I am here so you don’t have to be.
It’s a special board meeting- meaning they combined two December meetings into one so I don’t have to spend Christmas Eve here.
They are doing the consent agenda.
One item on the consent agenda is the approval of a contract modification to an existing employee contract.
No discussion on that however, I happen to know what it was.
CONTRACTS
Basically, the administrator is getting a raise.
The Administrator’s annual salary will be increased to $85,000 starting on January 1, 2025.
The Administrator’s annual salary will be increased to $90,000 starting on May 1, 2025.
The Administrator’s annual salary will be increased to $95,000 on May 1, 2026.
The Administrator’s annual salary will be increased to $100,000 on May 1, 2027.
The Village agrees to pay the Administrator a one-time bonus of $10,000 during the first pay period of January 2025. This one-time bonus will come due if the Administrator is employed by the Village on January 1, 2025.
The Village agrees to pay the Administrator a retention bonus of $15,000 on May 1, 2027 if he is still employed by the Village on May 1, 2027.
Termination without c a u s e
Section 8(A) of the Agreement is hereby amended to state that in the event of termination of employment without cause, the Administrator shall receive a lump sum payment equivalent ot six (6) months of the Administrator’s current salary compensation at the time of termination plus six (6) months of healthcare coverage in accordance with the healthcare coverage the Administrator is receiving at the time of his termination without cause.
Termination with c a u s e
The Village may terminate the Administrator’s employment with cause and no severance shall be owed. Termination “with cause” shall mean only instances of serious, intentional misconduct by the Employee that directly and substantially harms the Employer’s business ni a material, measurable way, and cannot reasonably be remedied through corrective action. Such misconduct must involve a deliberate violation of clear, lawful directives or policies that were previously communicated to the Employee in writing, or a criminal act, defined as a felony, that results ni significant, demonstrable harm to the Employer’s operations or reputation.
Before any termination “with cause,” the Employer must provide written notice detailing the alleged misconduct and allow the Employee at least 30 days to remedy the issue. Termination “with cause” will not proceed if the Employee effectively addresses the matter within the given period.
Actions taken by the Employee ni good faith, errors in judgment without intentional misconduct, or performance issues that do not meet the criteria above shall not constitute grounds for termination with cause.
Independent Investigation for Disputed Violations
In the event of a disagreement between the Employer and the Employee regarding whether conduct constitutes “cause” as defined above, the matter shall be referred to an independent investigation conducted by a mutualy agreed-upon third-party firm, separate from both the Employer and the Employee. The Employer shall bear the full cost of this investigation. Findings from the independent investigation shall be final and binding regarding whether the alleged conduct constitutes grounds for termination with cause
The Administrator is still considered an at-will employee.
Indemnity Clause
The Village agrees to indemnify and hold the Administrator harmless for any and all claims, lawsuits, or other legal actions arising out of official actions taken within the boundaries of the Administrator’s duties, even after the termination of the employment relationship, ot the fullest extent permitted by law.
Tyler Marsh is here to discuss salary increases.
“It is not uncommon for various employee salaries to be examined and adjusted during various times of the year,” said Mayor Tami Fruhling-Voges. “We have the budget in place with that. It was discussed amongst trustees that it was an important thing to do. It would have been costly to the village if we didn’t do that. It should have been done earlier.”
“The duties haven’t changed,” Fruhling-Voges said. “But we were underpaying this particular employee.”
“We pay our employees what we need to pay our employees to keep good employees,” Fruhling-Voges said.
TIF
Ok. I am going to hit the highlights of the TIF and write a longer story later tonight. Basically, the village has been negotiating with the schools for more than a year to get this TIF going. The village technically, doesn’t even have to negotiate with the other taxing bodies. They can legally just say “hey this is what we are doing.” but they opted not to do that. #tryingtobefriends
SO…… TIF is a tool to incentivize development. Residential and commercial. They want a TIF because our population has decreased and the schools are losing students and they need development and developers need incentives.
Tammy Vallee said that there was ill will or miss information out there from the last TIF.
I would argue that the public actually understood what was going on fairly well with the last TIF and was upset that the village was going to give hundreds of thousands of dollars to a developer from Tolono, who was effectively running the show to the detriment of current business owners, but I digress.
The difference now is that this is a taxing body led initiative. The schools, FPD and library have all had a say on this.
Ok, so anyway.
If the TIF is established- the EAV is set at that time in the district. Any new tax dollars go into the TIF fund. TIF $ can be used for improvements within the district. There will be no new taxes on your tax bill.
So if let’s say, a Dunkin’ Donuts comes here and says they want to build a two million dollar building but asks the village for some money to help them out. The village can say, we can reimburse you for this part of the project once your project is completed. That reimbursement would come from the property tax money that the new businesses has raised and is in the TIF. It’s not coming from current businesses.
Tami saying they are one of the few villages that doesn’t have a TIF district. They are discussing Homer’s which, I can say from covering it for years, is kinda a mess sometimes. But they do this weird thing where other taxing bodies can come to them and ask for money. The way St. Joseph wants to do it, with set money going to the other taxing bodies, would probably be better because it’s set in stone and there won’t be any misunderstandings about who gets what.
They are discussing how this TIF will be smaller than a normal TIF because they are giving so much money back to the other taxing districts. It’s very friendly to other taxing districts. Like beyond anything I have ever seen in any other TIF districts.
I will go in-depth on this tonight. It’s a lot of information.
ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT UPDATE
Everyone’s favorite economic developer Jim Ardnt, is here to give an update. You may remember him from the village’s strategic planning. Basically, he’s still working to get some economic development. He thinks the TIF will be helpful.
He said a business was here and picked out a site but it fell through. #aintthathowitalwaysgoes
Hotel, retail store (I’ve heard it’s ACE Hardware) and a restaurant. He’s also talking about a restaurant that is “more” local that wants to be here as well. #DONOTHIJACKMYFACEBOOKPOSTWITHSTUFFABOUTTHEHYPOTHETICALHOTEL.
The hotel is the ten million dollar project he’s talking about. It’s actually 11 million but I guess at that point a million doesn’t really matter.
I think we can all agree that the village needs a larger tax base, preferably from businesses that aren’t services and will pay sales tax. A fast food restaurant by a hotel by I-74 would be a good way to expand the tax base and give the village more money to do things.
“It’s a marathon,” Ardnt said.
Ardnt is always very vague. I’ve dealt with economic developers in Tuscola when I worked there, they had a whole organization that did economic development and they were very transparent about it. https://www.douglasedc.org/about/leadership
They are talking about the land between Jack Flash and Caseys which apparently can only be developed with a healthcare based business but Ardnt doesn’t want them saying that’s what it is or what the limitations are. #itsnotasecret.
They updated the employee manual. It had to do with vacation time.
BACKHOE
They need a new backhoe. They are discussing the quotes now.
GO up and look at that Douglas County economic development website. They have the available properties listed. It’s so cool.
They are still discussing the backhoe.
The lease is for $24,000 a year for five years. (I think.)
They are discussing a lease or maybe spending $5,000 in repairs. Mike is telling them that when machines are around 5 years old they usually start going bad.
Joe’s trying to get Mike to elaborate on trade in value and how if they decided to trade it in in six months they are going to get less for the trade in value. #idkmuchbutiknowthat
I guess they are buying the old one and going to gamble on whether it will break down.
For a $1.
They use backhoes for snow, brush, ect. They will use it to remove all the garbage boats from the boat graveyard.
FIELD TREATMENT
Please baby Jesus, don’t spent any time discussing this at all.
Now they want him to get bids for mowing.
An aside, the future Mayor Jim Page is here. Page won the republican caucus and the democrats aren’t running anyone.
No old business. #sadness.
An aside, there are photos of the proposed community center in village hall. It’s fancy.
Tami is thanking volunteers for the Christmas events.
I want to shout out Ashley York and Vickie Reese in particular. I worked with them on these events and they just knock it out of the park all the time.
Meeting adjourned.
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