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Committee of the Whole Minutes

VILLAGE OF NORTH AURORA
COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE MEETING MINUTES
MARCH 4, 2019

CALL TO ORDER
Mayor Berman called the meeting to order.

ROLL CALL
In attendance: Mayor Dale Berman, Trustee Mark Gaffino, Trustee Mike Lowery, Trustee Laura Curtis, Trustee Mark Carroll, Trustee Mark Guethle, Village Clerk Lori Murray. Not in attendance: Trustee Tao Martinez.

AUDIENCE COMMENTS – None

TRUSTEE COMMENTS – None

DISCUSSION
1. Riverfront Park Plaza Concept Design
Jodi Mariano of Teska Associates presented a brief overview of the concept design for the Riverfront Park Plaza. Village Administrator Steve Bosco stated that once permitting is in place, Teska would provide construction level documents.

The design shows an upper and lower plaza. Staff talked about putting in the lower plaza as an alternative and determining what the cost would be.

Trustee Carroll asked if there has been talk about selling memorial bricks to help with the cost of the project. Bosco said that the design does not have brick paving, only concrete. Mariano added that there is plenty of opportunity for memorial type ideas that can be added such as name plates on boulders. Bosco noted that the village would be putting in grant requests for the project as well. The Board was in agreement with the ideas set forth in the concept design.

2. Annexation of Lippold Park
Jeff Palmquist from the Fox Valley Park District was in attendance at the meeting. There were no questions or concerns from the Board. Toth stated that if there is support and moves forward, the full annexation agreement would be presented at the Village Board meeting on March 18th.

3. Town Center Economic Incentive Agreement
Trustee Guethle asked about prevailing wage. Community & Economic Development Director Mike Toth stated that it is mentioned in the current agreement but only applies to applicability that is required by state law. It was not included in the original agreement. Guethle said he would like to adopt the project as a prevailing wage project. Trustee Curtis said that if it is not necessary, why force the issue. Why have the community pay more for a project than is necessary. Curtis suggested allowing Preferred Real Estate to hire who they want. The rest of the board was in favor of the prevailing wage.

Doug Vitale of Preferred Real Estate said that this will force an increase in the cost of the project. Guethle said that there is no study that states prevailing wage costs more. Guethle said he does not want to subsidize with out of area contractors. Vitale said he does not hire out of state and that the contractors would be local.

Guethle said that we need to make a stand if we are going to stand by prevailing wage. Carroll said he agreed, adding that the village is giving up a large subsidy for this project and as a village we should be adopting prevailing wage for this particular project. Gaffino agreed as well. Gaffino noted that one project in the past had carpet contractors that were from Texas and that didn’t help our community.

Mayor Berman said that the village would move forward with the Incentive Agreement with the inclusion of prevailing wage.

EXECUTIVE SESSION – None

ADJOURNMENT
Motion to adjourn made by Trustee Guethle and seconded by Trustee Carroll. All in favor. Motion approved.

Respectfully Submitted,

Lori J. Murray
Village Clerk

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