City Council Meeting

Sat in on part of the city council meeting last night.  Missed the vote on the chicken ordinance but it passed, though with a limit of 20 licensed coops in the city at any one time.  Some of the details from the ordinance:

oops and enclosures must be covered in mesh, and they must be kept dry, clean, odor-free and in a sanitary manner.

- The odor of chicken waste must be contained to the property of the chicken owner. No more than three cubic feet of chicken waste may be stored on property at any one time. Composting of chicken waste is encouraged.

- Coops may not be located in side or front yards, and they must be at least 15 feet from the property line and 25 feet from neighboring residences.

- Coops must have at least 4 square feet of floor space but no more than 40 square feet. They must be at least 5 feet tall, but cannot be taller than 8 feet.

No indication who will handle inspection of the coops.

Discussion of funding of assorted community organizations took up the couple of hours of the meeting, with the main focus on Mayor Fritzler's proposal to pull $120,000 in funding from the Carbondale Convention and Tourism Bureau's and distribute it among other organizations, several of which had apparently been asked in January to present proposals for what they would do with additional funding.  Apprently, cutting the hotel/motel tax was not given consideration.

Councilwoman Jane Adams had a number of questions for Bureau Director Debbie Moore, most of which, of those I caught, concerned the Bureau's website. Adams appeared especially concerned that Moore devoted more time to her personal website than she did to the CCTVB's site and that Moore's website ranked higher in Google rankings than did the Bureau's.  Moore responded that the Bureau's website was under construction and appeared to take offense at Adams' questions regarding her personal website.  It does appear that the current version of the  Bureau's website is fairly recent, as the event calendar shows no events in the area prior to this month and several of the pages (favorite food events, camping, favorite grocery shops) are blank.

Mayor Fritzler cut off Adams' questioning before she had finished, appearing to want to give other council members time to ask questions of the CCTVB.  However, Councilpeople McDaniels, Monty, and Jack, preferred to make comments about the proposed shift in funding from the CCTVB.  All three were opposed, or at least concerned that not enough time had been devoted to the proposal.  Still seems there is acrimony between Fritzler and Jack as both men accused the other of interrupting him.

Several people got up to defend the CCTVB, includingformer mayoral candidate Sam Goldman, CCTVB Board chair Trace Brown (and owner of the Holiday Inn), and the manager of the Super 8, as well as a student in the SIUC Hospitality program, who spent much of his time behind the podium attacking Mayor Fritzler for stating on his official biography that his only goal as mayor was to help SIUC (it's not, you can read the whole thing here), then wanting to strip money away from CCTVB which would harm the Hospitality Management program at SIUC, and the organizer of a Marine reunion in Carbondale last year, who said the CCTVB had been quite helpful in organizing their reunion last year.

A couple of people, including me, got up to say that the CCTVB had not been particularly helpful in putting gone events in Carbondale (I have helped put on annual gaming conventions since the early 90s in Carbondale and have gotten little if any help over the years from the CCTVB, so am likely viewing the CCTVB with a jaundiced eye).  Had to leave soon after that, so am not sure what time the meeting wrapped up.