that need to be replanted every year.
• Bill Joseph is going to build an 8,066-square-foot “retail and restaurant building” in Bed Bath & Beyond’s parking lot (south side of W. Glen Ave., just east of N. University St.). That’s good, because we all know what a dearth of available retail and restaurant sites there are in Peoria.
• JJ Ryans is moving out of the Metro Centre and into the old Silver Bullet (7719 N. University), so a liquor license has been requested. This isn’t particularly notable except for this statement in the council communication: “One of the three Commissioners who voted to approve [Arndt, Jackson, McCabe] should have abstained due to interest in nearby property.” That’s rather provocative. Was any action taken to educate or reprimand this unnamed Commissioner? Or is conflict-of-interest voting not a big deal?
• Of course, the more volatile liquor license request is the one for Elliott’s (7807 N. University). The Liquor Commission voted 4-0 with one abstention (Jackson) to deny the request. You may recall that Elliott’s is a strip joint. The city has been trying to throw one roadblock after another in front of this place since it was first proposed in 2003. First it said it couldn’t issue an adult use license because it was five feet too close to a residential area. So the owners split the building in two and got their adult-use license. Then the city passed an ordinance prohibiting strip clubs from getting a liquor license (except for Big Al’s, which was grandfathered in). That didn’t stop Elliott’s from opening, though. Evidently nudity is enough to make a profit even without liquor. Then this past November, down around the St. Louis area, an ordinance just like Peoria’s was struck down by a federal court, prompting the council to repeal its ordinance. So now Elliott’s is back asking for a liquor license again. If the council denies it, they’ll have a lawsuit on their hands — one they’ll likely lose, in which case Elliott’s will get a bunch of taxpayer money in damages. The council should save the taxpayers’ money and give up on this one, then focus instead on a way of stopping — or at least containing within a certain geographic area — future nudie bars so this doesn’t happen again.
• T. Y. Lin has been chosen as the engineering firm to look at the economic and physical feasibility of building a trail next to the Kellar Branch rail line. Now the council needs to give the green light to let a contract be negotiated, the cost of which will presumably be shared by the City of Peoria, Village of Peoria Heights, and possibly the Peoria Park District. Pioneer Industrial Railway has said they will not help pay for the study, opting to use their funds instead to pay for an inevitable legal battle with Peoria Heights, which is trying to kick Pioneer off the line.
• Getting back to North University, the council will be making a decision on whether to allow a teen dance hall to open up in the same area. The proposed dance club at 7620 N. University, to be called Adrenaline, has to be more than 500 feet from a residential area according to Peoria’s current ordinance. The request is to change that ordinance — to lower the buffer to 200 feet. This request was first brought up two weeks ago and looked like it would surely go down to defeat. Councilman Montelongo asked for a deferral, and it comes back Tuesday with just one change — it would allow the Council “to impose additional conditions,” including “limiting the hours of operation” among other measures. The city staff and police chief are still against it, so I predict it will be defeated after all.