With all aldermen present at Tuesday’s (Jan 21st) Danville City Council meeting (before the early departure of Alderman Bob Iverson), the Council confirmed December’s votes on the new budget and gasoline tax plan by more significant margins that the first time around.
The January 7th meeting of the Danville City Council was when Corporation Counsel Leon Parker stated that his research showed the Danville Council must pass ordinances by a majority of elected officials, and not by a majority of those present when a quorum has been established. Therefore, the “yes” votes on the budget and gas tax in December were considered void and needed to be brought before Council again.
But this time, the gas tax plan passed 9-5 (Aldermen Bob Iverson, Jon Cooper, Ed Butler, Tricia Teague, and Heidi Wilson voting “no”), and the budget passed 13-1 (Alderman Jon Cooper voting “no”). The key moment seemed to be a proposed amendment from Alderman Mike O’Kane prior to the gasoline tax vote. That whole issue came to the forefront when it was discovered that fund recovery firm Azavar, working for the city under contract, had discovered that the city was not getting as much gasoline tax from local sales as it potentially could. There was also the problem of how much the city owed Azavar for their work.
AUDIO: So we don’t have any more problems in the future, I want to make sure that we don’t ignore a bill, or this ordinance, for 15 or 20 years, and then get caught up with a problem. So if we watch it every year, we shouldn’t have a problem in the future.
Alderman and Rick Strebing was pleased to hit the finish line.
AUDIO: Well, I think we can all breathe a sigh of relief. Because going back through after everybody had put so much time and effort into the budget for the year; and it was a problem that hit us with the gas tax. And if it hadn’t passed, we’d have been reopening the budget again to look at it.
Mayor Rickey Williams, Jr stated that once the gasoline tax situation was figured out, the significant majorities were ready to reapprove the gas tax update and the budget. The mayor says that now, for sure, the gasoline tax will not go as high as it potentially could have, based upon the city’s information from Azavar,
AUDIO: Most people don’t realize this, but the tax should have gone up to just shy of 20 cents. So by putting it at 14.6 cents, the Council actually lowered it. I appreciate that.
In other action, the full council approved the items put forth last week by the Public Services Committee, including plans for the city to use Community Development Block Grant funding to provide the Dwelling Place with a third home to temporarily house homeless families getting back on their feet. This brought about the question of what about the pending reopening of the Danville Rescue Mission on South Bowman, with the homeless currently having to battle extreme cold. Mayor Williams says the problem right now is the new operators of Danville Rescue not yet having proper insurance coverage. Williams says the city is trying to help.
AUDIO: They need to be able to provide liability insurance, so that they can actually house programs in the structure. I have instructed our HR/Risk Manager to reach out to our insurance partner. She has done so.
The next Danville City Council meeting is Tuesday, February 4th.
