It's too easy to pinpoint the issues regarding infrastructure in the City of Nokomis:
We need reasonable solutions to the City's ongoing issues.
Water & Wastewater Infrastructure
For a year, the City entered into a public/private partnership with Woodard & Curran to manage water and wastewater operations. With this partnership, city employees had the option to become private sector employees.
In that year alone, their operations would end up under budget, saving city taxpayers roughly $90,000 in tax dollars. Water quality would improve during that time. Any breaks in the water mains were repaired in an expedient manner with as little downtime as possible.
Employees would receive consistent training. Work was done to code and in an ethical means.
Due to an unfounded complaint before the state Labor Board, this partnership was forced to cease. We would gradually see that water quality go downhill, to the point of raising red flags with the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency.
As mayor, I would work with the City Council to revisit this partnership in hopes that it can be rekindled so that the water quality would improve once again.
On the same topic, the time for talk has to end. It's overdue time to start the updating process of our water mains. This should be a task that should be completed by no later than 2026, with work starting as early as 2021.
I oppose any water rate hikes, tax levy increases or a bond issue to get this completed. We've relied on local taxpayers for far too long.
It's time to stop being complacent and lazy. We should take advantage of any and all grants that are available. I think it would be appropriate not to rule out philanthropists who do contribute money to rebuild crumbling infrastructure.
Streets Infrastructure
Several of our city streets and alleys have seen better days. However, with no proper maintenance, they appear to be crumbling due to negligence. There are clay culverts that have rotted out with no action being taken by the city to resolve them.
There's no proper inventory taken on which streets and alleys are worked on each year. This goes along with another issue I will be touching up on. For us to truly become transparent about our operations, we need proper accounting about departmental operations. If it means keeping a digital map tracking when streets received their maintenance, so be it.
Also, I would not be opposed to inquiring on an additional public/private partnership with Woodard & Curran, which also maintains operations for street maintenance.
But before any streets are repaired in any fashion, it's time for a streets study (from an agency that specializes in those details) that is long overdue.
- Our roads are in terrible shape.
- Our current water system actively has issues with water mains bursting.
- We have water quality issues.
- There's very little to no accountability between the Water/Wastewater and Streets departments. There's also no proper accounts regarding their activities. Both also operate on deficits, spending more than their budgets allow.
We need reasonable solutions to the City's ongoing issues.
Water & Wastewater Infrastructure
For a year, the City entered into a public/private partnership with Woodard & Curran to manage water and wastewater operations. With this partnership, city employees had the option to become private sector employees.
In that year alone, their operations would end up under budget, saving city taxpayers roughly $90,000 in tax dollars. Water quality would improve during that time. Any breaks in the water mains were repaired in an expedient manner with as little downtime as possible.
Employees would receive consistent training. Work was done to code and in an ethical means.
Due to an unfounded complaint before the state Labor Board, this partnership was forced to cease. We would gradually see that water quality go downhill, to the point of raising red flags with the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency.
As mayor, I would work with the City Council to revisit this partnership in hopes that it can be rekindled so that the water quality would improve once again.
On the same topic, the time for talk has to end. It's overdue time to start the updating process of our water mains. This should be a task that should be completed by no later than 2026, with work starting as early as 2021.
I oppose any water rate hikes, tax levy increases or a bond issue to get this completed. We've relied on local taxpayers for far too long.
It's time to stop being complacent and lazy. We should take advantage of any and all grants that are available. I think it would be appropriate not to rule out philanthropists who do contribute money to rebuild crumbling infrastructure.
Streets Infrastructure
Several of our city streets and alleys have seen better days. However, with no proper maintenance, they appear to be crumbling due to negligence. There are clay culverts that have rotted out with no action being taken by the city to resolve them.
There's no proper inventory taken on which streets and alleys are worked on each year. This goes along with another issue I will be touching up on. For us to truly become transparent about our operations, we need proper accounting about departmental operations. If it means keeping a digital map tracking when streets received their maintenance, so be it.
Also, I would not be opposed to inquiring on an additional public/private partnership with Woodard & Curran, which also maintains operations for street maintenance.
But before any streets are repaired in any fashion, it's time for a streets study (from an agency that specializes in those details) that is long overdue.