And you will be given three minutes.

I'll set a timer when the timer goes off.

That's your time zone to end.

So first we have uh Kerry Humphrey.

Data centers harm people.

The time is now to repent and turn away from wickedness, including greed.

We are all in need of a savior.

It's becoming very clear in these days.

Give your life to Jesus before it's too late.

You do not want to be here when God pours out his wrath upon those who thought they didn't need him.

That time is coming.

So the TIFF.

Currently, this is already very ecologically fragile land.

There are at least two super fun sites in active dump and an old dump nearby.

Also nearby is the Kishwaki River, which is one of the cleanest rivers in the state, and it supports at least forty-four threatened or endangered plants and animals.

What happens if these forever chemicals are pulled into this data center and then thrown out into the air?

I've heard that this may be a closed loop data center and therefore safer.

These systems often require chemical treatments, including antifreezes.

If a leak occurs, these can enter the soil or waterways right next to the Kish and a forest preserve.

Maybe that's why the Forest Preserve Board is unanimously against the TIFF vote, and you should listen to them.

Data centers produce infrasound, which can cause dizziness, lack of sleep, nausea, fatigue, headache, panics, feelings of dread, stress, and anxiety.

Particulate matter released from data centers causes worsening asthma, lung and cardiovascular disease, heart attack, stroke, and premature death.

An analysis cautioned that children, asthmatics, and older adults with pre-existing heart and lung conditions have the highest risk.

And it's not just those who live near the data center bearing the health risk.

Another study found that these air pollutants can travel hundreds of miles.

So if you think this will just affect the people nearby the data center, you're sorely mistaken.

Hundreds of miles.

Think about that and your responsibility for the health of the people who live here and around here.

If you will not consider the cost of actual people's deaths and illnesses, maybe you will consider that this will put a burden on our health care system monetarily.

This won't bring long-term jobs.

It gives tax breaks to rich people, and it's not a blighted area.

Where's the incentive for the citizens of Rockford and surrounding areas?

Do you think the health care system being bogged down with sick people is going to help us?

Do you care about the people you represent?

I implore you to seek God's will in this far-reaching decision and for all lives in general.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next, we have Denzel Winter.

Good evening, City Council people.

We have a holiday coming up, Juneteenth.

And I don't think a lot of people know what the significance of that was.

June 19th, 1865.

Black slaves in Texas finally found out that they were free.

And the way they found out that they were free was that the Union soldiers that occupied the city told them that they were free.

You know.

And the thing that gets me is that we have Juneteenth.

We have the shortest month of the year for us to celebrate.

But here they wanted to get Charlie Kirk a holiday.

For what?

Speaking prejudice.

Downgrading people of color.

We need to wake up people.

Because the time is coming.

There's a reckoning coming.

And just like that lady said, Jesus is coming.

He's just around the corner.

And I don't think a lot of us gonna want to be here when he comes.

We need to start putting more emphasis on being more like brothers instead of enemies.

Instead of wasting money destroying other countries instead of wasting money trying to steal people's oil.

That's why we're having the problem we're having now, the oil prices.

They're starting to come down, they say.

Until the election is over with.

We'll find out soon.

Hopefully, people wake up and see what's going on.

Thank you for letting me speak.

Thank you.

Next we have Prophet Yusuf.

Good evening, ladies and gentlemen.

In the book of Acts, the first chapter, the eighth verse.

It says you should receive power when the Holy Ghost come upon you.

What I want to speak about tonight, Medicaid cuts will hurt poor people.

Medicare and Medicaid were hard run concessions to decades of organizing, not guilt.

Stripping them away is a violent act of economic and social warfare, particularly in a country where black people already die younger, suffer longer, and receive less care.

These cuts will accelerate deaths from preventable disease, drive elders into unpayable debt, and then throw disabled people into crisis.

This policy is crafted to hurt poor people, be young to meet aid that Medicaid provide.

There is a snowball effect of this erosion.

Medicaid isn't just a program.

It's a lift for a fragile, unequal society, remove it, and the whole thing collapse.

When you define Medicaid, you accelerate eviction, school dropouts, homelessness, poverty, hunger, untreated trauma, and preventable deaths.

Since 2015 to 2024, 230 hospitals have closed and by cutting Medicaid, more hospitals would be closing and in United, and more nursing homes and dialysis, because they depend on Medicaid to pay their bill.

You also push people into the criminal justice, where jails become psychiatric, holding sales.

The snowball turns into an avalanche.

Emergency rooms overflow.

Community clinics shut down.

And black families are left with funerals instead of follow the C and this is done intentionally.

Stripped in care from poor people and following public funds and to private insurance is how capitalism and forced obedience.

It's also set up for the rich to get richer and the poor stay poor.

So they can control the my solution, to solve this problem.

All followers of Jesus Christ to stand up and speak up and say we are tired of paying taxes, and this government is not giving us anything in return.

Thank you for allowing me to speak.

Thank you.

Next is um John Jack Brantley.

Good evening there, McMahon, our citizens of Rockford, uh Illinois.

I'm gonna start out by saying uh I've been coming here since 2009 uh speaking.

Last time I got a proclamation was in 2001 from the uh mayor.

I was highly upset when I seen the mayor give the uh Italians a proclamation saying Columbus discovered America.

Columbus did not discover America.

The Europeans conquered America and they stepped on the toes of the Native Americans here.

Also, uh I'm gonna uh bring up the fact that here the Democratics got 38 uh percent of the people that came out and vote, Republicans had 20 percent, independents have 41.5 percent of the people who came out and vote.

We got over 18,000 registered voters here that's African Americans.

Only 3,000 of them voters came out and vote during the last election.

Coming up uh this year in November is a very important election year.

We are gonna be cleaning up in Black Call Park, I mean Black Hawk Housing Area on the uh 17th next Wednesday.

I'm gonna be talking about and getting people to register to vote.

I'm also working on building the voters block.

And lo and behold, Argument Bell is gonna realize that his word is my stronghold and what heavy.

So the people look up to me, and when I speak and can't, they're gonna they hear me speak and they know that I'm uh telling the truth.

I had a meeting with uh um Jim Minch, uh Argentina Jenny Minch the other day, and we was talking about working with our youth that's in juvenile and working with our youth that's being suspended out of school.

Uh she mentioned about my taxes.

I mentioned, you know, but she don't realize my taxes, and the judge uh spent three minutes talking about uh uh how they have meetings in the judges' chambers talking about the way that our uh do the things in the community and how they wish there was ten more brother John.

The uh the uh correctional senders talk about Brother John.

The juvenile detects juvenile detention centers talk about Brother John, the tactics that I use, the text that I use is because the way I was brought up.

I am the last original of the Black Panther Party, the vanguards, the Mandinka warriors of the Black Man Part Black Panther Party.

When I major in social justice and physical education, I got a BA 3.8.5 and a BA.

I got a master in cross culture and race relations, got 4.12, cross-quotes and race relations.

But if you don't have a doctoring or a PhD in these streets, you just are educated fool.

And that's why I got so much respect in the community, and that's why I do things the way I do.

That data center, Camp Grant is uh where they want to put that daddy center.

That's a no-no.

They had over 2,500 POWs at that camp grant center, and they treated the POWs from Europe better than they did to blacks.

Book of Washington was a reservation that wasn't a center.

How you dare brag about we couldn't go nowhere but to Brooke Washington Center.

We couldn't go to downtown area unless we were the white person.

We couldn't go across the bridge unless we were the white person.

That's Jim Crow and Jim Crow is still alive and we are.

Thank you for allowing me to speak.

Vote for me.

Jackie D.

Batista.

Good evening, Mayor McMara and distinguished members of City Council.

Thank you for the opportunity to allow me to speak tonight.

My name is Jackie De Batista.

I am the executive director at Farmers Rising and a member of the Food Insecurity Task Force in Rockford.

In 2024, the Northern Illinois Center for Nonprofit Excellence convened a food and security summit.

Following that summit, a task force of more than 75 individuals representing over 20 local nonprofits and social service agencies, including Farmers Rising, began month meeting monthly to identify practical solutions that could be implemented in Rockford to ensure that every resident, regardless of neighborhood or income, has regular access to high quality affordable food.

One solution, first championed by the late NAACP president George Scott, successfully implemented by the Hunger Task Force in Milwaukee.

And before you tonight for funding consideration is a mobile grocery store.

A mobile grocery store is exactly what it sounds like.

It's not a food pantry, but instead a grocery store on wheels that brings fresh affordable food directly into neighborhoods where access to healthy groceries is limited.

The Rockford Mobile Grocery Store is a partnership between Farmers Rising and City Center Market that combines the strength of a nonprofit organization with those of a local food retailer.

City center market will ensure the mobile grocery store is stocked with fresh produce, dairy products, lean meats, eggs, and other essential grocery items.

While farmers rising will administer the program to keep it mission-driven, create market opportunities for local farmers, and leverage both public and private funding to help subsidize food costs and keep prices affordable for residents.

Recent reductions in federal SNAP benefits are adding to this challenge.

While food prices continue to rise.

For many families, the choice between paying monthly bills and putting food on the table is becoming increasingly difficult.

We are thankful the City of Rockford has adopted a policy to address food insecurity in Farmers Rising's mobile grocery store initiative directly advances all five goals outlined in your policy.

It will expand access to healthy affordable food.

It will support local food systems, it will prioritize residents most impacted by food insecurity.

It will strengthen collaboration among nonprofits, businesses, and community partners, and it will establish a sustainable model that reduces the need for public support over time.

At Farmers Rising, we believe everyone deserves access to fresh, healthy food.

The Rockford Mobile Grocery Store will bring choice, dignity, and affordability to neighborhoods that have too often been left behind.

And we look forward to partnering with the City of Rockford to make this vision a reality.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Thank you.

All right.

That concludes the uh public participation.

Now starting the legislative and lobbying meeting.

Um we've taken a role under committee reports.

We have one item, and it's for the renewal of the professional services contract with Zephyr government strategies for $10,000 per month for the City of Rockford's 2026 lobbying services.

So second.

I don't have the list of meetings on the committee.

Uh I'll second it.

All right.

Uh any questions or comments?

All of them in front of you.

Um I would like to um lay this over for 30 days.

Okay.

Um any discussion.

Is there a second on the layover?

I'll second.

All right.

Uh committee.

So take a vote on it.

I deferred to Director Everybody procedure.

Okay.

Uh any discussion on the on the layover of the contract.

Alderman Meeks.

Thank you so much.

I just wanted to say some of the reasoning behind this layover is we just received the end of session report, so I want a little bit of time to review that, as well as the talking points around some of our caucuses related to policies that we're bringing forward to our representative.

So until we get an opportunity to meet and talk, we'd like to lay this item over to have the time to do that.

Say that again.

Which caucuses are you referring to?

I uh I sit on the Democratic caucus, so I'm referring to the Democratic.

Okay, and with respect to the strategies moving forward, um because it hasn't been reviewed yet, is that is that what I'm hearing?

As far as the end of session report right, correct.

So the end of sessional report came out on Friday, that was sent to us, and then I would like to review that policy, but then sit with the rest of the Democratic caucus to talk about policies that we would like to see move forward.

Okay, all right.

Okay, all right.

Um other comments.

Okay, Alderman Bell.

Thank you, Chair, uh, for allowing me to speak on your committee.

Um this would be for Mr.

Kignoni, uh, if you may.

Um can you touch on some of the successes that uh the city of Rockford in partnership with our lobbyists as uh expands this session this past session?

Thank you.

So uh certainly happy to do so when Mr.

Cassidy is here this evening as well.

Should the committee want to entertain any uh opportunity for him to comment on the overall strategies that he's been working on.

Um but as you all may recall, we approve an annual uh list of items for consideration for our lobbying efforts.

Uh last year we did a uh 2526 list of priorities.

We provide that to Mr.

Cassidy, and he continues to work on those efforts many times, um, transcending over many uh different sessions.

But he's been you know, certainly when it comes to his overall success, we are talking about very specific legislative items, uh whether that's support of our objections to the build uh legislation, whether that's historically related to lit assist, which is an item on uh the closed regulations committee tonight regarding uh our efforts on changing that legislation, um securing grant dollars and working with our local delegation on a on a host of initiatives.

Um I would say that's on the legislative um directly in um additionally he's a tremendous resource uh when we are working through different grant opportunities, whether that's a tourism grant or city of Rocker directly or the region, or whether that's the DCO um site readiness grant, which we're fortunate uh to get uh when any time those grant opportunities come in, we'll work with Mr.

Cassidy to things goes forward.

So that's a very brief explanation.

Um certainly, you know, Mr.

Kasky would continue to uh communicate to the chair block in first all the proof you know all the Alderman Frost and certainly the mayor as well.

Should any of them have some direct um statements they'd like to make?

Well, first to take a vote any more specific questions on the vote to lay it over.

Okay, uh go ahead and call the vote.

Two no aye so that aye three has two okay that may not be laid over okay is there a motion to adjourn?

So moved all those in favor indicate by aye.

Aye, opposed.