Good morning everyone.

Today is September 3rd, 2025, and I call the Lake County Public Works and Transportation Committee meeting to order at 8:30 a.m.

In addition to being able to attend in-person, remote attendance has been made available to the public via Zoom at the link on the agenda.

This meeting is being recorded through Zoom.

The Power County Board rules and the Open Meetings Act attendance via remote means is permitted for qualifying reasons as long as the majority of the committee members are physically present.

We've been notified in advance by Member Maine that she has requested to participate electronically due to one of the qualifying reasons.

As a remember to men, as a reminder to members attending remotely, please ensure your camera is on at all times.

Can you please join me in the pledge of allegiance?

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands.

Can I get a roll call, please?

Member Caslin?

Here.

Vice Chair Maine.

Present.

Member Roberts.

Member Washington.

All right.

Is there any public comment today?

There is no.

Don't have any cheers remarks.

No unfinished business.

So our new business is our consent agenda, which is items 8.1 to 8.2.

Can I get a motion in a second?

Motion by Kasmin, second by Hunter.

All in favor?

Aye.

Any opposed?

Motion carries.

On our regular agenda, item 8.3 is our RTA quarterly update.

Okay, you should be able to speak.

Good morning, everyone.

My name is Kate Peterson, Mobility Outreach Coordinator at the RTA.

I also have Zach Brown with me from our government affairs team.

He will be providing our government update for you today.

But I have a brief update for mobility management, including that our transit guides are now on our website.

So our transit guides contain information about local dial ride services, on-demand services, and subsequent programs.

There are nine guides focusing on the different areas to help customers connect to public transportation and travel throughout their communities.

So that is now on our website.

I will include that in my follow-up to all of you this morning, as well as just our second update for mobility management is our section 5310 program.

So on August 21st, 2025, the RK Board of Directors approved a program of projects that will make it easier for older adults and people with disabilities to get to jobs, medical appointments, grocery stores, social activities, etc.

The Section 5310 program is a federal formula grant program that provides assistance to public transportation projects that focuses on enhancing mobility for seniors and individuals with disabilities.

The RTA will award over 16 million in federal funding to 16 projects, including Lake County, who will be receiving 1,750,000 in federal funds with that same amount in local match.

And the RTA is also doing a regional dial ride coordination study.

So we awarded ourselves dollars to that.

I know both of those are great news coming to Lake County.

So wanted to share that.

Thanks, Kate.

Good morning, everyone.

First being that our uh 2026 regional transit budget process is underway.

Our board of directors at last month's meeting approved the funding marks ordinance, which sets the operating amounts for the system for the next budget year.

We project that there is 2.6 billion dollars for operations system-wide this coming year.

And uh we did uh shift, uh, do a one-time shift of some discretionary funds, uh about 75 million dollars to help align services region wide.

Um, I do want to clarify that uh with this shift, uh, no service in Lake County or elsewhere uh will be impacted.

Uh Metro and PACE both are fully funded for the service that they have planned uh in the upcoming budget year.

Um second uh update that I have is that our ADA paratransit action plan will take effect in October of this year.

This would include a cap on rides for the rideshare access and taxi access programs offered by PACE.

This was due to a budget shortfall that uh came up due to uh the increased ridership uh of those programs.

The programs grew very quickly, and um some measures to keep balanced budgets uh have to be put in place.

And so I'm happy to answer any questions that the board may have on that.

Um, as I know there's a lot of information circulating around there.

Um, and then lastly, I would like to highlight that the RTA uh every Tuesday in September, uh starting uh September 9th, it will be hosting our transportation Tuesday webinar series.

Uh and those cover a variety of transportation topics.

Um, and we would encourage uh members of the board and your constituents to attend if available.

Um, and links to register for each of those events are included in the digital version uh of my update.

Uh, happy to answer any questions you may have.

Thank you.

And thank you both for coming.

I know we as a board really appreciate these updates for ourselves and for our constituents so that we know what's going on.

I had a question about the caps.

I know I'd heard there was going to be a potentially a cap on rides for the pair trans.

Is there is there a cap now or do you know what the cap is proposed to be?

So the uh effects of the action plan will take effect on October 1st.

And uh this is a um a cap only on the rideshare and taxi access program rides.

So we want to emphasize that for all ADA eligible riders, traditional paratransit will remain a transportation option uncapped uh for riders if they exhaust the 30 rides in a given month using wrapper tap.

Okay, thank you for that clarification.

And it's great to hear about all the increased funding for paratransit um and for the mobility enhancement um money.

And so would we expect to see any of that for our to help support our um Ridley County system?

Do you know?

Or is that more just the RTA paratransit?

That is for right the Ride Lake County system.

That's what I thought.

Okay, terrific.

Well, that's terrific news.

All right.

Anyone else have any other questions?

All right.

Well, thank you both so much again for coming this morning and for your update.

Of course, thank you for having us.

Thank you.

All right.

Next is our division of transportation item 8.4 is a joint resolution authorizing an agreement with the Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning for the Lake County Division of Transportation to provide transportation planning staff assistance for the Lake County Council of Mayors and receive an allocation of federal funds to cover the scope of services provided.

Can I get a motion and second motion by Hewitt, second by Roberts?

Good morning, Director Schneider.

Good morning, committee members.

Shane Schneider, uh, director of transportation and county engineer.

So this is an annual renewal of our CMAP agreement for the Lake County Council of Mayors.

So uh L C D OT staff uh serves as the planning liaison for the Lake County Council of Mayors.

So we are in charge of programming the federal funds uh that's allocated to the council.

It's about 11 million dollars per year.

Uh the council is made up of about 50 local municipalities and townships and the forest preserve and LCDOT.

Then we work through a systematic systematic method to program those funds that the council approves.

So we get reimbursed for our staff time for that effort.

It's a little over 200,000.

All right.

So yeah, so it's get we get reimbursed from the federal funds.

And so we kind of like coordinate like all those 50 municipalities, Lakelake County DOTs kind of like in sort of in charge, sort of and of coordinating all that.

Yeah, we serve as kind of the staff administrative role.

Okay.

And then each municipality is a voting member.

So they vote to approve all the recommendations that staff makes.

Gotcha.

Thank you.

Any questions?

All right.

All in favor?

Aye.

Any opposed?

Motion carries.

Item 8.5 is a joint resolution authorizing the execution of an agreement with the Illinois State Toll Authority, highway authority, stating the terms and conditions for the rehabilitation of the Deerfield Road Bridge over the Tri-State Tollway I-94 I294, and appropriating 1,854,000 of the county option motor fuel tax funds.

Can I get a motion in a second?

Motion McCasman, second by Hunter.

So there's a location map that'll come up here in a second, but um the toll way made us aware that they are making improvements to the Deerfield Road Bridge over uh 94.

So this is uh obviously the I-94 expressway is under the jurisdiction of the toll way, but the county has jurisdiction of Deerfield Road that passes over.

So we jointly own and maintain the bridge structure.

The toll way basically owns everything from the beams down.

And then the county owns the deck and above.

So typically when one agency pursues maintenance, we involve the other agencies.

We can do it jointly for efficiency.

In this case, the tollway is gonna be completing some work to their abutments in the bridge structure.

And then they've asked us if we want to partner and do some maintenance repairs to the deck.

So the timing is good.

So we are gonna be uh moving forward with this work in in partnership with them.

Uh the work is expected to take place in 2026 next year.

So this fall and winter, the design work will uh be underway, then we'll go out to bid next summer.

So we're covering our share of the design costs and the uh construction.

And you said the construction season maybe next year.

Correct.

So like next summer.

And we'll do if the bridge will be open partially during construction.

Yeah, it's planning to stay open.

There'll be uh daily lane closures, but overall the the structure will remain open for traffic in both directions.

Yeah, and I did notice.

So it says we're gonna be reimbursed.

So is this with after the reimbursement?

It says that we may be remote Oh no, we are reimbursing the tollway.

So is the tollway taking gonna be do the construction and we're just reimbursing our portion?

Correct.

They'll be the lead agency, so they'll hire the consultant that'll do the design, then they'll oversee the construction project, and then we'll just reimburse them for our cost.

Oh, great.

There's a lot of efficiencies there for sure for us.

And also I always like to show this is our county option uh motor fuel tax fund.

So it shows how important these funds are for and investing in infrastructure in Lake County, especially on this.

I mean, I don't know about you, but this is I've been over this bridge a few times.

All right, yeah, it's an important, important connector here.

Any other questions?

All right, all in favor?

Aye.

Any opposed?

Motion carries.

Item 8.6 is joint resolution authorizing an agreement with Gowalt Hamilton Associates Inc., Vernon Hills, Illinois, to provide professional engineering services for the 2026 Accessible Pedestrian Signal Project at a maximum cost of 363,941 and appropriating 436,000 of the quarter percent sales tax for transportation funds.

Can I get a motion?

A second motion by Hunter, second by Kasbin.

So these are the push buttons that you see at signalize uh intersections, you press the button.

Um there's new federal guidelines that dictates that we replace those buttons to a new audible uh system.

So when you press the button, it beeps, and then it also talks to you and lets you uh you know when it's safe to cross.

So we're going through completing several rounds of replacement uh with ultimate goal of replacing um all locations on the system.

Um there's a total of 179 locations after this contract will be 83% done.

And then the remaining work will be completed with individual projects over the next three to five years.

Um, this is our second standalone APS replacement project.

Uh the current or the first one is underway right now.

So uh by the end of next year, we'll be uh over 80, 80% um replaced.

Wow, that's really good.

So currently we like the first batch is being done now.

This is the second big batch done on the and then we'll just the rest of them will fill in as they have projects programmed.

Correct.

Yeah, the other locations have projects already planned in the tip within the next five years.

Yeah.

And some of them are more complicated, so it just makes sense to save them and do them with the road work.

No, that makes sense.

And this is for the push buttons, not curb cuts, correct?

It's mainly the push buttons, but if we're at a location where the ramp is not compliant, uh then we'll replace it.

Okay, great.

That's good to see more accessibility.

Any questions?

All right, all in favor?

Aye.

Any opposed?

Motion carries.

Item 8.7 is a joint resolution authorizing a contract with Mead Inc., Willowbrook, Willowbrook, Illinois, in the amount of 1,487,143 and 71 cents for the main excuse me for the maintenance of traffic control signals, street lights, and lake county passage field elements under the applicable high Illinois Highway Code from December 1st, 2025 to November 30th, 2026, and appropriating 1,785,000 of motor fuel tax funds, 1,700,000 for maintenance and 85,000 for electrical service.

Can I get a motion?

Second motion by Hewitt, second by Roberts.

So the second half of that, I'll just talk about that first.

That's just providing power to all of our traffic signals and street lights.

So that's our annual bill to come ed.

Um, and then the first part of this is uh this is our our traffic signal maintenance contract.

So we contract this workout, uh, we do a low bid, it's a one-year contract with the option to extend it for two additional years uh at our option.

Um, but this company will go out and respond to uh any defects with the traffic signals or the street lighting on the system.

They respond on a 24-7, 365 basis.

Uh, they complete monthly inspections of all uh intersections, test all the equipment, then if there's any defects that occur, um they replace them.

And then if we have a planned improvement that we want to make, there's a piece of equipment that we want to upgrade.

There's low bid pricing for each of those items that we can uh choose to replace with this contract as well.

So it's proving to be very efficient.

There's two contractors that kind of battle it out every time we bid it and they have very competitive rates.

Yeah, it's good to hear.

And I like that it's a shared services contract, right?

We're with Buffalo Grove, Deerfield, Deer Park, Gurney, Highland Park, and Highwood, because there's definitely economies of scale with all of us doing it together.

And so if so if a light light burned out at like a traffic light, then they would go out and fix it.

Is that basically included with their uh monthly maintenance fee that they replace anything that you know burns out or um just is defected or uh and this would be more efficient, it sounds like it's not all the time to do this instead of doing it in-house with our own employees.

Like yeah, we've looked at trying to do this work in in-house um and just the price alone, the upfront cost to buy all the equipment.

Um, this this proves to be much more efficient.

But we do evaluate it every few years to see if you know if these prices do go up, then it maybe at some point it might make sense to bring it in-house, but currently it's cheaper to go this route.

That makes sense.

Okay, questions?

All right, all in favor?

Aye.

Any opposed?

Motion carries.

Item 8.8 is a joint resolution authorizing an agreement with V3 Companies Limited, Woodridge, Illinois, to provide professional engineering services for improvements of Cedar Lake Road from Illinois Route 60 to Illinois Route 120 at a maximum cost of $3,615,705 and appropriating $4,340,000 of the county option motor fuel tax funds.

Can I get in a motion in a second?

Motion by Hunter, second by Kasman.

So there's three primary components of work that we're uh gonna be designing here.

Uh the first is uh our resurfacing of Cedar Lake Road from Illinois 120 down to uh Illinois 60.

And in particular, the south half of that from town line to 60, uh, needs to be resurfaced very soon.

Um, the other component of work will be looking at the intersection of town line road and cedar lake road.

I will be doing a full intersection uh study there to determine if improvements are needed.

Um, potentially looking at uh traffic signal or roundabout.

And then the third component of work would be a new non-motorized facility, a bike path along the corridor that would connect up uh to the north, uh the Nipper Sink Forest Preserve.

And then just north of that, as you approach uh Illinois 134, you have downtown Round Lake, and that's where our Cedar Lake Road realignment project is.

So that'll pull all of those improvements into this corridor and then connect that all the way down to Illinois 60, and then there's various neighborhoods along that route.

Wow.

Um, so those are kind of the three three main elements uh right now.

We're planning for one to three construction projects um with most likely it being two.

You know, we think uh we'll be able to accomplish the resurfacing from town line south to 60 and the non-motorized component in contract one, and then contract two would be the intersection improvement at town line and then the north piece of Cedar Lake Road.

Wow.

But all that'll be figured out through the engineering analysis.

So this is for a phase one and two engineering services for for the whole project.

That's correct.

And then we'll figure out how to actually construct it in phases after they figured that out.

Right.

And the main reason we put phase one and phase two together is because we know that resurfacing piece needs to be done quickly.

So that'll be a priority.

We want to get that done within the next one to two years.

So we'll expedite that work and we think we've got right-of-way um established so we can do the non-motorized piece as well.

Yeah.

We're gonna we're gonna analyze that.

A bay, a bike, the bike path there would be like a game changer connecting that area.

And it's good to see again that the county, it's our county um option motor fuel tech.

So showing that these paying for these important projects.

Member Wasick.

I think I'll read this right, but the proposal for the multi-use path is on the east side of Cedar Lake Road, is that correct?

Right now it's it's not determined.

Okay.

Um just shown there kind of, you know, in schematic uh view.

Uh, we haven't picked the side yet.

That'll be part of the analysis to see what what makes more sense.

Yeah, I mean it at this point I could just tell you anecdotally that the bulk of the population that would be using this multi-use path is on the east side, uh connecting Madrona Village uh to the east there.

Um, but DeWalt Hamilton or the engineers will be studying this.

Correct.

Okay.

Yes.

Thanks.

Yeah, exciting project.

Any other questions?

All right.

All in favor?

Aye.

Any opposed?

Motion carry.

Item 8.9 is a joint resolution authorizing an agreement with Christopher B.

Burke Engineering Limited, Rosemont, Illinois to provide professional engineering services for improvements at the intersection of Center Street and Atkinson Road at a maximum cost of $1,526 and $890, $1,526,891.

And appropriating $1,835,000 of the quarter percent sales tax for transportation funds.

Can I get a motion in a second?

Motion by Wasick, second by Kasman.

So in this uh study, this is just a phase one uh preliminary planning study.

We'll be looking at intersection improvements at Center Street, uh, which is a county highway in Atkinson Road, which is a village gurney road.

So uh we know the traffic signal equipment is out of date.

Um there's a lack of turning lanes in certain directions.

So we'll be looking to at a minimum uh enhance turning lanes and and traffic signal equipment.

We'll also be looking at potential for a roundabout or uh more substantial traffic signal uh optimization project.

However, we are aware that there's significant underground utilities and pipelines in the area that may restrict what what is actually feasible.

So that will all be vetted out.

We'll do a detailed um investigation of the utilities, including exposing those utilities and actually survey grade locations to determine where those pipelines are.

That's um the first component of the work, and then the second component of work will be investigating a new multi-use path that would go east all the way to US 45.

Um, and connect up kind of the wild wood area with the Grays Lake Corridor.

There's several trails um within Grays Lake already.

This would connect everything up to the business district along uh US 45 and then some of the residents that are trying to get back and forth to the wild wood area.

That would be terrific.

Any questions?

Member Kasbin.

Um just want to like a piece of election for any exactly what you're talking about, but I'm just in case anybody's watching.

I don't want to say Gurney.

Yes, you did, but it's okay.

Thank you.

I did I knew what you're it just I thought that was quite a connector.

I was like, that's awesome.

People from Green very excited to hear about that multi-use path.

Um that's that's gonna be a huge connector for for people in my district.

It's exciting to see.

Member Wasig.

Oh, she so I'm just thinking ahead a little bit.

So I love the idea of a multi-use path connecting uh center to 45.

But when you get to 45, it's it's gonna dead end because there's absolutely no multi-use path along 45.

I know it's state highway, but I was wondering if you've talked to the forest preserve about cutting a path north, uh perhaps through Braylock, uh, because they they've green lighted a feasibility study to move their general offices into Braylock.

So that would make sense to have it go north and then you just take it a little bit further north.

I know we're talking about state highway again.

Um, then you would be connecting it to CLC.

So I was wondering if if those talks are part of this plan or if you anticipate getting these other uh agencies involved.

We we do anticipate working with the forest preserve because part of this will be looking at what side of the road should it go on.

And if it would go on the north side, then that would you know have to involve the forest preserve there.

So yes, we will be engaging with them.

And if it makes sense to to reroute it in a different direction, we'd certainly be open to that.

You know, this is just a planning study.

Um, but at a minimum, in our mind, we're thinking, you know, we would at least complete the pedestrian crossing across US 45 to get folks to the east side of the road.

And then currently there's a pace bus pad on the southwest corner of center and 45.

We would tie that in.

So that I mean that's kind of the minimum basics that we'd look to include.

But if something else makes more sense, we're definitely open to that.

And you're considering both sides of the road in the study, right?

North and south, correct.

Okay.

Because that that south um west corner is is farm bureau property now.

Correct.

And if you take that south, it it just you maybe you can connect to 120, and there is a case pad down there as well.

So Kevin had some other details you wanted to share.

So yeah, Kevin Carrier, assistant county engineer with Lake County DOT.

Um we brought a contract through for a gauges lake road improvement as well that was looking at connecting path and gauges lake road to CLC.

And we're kind of planning that out with this project.

So with that project, we're also looking at, you know, does it make sense to connect these two paths together?

How do we get people over to CLC?

So between this project and that project and working with the Forest Preserve, that'll be kind of incorporated.

Good idea.

Thank you.

I don't know if people could hear with uh the microphone.

Oh, he gets a microphone.

Perfect.

Thank you.

All right, Vice Chair Mean.

Thanks.

Trying to unmute there.

I just want to remind um the committee member staff is okay, but committee members need to lean forward and use their microphones because the public or anyone listening, you you can't hear what you're what many of you are saying.

So that's all.

Can you hear me?

I'm just curious.

Remember me.

Yeah, I can hear you.

You got your teacher voice, but I got my teacher voice.

That's what I think.

Yeah, some of the other people lean back in their chairs and they're so far from the reminder.

You just you just it's like an old Charlie bound cartoon, blah, blah, blah.

Yeah.

Thank you for the thank you.

Thank you.

All right.

Thank you for the reminder.

Any other questions?

All right.

All in favor.

Aye.

Any opposed?

Motion carries.

Item 8.10 is a joint resolution authorizing an agreement with Oxcart Permit Systems LLC, Palatine, Illinois, for permitting and collection of truck permit fees required for all oversized and overweight truck trips on the county highway system in accordance with the Illinois Vehicle Code at no cost to Lake County.

Can I get a motion in a second, please?

Motion by Hewitt, second by Hunter.

So this is a permitting software that we use for overweight and over dimension trucks.

We've been using the software since 2018.

So this is a renewal of that agreement.

The big change is some terms and conditions on the oxcard side, mainly just a fee increase.

So they charge a flat fee rate for providing the service.

And then the permit, the trekking company pays that that fee.

And on average, it's about a five-dollar fee, and it's going to increase to six dollars.

But this is a widely accepted software.

Um that uh 23 counties and 165 municipalities use throughout Illinois.

So this is a really good convenience.

And it's something that we work together with a lot of other other local agencies uh to kind of all implement this system so that when the trucking company goes to apply for a permit, they can go to one location and hopefully pick all the different routes under different jurisdictions and get all their permits in one place.

Then it makes fee collection a lot easier for us.

So we've seen um compliance with permitting increase as a result of using this software.

And that is important also.

And I know at the technology committee we had a discussion about the cybersecurity, and I know the network is all they have their own network, it's not in our network.

So we were happy with that.

Any questions?

Any questions about this?

All right, all in favor.

Aye.

Any opposed?

Motion carries.

Item 8.11 is the director's report.

So I've got two items related to paratransit, and then uh Kevin Kierrier is going to give a quick update on our long-range plan.

So uh, first two updates regarding Ride Lake County Paratransit.

One, um, excited to share that at the RTA board meeting last week, they recommended a 1.75 million dollar grant for Ride Lake County, which would cover 50% of our operating costs for calendar year 2025 and 2026.

So this still needs to go to the federal transit agency for final approval.

But typically, once the RTA board approves it, it's been successful in the past.

So we'd expect final results at the end of this year.

Second update is um we uh received notification from Pace that it's time to re renew our annual agreement with them.

So neither uh L C D OT staff or pace staff is recommending any changes to the to the way we operate Ride Lake County.

So uh staff is planning to work with pace over the next several months to update that agreement and then bring it back to committee at the end of the year for final um adoption.

Yeah, that sounds great.

And that is really terrific news about the grant money.

So I know it's not all the way in there, but that's great that it's recommendated recommended.

And yeah, I mean, all the feedback we've gotten has been so positive about Ridley County.

So that sounds good.

I'll turn over to Kevin.

Yes, good morning, uh committee members, uh chair and vice chair, uh Kevin Kerrier, assistant county engineer with Lake County DOT.

So I have a quick update, uh just a couple minutes on the long range plan.

A lot of it's similar to what Mike Clemens briefed you guys on last meeting, but we just want to make sure we're in regular contact with you guys.

It's a big initiative.

Um, so we've um entitled it envisioned 2050.

Uh, there's a website out there, it's linked on our website.

Um you can and search on the web.

So there's a lot of good information on the website.

Um, the team is in the data collection phase right now.

Um, so they did a lot of um in-person um like pop-up events, I think five or six throughout the the county so far.

Um, we have a survey and a public comment um map that's live on the website now, and we're gonna be doing a lot of outreach, uh blasting that out to the public.

So we're looking for a lot of public feedback.

We're trying to meet people in person and do a lot of virtual events just to try to get the the word out there as best we can.

Um and then early October to late October, we're gonna have a two-week virtual public open house.

Um where we're gonna share some of the data and stuff that we've collected and do some more surveys and outreach.

So we're really trying to just get a lot of information from the public and use them as a good resource of what they're looking for in the plan.

Um that'll go out through board member newsletters, social media, email, all that kind of stuff too.

So we're about robust outreach.

They're the team is working on a series of videos that's gonna introduce the plan as well.

So um, as I keep mentioning, there's all sorts of different ways that we're gonna try to get in front of the public and educate them on what we're looking to do.

Um, and then in late fall or later this year, we're gonna come back and present all of all of what we heard of the committee, uh, all the existing conditions and what the public has been saying, and then start looking at kind of the goals and vision and stuff like that for the study.

Um, so this year is really wrapping up with a uh consultants calling phase one or to the discover phase.

There's four phases.

So they're doing discover.

Next year is gonna be develop.

Um, towards the end of next year will be kind of decide is what they're calling it, like the decision phase, and then uh the last phase will be delivered.

So there's kind of 4D is what they're calling it for the study.

So data collection now, but next year is gonna be you know, looking at what we can do once we develop the travel demand model, what the options are um and what the plan's gonna start looking like.

So next year will be uh a big year for the plan.

So I'm thinking still about 18 or so months, so and the next year, early 2027, um, to get it all wrapped up.

Sounds good.

I know all the data collection and all that input is so important.

So I know since we're back at some back at school, I think I'll have it assignment for everyone is take the survey, everyone in this board, right?

Take the survey, ask a friend or two take the survey.

It's really important we get this data going in because this is going to be our plan for how long?

Until 2050.

2050, yeah.

So it's really important.

I knew I sat one of my friends down.

I literally was like, I need you to take the survey.

But so the more data we get, and you're doing such a great job with outreach.

You know, I think these in-person events, these online events, these surveys, but if in our newsletters, but like when you're out and about, you know, I was speaking in a group the other day, and I said, please take the survey.

And I said, here's where the survey is because we need to hear from all like as many Lake County residents as possible.

So I you get to report back next month.

So uh I'm gonna be I'm gonna be checking.

Member Roberts, did you have a question?

No, you just mentioned what we can put it in our newsletters because that always helps.

Thank you.

But still asking people to take it is usually that extra step gets people to take it.

But the outreach you're doing is terrific.

And I'm I'm I know you had so many people come to some of those events.

So the I'm interested to find out how many people uh when this is all done.

Yeah, but thank you.

Yes, member Hunter.

Um Thanks, Chair.

Um a different can I bring up uh the Route 59 project while you guys were still sitting here whenever you Yeah, this is the under director's report.

Is it a quick just a update?

It's quick.

It's it's the messaging at the intersection.

It's pretty close to being done.

You have two intersections.

You have the reroute of Washington Street and the school, and then you have the traditional intersection there.

The truth, the the reroute shows the signage, Washington Street this way and school drive this way.

On the traditional intersection, you've got Washington Street denoted again going that way, which is a no outlet now.

So that sign can't stay there.

It's if anything, it should be Grand Avenue to the east or to the west and no outlet to the other side because you're gonna get people turning down in there and they're gonna just see the three reflective diamonds, and it's just gonna kind of be a mess until figure out because it's duplicate signage for Washington Street, is really what it is.

Okay, that was the local businesses.

They were the ones that he said, I think this is a little confusing.

The marina's on the corner.

And I went, I think it is.

So we'd like to avoid having people turn down those one-way streets.

Yeah, and you're yes, we've all been there.

Yep.

Better, yeah, signage is so key, as we know.

Thank you, member hunter.

And I also wanted to say I've been watching the Hunt Club Road um bike trail being created.

That seems like quite a uh project there, and it's coming along.

So that's gonna be such a huge important regional connector in that area.

So I know that's probably done hopefully end of summer or end of the year.

That's right.

Probably gonna push to next year.

Push push to next year, but soon.

Thank you.

All right, any all right, thank you so much.

Thank you.

All right, and now we're on to public works.

Item 8.12 is a joint resolution adopting the proposed 2026 to 2030 capital improvement program for the Lake County Department of Public Works.

Can I get a motion in a second, please?

Motion by Hunter, second by Wasick, Director McFarland.

Make sure I bring this closer.

Good morning, Chair, committee members, Austin McFarland, uh Lake County Public Works Director.

Uh presented afresh the department's 2026 and 2030 capital improvement program for adoption.

Uh, this program was presented at our last meeting.

Uh, we did receive a couple positive feedbacks, unfortunately, because of the the changes that is needed to upgrade the program.

We weren't able to to do so.

Our goal is to make this a um these changes in next year's CIP program.

So, with that in mind, no significant changes was made to the current program.

So I certainly would like to move forward and recommend adoption of this program.

And so, yeah, we had gone over this in detail last month.

And so they used there's been no real changes.

No changes.

All right, no changes.

All right, any questions?

All right, all in favor?

Aye.

Any opposed?

Motion carries.

All right, item 8.13 is a presentation of the fiscal year 2024 schedule of income and expenses for the county's northwest, northeast, central, and south east southeast sanitary sewer systems.

This is just presentation, right?

We got me in motion.

So we're sharing the regional reports for the Northwest, Northeast Central, and South East Sanitary Sewer System.

These reports are repaired and shared annually with the wholesale communities as part of the intergovernmental agreement that we have in place.

These reports are repaired during the audit process.

And today they're presented to you for information only.

We have with us today a rep from Baker Tilly.

Don't know if he's on as yet.

Ryan O'Donnell and he's available.

He's on there.

He's on there.

As well as uh Micah Thornton from County Finance to answer any questions that you may add on these reports.

Are there any questions?

Can you give us a brief overview?

I believe when I was looking over it, it looked like everything was fine.

I did.

It was like everything was in compliance, I should say.

Okay, Ryan, you want to give us a quick summary?

Quick walk through.

Yeah, certainly.

Hi, everyone.

My name's Ryan O'Donnell.

I'm a director at Baker Tilly, and we do prepare the financial audit as well as the report.

Um, really the process is you know, we do an audit of Lake County Public Works overall and within, you know, within the accounting system, they separate um their balances by by community here.

So really what we're doing as part of this again, we audit the overall big picture Lake County Public Works.

And what we're doing within these reports that are prepared by management is we're looking through to make sure that they're um allocated consistently, um, allocated within a reasonable means and we do analytical procedures as well to make sure that there aren't any balances or amounts reported that might indicate um you know a big fluctuation that we should look into to make sure that it's reported correctly and really at the end making sure that everything ties out to those audited numbers that that we audit um about a month prior to then.

So that's really the overall process.

And and from there we put together this report that that uh shows the numbers.

But again, happy to answer any questions that you might have.

Yep, seems pretty straightforward.

I know I looked at it, I just said here's the numbers.

Everything seemed to be, you know, all in balance, and that's it.

All right, any good other questions?

All right, I guess we're good.

Thank you.

Thank you for your time.

All right, it's always good to see that the word the numbers are very straightforward and check out.

So it's important we have these uh these audits.

All right, item 8.14 is a joint resolution ratifying an emergency procurement with burger contractors inc.

of Wilconda, Illinois, and appropriating 219,847 and 59 cents from fund 610 public works fund reserves for the Southeast Interceptor Sanitary Sewer Pipe Emergency Repair.

Can I get a motion and second motion by Hunter, second by Kasmin?

So unfortunately, we had a significant break on our sanitary sewer line on uh Salem Lake.

Um it resulted in failure with the sanitary sewer and also the adjacent manual structure.

Uh the picture there before you uh gives you a sense of just how bad this was on the eight-inch sanitary line as well as just how large that failure was on the manual structure.

Um certainly add to rush to get this corrected.

Um, because of the magnitude of the break, the emergency repair was necessary, and burger contractor was um recruited to complete the work.

The work is completed.

We do uh we are concerned about the remainder of that pipe, at least uh about 40 feet of the pipe was repaired and a new manual structure is in is in place, but we do have the remainder of that pride that we're currently investigating to examine the integrity of that pipe.

Um, so the good news is that the work is completed, and I recommend approval for this payment to the burger.

Yeah, well, we have to make sure these pipes work.

So, and it was an emergency repair.

Right.

Um, so it's 40 feet.

It was a it was a substantial repair.

Do we know why that this?

I mean, what the causes was was it soil or whatever?

And that's why I'm concerned about the rest of the pipe.

Like what are you gonna do to check?

Well, this pipe, the structure has probably been there for over 60 years, I believe.

And um in these structures, you get the buildup of the sewer gas over a period of time.

It does tend to erode the the structures, and especially with the volume of um sewer going through it.

It does happen with some of these structures.

And do we know how much I assume you have like a plan where you're like inspecting like other lines, like I mean, how much of our network is 60 years old?

And so we're bringing back uh a consultant to do another review, another four-year review uh for a water and sewer system just to see which ones are at that critical point.

And so we can really reprioritize them to do some type of repair, whether it's going to be replacement or line, and we're anxious to get that program going.

Yeah, because being proactive on this is kind of good versus.

Yes, you know, we unfortunately had three of these this year, and and and so you you plan, you identify the ones that you believe are critical and you go after them, and then you get these that surprise you uh along the way.

So we're we're we're trying our best to to get all of these age by in line and you just target them based and funded to get them corrected.

Is there a way to do like inspection, like a you know, like do you inspect a certain amount of the pipes each year?

We have our maintenance staff that does have um a program where they go out routinely and look at all our pipes, they do camera cleaning and TD of the pipes, and they can only get to so much throughout the year.

Um we try to make sure that they're doing that, and we are able to capture some of these before these there's a so we it's over 480 miles of pipes.

So we do have one a few during the course of the year that does surprise us that this is one of the unfortunate surprises that we encounter.

Yeah, well, just as we have this aging infrastructure, I just want to we might have to be, I mean, make sure that we're budgeting correctly for capital moving forward, right?

Right, because we want to make sure we have enough in capital to do these improvements and knowing that it's aging versus you know, suddenly we have to replace like a lot of lines and we don't have the money.

So I'm just hoping like in our CIP and our just like long-range plan, we're planning on whatever it needs to do to make sure we have to.

As I said, it it does include for next year an investigation of all the sewer lines.

Okay, good.

Looking at the ones where we are concerned for weakness about water and sewer.

Yeah, and then once that investigation is done, we will certainly prioritize those for budgeted.

And in addition to that, we have our maintenance team who was still doing the ongoing investigation on a regular basis to make sure that we keep those before us at all times.

Yeah, I know CLC Java was doing a similar thing as 50 years old.

And I think it sounds like 50 years old is not a great amount of it's good for people, but maybe not so much for sewer lines.

Member Casmin.

Not to share Clark's point.

Um, is this something we had our eye on replacing already?

Was it on our plan, or is it just completely you didn't?

I believe this one was on our our plan, but um it it broke before we got to it.

Thank you.

Sure.

All right, thank you.

And I'm just glad to see that it is repaired.

And out of curiosity, what happens when it breaks?

Can people I mean, is the sewage, does it still go?

I'm still the sewer still flows, but what we do, we're able to bypass around it to maintain excess sanitary sewer getting into the uh the streets and and the roadways.

So we were able to go around it so it minimize disruption to customers.

Um, there may be some temporary disruption for people using the streets because we got all sort of equipment there blocking it, but um we're able to to minimize disruption to the of services to our customers by being able to bypass around.

Do you bypass it by putting something new in, or do you use like using pumps to pump around it from one structure to the next, right?

That is a good thing.

Yeah, I can do that.

All right.

All right, all in favor of that.

Uh aye, any opposed motion carries.

All right, item 8.15 is a joint resolution authorizing the execution of a restated and amended intergovernmental agreement for sewage disposal between Lake County and the city of Waqegan.

Can I get a motion and second?

Motion by Hewitt, second by Kasman.

Good morning.

Can you guys hear me okay?

We can.

Okay.

Just make sure you talk right in there.

Uh good morning, Emily Carey, assistant director, department of public works.

Thank you for the opportunity to speak with you this morning.

So we have before you a amended and restated agreement with the city of Waukegan to provide sewer service in the, I should say, uh, transportation of uh Waukegan sewage in the area of Waukegan that is along River Road south of 120.

You can see up here on the map.

So we had an old agreement with the city from the 90s um that had been amended a couple times and has since expired.

So this agreement is just uh restating those terms and uh the commitment between the city and the county to continue providing uh service to this area.

The sewage goes from this area to our interceptor sewer that runs along the displains river and then ultimately goes to the North Shore water reclamation district for treatment.

Uh let's see.

What else did I want to tell you about this?

Uh the city council approved this on August 18th, and we have uh worked through the terms of this agreement with the state's attorney's office.

Okay.

And how many years is the agreement for?

Uh I believe it is a 20 year 20-year term.

I apologize.

The previous one I know was 30.

Yeah, 1992, amended 2014.

Yeah, generally we have these between 20 and 25 years.

Yeah, they're long in here.

We go 20 years.

Thank you.

I apologize for the 20 years.

So it's for 20 years, so it'll go to wow, what's 20 years from now?

2045.

All right.

So in 2045.

So it'll be on my problem when that happens.

All right.

So does it have the um, and I should have looked.

Does it have like uh the the cost over the 20 years?

Is it like a standard?

Or is just an agreement that we're providing it, and then we can charge.

Okay, I see.

Yep.

All right.

All right.

Any questions?

Right.

All in favor?

Aye.

Any opposed?

Motion carries.

All right, and item 8.16 is something that we've been asking for for a while.

Is our the director's report with for a PFAS presentation?

All right.

So PFAS, as you know, is uh emerging contaminants.

It uh does impact our water and sanitary sewer systems.

And so with that in mind, we have secured a services of DonnaU and associates to review the IEPA and EPA regulations relative to PFOS and the way ahead for the public works department today.

We'll have them share some of those findings.

And of course, it's just information only.

Um, the team with us from DonnaU today is Nathan Cassidy and Ting Wong, and they'll come at this time and present.

Good morning.

Thanks for having us here.

Well, uh, yes.

So uh we'll give just a uh few minutes of overview of the PFAS study that we've been working on the last year.

Uh so PFOS is an acronym.

There's always a lot of acronyms in industries.

Uh so this one is PER and polyfloral alkyl substances.

Uh just quick outline.

We'll give an introduction and then uh hunting will kind of step through results and conclusions for drinking water and for uh wastewater and biosolids.

So our study covered both those areas, kind of two separate reports for this.

So, as Austin mentioned, I'm Nathan Cassidy.

So I'm a wastewater engineer at Donnahu and Associates, uh located up in our Sheboygan, Wisconsin office.

I'm the project manager for this um study.

And then Han Ting Wang is here also.

She's uh uh water and wastewater process engineer in our Chicago office, and she did most of the work on the study.

Uh, just a quick overview of the scope of it.

So we wanted to look at the current PFOS regulations, and then also uh public works had already collected quite a bit of data from drinking water systems and wastewater systems.

So that data was analyzed, and then we put together an evaluation conclusions and some uh kind of solutions for PFOS reduction if needed.

Just why is PFOS in the spotlight?

Quick overview there.

Uh, you may have heard the term forever chemicals used quite a bit in articles for this.

That's because these compounds really don't uh they're they're very um uh rigid, they don't break down in nature kind of naturally.

So that's the forever term.

Uh, they've been using quite a bit of products over the years.

A couple of the real common ones are uh water repellent for clothing, uh stain resistance for clothing and carpeting, fire suppression foams, those type of items.

So they are um fairly prevalent in in products that had been produced for a number of years.

Uh they have been shown to be harmful to to health.

So that's you know, that's really why they are rising to uh an item to be looked at.

And once they're in the water and soil, since they are uh something that doesn't break down very easily, they just they move around and they're there.

So it's it's an item to watch out for.

Can I ask you really quickly?

Are PFAS are is PFAS banned now, or can people still produce stuff with PFAS in it?

Um companies within the US, it's pretty much um out of other than some real specialty items.

Like I don't know if it's been really taken out of certain fire suppression things yet.

But um Yeah, member Hunter would probably know.

Yeah, retired firefighters.

Oh, sure.

The they're working really hard and they're pushing up the timelines right now on the gear.

That's the big issue because all of the gear has got this in it, whether it's your Nomac hoods, whether it's your your gloves or anything else.

So they're in the process of doing that as far as the foam.

We took action on with our ARPA dollars to rid the county of having that.

Um, and that's already been done.

We were one of the first to do that.

So anyway, yeah, the the gear is the issue right now.

And they're and the state is really trying to move it up.

The problem is the manufacturer can't keep up with it because we said no, it's not it's not good anymore.

And they're going, wow, we didn't have a plan B.

Yeah.

Because they didn't know either.

Well, and it can't be good for I would assume it's not good for people wearing the gear.

Yeah, to have what you're wearing.

Yeah, exactly.

So hopefully they're not producing more.

Correct.

Or they're trying, and if they're yeah, yeah, they're trying to find alternatives.

Okay, that is good to hear.

I guess other countries might still produce goods, and you could bring them in this country.

That's the caveat is there's probably still other um import type items that come in and have had that treatment on it.

Like the nonstig hands.

So if they're manufactured in other country, you could ship them in and then it's you're eating PFAS.

Thank you.

Yeah.

All right, yeah.

Thanks, Nathan.

Um, so we'll dive right in.

We'll talk about PFAS and drinking water first.

Um, so talking about regulations.

So in April of 2024, the USCPA finalized its uh PFAS rule for drinking water.

Um, there are some proposed changes that are being talked about right now.

Nothing is finalized with those changes yet.

So we're gonna talk about what we know.

So as of August of 2025, um, there are maximum maximum contaminant levels or MCLs for six different PFAS compounds.

Um, and MCLs are the highest concentrations of a compound that's legally allowed in drinking water.

Now, to determine what those um what the concentrations are, uh monitoring is required um by all public water systems.

This is either quarterly or twice within a 12-month period by April of 2027.

Um, and that frequency of monitoring is dependent on the number of customers being served, and then also the water source.

So whether it's um surface water or groundwater.

And then the last item in the regulations is complying with these MCLs by April of 2029.

So to comply with the MCLs, there are um multiple treatment technologies that are available for removal of PFAS from drinking water.

Um, there's a lot that are up and coming for this study.

We really focused on ones that are commonly used already.

So we to simplify this, we we categorize them into two different categories.

So one is membranes, so that's using a semi semi-permeable barrier to essentially um take out the contaminants from the water.

Um, and because PFAS are really, really small, we'll need either nanofiltration or reverse osmosis to effectively remove those from water.

Now the other category is adsorption using something like activated carbon, um, which is already commonly used to remove dissolved organic compounds.

Um, and another option would be binding.

So something like ion exchange, which in this case would use a positively charged uh resin that will attract and bind PFAS, which are negatively charged, and that's how that would get removed.

And then the exchange part is basically while the negatively charged PFAS are getting removed, um other non-harmful ions such as hydroxide would be put into the water instead.

Um all of these technologies are commonly used already for PFAS removal for this study, just looking at costs, knowing that membranes one, they're expensive, the footprints are bigger.

There's a lot of energy usage for those.

The cost for that's pretty high.

So we eliminated that from further evaluation um when we were looking at costs, and we really focused on activated carbon and ion exchange.

Again, both of these um are are commonly used already.

And as we are looking at costs, um, we looked at the different wells that the uh the systems have and the capacities for them.

And we basically separated them into three different categories small, medium, and large.

And we looked at the 20-year total present worth costs for these systems.

So that includes the capital costs, like the equipment, the initial equipment costs, along with annual operation, maintenance, and replacement costs over 20 years.

We added those together.

And here we have just about what they would be.

Um, I think ion exchange is a little bit more expensive than um activated carbon in general, but it's around five million for small systems, seven million for medium systems, and 10 10 million for large systems when we're looking at the public work systems here.

And that's um and that's for for 20 years, not per year.

Correct.

That's over 20 years.

Over 20 years.

So that includes again, yeah, the capital costs and then annual annual costs over 20 years.

Member Kasmin.

Quick Java already uses activated carbon, doesn't it?

I know that's our central lake county water system.

I don't know, because we are not, I know Clitchiawa, the levels are so low that they're not doing anything.

They might use it for other things, but we're not for PFAS, I believe.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Member classic.

So this is what I was curious.

And maybe this is a question for Austin.

So what will we qualify for?

Small, medium, or large.

Yeah.

So what you're looking at.

Exactly.

So there, so we categorize these based on the wells at the public works system.

So there's different, uh I think we looked at maybe seven of the systems, and the well capacities are different.

So we size these technologies based on the well capacity.

So we're looking at well, because I know our system is has got the ClickJava, the CLC Java plus well.

So we're really looking at our well systems.

That is correct, yes, because Java will have to do their own monitoring on that surface water.

So that actually leads to my next slide here.

Um, but I want to say the great news so far is that all of the samples that have been collected, and this is at this the water supplies that have active and backup wells.

Um, all of those samples that have been collected have been below the MCLs.

So that's really good news.

Um, what that means is that there's no treatment that's needed at this time.

We did look at what's available and footprints and costs just to make sure that you know, if they needed to be implemented, that could happen.

But right now, we don't need that.

Um, some of the systems will need a few more samples collected just to meet those EPA guidelines for for required monitoring.

Um, but that's already in progress.

There's samples are being taken.

Public works is doing a really good job staying proactive about that.

Um, and then like I mentioned earlier, um, there may be some changes to the existing regulations that could come out as early as next spring.

Um, so it's just something to keep in mind to stay up to date.

And with all this in mind, as we can see from that funnel, just if we do all of this, complying with um the regulations should not be a problem.

Okay, so even if the regulations become stricter, there are this this type of technology we could use to make to comply.

Correct.

Yep.

That's good.

Yeah, member counsel.

How close are we to any thresholds?

Um, so the good news is that most of the results have been below the reporting limit.

So less than two nanograms per liter and the MCL is four nanograms per liter.

So we're at least half or lower.

Um, yeah, those those um sampling um procedures can only report a certain concentration accurately.

So if it's less than that, they just say it's less than that.

They don't say the exact number.

Yeah.

All right, thank you.

Perfect.

So that is water.

Uh, we're gonna switch gears now to wastewater and biosolids.

Um, similarly, let's start with regulations on the wastewater side.

There are no federal PFAS regulations yet.

That being said, there is language that's being added to the draft permits.

Um, that's related to monitoring, so sampling, reporting of those samples, and then looking at PFAS reduction initiatives.

So that's what's being added to the permits right now.

Like I said before, public works is already being very proactive about monitoring.

So they've taken samples over the last few years already.

And um, we're showing the results here in this table.

So there's three treatment plants result.

These are results from January of 2023 and December of 2024.

And we looked at two specific PFAS compounds.

They're called PFOS and PFOA.

Those are pretty much the ones that are most talked about these days.

Um, and we're showing the results here.

Now, like I said, there's no federal regulations.

So we don't have uh anything to compare with in that case.

And there's also no regulations yet in Illinois.

So what we did is we looked at surrounding states and we saw that Wisconsin has an enforceable standard already.

Um also for PFOS and PFOA.

And what we can see here is that the results from uh from Lake County are all well below Wisconsin standards.

So that's a really good sign.

Again, we don't know what the future regulations will look like, but this is at least a baseline that we can we can start with and see that at least on the wastewater effluent side, Lake County is doing pretty well.

Yeah, so this is different than the yeah, the other standards.

This is different, yes.

So this is yeah, the other was oh, water, correct.

And this is right, this is wastewater.

This is wastewater, and this is this is just um just monitoring at this point.

There's no requirements yet.

And it is higher.

Could that be from things people eat or yeah?

So most of uh the PFAS we think coming in are actually from the industries that are discharging into the system.

So there's a wide variety of them, and there's a handful of them.

And I was going to talk about that coming up, but that is likely where the PFAS is coming from.

Okay.

Yep.

Well, it's good to see that for the at least this Wisconsin standards, because I would assume there should be standards, and also just for us, we would want to for public health not be discharging huge amounts of PFAS and water systems.

Right.

These numbers look good.

Yes, the numbers look good here.

So then if we move on to the biosolid side.

So this is very similar to wastewater, where there's no federal regulations yet, there's no state regulations yet.

Um the same type of language is being added to the permits where it's monitoring, reporting and reduction initiatives.

And again, um public works is being very proactive about um monitoring for PFAS already.

Um so we're showing similar table here.

So it's the three plants looking at both PFOS and PFOA, and then the results.

And this is from January of 2023.

Um, I believe there are more samples that are being taken.

So this is what we have so far.

In this case, we summed up the concentrations of PFOS and PFOA.

And that's because in Wisconsin, again, we're comparing with Wisconsin.

They have their interim strategy for land application of biosolids that contains PFAS.

And it's a tiered um strategy where higher concentrations would require more stringent uh more stringent actions, I would say.

So um in this case, I I highlighted that in orange, just to show that that's one of the middle tiers that Wisconsin has.

So if these were results in Wisconsin, that would warrant more sampling of the wastewater effluent investigation of sources for source reduction.

So that's what I was talking about.

These industries that are discharging in, how can we have them reduce what's coming in first before even gets to Lake County?

And then lastly, would be monitoring the land application rates.

So there are states that, like for example, Maine has already banned all land application because of PFAS.

So this would just be looking at what the land application rates are, trying to reduce it.

Again, this is just for Wisconsin.

There's no rules like this in Illinois yet, but we just want to see what surrounding states are doing.

I think there should be some in Illinois.

I don't know.

Maybe maybe I'm surprised.

And like go Wisconsin, but maybe for we talk to our legislators, we should have these um sources.

And we still can do these things, like you know, investigate sources and try to lower our risk, you know, lower these.

Correct.

Member of Litzik.

She's online.

Thank you.

Um I just quick question.

I don't know if it's the right time, but it did you made me think of it.

So, how many other states um other than Wisconsin have these regulations?

And I'm curious to know how Wisconsin might compare to them.

You mentioned Maine, but if if that's sort of on another end of the spectrum.

Um, and then I'm also just a I didn't get my hand up in time from the last slide.

I'm curious to know you said much of the PFAS coming into our system is from industry.

Do we test that?

Does it come in and they've already semi-treated their discharge, or does it come into our system?

Then we test it, then we treat, or do we treat everything we have and then we test it?

Yeah, great question.

I'm gonna start with the first one.

So we did look throughout what we call region five.

So that's um Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, Michigan, Minnesota.

I think I might have missed one, but anyway, so Wisconsin is the only one that had set enforceable standards at the time, at least when we were reviewing.

I know things are changing right now, but I know that Minnesota and Michigan, um, they have been proactive about setting starting the process to set standards.

I don't think they have any yet.

Um, so I think Wisconsin was really the uh the front runner in that sense.

Like they they're really setting the stage for what that could look like.

Um so your second question, um so I don't know if Lake County has any SIUs, like significant industrial users where there are permits already.

I don't know if Austin.

Let me just quickly speak of member ballistic.

Um we are moving forward with our pre-treatment ordinance, and in that ordinance, it will incorporate the necessity for us to start testing all the relative industries that surround our treatment plant.

And so we will be testing for PFOS.

Uh, let me just add that in addition to the industries that may be discharging.

I believe it's also important to understand that uh a lot of for discharge are residential.

So whatever takes place in the home, um, a lot of that is coming to us.

So if we're looking at the industry, this gotta be a broader look at um the homeowner and what they're doing and some communication um send out the homeowners about better use of products and the discharge of products into the sanitary assistance.

So it's got to be a little broader than just looking at industries that are sending PFAS to us.

But at the current rate, we're not sampling this yet, but the plan is going into next year.

We will start sampling.

Okay, I think I think I got you.

And I I completely agree.

If uh residential waste, which I assume it is, is the vast majority of the waste that we treat, then um, I think yeah, spot on on the communication to residents.

So I'm sorry if I didn't if I didn't understand you.

I'm just curious to know when we I guess regardless of where the discharge comes from, when we're testing it for PFAS, do we do that after we've treated it?

Um, so when you're looking at the effluent, it's all shredded coming through the system, the effluent is the final stage, so it's treated.

Okay, thank you.

Sure.

Member Hunter.

Thanks, Chair.

Austin, don't go anywhere.

Um for the last three or the four years that Austin has been here.

Every time we come to the budget time, he wants another FTE as far as a pre-treatment coordinator.

And we somehow always seem to bypass that.

I I can't implore you enough to have another pretreatment coordinator.

And I know you know you need it.

It's just that we have to fund that for you.

Um, because a pre-treatment coordinator program is critical.

And we just we're behind the eight ball on that a little bit.

Um, so well, I appreciate that.

As I stated, we do have our ordinance out um circulating.

We will bring it to committee for year review and consideration.

It is it was reviewed by USCPA and was approved.

And so we still need to get committee endorsement and approval of it.

But in that particular ordinance, we will um have a lot more work to do in terms of monitoring.

Um, as uh the Don AU team pointed out, we will certainly be required.

Our permits are expired.

We did apply for new permits and new permits to will require um more monitoring for biosolids and our effluent.

So um, yeah, we'll probably be heard in for testing and for and for assistance.

But we'll start with what we have and we'll keep you informed as we move forward.

Thank you.

Thank you.

All right.

So we've already talked about this a bit, but our one of our key takeaways from the study is that source reduction will be key for PFAS removal in both water or wastewater and biosolids.

So at this time, um treatment technologies for removal of PFAS from wastewater is not really a well-researched topic.

Um, so source reduction really is the key response right now, as we've been talking about on the biosolid side, there are technologies that are being developed, they're growing.

One technology that is being used and could be used is incineration.

Um, but in Illinois, the emissions requirements are pretty stringent.

So we're not confident that permit approval would happen.

We think it would be quite challenging.

Um, there is another up-and-coming technology called paralysis.

It essentially uses very high temperatures and an oxygen-free environment to destroy PFAS.

Um, right now there are four um of these systems implemented in the US.

So it's very, very new.

Um, it's a massive system.

When we were costing this out, we can see here it's 20-year present worth cost of 50 million dollars.

That's to treat all the solids from all three plants together.

So just one system collecting all the solids, but still it's a it's a massive cost.

So really, if we can find ways to reduce the PFAS coming into the plant first, that'll really help to reduce the costs of treatment, you know, throughout the plant.

So that all being said, there are proactive ways to be able to meet these regulations on the wastewater and biosolid sides for the future.

So one thing, as we've talked about, continue to monitor for these for PFAS concentrations.

The public works is already doing that.

It's really good, good to see.

Again, staying up to date with regulations.

Um, I I'm guessing that something related to wastewater and and biosolids regulations may come out as early as next year.

So it's something to keep in mind.

Um, as we keep saying, just source reduction opportunities, that's going to be key.

And then as Austin mentioned, just increasing public awareness through public outreach measures.

So this will help to build trust and understanding and really to showcase what the county is doing already to address the PFAS issues.

So that's that's where we're at.

Um, I think this is our last slide.

So we're definitely open to answering any more questions if anybody has any.

Thank you.

Member Kasbin.

This is from the beginning of the presentation.

But how many of those um small well systems do we have in Lake County?

Just ballpark.

Okay.

So I think in our report, we looked at seven or eight of them.

Um I think that yeah, that that should be all of them that have the active and backup wells.

Okay.

Yeah.

Member Wasick.

Yes, thank you.

And Austin mentioned that the source could be from household uh effluent, but also is this a point source problem where it is coming from very specific places that we know?

Is it coming from factories?

Um, I'm just really curious about sort of the the global question.

I know it's in the environment.

I think we all know it.

We know that it's in water repellent fabrics and things like that, and you know, um nonstick surfaces, but actually, how does the chemical get from there into the environment?

Sure.

So um, as an example, the nonstick pans, right?

So that, so I guess PFAS was produced um by 3M many decades ago.

So that's a compound that was just introduced into the environment by them.

Um so your question was how does it get into the water itself?

So I mean, well, with the fire fighting foam, right?

It's just like as it's being used, there's gonna be droplets that get into onto the ground and then eventually under the ground into lakes, into rivers.

So these are really really tiny particles.

So and like Nathan mentioned, they move very easily throughout the throughout the soil throughout the water.

So I guess like once it's in the environment, it's just moving.

Yeah, the the household side of things is maybe a little easier to picture.

So any time you're laundering clothes that are stain resistant or carpet cleaning, any sort of thing where your activity where you're washing something that has that type of a coating on it is is bringing it in.

I know like uh old school spray bottles of um water repellent for your coats and backpacks and stuff, that was one of the compounds that was in it.

So um, yeah, uh industries, it's tough to really talk about without starting some sort of uh monitoring program.

Um, as you could kind of tell, even the testing for PFOS has had to come a long way just in the last couple of years.

Um because they you know, kind of find and get awareness of these compounds, then lab procedures need to be figured out on how to test them.

And the last few years they've been trying to get these procedures to where they can test them down to the levels needed to.

Um, so it's everything's kind of there's a focus on it, but there's a lot of information to still learn and and kind of figure out.

So uh just thinking about um some sort of source reduction strategy, one of the first items would be taking sampling that's right now being done with the water systems and the wastewater plants, and then kind of systematically picking other areas in the collection system to start monitoring for the sewer systems and starting to gather more data to actually find out okay, are certain areas in the collection systems higher than others, and then you can start pinpointing okay, what's all in those areas and where do we go next?

But that that is, you know, for where we're sitting right now, it's a tough one to give good answers, but you kind of have a process for how you get there.

Okay, thank you.

Yeah, and that is part of that.

I'm sorry.

Yeah, that is part of the permit language that's being added in.

So one of the first things is inventorying all the discharges that are dischargers that are coming into the system, and then seeing like what kind of um products do they or services do they have, and then kind of seeing are there any that are obvious dischargers?

So I know like EPA is looking at textile manufacturers specifically, because I guess they really do produce quite a lot of PFAS.

And I can't recall when we were working on the study if there's any textile industries that discharge into here, but that would be one example of one that's like, okay, we need to kind of get on them and see if they're doing any sort of reduction already.

Yeah.

Thank you.

Member Roberts, I I have a question for consumers.

Is it marked on the products that we use?

I've noticed it's PFAS.

I mean, because until this, I'm not really not paid attention.

And then at Google, you can't even, they don't even tell you what products I'd have to do more research, but I wonder if it's maybe something we can promote it and you know, in our legislative, yeah.

Put it on put it on the labels.

So I know there are products that say PFAS free now, right?

But I don't know if there are ones if they have PFAS, if they would say that necessarily.

For example, I was looking at a new tent this summer, and there was actually PFAS free or you know, kind of unlabeled.

Uh yeah.

So I know we are an interesting time where it's accepted that these are chemicals, forever chemicals that could cause a lot of harm, but if they haven't been like banned in the world, like the people are still using them, and it's really hard for consumers to know what you know if we're using them or not.

That's why I think also when we come back to the budget, I mean, it really seems like having a robust um, you know, public outreach campaign is the way and commercial outreach campaign is the way to go.

Since we, you know, and so people do know, like you said, member Roberts, everyone, you know, we know, you know, to be thoughtful about it.

And I don't know.

Um, I'm sure there's YouTube videos.

I mean, more than just like a press release and our newsletters because this is forever, these chemicals.

And I think when people can and people, if people are informed, they can make better choices to decrease, you know, the use of PFAS.

But I think we need to be a part of informing people about that.

And so maybe, you know, looking at maybe funding more of a public outreach campaign to make sure, because it will pay off, you know, immensely if we can have that targeted campaign for consumers and for companies, and addition to doing this monitoring.

But I do believe most people, a lot of people would make different choices if they even knew about it.

And so I think that's one of important roles for us in this region is to let people know at that, you know, like what those things are.

So I will I would hope that maybe we'll look at an ask for a public outreach campaign.

Member uh Hunter.

Thanks, Chair.

I I kind of look at this as our generational issue where the previous generation was asbestos.

They had no idea that asbestos was as bad like it was.

And then we found out as we were growing up that this stuff was toxic.

It was not good.

This is our generational problem.

Yep, and we need to address it.

I agree.

Member of a Litzik.

I have two questions.

Well, first, I uh completely support uh robust public public relations campaign, um, including with you know, all kinds of images of what contains PFAS and maybe what alternatives are because people we've you know found with invasive species.

If you ask them to take out Buckthorn, they want something to replace it.

So um, but that's getting in the weeds.

I am curious to know if there is federal legislation um in any in any stage that would address labeling imported goods that have PFAS.

And then I'm also curious to know I know there's been legislation that's been unsuccessful, or there's been efforts to get legislation at the federal level um to um help fund local counties and municipalities um in terms of helping them pay to reduce, you know, if we ever got to the level where we would have to medic mitigate with some of those strategies to help pay for that or to require polluters to, you know, obviously not residents, but if there were industries that were discharging in to have them help um fund that.

Do you have any idea those two sort of federal legislation?

If if any of them are making any um progress.

Yeah, that first question, I I don't really know yet.

I know the the pressure is coming, but I haven't really seen any actual legislation come out of it yet.

Um second question, yes, I know there is uh funding that's kind of being put out um toward for the end of this year, kind of getting um qualified entities, which Lake County would be one of them.

So I know that is uh something that Lake County is going to be pursuing.

I I don't know if Austin wanted to speak to that, but um that is on the radar, I guess I'll say it that way for uh kind of getting positioned for that.

Yeah.

And I think, you know, I think you know, we've been talking about our legislative program.

I know the legislative committee met on Tuesday, but like this idea of requiring labeling in Illinois um could be something we might want to think about recommending and also doing the the levels like they're doing in Wisconsin and other things, you know, encouraging our state legislatures because memorander, I think it is a really good comparison.

You know, this is something that you know, for decades we didn't realize and now is a huge issue.

And so uh trying to address it, I think maybe talking to I don't, I know as chair of legislative committee we can look at that.

Um, but we really could encourage our state legislatures at least to look at this, you know, potentially labeling um and because it seems like labeling seems like something they could be in charge of for Illinois.

And then also if Wisconsin looking at what Wisconsin has done in these other states, because it sounds like Illinois, as far as we know, isn't really looking at it as much.

Um, these PFAS levels, but maybe starting that process should be done.

And I'm I am a little surprised they haven't done that already.

So I think a little encouragement might be a good idea.

So maybe on the legislative, I would ask as you know, maybe our committee could ask your committee to maybe look at those two things.

Yeah.

I would I would like to say Illinois has like IEPA has been very, I wouldn't, I wouldn't say pushy, but they have done a big sampling campaign.

Okay.

So that's where they're at.

But I think generally Illinois follows the federal guidelines.

So that could be why there hasn't been anything coming out yet.

But Illinois did follow the federal guidelines for drinking water for PFAS.

They have the same same thing written in the admin code there.

So we follow the federal guidelines.

Yes.

Yes, yes, but that could be why Illinois hasn't put out anything yet.

Yeah, right.

Yeah.

But they still could.

We can chat with them.

Yes.

All right.

Well, any other questions?

Well, thank you both so much.

We have been looking forward for real.

We've been looking forward to this presentation for a long time to see the findings.

And it sounds like it sounds like we're doing, I mean, we're doing what we need to do for now.

People know that their drinking water is safe, or you know, is you know, or it is meets all the guidelines by far, and that we are proactively looking in the future to how to reduce it.

And it sounds like it'll be a multi-pronged campaign.

So we'll be ready for it.

Thank you.

Thank you so much.

Appreciate it.

All right.

And then do we have a director's report?

All right.

Yeah, just a couple of uh quick items to share, share.

Um, a couple of weeks one item number one is uh a couple of weeks ago, we had uh an unfortunate notice from Aqua, Illinois on uh radium incident.

Um, as you know, we have um Aqua Illinois supporting and providing water source for our two of our drinking water system, Althorne Woods and Forest Lake.

They notified us that the radium levels in their recent testing was above the NCL.

The N the action level there is five PPM and they exceeded that.

Um we did move ahead and make sure that our customers are notified.

Aqua is working diligently to reconcile that issue.

Um, they do have filtration at this at a plant, and they're working to to correct that so they can get back in compliance.

Um we, as I stated, uh notified our customers, and we have not received any follow-up to date from Aqua as to what they're doing.

I plan on following up with them later next week.

But just want to let you know that no complaints so far from our customers, and um we're still moving ahead to um consolidate those three water systems and um move away from Aqua down the road.

Yeah, I think that's really you know, I am thank goodness we're doing that.

And so currently though, does the water meet the standards?

I couldn't remember of radium, or is it still are they still or do we not know for the people who are drinking the water there?

Notice they're still non-compliant.

Non-compliant.

And should people there drink like bottled water, or is it or do we not know?

I mean, I just want to make sure our customers at the levels that there it's it's troubling, but it's not something that um is significant enough where you would have to drink a significant amount of it in one day.

I mean, we're talking large barrels of it to really before it's can begin to have any um medical or physical impact, but they're working to correct it um at the level it's uh we're talking they're probably at about six bars per million.

Um so we are we're hoping that they can correct the the situation.

And I said parts per million, really, it's it's quite a cure per liter.

That's the reported units.

So we're hoping that they can correct that shortly.

And um as soon as I hear from them, yeah, we'll share that with our customers.

Um, but for those customers with um compromise health-related issue, I certainly would recommend that they use bottled water.

Um then in the way they've all gotten a letter that tells them that we want to make sure the customers did receive a letter explaining this to them.

Right.

The letter that Aqua did issue was very thorough, and so we shared it with our customers in those two waters.

And do we do any of our own testing, like of that water system or well, we don't have wells in those systems.

So, you know, whatever Aqua provides certainly would show up in our system.

So if they're above in their system, it's going to be above in ours as well.

All right.

So we are hopefully the next couple of years, we'll be transitioning our customers off of the Aqua Well system onto our Lake Michigan water system.

Hopefully the next five years or something.

We're hoping.

We're hoping.

I think that it's sooner rather than later.

Thank you.

The other item I wanted, just a reminder, we had shared with committee a couple the last time we met that we are open to have a tour at the Mill Creek facility on the 12th.

Um, so for those committee members who are interested, please please let me know via phone or email so we can make necessary accommodation.

Um, just a reminder for September 12th October at 9 a.m.

Okay.

Right.

I I can confirm this is a very interesting tour.

So I took it with Austin, the staff.

It's a good, it's a good time.

You should go.

So it's next Friday at 9 a.m.

Right.

So just let you know we can make the the necessary complications for those folks who are interested in it today.

Okay.

Okay.

Thanks a lot.

Thank you.

All right.

Anything else?

Okay.

Do we have a county administrator's report?

Uh just two brief items.

Um, I think everybody's had an opportunity to meet Lacey Simpson, but I just want to point out Lacey Simpson, our new assistant administrator is here this morning.

And um, then we have a um Skillbridge intern that is working with the county administrator's office and facilities, Turk.

And I just want to make sure we introduce him.

He will um surprise see him throughout meetings and throughout our office.

Welcome.

All right.

Member Kasbin.

Um this is just a question, maybe it's for Member Wasick.

Um is there a safe way to um if you have items that have PFOS in them, um, is there a safe way to dispose of them without I don't think that's remember what throwing them away.

All right, well, that seems like more than ever was a call.

No, I don't know.

I mean because it's on Swalco.

He might know yeah, yeah.

Um not that I know of, but it's not something that we've ever encountered.

I mean, we we only should look into that for sure.

Yeah, that might be something.

I would suggest the best way to deal with it is reuse, saying, you know, is it though?

Somebody's that's that's as far as I can go with telling you.

I think we definitely need to look into that as part of our honestly, as part of our public information campaign.

Because sometimes it's not good to throw things away that have because then the chemicals will just leech more.

So I think finding out safe disposal way is a could be definitely an important part of our community.

I think this might be a good Walter topic, right?

Yeah.

Uh member Roberts.

I I was just gonna say that.

I mean, that sounds like P peasy.

Oh, first Walco.

Yeah.

PVZN.

Yeah.

Well, but we could ask from our committee too.

Because PFAS is going in our water.

Yeah, it'd be a great conversation.

From Swalco.

It would be.

All right, we will definitely find out more.

And I want robust communication from thing on this.

All right.

All right.

Excellent.

All right.

So I declare this meeting enjoyed.

Our next meeting is October 8th, 2025.

Have a good day, everyone.