Council ignores survey; proceeds with Microtel negotiations
</element><element id="paragraph-1" type="body"><![CDATA[The Chester City Council met on Monday, December 19, 2011 where they voted 4/4 with a tie-breaking vote by Mayor Joe Eggemeyer to proceed with further negotiations with the Hotel Group Microtel TIF proposal. This decision was made even after the City paid $4,850 for a survey, which told them bringing a new hotel to Chester was not a good decision.
Council members who voted yes were: Donald Clark, Carole Abernathy, Kenneth Dillman and Richard Brueggemann.
Those voting no were: Michael Blechle, Ray Allison, Russ Rader and Nancy Crossland. After the vote was made there were many in attendance that were furious with the outcome and made comments about how upset they were with the decision.
The Council agreed to retain Attorney Terry Bruckert as special TIF Council by a recommendation from the City Attorney Jeff Kerkhover.
During the open public comment part of the meeting, Bill Knowles asked Mayor Eggemeyer what his opinion was on the hotel coming to town now that he had all the information and the survey had been completed. Eggemeyer's response was that that would be discussed when they got to that item on their agenda.
When the Council reached the item "Discuss Hotel Group Microtel TIF Proposal" there was no discussion by any member of the Council or the Mayor.
Brad Reid gave a lengthy speech to the Council about the survey and asked them to think about the findings before they made their decision, and to take into consideration the impact it would have on his business and on Chester. Reid told the Council that the findings made by the survey were clear and spelled out that failure of one or both of the hotels, due to not enough demand in Chester for an additional hotel.
Don Welge, also spoke to the Council about the survey. Welge told the Council that TIF is a good idea if it brings a business that is a new business to serve the community, but bringing in a business to compete with another business that is already here and not operating at capacity but at 50% is not a good idea. He also asked them to take into consideration that those individuals wanting to bring the hotel in have not hotel experience and have admitted that to the Council. He asked them to think carefully before placing their vote.
Another member of the audience spoke up to tell the council "This really sucks!" having two hotels and two hardware stores in the same small town is not a good idea and that she would be really upset if the council agreed with bringing in the Hotel.
Another lady in attendance at the meeting asked the Council to give a reason why they would be in favor of a new hotel when brining one could destroy Reid's who are already here. Carole Abernathy spoke up and said that Tourism wants people who come to Chester to have more choices of where to stay.
A lady who works at the Chester Welcome Center spoke up and said that many people come here to see Popeye and the other statues and they may stay for lunch but then they leave they don't spend the night in Chester.
In other new business the Council acted on the stop light request at Lehmen Dr. and Chester Center. Nancy Crossland, made a motion to deny the stop light request due to the fact the State nor the City has the money to put into the project. Her motion passed.
The Council opened bids for a 20' strip of city property, previously Hamm Property. They received one bid from Blackstone Group for $26,570. City Attorney Kerkhover told the Council he would have to prepare a contract before they took any action on the bid.
The Council passed a resolution to appropriate$240,000 for the 2012 Motor Fuel Tax Program.
The Council also approved new hours for Chester Welcome Center, and it will now be open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.
An ordinance was passed by Council to delete the Dean Andrew's property from the TIF District due to the fact that Dean Andrews is the Zoning Administrator for the TIF District and he owned a couple different lots in the district.