$1.14 Billion MWRD Budget Finalized as Comm. Walsh Replaces Comm. Santos

Metropolitan Water Reclamation District Board Meeting - Dec. 15, 2016

Key Actions Taken:

• The Board further amended the 2017 budget that was passed on Dec. 8 by increasing it by $ 2 million.  This is now a final budget. 
• The Board approved an amendment to a lease to the city of Palos Heights for District-owned property that Palos Heights operates as a public park and lake, public recreation facilities, roadways, and public parking areas that is commonly known as the Lake Katharine Recreation Center.* The amendment allows for the consumption of alcohol at designated areas.  Palos Heights rents out the facilities for private functions, such as weddings and fundraisers, and the people and entities renting the facilities wished to serve alcohol, which had been forbidden under the lease, which is standard under the MWRD leases.  The money from these rentals covers a significant amount of the costs for operating the Recreation Center.  

* This item had been deferred from the Dec. 1 Board meeting to allow time for the MWRD Executive Director. David St. Pierre, to hold a meeting with Palos Heights, the nonprofit Board which manages Lake Katherine for the City, and the townhome associations around the Center who had expressed concerns about allowing alcohol, as well as about the lack of transparency in the Board’s operations.  Such meeting was held, and an agreement worked out which included the Board agreeing to have a representative from each townhome association on the Board, as well as agreeing that it would disclose material to the same extent as the City would need to, pursuant to the Freedom of Information Act, which the Board is otherwise not subject to.

Comm. Walsh Replaces Comm. Santos

• In the Eyewitness Report for the Dec. 1 Board meeting, it was noted that that was the last meeting for Commissioner David Walsh, who had been appointed to serve an unexpired term of an open Board position by Governor Rauner until the position could be filled in the Nov. 8 General Election.  Commissioner Martin J. Durkan was elected to that position which has a remaining 2-year term.  
• However, Commissioner Cynthia Santos, last elected in 2014 for her 3rd 6-year term, was recently appointed to the Illinois Pollution Control Board by Governor Rauner, and so she resigned her MWRD Board position.  Governor Rauner then appointed Comm. Walsh to serve in her place until the 2018 election.  

Item of Note:
Next MWRD Board meeting:  Jan. 5 at 10:30 am.  Note that per the MWRD’s Rules, the Chairs and Vice-chairs of all the Standing Committees (except for the Chair of Finance) shall be appointed by the President, with the approval of the majority of the Commissioners.

Observer - Priscilla Mims