January 18, 2026 Local Stories in and Around St. Joseph, Illinois

Live at St. Joseph Village Board, Jan. 23, 2024

I was just a tad late and they are discussing solar. They are getting a presentation from Keystone who builds solar on wastewater plants.


Shout out to MX Electric for sponsoring our live blogs.


Here is the solar presentation. https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1YDnRYt283KR3567Q4PBsLy0mB1N_2gX6

They are going to discuss this later too: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1YDnRYt283KR3567Q4PBsLy0mB1N_2gX6

This is a deep dive on what this company offers and your interest in it really depends on your interest in solar power. The board is asking a lot of questions. Max in particular has a lot of questions but electricity is kinda his thing.
There is a lot of discussion about what it means if the village owns the system versus someone else owning it, ect.

Moving on to discuss park budgeting. Terri Cummings. “When we did strategic planning- parks was one of our goals.” “One of the objectives was we need to have a revenue source.” They have talked about a sales tax referendum. Talking about how Pickleball has done a lot on their own. “I think we should consider things but move cautiously.”

Discussing what the goals were during the strategic planning.

Tami talking about the private group that worked on the sports complex. There is a telecommunication tax but the amount they get from it is very, very small. Tami wants a half-cent sales tax increase dedicated to the parks. She says it won’t increase property taxes and it would affect people who don’t live here, ect. coming off the highway to get gas, ect.

Tami saying there is a huge balancing act between maintaining parks and filling potholes, etc.

Discussing pros and cons of a parks and recreation director and how other towns fund parks. Mahomet has a foundation.

They will put their thoughts together and send ideas to Joe.

2024 clean-up discussion. They want to do it. it will be after the garage sales. Not the Saturday of the garage sales. Garage Sales are May 2, 3 and 4 just so you know.

Tami saying Public Works did a great job cleaning up after the snow, ect. #theyarethebest

meeting adjourned.

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