Grayville leaders have been grappling with a liquor license request from valued community business The Smokin’ Pig for more than a month now.
Read more at Grayville Council Wants to Hear from Public Before Allowing Sunday Liquor Sales to Start at 10am – WRUL-FM
And after Monday, they will continue to wrangle with it despite spending more time wringing their hands over the question of whether to allow the licensure to open up two hours early at 10am on Sundays. About 9 of the 16-minute post executive session were spent on the topic.
Commissioners say some of the fellow liquor license holders don’t want it. Others say they’ve talked to folks who aren’t all that concerned about it. Grayville Police Chief Mason Siegel offered input saying that he didn’t expect adding the two hours would result in a significant increase in crime, but that he didn’t have any empirical data to back that up. Later, he said he understood where the purveyor of the restaurant was coming from.
From the Pig’s perspective, you’ve got a lot of people at the KOA that are staying there anyway. They’re going to come up and have breakfast and maybe want a Mimosa or a Bloody Mary so I could see where they would think it would be beneficial and I do think it would be well received by the campers.
Commissioner Don Baldwin would eventually suggest tabling the matter one more time to gather additional perspectives adding the council needed to definitely “do something or get off the pot”. Only Commissioner James voted no on tabling the item.
Also Monday night, Commissioners agreed to apply for an IEPA Water Pollution Control loan. The city just received a million dollar grant for it’s sewer lagoon project that is now expected to get underway in the spring of 2027.
Read more at Grayville Gets Million Dollar Community Development Block Grant – WRUL-FM
Mayor Travis Thompson says the money for that project is on hand, but applying and getting the low interest loan would also potentially free up those funds for other infrastructure improvements. Council agreed to a first reading on that ordinance.
And finally, under new business, the city agreed to a loan grant request to Zack Walter for the demolition of property at 302 North Fourth Street. The cost of the cleanup is expected to run $5,500 and in order to facilitate that demo, the city agreed to grant Walter $2,750 or half the cost.