The Village of South Jacksonville handled mostly personnel issues last night during their regular board meeting.
Treasurer Tiffanee Peters was missing from the meeting for the second month in a row. Village Attorney Rob Cross was also not in attendance. Trustees Jackie Killion and Stacy Pinkerton attended the meeting remotely.
In the first action item of the night, the Village Board failed to approve the appointment of former trustee Todd Warrick to the open trustee seat in a vote of 3-2 against the appointment, with trustees Tom Jordan, Stacy Pinkerton, and John Stewart all voting ‘no’.
Village President Dick Samples voiced his displeasure with the vote after the meeting: “I was very disappointed that [Warrick] wasn’t voted in tonight. He’s got to go through another 30 days if he so desires. If he doesn’t, I understand that 100%. It’s super tough to find anybody that wants to work out here. My condolences to this guy, I apologize to him. I should’ve found out the vote beforehand and said ‘come’ or ‘don’t come,’ but somebody didn’t vote the way they was supposed to tonight, and by that, I mean they promised me the way they’d vote and they didn’t do it.”
Samples says he’s also had trouble filling the open Clerk position due to similar arguments about recent drama that has occurred in the village over previous administrations: “It’s still open. We don’t have anybody in line to do it. It’s another matter of probably myself training somebody or something. Whatever. I’ve got all I can do right now before I can worry about a clerk.” Village employee Clay Johnson continues to do the job of the clerk at meetings for the village.
In other personnel business, the trustees approved the promotion of Sergeant Brian Wilson to Detective at the village police department. The village also approved the hiring of Anley Gerdes and Joe Perry to full time officer positions. Village Police Chief Eric Hansell that the police department would now be fully staffed for the first time since February of last year.
The Village Fire Department recently held elections for assistant fire chief positions on Monday. The village board approved the appointment of first assistant chief Dave Bye and 2nd assistant chief Dave Sausito.
In other village business, the board approved a TIF agreement of up to $270,000 with Jose Lopez for renovation of 1852 South Main Street into a new banquet hall facility at the old Reichert’s Banquet Hall building. The board also approved the purchase and adoption of a newly designed village logo. Board members suggested that they look into trademarking the logo, which comes in both silver and gold, during discussion at the next village committee of the whole meeting. The village also approved to sell or dispose of several old computers, computer screens, old squad car parts, and miscellaneous other items that have been taking up space at village hall. A comprehensive list of items will be available to the public at a later date.
The next meeting of the village board was also set for a committee of the whole on Thursday, February 17th at 6PM.