Normal Town Council recognized for environmental efforts and approves key resolutions

NORMAL, Ill. – The Normal Town Council held its first meeting of the month on Monday, receiving the Bird City designation, discussing a contract for ambulance cot and lift maintenance, voting on a renewal of the employee insurance program, discussing a proposed law enforcement purchase and reviewing the town’s sustainability plan.

The Town of Normal was officially presented with the Bird City designation for its efforts over the years to protect the environment, conserve birds and promote better bird habitats.

Audubon Council of Illinois President Jennifer Kuroda praised the town for its work to improve and maintain the environment.

“We want to be able to recognize municipalities for all the great work they do to protect birds and conserve birds. Just to highlight a couple things from your application, you had a $75,000 grant to build bird-friendly habitat adjacent to the Constitution Trail, you use 18% of the community’s energy from renewable resources, and consecutive years’ designation as a bicycle-friendly community, and the silver lead certificate for the Children’s Discovery Museum. All of those really contribute to great environmental protection for birds in our community,” Kuroda said.

For more information on Bird City, Illinois, and the benefits of receiving this designation, take a look here.

During the omnibus vote agenda, council member Karyn Smith pulled a contract with the Stryker Corporation for ambulance cot and lift maintenance to discuss the benefits.

“I pulled this particular item from the Omnibus agenda because I wanted to highlight two of the things that this action is accomplishing. For one, the fire department has moved to these mechanized ambulance and cot lifts which is saving strain on fire personnel and medical personnel whose back injuries are a huge cause of workers comp claims,” Smith said. “That is to be commended, but we’re also making heavier use of this particular equipment and finding it quite a strain on the budget.”

City Manager Pamela Reece responded to Smith’s comment on the budget, supporting the resolution.

“We are asking the council to approve a 5 year contract which would have an annual cost of $24,518 per year for ongoing maintenance of the cots and the lifts, and just this year, as I understand it, we’ve had two repairs done, and those repairs cost $19,000, so when you’re trying to repair multiple cots, it does add up quickly,” Reece said.

This resolution was passed by the council unanimously.

A renewal of the employee group health, dental, life/AD&D and medicare advantage insurance program was approved by council unanimously with a 2.3% cost increase.

The council discussed records management for the Normal Police Department and a proposed budget increase to account for new suggested purchases.

Normal Police Department Chief Steve Petrilli spoke with the council, listing the proposed new purchases and their benefits. Some of these listed items include upgrading body-worn and in-car camera systems, upgrading their interview room and buying Axon’s unlimited premium digital evidence plan.

Town of Normal Director of Innovation and Technology Vasudha Gadhiraju explained the benefit of Axon’s unlimited premium plan.

“For law enforcement, one of the fastest growing data types is video, and that really accumulates fast and keeping up with that has been a challenge, so this unlimited digital evidence will be extremely handy for operations but also for maintenance perspective,” Gadhiraju said.

This resolution was approved by the council unanimously.

The Director of Planning & Zoning Mercy Davison provided the council with a presentation on the status of the Vision 2050, which is the Town of Normal’s current sustainability plan.

Davison started with reviewing Normal’s first sustainability plan (Vision 2035), which was adopted in 2010. The outcomes of this plan have included Normal receiving the Bicycle Friendly Community designation, instituting curbside recycling for residential use, restoring natural habitat at Hidden Creek and Underwood Park and extending Constitution Trail multiple times.

Vision 2050 was approved by the council in the Fall of 2024. Davison shared how this plan was constructed.

“The mayor pulled together a group of 19 citizens with diverse backgrounds and an outside consultant to come up with a refreshed sustainability plan, this time a little more tailored to our own operations (things that we can do as the town),” Davison said.

The plan was based on extensive outreach, scientific surveying, additional outreach through social media and focus groups. Davison said that the studies saw overwhelming support for the sustainability plan.

“84% of people surveyed were supportive or highly supportive of the town taking steps to invest in sustainable practice,” Davison said. “There was a lot of excitement around planting trees as a key sustainability initiative.”

When Vision 2050 was passed, a Staff Sustainability Committee, consisting of many local public figures from various different departments, was created. Since February, the committee has met on a monthly basis. A different department leads the meeting every month, proposing new initiatives to contribute to the sustainability plan.

Council member Kevin McCarthy shared his appreciation and support for the plan.

“I’m very excited and grateful that we have a very dedicated group of citizens that are engaged and have stayed engaged to help keep us moving forward,” McCarthy said. “I’m just tickled with the progress we’ve done, so thank you everybody that’s been involved.”

For more information on Vision 2050, take a look here.

The Normal Town Council meets every first and third Monday of each month. The next meeting will take place Oct. 20 at 7 p.m. on the fourth floor of Normal City Hall.