OPENPUBLICA · PUBLIC MEETING RECORD
Record of Proceedings

Oswego Committee of the Whole Meeting - June 10, 2025

Village Board & Commissions — Tuesday, June 10, 2025
BodyOswego, Illinois
SessionVillage Board & Commissions
DateTuesday, June 10, 2025
StatusFILED
Video Record
0:00 / 1:08:23

Transcript — Verbatim
0:02

Welcome to our committee of the whole.

0:04

Roll call, please.

0:18

We're good.

0:21

President Kaufman.

0:23

Jesse Kipper.

0:36

Mine's totally red.

0:40

Oh, it's a whole.

0:41

Hello.

0:42

Hello?

0:42

Yeah.

0:45

I think only six.

0:49

Hello.

0:54

All right.

0:55

Trusty Koenig.

0:57

Here.

0:58

Chelsea McCarthy Lang.

1:00

Present.

1:01

Trusty Nelvi.

1:04

Present.

1:05

Trusty Torres.

1:06

Present.

1:11

We will open the public forum.

1:13

If there's anyone wishing to speak, please feel free to come forward now.

1:23

Seeing nobody, we will close the public forum.

1:25

And move on.

1:26

We have no old business this evening.

1:28

And under new business, we have item uh F1.

1:31

Dan.

1:32

Yes.

1:33

Um item F1 is the 2025 community survey presentation.

1:38

Uh outside of COVID, every two years we try to do a community survey.

1:42

It is a statistically valid random sample uh survey that is sent to uh residents in Oswego.

1:49

Uh we try to do them every other year.

1:51

And the last several times we've done the survey, it was done by ATC Institute.

1:56

And we want to welcome Jason Morado to the Zoom feed.

2:00

Uh Jason is going to uh welcome Jason and he's going to walk us through the survey results and is happy to answer questions.

2:08

And we're dialing it up right now.

2:16

We can kind of see you, Jason.

2:18

There's a message.

2:22

Can you can everyone can everyone see and hear me?

2:24

Okay.

2:24

There we go.

2:25

Now you're good to go, sir.

2:26

Okay, great.

2:28

Um I'm going to share my screen here.

2:39

Okay, hopefully everyone can see that okay.

2:42

Um my name's Jason Morado.

2:45

I'm the director of community research at ETC Institute, and we're a marketing research firm that specializes in conducting community surveys for local governments.

2:55

And we just finished for the fourth time conducting a community survey for the village of Oswego.

3:02

So today I'm going to walk through the key findings from the survey.

3:18

And in the last 10 years alone, we've conducted surveys in more than a thousand communities across the country.

3:24

So this is really the type of work that we specialize in.

3:29

This is just an overview of what I'll go through today.

3:32

I'll go over the purpose and methodology of the survey.

3:35

I'll walk through the key findings, and then I'll highlight our main summary from the survey.

3:42

So there are several reasons to conduct a survey like this.

3:46

One is to get an objective assessment of how satisfied residents are with major village services, and to determine what residents feel are the top priorities for the community.

4:00

Most of these questions are the same ones we asked in your previous three surveys, so that way we can measure trends over time.

4:13

And we'll look at some of those comparisons in more detail in just a little bit.

4:17

And then we're also able to compare your results with other communities across the country.

Discussion Breakdown — Share of Meeting
Public Engagement█████████████████████████████████████████████52%
Water And Wastewater Management█████████████████████24%
Public Safety█████6%
Affordable Housing███4%
Procedural███3%
Technology and Innovation███3%
Transportation Safety███3%
Land Use Planning███3%
Fiscal Sustainability██2%
Summary of Proceedings

Oswego Committee of the Whole Meeting - June 10, 2025

The Oswego Village Board Committee of the Whole met on June 10, 2025, at 6:00 PM to discuss the 2025 Community Survey findings and potential changes to water tap-on fees for residential development. No public comments were made. The board gave direction to staff on both items.

Discussion Items

2025 Community Survey Presentation

  • Jason Morado, director of community research at ETC Institute, presented the fourth biennial community survey for Oswego (conducted via mail and online, 606 completed surveys, margin of error ±3.9%).
  • Key findings: Satisfaction increased in 68 of 113 areas since the 2023 survey; Oswego rated above the U.S. average in 55 of 60 areas; top overall priorities were traffic flow/congestion and management of village finances.
  • Trustee questions addressed methodology (demographic weighting, response mode breakdown), request for crosstabs by age, length of residency, and renters vs. owners; interest in AI sentiment analysis of open-ended comments.
  • Discussion noted that while communication ratings improved, residents may lack context on village finances; the increase in satisfaction with financial management was attributed to recent board actions like reducing property tax rates and paying off debt.

Proposed Water Tap-On Fee Changes

  • Dan (staff) reviewed the history of water tap-on fees: $5,000 per residential unit in 2007, increased to $7,200 in 2010, lowered to $2,200 in 2015, and now proposed to increase by $3,000 to $5,200 per unit for all residential types (single-family, townhome, apartment).
  • Comparison with competitive communities: Yorkville current fees ~$7,500 (rising to ~$10,500 by 2028), Plainfield $3,300 for single-family/townhomes and $0 for apartments. Oswego’s total fees are $24,000 for single-family, $15,000 for townhomes, $13,000 for apartments—within market range.
  • Staff recommended no increase to commercial tap-on fees (currently $3,750, unchanged since 2007) to incentivize business growth. Trustees generally agreed, noting commercial users pay more through volumetric rates and large meter fees.
  • Trustees expressed support for the $3,000 residential increase, citing fairness to existing residents who bear water system upgrade costs, while acknowledging potential impact on housing affordability. Discussion noted that affordable housing requires separate incentives.

Key Outcomes

  • The board reached consensus to direct staff to prepare an ordinance increasing residential water tap-on fees by $3,000 (to $5,200 per unit) for the next regular board meeting. No increase to commercial tap-on fees at this time.
  • Staff will also provide additional crosstab data from the survey (by age, length of residence, renter/owner) and explore AI analysis of open-ended comments.

Meeting Transcript

Welcome to our committee of the whole. Roll call, please. We're good. President Kaufman. Jesse Kipper. Mine's totally red. Oh, it's a whole. Hello. Hello? Yeah. I think only six. Hello. All right. Trusty Koenig. Here. Chelsea McCarthy Lang. Present. Trusty Nelvi. Present. Trusty Torres. Present. We will open the public forum. If there's anyone wishing to speak, please feel free to come forward now. Seeing nobody, we will close the public forum. And move on. We have no old business this evening. And under new business, we have item uh F1. Dan. Yes. Um item F1 is the 2025 community survey presentation. Uh outside of COVID, every two years we try to do a community survey. It is a statistically valid random sample uh survey that is sent to uh residents in Oswego. Uh we try to do them every other year. And the last several times we've done the survey, it was done by ATC Institute. And we want to welcome Jason Morado to the Zoom feed. Uh Jason is going to uh welcome Jason and he's going to walk us through the survey results and is happy to answer questions. And we're dialing it up right now. We can kind of see you, Jason. There's a message. Can you can everyone can everyone see and hear me? Okay. There we go. Now you're good to go, sir. Okay, great. Um I'm going to share my screen here. Okay, hopefully everyone can see that okay. Um my name's Jason Morado. I'm the director of community research at ETC Institute, and we're a marketing research firm that specializes in conducting community surveys for local governments. And we just finished for the fourth time conducting a community survey for the village of Oswego. So today I'm going to walk through the key findings from the survey.

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