Looking forward to next year's municipal elections, Mayor Marlin will not be running for a 3rd term according to Illinois Public Media. This post, however, is more of a round up about current business before the board and recent news coverage. It's been a while since our last City of Urbana Updates earlier this year.
- March 18th City Council Meeting: Coverage of the compromise ceasefire resolution, public comment, and text.
- March 25th City Council Meeting: Included debates about plastic bags and potential taxes on their use at stores.
- Tuesday April 9th Cunningham Township Annual Meeting: which included its own referendum, including one on the Gaza conflict.
- May 27th City Council Meeting: Coverage of the City's financial plan and discussion of the role of social services in it. More on this meeting's dispute on appointments was covered in the News-Gazette and highlighted later in this post below.
- June 3rd and June 4th Committee of the Whole Meeting. The most recent City Council meeting was a Committee of the Whole meeting that was overwhelmed by public opinion on police hiring and alternative responder model issues. The meeting was continued the next day after it had initially gone on for a few hours. The first day of the meeting made it through item F. 6. (the police staffing presentation) before it was recessed. More coverage on those issues later in this post below.
Redistricting:
As with other local government bodies, the latest Census information has led to a new proposed ward map for the Urbana City Council as well. From Illinois Public Media:
Starting with the spring 2025 municipal elections, the new map will set boundaries for the next decade for the seven wards represented by the seven aldermen and alderwomen on the Urbana City Council...
The Census lowered Urbana’s population count from 41,250 in 2010 to 38,336 in the new Census, a population drop of about seven percent. Marlin says the decrease in population translates into a roughly $750,000 decrease in state and federal tax revenues coming to the city every year.
Marlin says the lower census count is not due to an actual decrease in Urbana’s population, but to a pandemic undercount of University of Illinois students. She argues that this is evident in the census data, which shows the greatest population losses in and around the University of Illinois campus. Students dominate the population in that area, and many of them went off campus during the time the census was taken, because it was also the peak period of the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown.
That full article here. The City's web page for the ward map details is here.
Police Budgets:
One of the more hotly contested aspects of the budget has to do with the City's long term plans with policing, crisis intervention, and alternative approaches to police calls for certain situations. Previous consulting recommendations focused primarily on more traditional staffing needs for the Urbana Police Department. From Illinois Public Media:
The national consultant hired by the city of Urbana has released its first report evaluating the police department. In this report, BerryDunn, a national consulting firm, recommends hiring more police officers, which would cost the city millions and involve raising taxes.
According to the report, more than 64% of calls for service don’t involve criminal activity. Those calls, activists argue, don’t need a police response. Instead, many residents want Urbana officials to establish alternative responses for these calls, involving domestic violence experts, social workers and mental health professionals.
That full article is available here. The News-Gazette had additional coverage earlier this month here and a more recent update from last week. Excerpt from that update:
The latest report from a multi-phase review of the city’s public-safety services said the city stands to benefit from developing alternative methods for how its police and fire agencies respond to calls for service.
The “Essential Calls for Service Report” from BerryDunn, a national consulting firm the city hired in 2023, determined that expanding supplements to the Urbana Police Department’s response model — like telephone units, online reporting services and co-response teams — could help free up officers to answer more urgent calls and provide appropriate resources for those in crisis.
The assessment ties into the first phase of BerryDunn’s review, which recommended that Urbana police hire seven sworn officers and six non-sworn community-service responders, a potential 22 percent increase in the agency’s staff levels.
That full article here.
[Update 6/10/2024: The News-Gazette had even more coverage on this issue in today's paper here. It covers last week's City Council meeting and some of the disagreement on the police portion of the budget. Excerpt:
Police department officials presented proposed staffing increases as part of last week’s budget discussions, which started Monday night and continued into the wee hours of Tuesday after the council voted to take a recess due to the late hour.
Boone said he is requesting the following new positions, which are currently included in the city’s proposed budget for Fiscal Year 2025:
- One deputy chief to oversee operations
- One training sergeant
- Three patrol officers
- Two non-sworn community service responders
- One social worker “in support of alternative response models”
- Three community engagement officers]
More Budget Items:
The City of Urbana, unlike the City of Champaign, appears set to absorb the loss of the State grocery sales tax revenue, according to the News-Gazette. The City Council will also be looking at its financial plan, with approval of that plan coming up at their June 24th meeting. Excerpts from the Daily Illini:
According to the proposed budget, investments will be made in public safety and public works, such as 911 services like fire, EMS and police, as well as city infrastructure. Other investments will be used to support the mayor and city council’s strategic goals.
In addition, the budget proposed a local motor fuel tax rate increase, with all tax revenue to be dedicated to transportation infrastructure improvements.
The budget also proposed investments into research of the connection between the maintenance of housing and community well-being and occasionally crime. Council members also seek to increase funding for nuisance abatement, or the elimination of harmful property conditions.
That full article with a lot more additional information and links here.
Appointment / Reappointment Disputes:
Disputes about appointments continued to plague the Council. People familiar with the Urbana City Council will be very aware of a years long crusade to remove City Manager Carol Mitten from city government by more openly left-wing board members and public commenters. From the News-Gazette Meeting Minutes feature:
Things took a turn for the awkward at this week’s city council meeting after Alderwoman Grace Wilken, as she did in 2022, motioned that Mayor Diane Marlin‘s recommended one-year reappointments be voted on individually and not lumped together.
Chris Evans took it from there, reading from lengthy prepared comments all the reasons he wasn’t supporting the appointments of City Manager Carol Mitten, who was sitting just down the table at the time.
That full article here.
More City of Urbana News:
- Kathy's Mailbag answered a question about ambulance contracts with the City.
- The News-Gazette had some updates on the fire station projects back in April.
- Urbana joined other local government bodies in supporting a program to expand flight service out of Willard, according to the Daily Illini back in March.
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