May County Board Updates

May had a return to many of the County Board committee meetings since the initial coronavirus cancellations and transition to remote meetings on Zoom. While most members are still attending remotely, there are some attending in person at the Brookens Administrative building. Some County Board members have raised safety concerns about the current process. Videos of the May meetings are primarily available on the Champaign County Clerk's YouTube Channel:

• 5/5 Facilities Committee (video, agenda packet)
• 5/7 Environment and Land Use Committee (ELUC) (video, agenda packet)
• 5/8 Highway and Transportation (video, agenda packet)
• 5/12 Committee of the Whole (COW) (video (date typo on YouTube), agenda packet)
• 5/18 County Board of Health (video, agenda, Cheat Sheet post)
• 5/21 Regular County Board meeting (video, agenda packet)

Agenda packets are generally available from the County website "Meeting Info" page by clicking the specific Board or Committee you need information for. This is a handy page to get previous meeting minutes and presentation materials and other handouts.

This post gives overviews and summaries of most of these meetings, but also has an additional reference to the City of Champaign's government that has put out a call highlighting a funding crisis being caused by the Champaign County government (jump to that item below here).

Committee Meeting Overview:

The Facilities meeting covered topics like public safety in County buildings, including the County Courthouse. The News-Gazette had an overview of coronavirus related precautions the Courts are taking to begin jury trials soon:

The first batch of summonses for jurors in a pandemic have been sent out in Champaign County with accommodations in place to make the process as safe as possible.

Those include watching jury orientation from home, only reporting to the courthouse when a trial is set to begin, sitting several feet apart and deliberating in a separate courtroom, not a jury room.

More details at the full article here. There was a more comprehensive overview of reopening the Courts earlier this month. Excerpt:

Pieces of Plexiglas are being installed around the witness stands to shield the court reporter, who is seated right in front of the witness, and to the side of the witness stand, to shield the jurors who sit closest to the witness.

It’s impractical to spread jurors out in the gallery because that would preclude spectators from having a place to sit. And Difanis noted that jurors have to be up close to hear audio clips and see physical evidence.

That full article here. The ELUC meeting was covered in the News-Gazette and looked at cannabis business regulations again. More on that at the News-Gazette here.

The Committee of the Whole (COW):

The Committee of the Whole began with public comments from a local business owner begging for economic relief and highlighting the damage being done to business owners and their livelihoods. The County Clerk made comments about the impact of the coronavirus on the primary election and potential impacts and planning for the 2020 general election.

The COW also had a presentation on the Youth Assessment Center and its work on diversion and restorative justice services. The slide presentation is available here. The video presentation is available here with a direct link.

In Board communications, member Stohr advocated an ad hoc committee to look at and possibly revive the jail consolidation plans. Member Harper would vehemently oppose the idea in the regular board meeting's communication portion next week. Jon Rector emphasized the public participation comments on the desperate economic relief needed locally in balance with health concerns. There were other members who spoke on and thanked community members for their efforts to help fellow citizens and other topics.

After the Treasurer's report, there was a technical discussion about payment penalties being delayed or forgiven, but the topic involved some confusing legal technicalities that I didn't fully understand. Deputy Director of Finance for the County, Tami Ogden and the Treasurer's office explained some of the administrative hurdles and complexities involved with some of the suggestions.

A little bit later there was a 50 minute discussion on mitigating expenses for 2020 and 2021. This discussion had an overview of the County's financial situation (dire) and projected hardships and revenue decreases (severe). There appears to be real concerns among Democrats that austerity measures will go too far and Republicans that the Board may not be prepared to cut deep enough to keep the County government functioning. The discussion appeared sobering to all County Board members who were already looking at difficult budget choices before this crisis. The Finance Committee will be looking at the issues and sacred cows raised during this discussion to bring some options back before the board later.

There was some debate on extending the county disaster proclamation, a dispute about the message it sent for reopening the local economy versus its role in ensuring that the County could receive funding related to the the current coronavirus emergency and other funds. Republicans throughout the meeting emphasized the economic concerns while Democrats emphasized the health concerns. The differing emphasis aligned with assessments of economic and health impacts and interpretation of data that has become a divisive topic in both local and State politics.

The jail consolidation issue was brought up again, with all of the concerns about the downtown jail being on the verge of having to be shut down at any time, no current plan to come up with a facilities remedy, and now a situation where other jails are unlikely to accept any prisoners that may need to be segregated or moved elsewhere.

The video of the meeting cuts off around three and half hours in, but towards the agenda of the agenda items. John Clifford resigned at the end of the COW meeting according to the agenda.

Regular County Board Meeting:

The regular County Board meeting began with multiple public participation speakers on the topic of the coronavirus and its impact. There was a presentation from scientists at the University of Illinois on coronavirus data. Will Kyles, an at-large member of the City of Champaign City Council spoke on the impact on minority owned businesses and the need to consider that impact in reopen policies. Others spoke on impacts to those in addiction recovery, the local health care industry, and our local homeless population.

Former County Board member and Champaign County Auditor Diane Michaels was sworn in to fill the vacancy left by John Cliffords.

The County Executive delivered her annual report to the County Board, though the video quality and compression made it unreadable from the Zoom app to the live streaming videos for home viewers. The projections started at a worst case scenario, but overall the outlook is looking grim for future revenues. The current budgets were already strained under debt, limited balances, and departments already operating on limited staff. Maintenance, IT, facilities, and other basic needs have been delayed for years and in dire shape (if not flirting with disaster such as with the downtown Jail or unsupported technology).

The County Executive asked County Board members to make sure their priorities and sacred cows were made known so that the upcoming budget cuts could take their concerns into consideration. Funding for the County's reentry programs and staff employment and pay were mentioned in the discussion afterward.

City of Champaign:

The City of Champaign's Mayor raised serious concerns with the Champaign County Board and Treasurer's Office during "Council Comments" of the most recent City Council meeting. at the 27:40 mark in the full video. She argues that social programs in Champaign and through the Champaign County Regional Planning Commission are being threatened due to a lack of an audit required for funding. She explains that we are in jeopardy of losing millions of dollars of that funding and encourages people to contact to their County Board members to address the audit delay. She says they have been receiving letters from funding providers citing the lack of audit for a potential loss of funding.

March / April County Board Updates

The pandemic may have interrupted a lot of plans and activities, but local governments still continued, albeit with more remote access and technology hurdles than usual. The County Board meetings since our last coverage of the regular February meeting have been... interesting... to say the least. The videos are available on the Champaign County Clerk's YouTube Channel here.


March County Board Meetings:

The March Facilities Committee meeting delved into the jail consolidation plans and public concerns again. The video is available here for those interested in where they left off before those plans were canceled.

The last normal County Board meeting was the Committee of the Whole (What is this?) on March 10th. That video is available here and generally focused on the jail consolidation plans that have since fallen apart under the uncertainty of the coronavirus and its detrimental effects on budgets and planning. There was a great deal of public participation and a presentation on the jail consolidation issues, including local activists and State Representative Carol Ammons and the Criminal Justice Collaboration presentation.

There was also an update by Rosecrance on the Champaign County Reentry Council (video link here) and a presentation on the Champaign County Clerk's website updates (video link here).

After that March 10th meeting, the coronavirus news took a dark turn for the rest of the week, from European travel bans to the NBA canceling games and the country beginning to close down. University students were asked to return home and life changed dramatically.

The "regular" County Board meeting for March was done partially in its normal location with initial attempts at social distancing as well as with remote Zoom meeting participation. That chaotic learning process is available on video here. The technical issues, sound problems, alien reverberation noises, etc made the meeting almost unwatchable.

Public participation started around the 25 minute mark (video link here) and began with concerns about the jail and the infection control concerns with the coronavirus. Public participation continued later in the video (due to difficulties with the new Zoom app method of participating) and that video link is here.


April County Board Meetings:

A lot of the meetings in the rest of March and in April were canceled due to the coronavirus outbreak in the United States, including the April Committee of the Whole meeting.

The regular County Board meeting was still a bit of a technical difficulty mess, but improved over the month before (video available here). The main issue of contention at this meeting was about pandemic funds and making them available for immediate use if need be or requiring approval or emergency approval by the County Board. A lot of budget technicalities were discussed about ensuring the funds balances were sufficient to set aside the money for that purpose while ensuring the County's other obligations were paid on time.

In the end half of the funds for pandemic response were made available in case they were needed immediately, with the remaining half available later. In an emergency those funds could be made available by a special meeting of the County Board in roughly 48 hours, if I understood the details correctly.

There seemed to be some concern among Democrats on whether the Republicans were being sticklers on protecting the County's financial situation or being unreasonable due to partisan distrust. There appears to be a division locally mirroring national disputes on the facts and what they mean.

There was a presentation on the Champaign County Financial Forecast that is worth checking out if one is interested in the outlook prior to the coronavirus pandemic basically adding endless uncertainty and wrecking balls through it. The written report is available in PDF format here.

There was also some discussion about extending the contract with Rosecrance on the reentry program and some quick questions about the effect of the coronavirus so far.


May Links:

May meetings are available on the County Clerk's YouTube channel and will be the subject of another post. They're available to watch now, with a bonus meeting of the County Board of Health, available separately here, that had an unusual amount of public participation and questions and answers worth checking out. That meeting and a general coronavirus update is available in a previous post here.

A new County Board member (also former Board member and County auditor, Diane Michaels was seated to fill the vacancy left by John Clifford who resigned at the end of the May Committee of the Whole meeting.

Coronavirus and General Updates

Sometimes the Cheat Sheet doesn't have any posts for days or weeks depending on how busy everyone is and everything going on in the world. The last 12 weeks since we last posted have been an extraordinary time for everyone.

The coronavirus went through some naming conventions and concerns about political correctness versus inflaming racial tensions. Older posts still refer to the likely geographic origin, but the technical names for second severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus, or SARS-CoV-2 and the coronavirus disease of 2019, or COVID-19, that it causes are a lot to type out.

I'll be referring to the coronavirus currently kicking humanity in the teeth as the coronavirus and qualify any other coronavirus with additional information (e.g. the original SARS or in contrast with less virulent coronaviruses that cause other diseases).

The latest County statistics on the coronavirus here are still available on the C-UPHD website here, with regular updates on their facebook here. There's also a collaborative effort to help businesses during the reopening phases here.

For folks looking for more detailed information and with some spare time on their hands (and coffee), I strongly recommend the last Champaign County Board of Health meeting video here (with a 17 minute delay during logons and Zoom setup). The meeting runs about two and half hours, but it begins with an update by Julie Pryde of the C-U Public Health Department with the latest information on local outbreaks and efforts. If you keep watching beyond that you'll get to see her respond to community and County Board member concerns on a host of issues.

Some highlight's from that update last week included details on the the 19 local outbreaks in Champaign County. There were over 700 people in quarantine (potentially exposed and avoiding contact and further spread) and 188 people in isolation (confirmed infected and avoiding contact with others). The low hospitalization rates due to the lower ages of many of those who have been exposed.

Critically, our local region, including Champaign County, is in a "sweet spot" according to Pryde when it comes to our hospital capacity in the cities and overall infection rates and treatment needs. This means that we're on track to move to Phase 3 of the reopening process. This next step allows other classes of businesses to open along with essential businesses and relaxes some other areas of the Stay at Home Executive Order. She answered numerous questions and addressed several concerns about the timing and process of this.

Phase 3 has a minimum period of 28 days (or two incubation cycles) to ensure that changes to the mitigation policy are being done safely. With the exponential nature of out of control infections, lives hang in the balance between being patient enough to have accurate data and acting quickly enough to control outbreaks before they get out of hand. An exhausting and constant effort that has been going on locally since the beginning of the year.

One of the issues that came up was child care access expanding in Phase 3, which would be necessary for many parents, but there were concerns about needing more details. Illinois Newsroom had a blurb on that this morning:

Child care facilities  will be able to operate again once Illinois enters the third phase of its reopening plan, which is expected Friday. Maria Whalen is president and CEO of Illinois Action for Children’s, which offered input into the plan to reopen child care centers. “I think that this is a plan that recognizes that at the end of the day, we’re talking about children who are being cared for in congregate settings,” said Whalen.  Newly reopened child care facilities will limit rooms sizes to eight for infants and 10 for others. There are now new sanitation and social distancing requirements. Children over the age of 2 will wear face covering when possible.

More information will probably be available as policy meets reality next week.

The meeting ended by adding an additional June 1st Meeting at 5:30pm (with Zoom meeting information for people to attend remotely to be made available on the Champaign County website later). It will be for additional public participation and updates prior to the regular meeting scheduled on June 16th. 

I'll try to get more updates and information on the Cheat Sheet going forward. I apologize for the long break while adjusting to the every changing landscape on how local governments were adapting and a tsunami of news and information that we just couldn't keep up with. I have a huge to do list on updates and information on how people can still participate in local government. Good luck and stay safe, everybody!