One it's being 5:30.
I would like to call this regular council
meeting for August 24 to order.
Please, please all rise for the Pledge of Allegiance.
I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America
and to the Republic for which it stands.
One nation under God, indivisible,
with liberty and justice for all.
Please, all remain standing, if you would for a moment, please.
I want to take just a couple of moments here
and we had a rough day here in the city of Pekin,
but our police chief, Mr. Seth ranney,
did an outstanding job protecting our children,
protecting the community when it comes to safety, when it comes
to the police officers, the men and women
that are under Chief ranney.
They are second to none.
I am so proud to call him our chief.
So if we would just have a moment of silent prayer
for our police officers, for our children, for our community,
and I want to personally say thank you for keeping us safe.
Thank you.
Please have another prayer when you go to bed at night and pray
for our police officers.
I would like to call Mr. Kevin Bresnahan to the podium.
The city last council meeting, we
had a proclamation for antique tractor preservation day,
along with the city coin that I had
presented to him on Saturday.
Our representative, Travis Weaver, our County clerk.
I guess he's a self-made historian Mr. John
Ackerman and myself, we all spoke on behalf of this
being the start of.
Hopefully something will come of it every year as a show.
But he went to the Capitol and got this day
passed as preservation day.
So I would like to give Mr. Bresnahan
just a few minutes to speak about how it came about.
And you have passion and drive for it.
So the floor is yours.
Thank you Mary.
Appreciate that.
How much time do I have.
Half hour.
Pardon me.
How much time do I have.
Half hour.
45 minutes.
Thank you.
Keep it to that.
I'll try and keep it to a minimum,
but thank you and thank you, city council
staff and the public too.
Thank you.
I'd like to take time right now and publicly thank
Mary and Travis Weaver, the state representative
who sponsored this House Bill.
It's HR 0423 and John Ackerman, the Tazewell County
clerk and recorder of deeds.
All three of these individuals gave outstanding presentations
at the first annual antique tractor preservation
day that we held out there at the Pekin park in the livestock
review building.
So it was well attended.
We had 31 big machines.
I'm going to call that, with the oldest machine being a 1911.
Yes, that's what I said.
1911 rumbly oil pole tractor.
And the gentleman that brought that in is a 21-year-old man.
His name is Elaine Sauter out of Tremont,
and he actually gave a little demonstration with that.
But that being said, I think the youngest person besides that,
we had some younger kids in there,
I think 9 and 10 with their garden tractors.
And that was the other thing too.
We had 19 of those machines out there.
So it's a start.
And I had a couple of machines out there as well.
But something fun, something important,
but little history on this House Bill, this HR 0423,
how this all got started was I subscribed
to a magazine called Red Power.
That's international tractors, just like I'm
sporting the shirt and the hat.
But there was a gentleman in there
out in Kansas that started this movement as
far as antique tractor preservation day.
And the state of Kansas passed this through,
making August 22 the day.
So I called the state rep, Travis Weaver,
and I said, hey, Travis, is there anything on the books,
the state of Illinois for us.
And let me get back with you on that.
About five days later, he calls me back and he says,
there's nothing on the books.
What do you want to do.
And I said, I'd like to get something going on this, please.
He said, I'll sponsor the bill.
You can co-sponsor it with me.
But he said, hang on, this is going to take some time.
Well, ladies and gentlemen, the way government
works from the time I called him until we actually got the House
Bill passed was 14 months.
So it does take some time, but it was well worth it.
Going down there to the.
When he called and asked me, that
was in October of last year, he said that, hey bresnihan
the House members want to hear or your presentation
and testimony on these antique tractors.
And I thought, you've got to be kidding me.
How much time do I have.
Three minutes.
And when I told my wife that, she just laughed.
She says, you can't talk about antique tractors
under three minutes.
There's no way.
So anyhow, long story short, we get down
there and just his admin, our personal assistant,
that experience.
I don't know if you've ever been down there or not before,
but it was top notch.
They made sure Mr. President, go here if you need a drink.
It's over there.
But I was the second one in the hopper there that day.
And it was a subcommittee of ag.
And you're standing there before lawmakers, ladies and gentlemen.
So there's six Democrats, six Republicans.
And I asked them before we even got the show started
to make this bipartisan.
Well, six months later, there was about 15 seconds of silence.
And I'm thinking to myself, Bresnahan,
you either screwed that up or you wowed him.
Well, it was the latter.
And the Hat Lady there that as far as that, oversees it.
She said, well, any questions for Mr. president han?
Well, three hands go up.
And remarkably, I thought that it was going to be more directed
towards the history of these tractors,
but they were mechanical questions.
They were asking.
Well, Kevin, my tractor is doing this.
What do I do.
And I feel those questions after about 10 minutes and we left.
But anyhow, on our way back I got a text from Travis
and he said Bresnahan, one of the ladies
texted him and said that I crushed it.
So I mean, I was just excited with that.
So that being said, we got the House Bill passed
and then the let's see here.
But I'd like to ask you folks a show of hands who likes to eat.
Get your hands up there.
Get em up.
Come on, John.
I know you do.
Yes you do.
Nick, I saw your hand go up.
Good, good.
So what.
Think Where are we going with this breznahan?
Well, you stop and think about how we used
to harvest our food years ago.
There wasn't a combine around back in 1837.
That's when John Deere invented the moldboard plow.
We wouldn't see a tractor from him as far as turn
of the century around 1900s is really
the pivotal point for all this.
John Deere had actually merged with a company
called Waterloo boy.
That was about 1918, 1920.
But John Deere, as far as mass production,
didn't have a tractor until I think, 1934 with the John
Deere model A, but j.I. case had a steam
traction engine about 1905.
So that the turn of the century was
very pivotal and monumental as far as getting things done,
work done.
How we shelled corn back then.
You wore a glove with, like, a hook on it.
And that's how you shelled your corn, shucked it.
Imagine doing that today.
So basically, in 100 years, you look at where we're at
and where we're at now.
Self-driving combines air conditioning,
cabs, Hi Fi stereos in them.
They've got coolers in them.
Air controlled ride.
I mean, just fantastic.
Excuse me.
Mary had the privilege on Saturday
of seeing there was a 1957 Massey Ferguson combine there.
Ladies and gentlemen, that was an open station tractor.
There was nothing covering you.
I mean, there was no air conditioning, no cab.
It's just you and God Almighty, the elements.
That's it.
And even the rumbling, the 1911 at least
had a cab on the thing or at least a cover.
So that's where we were at.
And that's how far we've come and evolved over the last 100
years or so, give or take.
But this transition from horses to horsepower.
John Deere invented the moldboard plow in 1837.
Like I said that we didn't see a tractor in 1920.
But another gentleman we need to thank,
Cyrus Hall McCormick as far as the threshing machine.
And then again, j.I. case with the traction engine.
What I'd like to read as far as the proclamation.
I thought Mary had a couple good areas in here.
It says whereas dedicated collectors restores,
historical preservationists invest significant time,
craftsmanship and resources into maintaining and restoring
these iconic machines, ensuring that our agricultural store
remains vibrant and accessible.
And then in the house.
Bill from Mr. Travis Weaver.
Antique tractors represent a vital chapter in our nation's
agricultural development and serve
as symbols of innovation, resilience,
and community heritage.
As far as the future is concerned, as far as the show
and going forward, Mary and I spoke briefly
about possibly incorporating this with the Marigold festival,
which I think we might be able to do,
but we need to sit down and work out the details of that
and maybe have a threshing demonstration with that Rumley
and maybe some other demonstrations
as far as how we used to make our grain corn, whatever,
but anything related to AG.
But I do thank you again for this opportunity
and to come down and speak to you folks this evening.
Thank you very much for that medallion
and for the proclamation.
Thank you again.
I appreciate it very much.
You're welcome.
Thank you.
Madam Clerk, call the roll, please.
Good evening.
Council good evening.
Evening council member.
Council Abel I. Council Member.
Fletcher here.
Council Member.
Hilst here.
Council Member.
Hochheimer here.
Council Member.
Nutter here.
Mayor Pro Tem Phillips here and Mayor Burress here.
Having a quorum, we will conduct business.
Chair will now entertain a motion for the approval
of the agenda, please.
Madam Mayor, I move the agenda.
Be approved as presented.
Second Motion made by Mr. Nutter and second, by Mr. hilst.
Any questions, comments, or concerns
of the approval of the agenda.
Seeing none.
Council, take your vote, please.
Motion passes 7 0.
Chair will now entertain a motion
for the approval of the minutes from August 10, 2026.
Madam Mayor, I move that 4.1 city
council regular meeting minutes of August 10, 2026 be approved.
Second Motion made by Mr. Nutter.
Now excuse me.
And second by Mr. Abel.
Any questions, comments, or concerns on the minutes.
Seeing none.
Council, take your vote, please.
Motion passes 6 minus 0, with one abstained.
I believe you were absent, so.
Yes thank you.
We have now come down to public input.
I want to remind everyone that you have five minutes.
Please state your name for the record.
And if there is 20 or more.
Speaking on the same.
We will have to limit it to one hour.
The same subject.
We will have to limit it to one hour.
And once again, I ask that we have respect in the room.
Thank you very much.
Anyone wishing to have their voice be heard.
Make sure the mic is on if I just check that.
Good evening, Mayor Burress and Pekin city council members.
My name is Troy tarter, and tonight I
represent Pekin pride soccer club and our seventh Annual Tony
folk Memorial classic, held on May 22 through the 24,
and a tour sponsorship recipient in only our seventh year.
Our 2026 tournament was another record for our club
and ultimately the city of Pekin.
We hosted 125 teams, which was an increase of 25 teams
from 2025 at 100 this past May, representing 31 different soccer
clubs across Illinois and Iowa.
We estimate that over 4,500 guests spent the weekend
in Pekin eating in our restaurants,
buying gas from our stations, and likely
making stops in our grocery stores and retail stores.
Inevitably, last minute items that are often forgotten
on a weekend trip because of discover Pekin
tourism and the city council members,
we were able to use our sponsorship
grant to pay expenses towards rental of our own Park District
fields equal to 76% of the award marketing of our tournament
equal to 4% Hiring of athletic training staff at 4%
and the purchase of awards for 21 different age divisions
equal to 16% For that, I am so grateful
and wanted to be here tonight to thank each and every one of you
in person.
I wanted to share some numbers with the council
regarding our 26 tournament 125 teams as I mentioned.
Participating a record of 25% growth from the year before.
We hosted at two sites here in Pekin and North Pekin.
207 total soccer matches over the weekend.
31 clubs represented.
Previous record was set in 2025 with 27 clubs.
Over 4,500 families.
Players and guests from out of town
visited Pekin over the weekend.
Many who stayed in Pekin hotels as well as other local hotels
outside of Pekin.
Most importantly, our club and tournament
continue to generate economic impact to the city of Pekin
through hotel stays, restaurant visits and gas
and retail store traffic.
Most importantly, as we continue to grow our tournament each
year, we simply cannot do it without discover Pekin
tourism and Pekin city council.
As we look forward to 2027, we 2027.
We are already planning to host more teams
and in fact are looking at how we can raise funds to purchase
additional soccer goals that will
allow us to add additional fields to host even more teams.
I want to close tonight by sharing an email that I received
from an attending club director and Coach with Orion Football
Club out of Orion, Illinois.
In case some of you don't that's up near the Quad Cities.
Troy, I wanted to thank you first and foremost
for a great Rand tournament.
I must say, many of my families also
commented on the facility layout,
the cleanliness of the entire area along with parking.
Having never played in this tournament prior
and with 10 years of coaching soccer,
this is one of the top tournaments we
have been to in so many ways.
Obviously, not everyone may have the same experience as we did,
but I must say overall the referees
were hands down some of the best we have experienced.
They were all polite and took time
to explain things to the players, which
not only helps development, but encourages
good physical and ethical play.
And this is coming from a team who
received more yellow cards than our opponents
in far too many ways.
I will definitely be recommending your tournament
to our other 12 travel teams under Orion Football
Club in all age groups.
Again, thank you for a great weekend.
Dan Crippen, Director of communication
and safety and also head coach.
Again, on behalf of our families, players, coaches,
and tournament committee, I want to reiterate
my sincere gratitude to Mayor Burris and each of our city
council members and the tourism committee
for your generous support of Pekin pride soccer club.
Thank you.
Thank you so much.
What positive news.
I love hearing it.
Hello, my name is Ryan and.
Thank you.
Try again.
Hello my name is Ryan and I spoke at the last August
10 meeting regarding floc.
At that meeting on the 10, the city council, the mayor
and the police chief all agreed that they wanted to make sure
that the council has the best information available to make
the floc decision.
That's a very reasonable decision because it's
a very complicated subject.
And as we've seen on social media and on the news,
it's a hot topic.
So some of our claims that we came
on the 10th with were dismissed, I
would say a little prematurely.
So myself and some other speakers
are going to discuss some of those claims that were made
that I think were dismissed prematurely
in a way that could be harmful towards that decision making.
At the end of the day, you are elected officials,
the public is an outrage.
And there are organized groups against floc
in every major city.
Peoria has one, Pekin has one, Bloomington has one.
They're popping up everywhere.
And the Court of public opinions is not
the final court and final decision over everything.
But this is a topic that is so universally agreed
upon that both sides of the political aisle
can agree that these cameras do violate rights in some aspect,
one way or another.
As you listen to our statements, I
want you to know that everything does come at a cost,
whether that cost is from a pending lawsuit,
from their misuse, or from the loss of public trust.
I'm not sure that Pekin can afford
that loss of public trust.
On August 10, when we spoke last on flock.
Police Chief Rainey said when he was
asked about casual use of the cameras that, quote, any idea.
Officers are sitting around doing searches because we
want to do something.
We're not supposed to do.
There's no time for that.
They get an alert.
They take action.
That's it.
On average, less than 10% of Pekin PD searches
are license plate searches.
The top user for flock and the Pekin patrol officer is
an officer who in only 92 days of flock use, racked up 12,730
searches of the flock system.
That's over 130 a day.
I would not describe that as particularly appropriate
use of the flock system.
Shockingly, his nearly 13,000 searches contained only 105
license plate searches, so it's not being used as a license
plate search system of his searches,
almost 10,000 of them were the search
term 99 or invest investigative reports into flocks.
Databases have revealed that users frequently
input short numeric codes and filler texts, such as 99 invest
or susp into mandatory search fields,
rather than typing a valid case number or detailed context.
This allows them to bypass the safeguards
built into the system.
The system requires a reason for querying tracking data.
Entering in a shorthand like 99 allows
the user to execute a search without supplying
a valid, named reason.
This tactic is used in flocks stalking cases
throughout the country, and has been
proven to be the search term.
I have found three examples in Illinois of flock
being used to stalk people or commit
crimes by police officers that have
been convicted for doing so.
The claim was made at our last city council meeting
that the cameras are not illegal.
That is a violation of the law if they
are being used in that way.
And this particular patrol officer very likely
has violated that law.
There is evidence that is very significant that he has been
reprimanded for violating this.
This is a very serious problem.
This is the data showing that on this chart,
we have the top 10 users who are searching 12,000 times
and making 105 license plate searches,
searching for 4,400 times and making only
150 license plate searches.
Searching 4,200 times and making only 210 license plate searches.
This is not a license plate search system
and we are not protecting the city of Pekin.
On average, our police officers are searching more than
80,000 cameras in the country.
They're searching cameras in California.
They're searching cameras in Alaska.
They're searching cameras everywhere
throughout the country, every single time they make a search.
And it is very rarely a license plate.
Thank you.
OK hello.
My name is Steve Soderstrom.
I'm from Morton, Illinois.
Good evening.
Thank you.
I want to talk about the flock system here.
I come here with a heavy heart.
I love Pekin, I have a lot of friends here.
We started an endowment that donates money for graduating
students in 2005.
This matter began in a quiet residential neighborhood
in Groveland, Illinois.
It's where families, children, police officers and Sheriff's
deputies live near one another.
We should.
This should have remained an ordinary neighborhood traffic
complaint, but instead appears to have expanded across
jurisdictions back into Pekin using police personnel,
repeated travel, historic license plate data and a before
school traffic stop to pursue my own
16-year-old son, who's a minor.
I want to be clear about one thing.
I am not categorically opposed to flock.
What I'm opposed to is their misuse.
So I stand alone here tonight.
I'm also opposed to renewing the flock system here.
Pekin with your vote without enforceable,
enforceable safeguards and independent oversight,
which I think Mr. hilst would agree with.
So today I had to submit a formal complaint
to your police department, I signed it, it's downstairs.
I brought a couple copies.
One for you, Mayor, one for the chief.
And here's why.
This involves flock data and a Tazewell County case
with my son.
A Pekin police officer was not a neutral police investigator
assigned to this matter.
He was an off duty neighbor, complainant witness,
a listed victim, and an evidence provider in a Tazewell
County case outside of Pekin.
Third party flock audit information
displays a Pekin police search conducted on September 2, 2025.
It covered a full 30 day period with an Illinois filter,
a stated reason reckless driving which my son did not do.
The public inquiry reports a potential
scope of 90,439 cameras around the country
on a 16-year-old minor.
OK, that is worrisome.
Across 6475 networks, they're not even filtering.
OK I'm going to continue to say the entry displays
no numeric peak and case code.
The abbreviated user, which is the initial C and the letters m,
T was automatically matched with a 95% confidence.
I did a four year request to your police department
about 10 months ago.
It was never produced.
And I'm going to get into that in a minute.
The official reporting law enforcement was Tazewell County.
Brody, Oberly.
He states in his report.
And this is just amazing.
I had previously conducted a flock inquiry on a car
and discovered a traffic pattern which shows this miner
typically drives on North Main Street
every morning around 7:50 AM.
Brody Oberly search and I did a FOIA.
He searched a one day search on a Saturday.
This is worrisome because he has no way to know my son's traffic
pattern without being shared.
The search from the Pekin police department.
That was the only other one.
OK, so deputies then positioned themselves along the route
to school.
The shorter Tazewell searches presented disclosed.
The repeated morning pattern.
There is not yet proof that the Pekin search
may have supplied or contributed to the route information
used to locate my son.
They staked him out in front of his school.
The Pekin officer in Groveland, added a fake charge of a 60
to 70 mile an hour speed.
Thank God we had Life360 on my son.
They provided us an affidavit.
We took it to the court.
So the Pekin police officer estimated a speed double.
Double the speed.
He's either that bad at estimating speed
or he has a really interesting relationship with the truth.
What was the.
I'm sorry.
You have 30 seconds.
Yeah OK.
My son had a loud exhaust.
This is why he was chased down.
So, Pekin, I would ask Chief.
Chief Randy, my FOIA 2025 385.
I never got production.
I don't know where that is.
Also, my new one 2026 641 I'm trying
to determine who the officer is and why they ran this.
I brought you two copies.
Would you like one Yeah, actually can give
it to our clerk right here.
Nicole make sure that she has it for the record.
And one for your chief right here.
You can hand them both to her.
She'll make sure he gets it.
Thank you so much.
Thank you.
Before I have someone come up to the podium,
we all received a copy.
I just got it at fourish 4:30, something like that.
I wasn't sure exactly at the time.
I don't know that it's printed out here.
But anyway, a realtor, a local realtor,
Mr. Gary Allen, most of you in the room, if you're from Pekin,
know him.
And he had previously sent us all an email
that he was against flock with studying
and doing his due diligence.
I know some of you hate that people say due diligence,
but he did his own study and he is for your flock cameras
in the city of Pekin.
It's a long letter, so I'm not going to read it,
but I am going to hand it over to our County clerk.
So she has or excuse me, city clerk.
So she has it for our record as well.
You have a copy.
All right.
She has a copy.
So all right.
I wanted you to know that Mr. Gary Allen had written a letter.
Anyone else wishing to have their voice
be heard from the audience.
Hi hello.
Zoe Carter.
First off, I kind of want to say something positive real quick.
This last weekend, on Saturday, Saturday,
August 22, we had the second annual Pekin Pride Festival
right here in Pekin, Illinois.
It was at the mineral Springs Park right on the lagoon,
and this was by far one of the best attended events
that we have had so far.
We had nearly 1,000 attendees at the park coming
out and being proud and out.
We had people coming from Texas, from Oklahoma.
We had over 30 vendors.
We had so much joy and happiness in that park.
And I am just so excited that this is something
we've been able to do, that so many people in the community
have been able to get into, and that hopefully from here
on out, it just gets nothing but bigger and bigger and bigger.
It was just an amazing time and I just
want to come out and say that.
Just some good news.
It was great.
Now into the nitty gritty here.
Last time we were here, we had some conversations.
You ever heard from a couple other people.
So I'm going to be very brief with this
when it comes to the law, when it comes to the claims that the.
Department is communicating or not
communicating with federal agents
last meeting Mr. Nutter said, or asked the chief,
do alerts come from the feds, the state
or other municipalities.
How are alerts put into that system.
For knowledge purposes and public for the public myself,
the chief said.
They do come from several different places.
The alerts do, but not feds.
I have a question on why immigration and Customs
Enforcement from Kyle, Texas Police Department
was asking for information for theft offenses here in Pekin.
That's not their job.
Their job is immigration and Customs Enforcement, not theft.
So why is the Department from Texas
asking for information on individuals
here year on stuff that's not even their job to do.
I'm really confused on why they would
do that, why that's acceptable.
We also have from the Dea, from Washington State,
from Texas, from here in Illinois, we
have agency and different other organizations,
the FBI reaching out and asking for information for people
here in the city, outside of Illinois, from outside of Pekin.
Why is that.
Why is that happening.
The last thing I want to read here
is state Illinois State law ILCs 805, Section 15, subsection h,
unless presented with a federal criminal warrant
or otherwise required by federal law, a law enforcement law
enforcement agency or official may not
participate, support or assist in any capacity
with an immigration agents.
Immigration agents, not immigration agency.
Enforcement operations, including any collateral
assistance, such as coordinating the arrest
in the courthouse or other public facility,
providing the use of any equipment.
Transporting individuals, or establishing a security officer
or traffic perimeter surrounding such operations
or any other on site support.
That's one.
Two give any immigration agent access, including by telephone,
to any individual who is in that agency's custody.
Custody three.
Transfer any person into immigration agents.
Custody for permit.
Immigration agents.
Use of agency facilities or equipment, including any agency.
Electronic databases not available to the public
for investigative interviews or other investigative or
immigration enforcement purposes 5
enter into, enter into, or maintain any agreement regarding
direct access to any electronic database
or other data sharing platform maintained by any law
enforcement agency, otherwise provided such direct access
to US Immigration and Customs enforcement's United States
customs and Border Protection, or any other federal entity
enforcing immigration violations.
Providing information in response
to any seconds agents inquiry or request
for information regarding any individual
or in the agency's custody.
That's a lot of words.
But what I'm saying here is that if the truth was the truth, what
I am seeing here is a direct it's
against the law in the state, and it
is a situation that I'm not going
to be doing anything about it.
But the attorney general could come back on the city.
So we just need to be careful.
Thank you.
Anyone else wishing to have their voice be heard.
Oh, please.
Go ahead.
Do your thing, Chris.
No fighting.
My name is Chris, and I am not an attorney.
And I'm not giving legal advice.
The game for Alpers changed on June 29 of this year,
with the Supreme Court ruling in chatrai versus the United States
ruling, which was a Fourth Amendment phone
location data access case.
Paraphrasing the ruling, individuals
maintain a reasonable expectation of privacy
in their digital location history,
even when held by a third party tech company.
Rejecting the government's argument that sharing data
with a third party company removes constitutional privacy
protections.
I'd like to read a quote from the ruling.
Whether an expectation of privacy counts as legitimate
is less the result of any fixed set of rules than of.
Guideposts stretching back to the Fourth Amendment's
beginnings.
From the founding onward, we have explained
the Fourth Amendment has sought to secure the privacies of life
against the exercise of arbitrary power.
So too we have recognized and repeatedly that the Amendment
was designed to place obstacles in the way of a two
permeating police surveillance.
Whatever the form of an attempted incursion,
the Fourth Amendment protects Americans long held conviction
that no government official should have
free access to the most closely kept
aspects of their lives unquote.
I did a Google search for how can city council members
lose qualified immunity.
The result was that city council members lose qualified immunity
community or face personal civil liability when their conduct
violates a clearly established statutory
or constitutional right that a reasonable person would
have known.
A quote from the Institute for Justice website
reads, quote, under qualified immunity,
government workers can only be held accountable for violating
someone's rights.
If a court has ruled previously ruled that it was clearly
established those precise actions
were unconstitutional unquote.
A no vote on Alpers this evening ensures the qualified immunity
and Fourth Amendment questions won't need to be
litigated by the city of Pekin.
Thank you.
Greg Hansen.
Sorry, I read I'm OCD.
I don't want to lose track of anything,
but I will start out by saying great news on that soccer
tournament yesterday I donated to the hockey team
because I'm a big hockey guy.
I love seeing that kind of thing here.
So anyway, Mayor and members of the Council,
you've heard several different concerns tonight and last week,
and I'm not going to repeat the arguments the people
before me have already made.
Instead, I want to close by explaining something
about the technology itself.
There is one thing about my background
I haven't mentioned during these discussions
I install flock cameras.
I physically put these systems in the field.
I've done site surveys, I've done repairs and replacements,
and I've installed the Falcons that Pekin uses
and the piccards, which are the next hierarchy.
Both models use extensive AI.
Now that doesn't make me a flock engineer,
and I won't pretend to know exactly which software options
Pekin is enabled, but having installed
them gives me a different perspective on what
we're actually talking about.
And the first thing I want you to understand
is this the camera isn't really the issue.
The camera is the collection point.
It photographs vehicles and sends that information
into a flock system.
The real power is what happens to that information afterward.
That's where AI comes in.
At the last meeting, when council asked Chief
Raney specifically about AI, he was
very careful with his answer.
He said, I don't want to mistake,
excuse me, misspeak on the AI side of things.
I respect somebody saying they don't want to claim
knowledge they may not have.
But I think that statement should matter to the council
because you're being asked to renew an AI
powered surveillance system.
And I'm not convinced you've ever
been given a complete explanation of what that system
is capable of doing.
The chief also told you how Pekin searches it.
He said we put in a vehicle description or a license plate.
That distinction matters.
This isn't simply a camera reading ABC one 2, 3 and telling
police where ABC one 2, three was seen.
Flash uses machine learning to analyze vehicles.
Its system can categorize vehicles by things make, model,
color and body type, and flock advertises the ability
to search characteristics even when
there isn't a readable, readable license plate.
Its current platform goes further.
Flock now advertises AI powered search and alerts
using ordinary language.
An investigator can describe something
like a dark SUV with rear bumper damage,
and the software can search available vehicle
evidence looking for matches.
Again, I want to be precise.
I am not claiming Pekin has every AI feature flock offers,
I don't know.
But after all these meetings, does
the council know which AI capabilities
does Pekin have enabled today.
Which ones are disabled.
Which ones can be enabled administratively?
When flock updates its software or introduces a new capability,
does that come back before this council,
or can the capabilities of the system
change while the contract remains the same.
You've already heard what Pekin zone records
obtained through FOIA reveal about searches
conducted in the system.
I'm not going to repeat that evidence.
You've all heard it, but it illustrates
exactly why the difference between policy and capability
matters.
At the last meeting, you were told there was really no way
to fish through the system.
Tonight, you've seen the city's own records concerning how
it has actually been searched.
So I would ask you to stop looking at this decision
as a question of whether you trust
the people currently using it.
This isn't about whether we trust chief rayney.
We do.
Chief rayney will not always be chief.
You will not always be sitting on this council
and I certainly won't always be the annoying
guy standing at this podium.
But safeguards have to survive, all of us.
Flock isn't 54 cameras.
It's an evolving, searchable, AI powered
network that happens to have 54 collection points in Pekin.
And that's the decision before you tonight.
Maybe there are legitimate law enforcement benefits.
Nobody's standing here.
Has to deny that.
But usefulness does not eliminate
the need for oversight.
And after everything you've heard,
I think one thing should be clear.
There are still questions about this system that
this council cannot answer.
You don't have to decide tonight that flock is bad technology.
You only have to decide whether you
know enough to commit the citizens of Pekin
to it for another year.
If you don't know exactly what it can do, exactly how it's been
used, exactly who can access it, and exactly
what safeguards govern it, then renewing it tonight
isn't caution.
It's signing first and asking questions later.
You've heard the evidence.
You've seen the records.
Now you have the opportunity to require
those answers before giving the system another contract.
I respectfully ask you to vote no.
With my last 30 seconds, I just want to say,
when I put this group together, it was because I had questions
about how flock was being used.
I never expected this many people to jump on board
and come with all this information.
I don't know how you're going to vote.
I know funds deposited are hard to say no to
and I hope that the questions that we inspired you guys to ask
last week are still ringing in your heads,
and you'll make the right decision tonight.
Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Good evening.
My name is Charles.
I'm from Peoria.
I'm a professional software engineer of more than 15 years,
and I would like to speak on the topic
of flock cameras inaccuracies.
At the last city council meeting, the chief said.
So I know that there was some information
earlier about misreads.
That is a real thing.
Misreads happen, but it is the officer's responsibility
to verify that information.
I'm thankful that chief Rainey admitted this shortcoming.
However, he has downplayed the severity of the issue.
Studies have shown somewhere between 40% and 70%
of license plate identifications done by flock are misreads.
That is worse than a coin toss chance
that it is correctly scanning the plate.
These misreads have resulted in people being falsely arrested
throughout the country, and this puts both the Pekin
police department and Pekin itself
at risk of legal repercussions.
This is not a hypothetical problem.
It's happening all over the country every day.
We have a number of examples here.
I'll read a few just to highlight things.
In Auburn, Washington, July 2026, Auburn police
used flock cameras to track down a shooting suspect,
but they arrested the wrong man.
In Volusia County, Florida, April 2026.
Based on a flock capture, officers
mistook an innocent driver's car for one that was at the scene
of a deadly accident.
The driver was jailed for 13 days as a result.
San Diego, California, November 2025 based on a flock capture,
officers mistook an innocent driver's
car for one that was at the scene
of an attempted carjacking.
The driver was jailed for nearly one month.
Lafayette, Indiana, July 2024.
Officers detained an innocent man
at gunpoint after a flock camera misread his license plate.
I will also speak on the topic of racial profiling
with flock at the last meeting.
Manager Dorsey said a comment was made about Evanston
and 82% of flock are incidents of.
I'm not quite clear on the wording
here in Oak Park was related to racist traffic stops.
Police are required to do stop cards on every traffic
stop they make.
They're required to.
I'll paraphrase a little.
They're required to fill out these stop cards long
before flock was even considered a tool,
because that's been the ongoing allegation out there.
So I'm not saying they're wrong.
I never say never.
I'm suspect on the 82% of that.
And I would like to compare that to what they have to submit
to the state of Illinois and those traffic
stop cards end quote.
According to the journalists at freedom to thrive in Oak park,
Illinois.
During the Illinois traffic stop, study for 2022
reported that 53% of drivers stopped by Oak Park police
and traffic stops were Black.
During a 10 month study following
the install of flock cameras, that number
had risen drastically.
84% of drivers stopped by Oak Park police
in a flock based traffic stop were Black.
Black residents comprise only 19% of oak park's population.
We have a chart to visualize that.
On the chart, purple markers indicate.
Stops that were of Black drivers.
Is that correct.
And keep in mind, only 19% of the city is black,
so the purple ones make up.
I think it's the 82 or 84% number
we were talking about here.
The discrimination does not end there.
Police departments throughout the country
have been found using racial slurs to search
for people in the flock system.
In Illinois, we have found at least 130 examples
of anti-romani slurs alone.
This is a clear sign that flock can and is being used
in a discriminatory manner.
With my last minute, I also want to speak informally
in my experience as a software engineer,
what Greg said is accurate.
My big issue with the flock, to put it in an elevator pitch
is and we'll have the same problem
with axon and similar systems.
They are marketed to the city and the police department
as if this is a thing you buy and you own it,
and then the citizens trust you.
Therefore they must trust the cameras.
But that's not actually how they work.
It is a nationwide network I believe, more
than 100,000 cameras, 130,000.
And the police don't control them.
Any appearance of the police controlling them.
Thank you.
Is the police ask the flock company to do something.
Flock says they did it.
And then it appears as if the police control them.
But actually flock controls them.
They're not controlled locally and personally.
For me and a couple people I've spoken to one compromise
I would feel a lot better about.
And I'm going to propose this in Peoria too,
is that they should just be offline.
Like if you have a dash Cam with an SD
card and no cell connection, it should
just be completely offline.
Thank you.
Hello, my name is Sunny, I am from manito
and I am speaking on the behalf of my loved ones in Pekin.
Here there were a lot of claims made
at the last council meeting.
One about one hour and 37 minutes into the whole meeting,
manager Darcy said.
According to phlox published information,
the system does not use facial recognition.
A few seconds earlier, a police chief,
Rainey, said flock is an automated license
plate reader system.
It captures information associated with vehicles,
including the license plate, certain vehicle
characteristics, and the date, time, and location
of the observation.
According to the page 19 of the flock system patent in use,
the cameras do, in fact, have face recognition.
They also state that flock cameras
are designed specifically to identify people.
Some of the things the flock system is designed to do
include identifying the face of a driver,
identifying clothing, determining weight,
height, gender, and race.
Even if the Department itself is not using this data,
flock itself is.
This data is saved and sent overseas,
where data laws are less strict in the Philippines
to train their AI models.
I'm going to read a bit from the patents
themselves here, but humor me because their patents are wordy.
Now, with the face recognition data points,
the investigators may be able to query
the dsoc system for any footage captured by one or two.
Having a person with matching face recognition data points.
Emphasis on that last part.
These cameras match face recognition in their data
and further in their patent they list with an object
identified in the image frame.
The object detection module leverages
a cascade of neural networks to identify aspects of the object.
They even give an example, if the object class
of the identified object is that of a human being,
then the object detection module may further analyze the image
using a neural network module configured to identify
different classes of people male, female, race, et cetera
subsequently, with aspects of the person identified,
the object detection module may leverage other more detailed
neural networks to further identify aspects of the person,
such as but not limited to a neural network
for identifying clothing types like jackets, pants, shorts,
hats, et cetera, and a neural network
for gauging height and weight.
Now, if I'm going to be honest, that
doesn't sound like what was said last meeting,
but that was in the patents themselves.
These cameras do identify people,
and I think it's very important to keep that in mind.
Furthermore, for there were other claims
made as well concerning public roadways.
At two hours into the meeting, it
was said, as far as the privacy concerns,
they've upheld the legality of the technology.
And I quote, They deem that there is no expectation
of privacy in relation to the exterior of a motor vehicle
or its government issued license plate when it's
displayed on a public roadway.
The cameras do not only photograph
the exterior of the vehicle, though, do they.
What happens when someone who owns a convertible
drives past one.
Seriously what happens.
There is a reasonable expectation
of privacy for people inside of their vehicles.
There's an expectation of privacy for vehicles parked
at homes on private property.
There certainly is an expectation of privacy
for people on private property.
A full 23% of flock cameras in Pekin face a citizen's home.
The cameras do not exclusively take a photo
of the exterior of a vehicle.
As previously stated, when facing a home or sidewalk,
they can certainly capture people.
At the end of the day, let's pretend it's just a Kodak
camera owned by a person.
Would it be legal for a citizen to place
a camera on a pole facing someone's home
and record all day, every day.
No it wouldn't.
So why are we allowing this much more pervasive and connected
system to do the same thing.
I hope you will consider what me and my friends
have said tonight.
It is very troubling, especially because my family
is a big part of why I'm here and it means a lot to me.
I hope you consider what I said.
Thank you.
Thank name is Roger Greer.
601 Prince Street, Pekin, Illinois.
Last Friday afternoon, August 21, the election board
met concerning a referendum petition question being turned
in to the city clerk's office, consisting of over 1750
signatures and 71 pages.
At the hearing, Mayor Burris presided
as the election board member.
The city clerk presided, and councilman Abele
was part of the board, and the mayor has went on record voting
against putting a referendum on the ballot about two years ago.
It was put on the council agenda and the council was tied 3 to 3
over putting a referendum question on the ballot,
simply asking the voters their opinion on the matter,
whether the city should remain a home
rule local government or not.
It was again, it was tied 3 to 3,
and our current mayor broke the tie
and decided that it shouldn't be on the ballot
for the pekan voters.
Now Mr. Abell did the same thing.
He also voted against it.
So it's hard for me to believe that they could be completely
impartial on this matter, because they'd already went
on record stating they didn't want the citizens to have
a right to vote on the issue.
And my understanding, the city clerk is appointed by the mayor.
So I have a hard time believing that person is going
to be 100% impartial because she was appointed by the mayor, who
went on record against putting a home
rule referendum on the ballot.
So at the hearing.
Their side had an attorney from Cook County
drive all the way down here to present
all kinds of legal technicalities
against the petition, for example.
It wasn't bound sufficiently.
Now, personally, I think that should
be more of a concern for me, the petitioner,
and not the other side.
Because every sheet is notarized and the petitioner,
the circulators required to sign that in front of a notary.
And so the likelihood of someone inserting, petitions
after the fact to try to get more signatures
seems to be, to me, not a possibility.
And so for me, each page being numbered and notarized
should be sufficient to keep myself
from being concerned about somebody changing out the pages
or something like that.
But in any event, that was one of the reasons
the Cook County attorney gave the board
for dismissing the referendum.
Another concern was that the question was too
difficult to understand, and the exact question on the petition
was, shall the city of Pekin elect not to be a home rule
municipality as allowed pursuant to Article
7, Section 6 B of the Illinois Constitution.
Now, honestly.
If the voters are that stupid that they
can't understand that question, then
we've got a really big problem.
But that was an argument their attorney presented.
The voters aren't smart enough to answer
that yes or no question.
The Pekin shouldn't be allowed to answer it.
And so there was another concern that one of the circulators
turned in an inappropriate address on her petitions,
and she was here at the hearing with her driver's license, which
stated the address that she turned
in on the petition, as well as her voter registration card.
So no one ever asked or present that she was here to present it,
but no one asked her to.
But that was another issue that was
brought up that 11 pages shouldn't
be considered because of that.
And so, in any event, I thank the voters in Pekin
who fund the local government should
have every right to decide what form of local government
they want.
And I don't care what side of your honor seconds,
should be something that the voters should be able to do.
And so I ask all the council members here,
if you haven't seen the hearing recording,
it's on the city website, I ask you to look at it
and make your own decision on what you think should have been
done, as well as any people here today,
or maybe watching this to watch the hearing.
It's on the city's website.
Thank you very much.
I would like the audience to know that home rule
is not a form of government.
All right.
Hello my name is Diego, and I just
want to get this straightforward and just put my word out there.
This will be my first time speaking at a council meeting,
so if I trip up, I apologize.
It's my first time, so I'm a little nervous.
We all are.
I would just like to say I came here today because
of my family and friends.
We have a flock camera on our property
that we had no idea of until later on.
Until later on.
The way we just.
Yeah but I'll get into my argument.
Flock cameras have many reasons on why the town of Pekin
does not need them.
We should not be a security state,
nor should we be watched without our consent.
We do not know what these people do
with our information and our facial recognition
behind these cameras.
So why should we trust them.
As flock cameras are known to stalk individuals and even track
their faces and use our data with our faces
as well, without any warrants.
Officers and any other law enforcement
can provide seizures and arrests to us
without any warrants or documentation,
where they can arrest us.
As a minority myself, I do not feel safe
with these flock cameras, especially with the high cases
of police brutality.
Speaking on topics of private privacy invasion.
As flock cameras have been proven to trace Bluetooth
signals from your devices.
An article called The hidden surveillance network
what flock cameras and signal trace
mean for everyday Americans, published
by Emily Stanley Allard.
She explains how the AI powered technology tracks our devices.
Recent reporting and product demonstrations
indicate that Bluetooth and wired signal
collection technologies, such as Leonardo signal trace platform,
is being integrated with some quote unquote license plate
reader reader ecosystems, which, yes,
they do read license plates, but that's
not the only thing they do.
Which allows investigators to associate wireless
devices traveling with a vehicle over time.
However, I feel like this is a violation of our human rights.
We do not know when we are being recorded.
We do not know who's recording us.
We do not know about flock cameras on our properties.
That is all.
Thank you.
Madam Clerk, before we continue.
Do you know the time that we started this.
I realize it's an hour into the whole meeting.
Did you mark down.
It's I mean, it's getting close.
We had a couple things.
Go right ahead.
OK ma'am, respectfully, I will make this as quick as possible.
Council members.
Dave Nutter I don't know if you're related to Doug Nutter,
but I really love going to Pekin high school
and having him as my gym teacher.
He's a great gym teacher, pushed a lot of us.
But anyway, let's get that out of the way.
I just want you to know I agree with everything these people
back here have met.
I enjoy seeing people of all different political backgrounds,
race, gender, sexuality, all that fun jazz
uniting here on this one issue.
I think it's something special that we get to see very often,
whether you may be for or against walking camera
for or against flock cameras.
My biggest issue with the flock cameras.
Or one of them, besides what these guys have said,
is that and what's not been talked about tonight
is these cameras have several vulnerabilities
and issues with them from the technical side.
I know some people have talked about the patents,
but one of the things that's not talked about is the security
vulnerabilities and how you are able to
through some way, able to watch the camera feeds yourself.
And it is a closed system.
None of this is open source.
So we don't really know.
We don't really know what's the word I'm looking for.
We don't really know how to protect against it.
No one has been.
There's a guy I watch on YouTube, Ben Jordan.
I don't know if any of you have watched him.
I highly recommend checking out his video on flock,
but he demonstrates that he was able to get remote access.
And for anyone who's not familiar,
remote access means I could be sitting at my house over
behind the herget mansion and I would
be able to get into a flock camera
without having to physically get into it, as long as I have
a cellular or Wi-Fi connection.
With this, I bring up.
Another concern is that we don't know they
said, who is accessing them.
We don't know which state counties are accessing them.
We don't know if the federal government is secretly
supporting using the secret courts
to subpoena people around the US to get this information.
And ultimately, one of my biggest concern
is that we have another neither Edward Snowden incident, where
someone uncovers a mass surveillance program where
our name, dates and everything about us
is being stored and stocked by the federal government more
than they need and more than they
already have to do their jobs.
I think I've said enough.
I've made my concerns clear.
One more thing about Beacon high school.
I really love going there.
I was able to get my first internship about three
months out of high school.
Because of all of the tech classes, I was able to go.
Thank you guys for your time.
I would greatly appreciate if you could vote no to this,
as this is one of my biggest concerns
of my children growing up and everyone
knowing everything about them from the time they're born.
Thank you very much.
You're right.
Beacon high school is wonderful.
Thank you.
Good afternoon.
My name is Wrigley, and the last time I was here,
I stated that this was an Orwellian idea that the city is
choosing to put its funds, resources, and energy
into these cameras over a variety of other things
that I proposed and later listed off,
would be more beneficial to this community.
I understand that we want Pekin to be a safer place.
I want Pekin to be a better and safer place.
However, the argument that we need to focus on Pekin alone
and ignore the rest of the concurrent reports of police
misusing the cameras outside because it hasn't happened here
is nothing short of willful ignorance and naivety.
No country, no state, and no country
is immune to authoritarian abuse.
I cannot speak, nor will I question the intentions
of the chief, as I can only assume that he has
pekin's best interests in mind.
However, I have to ask on why we're forgetting to mention
that flock doesn't work alone off the license plate,
as even Greg stated that they work off of body my make model,
and color along a variety of damages, bumper stickers,
and a variety of other things, including the absence of license
plates themselves, all of which is fed through an AI
machine learning algorithm.
As we already know that the city doesn't even own.
It is privately owned by flock and stored in their system.
And I also think it should be pulled up into question on why
the representatives of flock felt so felt the need
to be evasive about it.
And this is all acknowledged in their flock evidence policy
as you can go and find it.
So again, why they're so evasive about it in the first place
should be called into question.
They can argue that the Delete said documentation all they
want, but if it is being used for AI training
and being fed into a learning program,
is it really being deleted in the first place.
Not to mention that they say that the documentation is
deleted every 30 days, which over the current time
since we were last meeting about this was reduced to seven days.
And sure can argue and say that this may be a good change,
but then I want you to think back on the idea of an AI base
itself, something that can learn anything
within microseconds at a time.
And with them placing cameras around every corner
and every block, it makes it effectively
futile to even have this policy here in the first place.
They might as well not even delete it,
since your plate would be captured,
or your car would be captured at every given moment.
And not to mention they log your exact GPS
coordinate at the very moment capture.
I would also like to expand more on MS Phillips comments
about our devices and even other people's cameras tracking
us our cellular devices.
Tracking quotation tracking us is our personal choice.
We sign an agreement with Apple to allow and permit
this in our very pockets.
The very same thing goes with ring
as the Ring doorbell is another great example she proposed.
This is a privatized choice on private property
for the private owner.
It is no different than a business
choosing to have cameras in their store and premises.
The issue is that it's not the government's responsibility
for how we choose to protect ourselves,
as I believe that's what the Second Amendment is for as well.
But instead of the individual of the privacy of their.
Let me rephrase that.
But instead the individual themselves to prioritize
their security, thus nullifying any debate
about the differences between flock
cameras and personal devices.
One of the biggest things that you're taught as an officer
is that you need warrants for almost anything
and everything to ensure that you do not
violate the Fourth Amendment.
They need warrants to access our devices
in and outside of our homes.
They need them to enter our homes.
But suddenly this changes with these cameras,
as they can navigate beyond and bypass the whole process
of warrant by contacting flock directly,
as that's even being discussed in federal courts at the moment.
Since it's captured and documented through a privatized
company, they can have access to it at any given
point within their grace period, making
it so pointless to how they even have
this many setup to begin with.
The first real major step to mass surveillance
was during the Bush administration in 2001.
Under the Patriot Act.
People took issue with it then, and
people take issue with it now.
The only difference is people have become aware
of how the authorities and the government
have used it maliciously.
Seconds more thorough understanding of the technology
now more than ever.
And the few people that Mr. Fletcher claimed to have heard
from supporting these cameras are severely
outweighed by the mass public of Pekin,
as evidenced by their so-called fear of being outnumbered
by us in this very room.
We've asked for statistics.
We have received none.
Tens we've asked for reasons to how these cameras
benefit the people.
And we've received none.
We hear your explanations and we are not interested.
Thank you.
Did you say we have at that time.
We had.
We have five more minutes left.
Thank you.
OK our next speaker.
My name is Devin with an O. I'm not a good public speaker,
so I'm going to be looking down a lot.
I'm sorry.
So I've lived in Pekin with my husband for over a decade.
When it came time to transition from renting to owning,
I did a lot of research and determined Pekin to be
an excellent match for us.
Like everything showed that the place was on the up and up.
It felt like a really nice place, one
that you could raise a family in.
Kids left their toys in the yard and folks had chairs out
on their porches, and there's so many beautiful parks and perks.
It's obvious we're a dog town and we have two dogs,
and it felt really safe to walk around.
And I've been talking the place up so
much that my mother-in-law has even
decided to come and move here.
So back then, the only cameras were like traffic cameras,
and nobody likes those because we know what they're about.
They don't make driving safer, but cities
can use them to automatically find people without having
to staff a police officer.
It's really impersonal.
They don't account for when we're tired from a 16 hour
shift, or when we're distracted from three hungry children
in the back seat.
They just tag and flag, and the ticket would come in the mail,
and the cameras don't care or feel,
and people end up feeling as though those benefiting
from the cameras don't care or feel about the people
of their cities, either.
When I saw one of those Black cameras
with the solar panel in piqua and it made
me feel unsafe and scared.
These automatic license plate readers
are a new type of surveillance, and they're not to gather
ticket fees, but are data.
What has happened to Pekin to warrant this.
Since I've moved here, because I haven't seen it.
They're also very impersonal.
They record, regardless of need, and they
feed a database of a private company in Georgia.
We give you your office's badges, privileges, and even
weapons because we want to trust you to help us
and to bring structure in order to our lives
and to give us a beautiful and safe community
like you've been doing.
But trust has to be mutual.
Flock safety has not shown itself
to be a trustworthy Steward of our information.
Last year in August, the Illinois Secretary of State
gave a public report regarding their audit
of the automatic license plate systems
under government contract in Illinois.
And like 90 something percent of those are flock safety.
And like 99 point whatever percent
of the ones in this area in Tazewell County
are flock safety.
And they stated that flock safety was in frequent violation
of Illinois State law, and that local governments needed
to audit their contracts, and that 74 outside agencies had
to have their backdoor access revoked from Illinois system
access, and there have since been myriad reports
from across the nation and in Illinois,
and everything we've heard in the room
today that the misuse and abuse of these systems has continued.
And I'm just wondering what is the compelling public safety
need that Pekin police department has identified
to allow this into our town.
I'm being watched without cause, evaluated by someone who
only knows me by my data, and who isn't
a member of this community.
Someone who's shown themselves to be irresponsible
at best and repeatedly demonstrated
a disregard for our own law.
They don't have to care or feel.
But the person they trust with a gun and a badge
wants to rely on such an impersonal system,
implying they don't trust me and want
to keep their distance from me.
Though I have nothing to hide, I don't feel safe in Pekin
anymore.
Public input is now closed.
I'm on that subject.
A minute.
No OK.
Not perfect.
My name is Biden.
For if you remember, not this meet last meeting,
but the one before.
When I came up and I told you guys that my truck was parked
and they didn't empty my daughter's garbage cans.
Oh, yes.
OK well.
Wednesday, when it was pouring down rain.
My daughter's boyfriend was parked.
I have never, ever heard that you have to be
parked 6 feet from a driveway.
How are we supposed to know this.
To be able to get a ticket, even though the ticket was squished.
If he went out and moved the truck in the
pour down rain, which he did.
This is me.
I am like that neighbor next door.
He came over and knocked on the door when I was there and said,
hey, can you move the truck.
And I said, yeah, when they empty the garbage cans.
What are you supposed to do.
You're on North 11th Street.
There's a white car that's been sitting there for a month.
Then there's the Brown house, blue truck.
Then there's this vehicle.
There's only one parking spot.
Which I've already called the city.
And I ask about tearing that out and them putting rock in there.
But you've got to cut the curb and the sidewalk.
And I understand all of it.
Except you're not allowed to use rock.
It can only be concrete.
So these kids can't afford a concrete driveway
to add on to it.
And that was to give them two parking spots.
And I just don't understand.
How is anybody supposed to know that you're supposed
to be 6 feet from a driveway.
Without getting a ticket for $25.
They do have a camera.
And it was proven that the person that wrote the ticket
did not measure, and the gentleman
asked him to come back with a police officer
and get out and measure it.
And he said, as long as you move it all,
turn it down to a Warning.
They've asked me not to say anything because I
didn't want no trouble.
I said, oh no, I'm taking this to the council
because the city, the people in this town
apparently need to know.
But because of the neighbor next door,
he got mad because he can't back out.
Well, you can back out.
I back out of my driveway all the time,
and I've got Mr. Luff parked right here.
And then I have the neighbor right behind my driveway.
And then I sometimes get Mr. Luft's neighbor, that or friend
that wants to park right there.
And I got to back a truck out of that.
It is capable to be done even with traffic coming at you.
So that is my complaint, and it's something that I
wanted to put in front of this.
And I hope anybody watching this understands.
Don't park 6 feet from your neighbor's driveway
or you'll get a ticket.
Thank you.
We have one more speaker on flock
because there was a speaker.
There was two minutes.
There was two minutes left and there was a speaker
talking about the Home Rule.
So there's five more minutes.
According to code.
So I'm going to have him speak and then we're done.
And there were two minutes left.
I'll speak in less than two minutes.
My name is Jeff Johnson.
I live on Sixth Street here in Pekin.
I'm a property owner and I am opposed to the flock cameras.
But my question is rhetorical to the mayor and the council.
Do you feel as you're going to vote on this.
Please ask yourself, do you feel that you are getting the value
out of what you're paying.
Flock to have the cameras in place.
Are you getting the annual value that my tax
dollars are helping to support.
Thank you very much.
We're done now.
Public input is now closed.
Chair will entertain a motion for the consent agenda, please.
Approval of Madam Mayor, I move that the following consent
agenda be approved 6.1 financial reports through July 31, 2026
6.2 accounts payable paid proof list through August 14, 2026.
6.3 ordinance number 4428 dash 2627 approving a Second
Amendment to purchase and sale agreement
with Epic pharma solutions.
6.4 ordinance number 4429 dash 2627 approving a special use
request for the operations of an automobile repair shop
at 912 South second case Sioux.
2026036.5 ordinance number 4430.
2627 approving a variance to allow
for the construction of a second driveway
and approach at 18 Ashwood lane.
Case V20620260366.
Ordinance number 4431 26 27, approving a map Amendment
to rezone the vacant property located adjacent to lots
13, 14, and 15 of the dawn on the lake subdivision along Foot
drive from AG agriculture to re one family
residential estate district.
Case 2026026.7.
Resolution number 473 26 27 approving a council permission
for Roger Brotherton to utilize old police vehicle logos on a 63
Plymouth Belvedere vehicle as a historic replica
to be on display.
Second Motion made by Mr. Abel and second by MS hohimer.
Any questions or comments and concerns on the consent agenda.
Seeing none.
Council, take your vote, please.
Motion passes 7 0.
We have now come down to presentations, communications,
petitions and reports.
I'm going to give you once again the mayor's report.
It's not going to be near as long as last time,
because I had so many things that I wanted to bring
to your attention on how hard our city, our staff,
we are working very hard to bring in new businesses
here in town and making our city grow.
But I do want to tell you a few things.
That last time I said that Excalibur
seasoning that they were on.
They're still on pace, on track to finish
by the end of September they're almost doubling in their size.
Let's see.
Electronic hydrogen is working.
They are doing renewable energy contract for wind and solar
on their facility.
I'd stated that last time and they're
moving forward with that.
The city currently has an RFP to purchase
the sale of eight acres out in the river
Riverway business park.
We don't have a lot of land out there left,
but we do have these eight acres that is by the frontage road
for a local contractor to.
He's expressed interest in building
a new facility out that way.
City staff has begun discussing a 30 to a 40 acre
sale of looting and property for a state for excuse
me for residential development.
So this will be the second thing that we're moving
forward with lutken property.
And this is off of 98 highway 98, our audits.
I had said how proud I am.
It's almost unheard of how we are
getting these audits caught up.
When I first became mayor, we were
four years behind in audits.
Just those four years and the three
years that I've been mayor by.
Let's see, by November 2025, audit will be completed
and then 2026 audit will start shortly afterwards.
And as I stated, that will be seven years of audits.
That is unheard of.
Hats off once again to the finance department
for the city of Beacon.
Thank you so much.
A couple other things that I want to mention
and that is with our finances.
I did speak with our Mr. Dabrowski, the head of finance,
and we are trying to be so transparent with where we are.
And right now we are a quarter way into the year,
and we are pretty much on track collecting a fourth
and dispersing a fourth just going in there.
So as we get closer to the year as a half,
I will be getting with Mr. Dabrowski again.
But I do want you we want to be so transparent,
but first and foremost for him is not
to just keep the finances going, but to get these audits done
and caught up.
So that will be his priority is to get those audits
completely caught up.
Second thing, I am actually going to pick on our fire
chief, Mr. Trent Reese, today.
We set a record.
I don't know that we've ever sworn
in four officers at one time.
So I want to give you the floor for just a minute
to say how exciting it is, what it means for the city
and your firefighters.
Thank you.
Put you on the spot, didn't I. Much appreciated.
I thought the speeches were over.
Yeah so this morning we did.
We swore in four new firefighters.
The group of them.
There's actually five that will be going to the Academy starting
at 3:00 o'clock this afternoon.
There was a little bit of an issue
with the timing of the Academy.
So they all got sworn in, got all
their paperwork handled, and then
made their way to the Academy.
So normally we like to have them for a week prior to.
But that's not how it worked out this time.
Pretty excited to have four or five of them
go together because they start that bond early.
They have each other to lean on, to learn from,
because they come from all kinds of different backgrounds
and walks of life.
So yeah, Nicole had to do four of them today, swearing them in,
and they seem very excited.
We were very, very fortunate to have a lot of family and friends
in the room to support them on their first day,
and that support will be very, very important
throughout their career, especially in the next three
years where they're doing nothing but learning and maybe
getting yelled at a little bit.
Not too much, but a little bit.
But yeah, as we are a very young fire department,
so every opportunity we have to get them to some training
and work them through is it's a good opportunity.
So pretty happy to have them.
Thank you.
Those who came and we wish them the best
and we'll do everything to make them successful.
We had a full house and it was really wonderful.
You did an outstanding job swearing them in this.
This actually means that we are finally full staffed.
And with that, I think that will help with cutting back
on overtime, forcing people in.
So thank you very much for your hard work.
We appreciate everything.
So that's all I really wanted to say.
And once again, I thank you all for coming,
letting us hear your voice.
We have tough decisions up here, but we all
elected to be here and make these tough decisions
and do what we feel is right for the city of Pekin.
So thank you very much.
I have now come down to item 8, which
is unfinished business chair would entertain
a motion for 8.1, please.
Madam Mayor, I make a motion that resolution number 468 dash
2627, approving the annual contract
with flock safety for license plate reading cameras
be approved.
Second Motion made by Mr. hilston.
Second by Mr. Abel Mr. Dorsey.
Once again, thank you mayor.
This was tabled at the last meeting.
I believe councils had some individual or conversations
with the chief on this.
I think he's available to answer any questions.
I believe he's got somebody available if he
can't answer the question.
So I'll turn it over to him and the council.
Perfect Thank you very much.
Does any council have any questions for our police
chief, Mr. Seth rennie?
Thank you for being here, Seth.
Sorry, sorry, MS Phillips.
There were some specific concerns raised about how
the flock cameras have been used in Pekin, including the number
of searches, the type of codes used,
a particular case with a potential misuse
by a local officer, and questions about which
AI systems are is beacon using.
Can you clarify or expand or answer any of those concerns.
Yeah so the question on the I think
it was brought up by Greg, as far as I
didn't want to misspeak on it.
So after the meeting last time, I reached out and spoke
to our rep and it was already said
but Phil Arnold is on the line from flock
as a flock representative.
So everybody's aware.
So what we currently use is what was basically described
by a lot of the members of the audience that spoke,
Ryan and Zoe, that they're all accurate in the sense
of what we use is AI.
That helps determine the make, model, color.
Does it have a license plate.
Does it not have a license plate.
But then flock also has a lot of other options that we don't use.
Deconfliction connecting incidents without a known
suspect, uncover accomplice vehicles
and detecting organized crime.
Those are all AI driven options that they
use that we do not use.
So the AI that we're currently using
is AI that helps capture the data of the vehicle.
And so that is what we're currently using.
So that specific question.
Do the cameras are they able to pick up the drivers.
It's in the patent.
But I don't really I'm not sure how the cameras are pointed.
And is it taking a picture.
Is it a stream.
Yeah so it's taking a picture of the rear of the vehicle.
Fox says it doesn't capture any facial recognition.
I can only speak from looking at a lot of these photos
and it's the rear of the vehicle.
So that is what's picked up.
I have looked at a lot of these over the three years
that we've had it, and I've never
seen any type capture that you get
any type of driver information.
So I'm literally a lot of it's off of my own experience.
That's just looking at a lot of these.
That's what I've had the experience of.
So I think it was Ryan who asked about.
The 12,738 uses with only 105 license plate.
And the general category 99 invest.
Can you tell me what are those statistics mean.
What are we doing.
Yeah so I don't want to.
Clearly he got some statistics from somewhere.
So you can tell he does his homework.
I don't want to misspeak on whether those numbers
are accurate or not.
I can't say that the 99 is a police code
for a person with a warrant.
So that is a code that we use on a regular basis.
And it is a search code.
And then invest is it would be a warrant investigation.
So that is correct.
That would most likely be police for lack of better
terms, police shorthand.
I will say that those are all things,
as this situation with flock has unfolded over the last 10 weeks
or whatever it's been a hot topic.
That is something that we're making sure that we're doing
a much more thorough job of.
When an officer does a search, we have more information
in there, but overall that type of search is a 99 investigation
is they're going trying to locate someone with a warrant.
So if it says 105 license plate searches versus they will call
them 13,000 searches in general is and I know you didn't gather
the data, so it's not really fair
to put you on the spot for it.
But can you imagine an explanation that makes sense.
I mean, there are explanations.
It depends on who's doing those searches
and how long an investigation took place.
If it's AI don't want to misspeak because I don't know
who he was referencing, but it's one of those like our detectives
that do a six month or a year investigation of the cartel.
You could run if there's a half a dozen vehicles that
are involved in the trafficking, large kilo quantities of Meth
into the city.
Then they may run that every day for a year.
And so they're gathering that data
of when trips are happening.
The frequency where the meet locations
are what cities, that type of thing.
So as money drops are going on, those
are all things of investigative tools
that are being used to try to get that information.
So it's one of those where there is plausible explanations.
I don't want to misspeak and speak on something that I don't
know what Ryan's referencing, but just in general, there
are applications where that could be the case,
and we have multiple drug investigators
that that's all they do.
Very good.
I may have some follow up questions,
but I'd like to give some of the other counsel.
I know that Sharon has a question,
but I think Mr. hills did.
Also, who would like to go first.
Shut up to you.
Go for it.
I just wanted to let everybody know that I
don't think your mic is on.
Try it again.
Hello nope.
Hello here.
Hello there you go.
Sorry I'm sorry I was not able to be here at the last meeting.
I was in Missouri.
My grandson had to have a medical procedure.
And I am a loving grandmother and wanted to be there for him
and his brothers and baby sister.
That being said, I did watch the entire meeting,
and I did hear all of you speak.
I want you to know that I listened
to it all, every minute of it.
The irony behind this is we've already had the flock
cameras for three years.
We are literally going into the last year of our four
year contract for three years.
Not one soul has come in here and said anything.
And now all of a sudden, it's a big deal.
I'm really unsure of that.
I will tell you.
I spoke to four people just today.
Two called me about other issues and I said, by the way,
can I ask you.
I have to be honest with you.
Not one person cared.
They said if it saves a life, if it keeps drugs out
of our community, I'm for it and I will tell you
it has saved lives.
It has absolutely saved.
I can tell you right now.
Hand to God it has saved lives Mr. ranney,
Chief ranney could tell you that.
I got from Mr. Allen's letter.
I read it thoroughly, and he one thing he wrote in here
that I really respected.
It says I understand and respect the legitimate concerns
surrounding privacy, surveillance
and the potential misuse of this type of technology.
Those concerns should not simply be dismissed.
At the same time, I now believe we also
need to carefully consider the potential benefits in real world
situations in which this technology could
help law enforcement locate a missing child,
identify a subject, suspect, or assist
in solving a serious crime.
If it saves one life, I think we've done our job.
This is the fourth year of a four year contract.
It's something that we would absolutely
want to look at in the future.
I'm not going to say that this is perfect,
but I have to tell you in my heart,
if one child is saved from sex trafficking
or save from attempting to unalive themselves.
Then I absolutely 100% will vote for this.
Thank you Mr. hilst.
I just got one quick question in regards to the resolution.
It says that we're approving the annual contract with flock
safety, but then the only information that we really
have in our packet is just a couple invoices
for the price of the cameras.
Is there an actual contract with language in it
that talks about the locations and the use
and how the data is stored.
I mean, is there an actual school contract
that we just haven't been provided.
Or is the contract just the cost of the cameras.
The contract is the cost of the cameras.
I mean, we did an original contract, if that's
your question, when you initially passed it
unanimously the first time, then all of that was in the contract.
This is part of the four year grant that we were awarded.
It wasn't a four year contract.
It's a year by year and this year is just the invoices.
The contract is the same contract
that was already approved.
This is just an invoice for this year.
But where is that contract.
I mean, why wasn't that provided in our packet.
Because it's the same contract that was passed
for the past three years.
And I understand that.
But there's been a lot of information brought up
in the last two or three months that could pertain to language
in that contract that maybe wasn't picked
up on three years ago when that contract was
originally approved.
Yeah I mean, it's the same contract that we are.
Just what is brought forth this year is to just do like you have
the last two years, and it's the same contract with just
the fourth year payment.
That's all I have.
Thank you.
I do want to say that we have had these last two
weeks to ask the chief to see that contract if we
needed to again.
So I think he's being very transparent with us all.
Did you have more MS Phillips.
Oh Dave did.
Oh, yeah.
I got questions.
So thank you to everybody that brought the information.
Every time you guys bring something,
there's something else.
And I got three pages of notes, so he only gets five minutes.
I can do this in five.
So one of the biggest concerns is the access of the data.
So I'm going to pose this to the chief.
A town in Washington, the state of
wants to access something in Pekin.
Step me through the process.
We don't share outside of the state of Illinois.
Are you sure.
100% I mean, just if you're asking me what I have control
over and the information that I'm provided by flock,
there were times where we have shared outside.
But last year when I think someone already brought it up.
But when the Secretary of State did the audit
and we found that was not being used properly,
flock was sharing information, then
we utilize the ability to make it so we
only share within the state.
It's been a progression.
It's not like it's one of those things where as this has gone on
and things have been brought up, we try to listen
and we make changes to try to ensure
that a lot of these things that are brought up don't happen.
And so it's one of those where when we were told that hey,
this is what it was being used for.
And then as it has progressed, now we just share
within the state of Illinois.
So here comes the caveat is that in the contract, does it state
anywhere in this contract because I
haven't read it again, honestly, that's
completely at our control.
So that is local control.
Yes OK.
Very good.
I go get somebody else.
I got to write something down here.
Did anyone over here have a question
Because MS Phillips does.
But I'm checking just Mr. Abel.
I guess I've been asked 20 times at least.
Where have you people been for three years.
People that said.
Well, they knew we had it.
I had to couple had to go out and show em
where the cameras were.
They didn't know where they were, what they were
actually being heard about.
But they kept saying, where have all these people
been for three years.
What changed.
I said, nothing changed.
I know we're renewing a last of a contract.
So that is.
And I think you've heard the chief talk about instances where
it has actually saved somebody's life,
found somebody that was lost with dementia
in the city of Pekin.
Everything's going to have its downside where
it's made by human beings.
So it's going to have mistakes.
Yeah, but the good far outweighs the bad,
and I'm not going to vote against it.
There's too many way too many positives
outweigh the negatives Mr. Fletcher, you're good for now.
OK MS Phillips, a follow up question for chief Raney
or a question I forgot to ask the first time.
One of the handouts of information
that we've been provided from the public
mentioned that the ice had access to our system in January.
Can you give us any more details about that.
Yeah so we saw that also in the information that we have
is that it was actually the ATF and that it was part
of a criminal investigation not related to immigration
or any of the things that are off limits.
Other than that, I don't want to speak to why that was accessed.
Any other Mr. Fletcher.
So I think the biggest problem the public has
is not the cameras themselves.
It's the expectation or the worry of the information
being used for the wrong purposes
and not being able to be tracked.
I totally understand it.
I don't like my privacy being invaded either.
I understand that it's a great tool for the police officers
for peaking and beyond.
But what I would like to see, and I know
that Chief rayney does this.
I would like to see him continue to be
diligent in checking on his officers and more education
on his officers.
And ultimately, it does come down to Chief Raney.
Being in charge of this.
We give him the tools as a council
to do what's best for the citizens of Pekin,
and then he has to run with that.
And I think so far he's done a good job.
Now, if there's stuff I haven't heard,
I'm not saying that's not possible,
but my feeling is that the good outweighs the bad.
But I will ask and I will continue
to ask questions because this is just it's
not over with the governor.
There's court cases ongoing that could change
everything that we're talking about,
and this contract will be up again.
There may be competitors in the markets in the space,
so we don't know what's going to happen a year from now,
but it will be debated a year from now again.
And I just will hope, and I expect that the chief
will do what he needs to do to keep
the system from being abused.
Thank you.
Thanks, Mr. Fletcher.
I couldn't have said that better.
Thank you Mr. Nader, did you have something else, or did
MS Phillips.
Your turn.
All right.
So I just want to clarify something,
and I think Chief will back this up.
None of those cameras are on private property.
That's correct.
So that leads into.
Does that camera have the width, the broadband
to look at private property.
Well hold on.
Let him answer, please.
Quiet in the audience.
The focus is on the lane of travel.
Is it specific on the lane of travel.
There are things on the outside sidewalks,
things like that it can pick up.
But as far as what it's actually focused on,
it's not on persons residences or things like that.
So it's one of those where I'm not saying that there's not
something on the peripheral that you
might pick up but most of them are
in really high traffic areas.
So the original intent when we passed this contract
was to look at the license plate, whatever
flock does with that information peripheral
to that we can't control.
We can't control if they're doing
something with the data for the development of AI,
which they are.
And everybody's got to be naive if they don't think they are.
The products are being overseas.
They're doing all kinds of information.
They're developing logarithms, logarithms
for a multitude of things.
However, we got to look at the original intent
why we bought them.
It was to help capture perpetrators in the city
or to help another city catch a perpetrator.
Unfortunately, floc has expanded what they're doing.
In my personal opinion, it's all about the money.
Who's getting the money.
I don't know.
I don't know who owns floc.
We hear floc.
So is it a Black Ops.
Is it China.
Is it some other foreign state.
I don't know.
But as Mr. Fletcher said, that's out of our control.
We're looking at cameras for license plate readers
to find perpetrators.
And I'll use an example.
You're at sefcu and two people come in masked up
and you're an innocent bystander.
And they robbed the bank, and they shoot and kill somebody.
Yep guess what.
Sefcu got cameras.
They definitely do.
But what if I'm the citizen sitting out in the parking lot
and happens to give a description of that vehicle.
The flock cameras more than likely
are going to catch that vehicle going in or out of this city.
That is the intent.
It's not to reduce crime.
It's to catch the perpetrators that committed the crime.
So unfortunately, it's like big systems.
AI is big.
I just watched a robot run and beat Bolt's record
or whatever it was.
It was a robot.
OK, well, that had to be developed.
So we buy the cameras for a specific reason.
The AI goes out there and does something
else unless we write something specific in a contract.
And I don't think that may even not even be a possibility,
I don't know.
But I agree with Mr. Fletcher, as we move forward, we
need to do better on the audits and the looking
and what's available.
The state attorney general has come out with multiple things
saying this is illegal, and I'm glad he did.
I mean, it's a step in the right direction.
This is one of those tough ones that I got to say,
if you look at what the camera was intended to do
and what it's being provided, and I've
talked to multiple police officers and multiple citizens
and they're in favor of them.
I appreciate everybody's input here.
But man, there's so much data coming out of this.
I don't know how we keep our head around it,
but I appreciate the input.
We'll see where it shakes out in the vote.
I'm just going to say one quick thing.
I think that our police department
has done great on audits.
I said that we need to do better Mr. Nutter.
Yes we can always do better.
You can always improve and do better.
Yes, we always can.
We have not made huge, huge mistakes.
So, MS Phillips, did you have more.
Oh, boy, do I have a lot of thoughts about this.
I have spent hours every day since we met.
Last I was already aware of the headlines that
are hitting my news, I know.
Not everybody gets the same news feeds we do.
And I've read the articles and I've researched them.
I have talked to.
Domestic backup for a second.
I've talked to friends, family, everybody I can talk to about
this from all different walks of life
and all of the tech concerns, the privacy concerns,
those are valid.
And I don't necessarily want to take up my time going
into a lot of that, because I know you guys want us to go
on with our lives here, but.
Amongst my friends, one of the first things that was brought up
was, well, we can't have those cameras
because there are abusive cops out there who
will track their girlfriends.
And we know that some types of abusive people
are attracted to professions that give
them access to people to abuse.
So what I did was I reached out to domestic violence advocates
and I said, what.
What's happening on the ground.
You're there is this happening.
And they said no, that they haven't seen that.
What they've seen instead is that the cameras are helping
us catch the abusers when they're violating
the protection orders.
It makes it easier to protect people.
As far as you've all done amazing jobs
on bringing information to us and I appreciate that a lot.
I personally.
Can think of several reasons that someone
might choose to misuse a flock or any surveillance system
against me.
And I know that there are members of the audience who
are in communities that are often
targeted by people with access to these kinds of things.
And as a member of one of those communities,
I've always since the first time I signed
my name on something I said.
I'm on a list and I have been to protest where I have carried
a sign that maybe somebody might disagree with,
maybe a thin skinned politician.
And I'm on the city council.
If we had a corrupt police department,
it would be in the corrupt police's
benefit to use these cameras in a way
to track politicians like us.
We're not politicians, really, but to track people
in public office and use that information to get us unelected.
And I mention these things because when I've sat down
and I've soul searched on this question.
I said, OK, what's the worst case in both scenarios.
What's the worst case if we get rid of flac?
What's the worst case if we keep it.
For me personally, this is not the big picture.
This is bringing it all the way down to the person.
And I personally decided that the worst thing
is if I had to stand in front of a parent in Pekin,
which these are not hypotheticals.
These are real situations that we've already
had in this community and say, not even say it, but know
in the pit of my stomach that we could be finding that person
we're missing, but we don't have this tool anymore,
and that person right now is out there.
We don't know where they are.
I could not I would hate to be standing in front of that person
and say I chose.
To do away with the tool that could be helping you right now.
When we know in real life that this has helped people in Pekin.
And I think it's even more troubling,
as a council member to say, I'm going to take away this tool
and I'm not going to stand in front
of that person, because more often than not,
when this situation occurs that we're trying to find someone
urgently, the police isn't calling in the council, the fire
department, when they're trying to respond
to a situation in cooperation with this police department.
They're not bringing us in it.
They're the ones standing there with a fist in their stomach
saying, if only I had this tool, I might
be able to save that person.
I am assuming the risk that we won't have it,
and delegating the responsibility
for facing the bad situation that we're in.
And we have.
I have a lot of friends who are first responders.
Define a lot.
I have a couple of friends who are first responders.
And the things that they see, the things
that they protect us from.
It's tragic when we put them through as a community.
We ask them to keep us safe.
We're asking them to take care of us
and to put them in a position where they have to watch one
of us potentially die, because we didn't
trust them with this tool.
I can't do that.
And I do.
I understand why we're afraid of these cameras.
I understand why we're afraid of the surveillance system.
I do understand the difference between the government
surveillance system and the private surveillance system.
And like I said, I have spent hours
every night looking into this.
And I would sit up here for an hour
and give you arguments on every topic that came up.
But I don't think that's going to be necessary.
I just I want you to know those of you who came here,
you're doing your job as a community.
You're not wrong to be concerned.
The other thing about the why we're concerned,
the more I study on this, the more important
it becomes that the true answers to a lot of these problems
is taking care of each other.
It's seeing not us and them, but all of us.
It may be us against the Texas cops.
It may be us against the techno oligarchs.
But it's us.
We're not us in them.
We're us.
Every member on this council, we live with these flock cameras
too, and I found on the map.
I do live within a block and a half of one.
And I'll tell if you want to follow me.
I'm a very boring person, but that.
Me too.
But nonetheless, I do recognize that it could be misused.
It is extreme.
Somebody mentioned the we trust Seth.
Now, what about the next police.
And I will say that it's a culture that we grow.
We develop the internal controls.
We develop the checks, we develop the alerts,
we follow through on those.
And once they become procedure, then it takes multiple bad cops
to break the procedure.
So like I said, I'll stop going on every topic.
It's tempting, but I just want you to know that I did hear you,
and it isn't that I don't believe you
or that I don't care.
It's personally what can I live with.
And my vote up here tonight is for the community,
because I'm absolutely convinced that we are going to help
far more people than might be hurt
if someone abuses the system.
Thank you.
Well said.
Peg well said.
Thank you.
Anyone else from the council.
Seeing none.
Council take your vote, please.
Motion passes 6' 1.
Chair would now entertain a motion for.
We are at New business 9.1, please.
Oh, I get to talk more.
Madam Mayor, I move that we adopt resolution number 474 dash
2627, approving a professional auditing service agreement
with Lutterbach and almond LLP for the fiscal years
2026 and 2027.
Second Motion made by MS Phillips
and second by MS hochheimer.
Yeah before I turn it over, let's let.
If the audience is wanting to speak,
you need to step out into the hallway there or.
Be seated.
There trying to get up.
Yeah OK.
Thank you.
Congratulations Mr. Darcy.
Thank you.
Mayor this is, in essence, approving the agreement
with Lutterbach and Ammann regarding
the fiscal year 2627 audits.
Eric, will going a little bit more detail if you have
questions for him on it Mr. Dabrowski,
does council have any questions or would
you like to just say a few things.
Yeah, I would like to say a few things,
kind of dovetailing on comments from earlier tonight.
We have made really good progress thus far in 2026.
Catching up with the audits.
As you may recall, we've completed the FY23 audit
in February, FY24.
In June, FY25 is nearing completion.
Our target is actually late September, early October.
We'd love to get it in at that time.
Our intent is to go straight into 26.
Ask the state for an extension on that.
So won't be considered delinquent
as we have in the past.
It would just expand the timeline on that.
So that would roughly mean and then heading
into 26 with a target completion date of roughly January 31
of 27.
So with that would be for audits in the 12 month period.
And that would eliminate our backlog.
So tonight essentially what I'm bringing
is the engagement with Lutterbach for the 26 audit,
with an option for FY 27.
They're very familiar with the city.
We've had a good working relationship.
We want to capitalize on the momentum.
So for FY26, the base cost for the city audit is 54,600.
When you add in the additional reports for the library audit
single audit by tiff reports, the total
cost is 74,775 for FY 27.
The base audit is 56,300.
When you add in all those other reports, it's 77,000.
And then once we get to that point, what I'd like to do
is to go out for an RFP.
Again, lauterbach's great firm, what have you.
I think it would be a good opportunity.
I'd be looking probably for a six year engagement with a three
year partner rotation to get a fresh set of eyes
so you can get an economy of scale with the firm.
But then it's good to have a different vantage point.
So again, in a nutshell, finish getting caught up
with the audits, get back on to normal audit schedule
and then competitively bid the work.
Wonderful wonderful news.
And you are scheduling budgeting for us.
Perfect thank you so much.
Any questions.
Yes thank you.
Any questions for Mr. dabrowski?
Oh, yes.
Eric, if we would say go out for RFP and go with somebody new,
what's the lag time in a new firm getting used to us
and learning about our system and vice versa.
Being a first year audit takes a little bit more time.
By that time, and a lot of credit goes to my team.
They're really stepping up.
They're learning what have you I think they're getting so used
to our audits that it'll help.
But there is probably takes a couple months
longer in that process.
But in a normal audit process, we would still be on time.
I think it would be closer to an October finish
than we would on a September finish,
where I usually like to be on an audit.
I was just wondering, because if we would get to that position,
we have to balance somebody that's had us for seven years
and knows all about US, compared to somebody that's brand new
and has to learn us, which is that's part of their process
too.
I understand, I just wondered if it would slow things down.
It does, but not now.
And it'd be nice to keep the positivity going.
At one potential option with the RFP process,
again, doesn't preclude is if Lutterbach did
want to go and bid with different partners
and different things like that.
I mean, I think that they're welcome to do
that as well, as long as there's a fresh set of eyes.
So there is something to be said.
That's an economy of scale with that.
But again, it's good to have all those different bids.
And I think part of this is the strength of the team
and getting familiar with the audit process that we have here,
that speaks volumes.
There will be a learning curve for any firm that
comes into the situation, but it's also
an industry standard industry norm if you have the staff that
are ready for it and if you are and I
guess this is the key to why we've been moving quickly.
It has to do with organization.
The better organized you have your files,
and you have your paperwork.
And you have your schedules and they tie out,
the easier it becomes.
So our staff has been doing a really good
job of keeping things in line.
And kudos to our city clerk.
A lot of the different resolutions and ordinances
and other type of things.
The easier it is, the easier it is for us,
the easier it is for them.
And that will help expedite audits.
Thank you.
Any other questions.
Seeing none.
Council take your vote, please.
Motion passes 7 0.
Chair would now entertain a motion for 9.2, please.
You get to talk again.
I'm sorry.
Oh, Madam Mayor, I move that we adopt resolution number 4752627.
Emergency operations center technology
lifecycle replacement.
Second Motion made by MS Phillips
and second by MS hohimer.
I don't think your speaker is working too well tonight.
Yeah Mr. Darcy.
Once again, thank you.
Mayor this is highly involved.
Dave Hess can speak on this.
If there's any council questions on this,
or I don't know how much chief Rainey might have,
but this is the planned replacement
of technology within the EOC emergency operations center.
Life cycle replacement.
Dave went through and explained very detailed what
that all will involve.
If there's questions, I'll pass those to Dave
as the IT expert or chief Rainey,
as far as how the operation center works.
Council have any questions.
Seeing none.
Council take your vote, please.
Motion passes 7 0.
Chair will now entertain a motion for 9.3, please.
Madam Mayor, I move that resolution number 476 2627
authority to award 2026 general maintenance mill and overlay
be approved.
Second Motion made by MS hohimer and second by Mr. Abele.
Once again, Mr. Darcy.
Thank you.
Mayor this resolution authorizes myself as the city manager,
to sign acceptance and award the 2026 MFT
general maintenance mill and overlay
contract to the lowest bidder.
Justin Reese, our city engineer, is available for questions
on this.
I believe councilman Nutter may have had a question on that,
from what I understood from earlier today,
and I think we're prepared to answer that for you.
Any questions from council.
Yes, please Mr. Reese, good to seeing you this evening.
As usual.
So what is the project.
Because on the original there were two different mill
and overlay projects.
Is it both of them.
One of them.
Or did it change.
Explain that first.
Yeah it's two 2 million overlays.
Two small sections of road.
It's West Shaw between the terminus of our court
Street project and 18th Street.
So that block there and then at Somerset and Second Street,
it's kind of an unusual shape there where
those two roads come together.
OK thank you for that clarification.
So in a previous meeting, we allocated
or approved the chip seal project and that project
was 1.4 million.
And that's the total amount that's in the budget
under the motor fuel tax.
So can you explain where this additional money is coming from.
Yes this is governed by I dot.
So you have to award general maintenance
a GM program every year.
And so what was approved by council was about $2.11 million
of potential spend that you could
which included the chip seal project, which as you mentioned,
was awarded for about 1.35.
And then the other piece of that,
the other construction piece of that was the mill
and overlay that we were asked, we estimated
at just under 220,000.
But IDOT actually lets you go up to 10% over.
So the original estimate was for let me get this number.
Yeah 2.115 and change million.
And then the resolution you passed was for about 10%
over that, which gave you every piece of that going 10% over,
which is what IDOT allows without further without having
to modify the estimate.
So the 10% overage was on the original 2.1
or whatever it was that we approved.
Correct the resolution you passed at that point
authorized approximately to 10% over the 2.1 million.
All right.
And so the general maintenance included.
So those two construction projects,
we also got it approved.
If you did, the city so decides to buy your salt out of there,
because we knew that there would be potential challenges with
getting bids this year on the salt. So about 240,000 I
think we put in there for that.
And then also there was the potential
to buy some stockpile materials and also
to pay the electricity, which are all MFT eligible expenses.
If we don't put them on the estimate,
we're not allowed to use them.
So this is something I think will work better, as we've
discussed as we move to a fiscal year
from to a calendar year, MFT from the fiscal year.
So we could be setting this up at the same time that we're
doing budgets versus the City budget
happening and the MFT happening in a different timeline.
So hopefully this is the last year that there's
misalignment between those.
And it's just because of historically how
the city has done MFT program.
I'm glad you're taking that into consideration, because it's
going to help all of us in the long run, budget wise,
going to IDOT, and we won't have this hopefully dragged later
in the year, so to speak, so to get the work
done earlier if possible.
And part of the request tonight if council so
wishes to give the authority to sign this contract if we get
an acceptable bid is to get us that couple of weeks
between the next meeting.
So this can go to IDOT, it will probably
be there for three, four or five weeks for their final approval.
So we're just trying to get rid of those a couple of weeks
that we would lose so we can get it to get approval because we
have to have this work done.
So we can close this year's MFT before we can make that change
over and how we do the MFT.
Very good, MS homer.
Justin, again, what are the streets that we're going to do.
So it's Somerset and second where
they come together at a point kind of on the Northwest
side of town.
There's some pretty severe edge cracking.
It's an irregular shape that we're doing,
but we're just trying to that pavement is beyond the point
that it could just be maintained.
We need to mill it out and put some fill in there.
It's just a pavement preservation project.
And then the other one is West Shaw
from where we go around the radius returns for the court
Street Project.
So where that project ends and to 18th Street,
which is kind of an odd shaped little road, OK.
It's kind of a sweeping up to 18th Street.
Yeah, exactly.
So you're going to do 18th Street or.
No, just West shore and then stop at the radiuses.
And you're not West Shaw Drive.
That goes back.
No, just the piece between 18th and court street.
OK yes.
Oh, yeah.
And that was all part of the decision optimization technology
software that we used.
We gave it a budget and tried to find where
to best put that money in.
Now, obviously we knew that costs were
going to be higher this year.
So while we targeted 1.4 million when we actually
did the estimates, we had started
seeing some bid prices come in.
So that's why we did inflate them.
And we were very close on the chip seal.
Based on some other projects I've bid this year,
I imagine we'll be close on the million overlay as well.
OK thank you.
Yep Any other questions.
I do, Mr. hills.
So I know Simon's not in attendance tonight,
but I've had some discussions with him
about this particular mill and overlay.
I was told maybe just guessing off the top of my head,
maybe about a month and a half ago,
that Somerset project down there on this mill and overlay
had been removed.
And we weren't going to do that.
You know anything about that or was that removed
and put back on or.
I'm not sure what you're referencing.
What was approved by IDOT does include both the projects.
And the other one you're talking about on West
Shaw there from court to 18th.
And this isn't I'm not throwing any darts at anybody on this.
This is my own opinion, because I drove around
on a lot of these streets that was on that original map we got
several months ago for the chip seals and for these mill
and overlays.
I don't feel in my own opinion that road is in bad shape
to be milled and overlaid.
I think that's a waste of money.
200 and almost a quarter million dollars.
And we're going to overlay a road that probably would have
been a better qualified road for a chip
seal on some of the other ones I drove around with.
So just me personally, I don't agree with this because I and I
know you guys got your software stuff you go by
and how they rate them streets and whatnot,
but you take a drive down that road.
I just do not see where that needs milling overlaid.
We've got a lot worse streets around town than that one,
and I just don't support it.
But that's just my opinion.
Any other council, Mr. Abel.
Does this also include the 1,400 block Park Avenue to court.
No that was awarded as a change order
on the court Street Project.
So that is being completed, but it's not
being completed with MFT funds.
Correct give Abel his mic spike back to late.
Without any other questions.
Council, take your vote, please.
Motion passes 6' 1.
Chair will now entertain a motion for 9.4, please.
Madam Mayor, I move that resolution number 477 2627.
Authorizing repair of the traffic
signal light at court street and stadium drive be approved.
Second Motion passes by MS hohimer and second
by MS Phillips Mr. Darcy.
Thank you.
Mayor this is the traffic light right there at the high school.
As most of you will recall, there was a lightning strike
that impacted a lot of I think how the signals process
and they work and they finally identified
all the equipment issues and what needs to be done.
We're also working through some of the processes with insurance
on this as we move forward.
Total cost is 26,500 to repair this signal.
Our biggest concern is now that school's back in session.
The walk signal is not operating correctly.
This is going to address that issue.
First and foremost.
But approval tonight we can give them to go
ahead to get going on that.
And we're going to continue working with the insurance
process on that.
So there's going to be some probably
budget amendments or changes that will
be coming down the road here.
Justin could speak a little bit more
as far as how the technology works and talks to each other up
and down court street, but that's been a lot of the issues
there.
I think as much as we've discussed it publicly,
I think a lot of people just are missing that lightning strike
committed or caused a lot of havoc
with how the signals are operating
up and down court street.
It did.
And, I appreciate that the work can go on.
Instead of waiting for all the insurance to finalize.
So thank you.
Anybody have questions for Mr. Reese.
I got one that I was asked to bring up since this
is on the agenda tonight.
Is there a problem with the stoplight or the signal cycling
at eighth and Broadway and Margaret and Broadway
that you're aware of.
And if not, would you check into it, please.
Because it's got traffic backed up
and it seems like those lights are just not synced
or they're longer.
You get a school bus in there, you
got cars backed up into the intersection
at eighth and Broadway.
So if you're not aware of it, could you take
a look when you get a chance.
Yeah, for sure.
There's not an issue that I'm aware of.
But we'll look into it.
A big issue I mean, I was backed up all the way
into the intersection, so I know it
didn't pertain to this particular thing,
but the timing is good.
So if you could look into that.
Thank you.
What was the other one you said.
Margaret Margaret and Broadway and then eighth and Broadway.
So it's that strip between the two churches, two lights,
and it's back in traffic up there.
So it might have been a lightning strike again.
Maybe so we've had some.
It's been pretty rough.
Yeah it has.
Day and a half.
Yeah thank you.
Could also have something to do with court
street being complicated.
Hey, that's still on track, too, by the way, Merry Christmas.
Council, will take your vote, please.
Motion passes 7 0.
Chair will now entertain a motion for 9.5, please.
Madam Mayor, I move ordinance number 4432 dash 2627,
amending chapter 3, Article Ii, division four of the Pekin city
code to clarify wastewater charges and general provisions
be approved.
Second Motion made by Mr. Fletcher
and second by Mr. Abel Mr. Dorsey.
Once again, thank you, Mayor.
This was brought up by council regarding some of the wastewater
and just some clarification on the language in the ordinance.
I think staff was able to address
the issues exactly how we're doing it to try to clarify that.
And we tried to break it down in the simplest of terms.
So I think we've accomplished that.
At least I hope we have.
Any questions from council.
Council take your vote, please.
Motion passes 7 0.
We have now come down to any other business
to New or any other business.
Come before the council Mr. Darcy.
Staff thank you.
Mayor we kind of picked on your Chiefs tonight, so.
Yeah, he.
He's done.
Just a couple things.
We're going to have a street closure this Friday.
Court street between eighth and 10th
will be completely shut down.
I had a lot of conversation with Justin.
We feel it's probably safer for the construction workers.
And it's going to be safer for the people for that one day,
for them to be able to get in there and try to get it all done
all at once, but between eighth and 10th
it'll be closed this Friday.
Pretty much through the business hours while they get in there
and do their work.
Thank you for the heads up.
Downtown concert on the 29th.
Reverend red will be this Saturday.
Just a reminder to everybody.
September 4, the riverfront circus that I
hope I'm pronouncing it right.
Flotsam 6:30 PM.
And they're looking for 6 to eight volunteers.
If anybody in the community wants to help them out with some
of the things they need done September 9 taste of Pekin,
which will be held downtown September 12,
will be the Marigold parade September 10 through the 12th.
The fire department is going to be doing the fill the boot
for muscular dystrophy.
Nice and Josh and I talked.
We both have heard a couple rumors
circulating around town about the bowling alley, I believe.
Sunset lanes not opening because the city has an ordinance.
If you're not making a profit, that the city
can close you down.
That is not true.
Just want to get ahead of that.
The city did not close them down because they don't make profit.
Business survival of the fittest.
I mean, business runs their own business.
We do not get involved in any of that.
So I just want to make sure we clarify that rumor
that is not accurate.
All right.
Thank you.
That's all we have from staff, Mr. hilst.
Nothing thank you, Mr. Nutter.
John Stole all my thunder.
But I do have a question for the street closure.
Are you going to publish it out on social media and everything.
Also on the government website or the government post.
We'll put it out on social media.
Thank you.
That's it MS Phillips.
Oh, you want to.
You want to wait Mr. Fletcher.
Nothing thank you Mr. Abel, I've been asked by a lot of people.
Well, a lot of the cones disappear from Marigold.
Will they have enough to get traffic somewhat back to normal.
Just normal.
Well that's true.
Yeah you're right.
I imagine they're going to have to have some out there
still for safety, but I'll let Justin answer that if he knows.
So there.
The goal is for 14th to have the overhead mast
lights back up and flashing.
Just that's we're on track for that.
The sidewalk should all be completed, which will allow us
to pull back some give a little bit of additional lane width,
but the mill and overlay won't be completed yet, so.
Yeah, I noticed there's been a few Saturday working too.
So So we have biweekly meetings on this
and it's been discussed since like June.
How that would fall with the schedule.
And so I think Audubon should complete most of their work
the week ahead of the Marigold.
And then we're going to try to accommodate as much foot traffic
as we can through that intersection
should be a little better than last year, actually.
Thank you.
Yep miss hofheimer.
I have nothing tonight.
Well, I'm going to tell you this.
I'm not going to say anything because it's waiting
between me and a late dinner.
So Chair would entertain a motion to adjourn.
Oh, peg.
I'm sorry.
I guess I'm my dinner is going to wait.
Oh, Mary, I'm so sorry.
I want to briefly address some of the things
that Mr. Greer brought up.
Oh, sure.
I was not on the council previously,
I happened to notice.
On my YouTube alerts that the city of Pekin had posted
a video of a meeting.
And so I thought, hey, I should watch that hearing.
And that's what I actually did with part of my weekend
was watch the roughly two hour hearing.
And I will say that for anyone else who casually watched it,
it was confusing for someone who doesn't
understand procedure and law.
And it took me a little bit to catch on to what was going on.
And I don't think it was ever clear to people
who don't know how these things work, what happened.
So I'm going to try to give you a really brief, two
minute summary of what this happened
with the electoral board meeting.
The case that was brought, Mr. Geer went in
and he turned in his petition to have the question
on the next ballot.
And after he turned in his petition,
I believe Mr. Newman and somebody else
reviewed the petition and said there's legal problems
with this petition.
Now, was Mr. Newman, wasn't it.
Yes and Baker and Newman, thank you.
I tried to look it up, but I lost the pause
button on the YouTube video.
Those citizens filed a complaint, basically
an objection that the laws weren't followed
with the application to put it on the ballot
that their side was not our side.
It wasn't the electoral board side,
it was Baker Newman's side.
So Baker Newman and their counsel,
they went through the petition and they
found four areas of concern.
Three of the areas were very on the face technical areas.
And the fourth had to do with maybe some questions
about signatures.
I won't go into all the tech, but the big tech was apparently
under Illinois law, a question to accomplish what they wanted
to accomplish had to be worded exactly like was
laid out in the law, and that petition
did not have that wording.
And Mr. Greer offered to change the wording for it
to be on the ballot.
And even if the electoral board wanted
to accommodate that can't change the wording after people
sign the petition.
As I stated that, I just wanted to reiterate that it's
because you go out and you give the people the paper
and you say, do you want this on the ballot.
And they go, yes, that's the question I want on the ballot.
There's no take backs.
Once they've signed that one because and the two other tech
issues, the binding whatever, but because that one
is on its face, clearly not true.
It doesn't meet the statutory requirement.
It really didn't matter what the parties had brought up
about the signatures and the pages
in the binding and all of that.
So the hearing never even talked about the signatures,
because they'd already determined
that based on the law, the question could not be
placed on this upcoming ballot.
Any other details whatnot on that.
The Mr. Greer does have an opportunity.
If he believes that the board made
an incorrect legal decision, he can appeal the law to.
I'm not exactly sure.
I'm sure a lawyer knows they can file an appeal
and say we shouldn't be held to that law
or that law was misinterpreted.
That's certainly up to the courts.
But I just felt like, sorry, I took three minutes.
I felt like some people out there might not
want to go through all that.
And even if they went all through the hearing,
a lot of that was a lot of legal stuff that kind of went, hi.
And I hope that my bullet points summed it up for people.
Thank you.
Chair will now entertain a motion for adjournment.
Madam Mayor, I move that we adjourn.
Second Motion made by.
Motion made by Mr. Fletcher and seconded by Mr. Abel.
Council, take your vote.
I signed out.
Did you.
And maybe.
Motion motion passes 6 minus 0.
But Karen signed out.
Good night, everyone.