Carbondale Cycle

 In case you are looking to save on a bicycle or accessories, Carbondale Cycle is having a moving sale. Wants to minimize the amount it has to move to the new location at the corner of Marion and Illinois.

HSSI

 More pets are coming into the HSSI shelter. They are an "open access" facility, which means they take every pet left there and, when they get overcrowded, they either have to foster pets or put them down. Before you get outraged over that, remember the local "no-kill" shelters have the luxury of saying "We are full and cannot take your pet". HSSI is a small shelter than takes any animal brought there, wheter from an individual or Animal Control and works very hard to place animals brough there. If you can foster an animal, esp. larger dogs or for longer periods of time, here is the applicaton .

They can also use food, supplies, monetary donations and volunteers.

Cars

 I was talking about the availablity of cars in Carbondale with a salesman for a local dealership. He only expects a trick of new cards to come into the Carbondale market until 2023 and they are getting a lot of traffic from outside the Carbondale area:  St. Louis, Springfield, Paducah. Local dealerships, according to him, are keeping prices on new cards very close to sticker price, unline dealerships in more metro areas, which are marking prices up on new cards $2000-$4000 over sticker price.

As far as used cars, most local dealerships are bringing in about 15 used cars a week and those are moving very quickly so, if you want a new used car, contact a salesperson at a dealership and ask them to contact you if one arrives.

Scooters

 Have seen a lot of people riding the new electric scooters around town, more often on the sidewalks than is safe. Just like with bicycles, City ordinances exclude riding scooters on sidewalks, except on those walkways designated for dual use, which, I beleive is primarily on campus. Going to look into policies for  maintaining scooters. Is someone collecting them, recharging them and replacing them, as I have seen them left standing at palces on the east and west side of town?  Wing  offers a bounty to people that collect, recharge and replace the company scooters? Would be useful to know Veo's policies.

PK's

 Looks as if PK's is shorthanded. Either that or HVAC problems as there is a sign on the door saying that Carbondale's oldest bar for the time being, is not opening until 4 p.m. Still opening every day but later than normal and the new hours only extend until the end of July

Food Trucks

 The city has updated ordinances to make it easier for food trucks to operate within city limits. They now only need a permit from the Jackson County health Department, operating times are removed as are criminal background checks and surity bonds.

Scooters

 The Veo Scooter program launched yesterday and I saw a number of people riding them aournd town yesterday afternoon and evening. not sure how the recharging program works. I imagine it runs something like Wing's , werein people get paid for collecting scooters, recharging them and replacing them  at usable locations. Since Veo relies  on photo verification, the company might require rechargers to upload a photo of the replaced scooter before releasing payment.

Scooter Code

 If you decide to try the new electric scooters spread throughout the town and campus, use the code "veoride" for a $5 credit. The scooters and promo code both go active on July 15.

City Council Meeting

 Liveblogging the city council meeting as I can. Here is the agenda

Pro and anti abortion speakers at tonight's city council meeting. Those supporting access to abortion are trying to get the mike and just run out the clock on citizen comments. The term "fascist" getting used. One young woman offering to arrange for adoption of any babies to prevent them being aborted. Of course, the problem becomes the previous 9 months as she did not mention anything about carring for those women during the pregnancy.

Citizen concerns about number of miniorites on city bid projects.

Another citizen concerned about zoning for the Choices abortion clinic. She is not sure why the zoning cannot be changes to keep the clinic from opening. The location where the clinic will open is zoned for medical business so the zoning is not an issue. She did ask the council for forgiveness for judging them during her last time speaking before the council and wants to know what can be done to change the zoning so the clinic cannot open.

Council comments

Councilwoman Harvey now asking why it is easier to get a gun than it is an abortion and asks people not to judge the other. Asking for help for the people in Georgtown Apartments some (or many) of which are getting moved. Also thanked people for coming out to Juneteenth events and the re-opening of the Eurma Hayes Center.

Councilman Loos points out the city cannot rezone properties without the property owner's request.

Consent agenda:  

New LED display for Turley Park

City providing funding to help relocate Carbondale Cycle from its current location to 126 S. Illinois (the old tourism office). Carbondale Cycle's current location will be demolished to make way for the new multi modal transit station.

Consent agenda approved.

Council approves annexing properties in Bonnie Brae Subdivision.

Discussion on tourism. Belleville spends about $38000 on tourism and Charleston spends about $124000, less than what Carbondale does.

City staff sees the Superblock as a possible focus of tourism.

Southernmost Tourism covers the 10 southern most counties of southern Illinois, with offices located in Anna, including Jackson County. Carbondale is the only large metro area in the region that could provide lodging and infrastructure for a significant influx of tourists. Would like to strenghten relationship with the city. 1 full time employee.  Generally carves out Carbondale from the rest of the 10 county region because Carbondale has its own tourism office but agrees Carbondale should be more represented in the office's outreach. Shawnee National Forest and Shawnee Wine Trail are the main destination drivers. Funded through a state grant as well as a hotel/motel tax. Budget is $250,000

Illinois South covers 21 counties and is membership funded. Reaches from the Cairo up to Highland. Heavy into social media and online marketing of the region. Carbondale not currently a member. Runs a very high end online operation. Anecdotal evidence as to the effectiveness of their operations. Budget is $2 million

Carbondale Tourism having problems tracking how effective their their promotional activities are.  City should quit doing the same thing it has been doing over the past several years as council does not think it has been successful.

Don Monty now speaking, saying the city should say it wants from the tourism entities it supports. Carbondale Tourism started off promoting conventions and meetings in the city but has gotten away from that.

Council discussing rental of space at Eurma Hayes Center. Market value is roughtly $3-4 per square feet.  Does the amount the city has contributed to refurbishing the center justify a lower market rent?  Council seems to be saying yes, at least for the immediate future. Get the center running and see how it works. Councilpeople Rye-Sanders and Daughtery think market value is fair because the money the city gave came from Coivd relief money.

Looks as if a large number of attendees have departed by this stage of the meeting.

Motion to rent the space, apparently at the lower rate, carries unaimously and the meeting adjourns.

Rentable Scooters

Veo will deploy 350 rentable electric scooters throughout Carbondale later this year. There will be a demonstration of the standing and seated scooters from 10 to noon at the city hall this Friday. Cost to unlock a scooter will be $1 and 31 cents per minute. Users will have to have access to a smart phone though in order to use the service as unlocking a scooter requires scanning a QR code on the state. Cool idea. However similar systmes have gone awrye as users just left the scooters lying on the sidewalk or in some cases putting them in inaccessible places. I gue the requirement of taking a picture of the scooter at the end of its use is designed to avoid that problem

Accident

 Accident at the intersection of Walnut and Illinois shortly after 9 a.m. this morning. A SUV apparently t-boned a Carbondale police vehicle. Not exactly the sort of car you want to hit as it is very hard to disput what happened to the police. Fire and police vehicles were on site about 9:30 but traffic was moving smoothly and I saw no ambulance so do not think anyone was injured.

Panaderia La Unica

 Had someone ask so yes, La Unica Panaderia is closed currently. Sign on the door says they are closed from July 1st to July 8th so no jalapeno rolls or flan. 

Fireworks

 In case you want to view Carbondale fireworks tonight, they are best visible from the Bantera Center Parking lots. Road closures on campus start at 6 p.m. and the show begins at 9:15 

Tracks

 Either the railroad or the state or the city has painted warning signs on either side of the rail crossings on East Main and East Walnut. Just before the sidewalk crosses the tracks, painted on the concrete in large letters is "See Tracks? Think Train." 

Given than the trains run right through the recently designated "entertainment district" wherein a good number of the town's are located, it is a wonder that more people do not get hit by trains after leaving the bars.

Appears that is what happened with the truck train crash over in Missouri. The crossing has no lights or guards but the driver seems to have ignored the oncome train or gambled that he could get across before it got closer and failed.