No popcorn necessary. After a tenuous meeting October 7th, nerves were calm for the October 21st Carmi City Council gathering and leaders were able to breeze through a 15-minute session. Having only bills to pay on the agenda certainly helped. On the agenda, council approved pay estimates to Wiggs Excavating for the Rosebud Street watermain replacement to the tune of $11,500, payable out of TIF 2; also Brown and Roberts engineering for work on the water tank project amounting to $6,324.50, payable from the IEPA loan; a $79,280 bill to Elevation Coatings and Restoration for the water tank painting, payable from the same loan; and a Brown and Roberts bill for $15,000 for a sewer planning grant.
In reports from Mayor Bill Stendeback, he mentioned the long-awaited demo of a dilapidated property at 620 Oak Street.
The Oak Street house, we’ve finally gotten all the approvals needed to demo that. I can’t imagine living next to that. Poor Holly [Healy] went out there to take some pictures for the people who may call it a historical site and she gagged about 4 times and she lives on a farm with animals. She said it’s awful. There’s 5 foot of garbage all around it.
Officials are expecting Guisewhite to win the bid on that as they’re typically the only outfit that bids and meets the criteria necessary to handle demos. Details are available at www.cityofcarmi.org/demo.
Mayor Stendeback says the water tower is being filled and it should take most of the day Wednesday. He says it could go online on Thursday and residents should be on the lookout for leads as they turn that system back on. Trick or Treat in Carmi will be from 4 – 8pm on Halloween (October 31, 2025) and a Trunk or Treat will be hosted behind the city council chambers parking lot at 225 East Main from 4pm – 6pm.
In reports from Alderpersons, Doug Hays thanked the city on behalf of Kiwanis for the effort in getting everything cleaned up and back in order after Corn Day. Jeremy Courson thanked the linemen who repaired and restored power following Sunday’s storm. Lacey Bradshaw said she’d been in touch with a contact out of Collinsville and is hopeful they can provide some insight regarding credit card processing fees.
With no closed session, council adjourned at 5:45pm.