The Mt. Vernon City Council held their second December meeting last night. On the agenda was the approval for the lowest bids on two projects. One project for the Summersville Sanitary Sewer system of $64,355 and one for water distribution system leak surveys of $19,995 were approved. The projects are designed to help find leaks and problem areas in the systems sooner rather than later and get them fixed before they become worse.

Once that business was handled, the Council turned its attention to raising the tax levy and collection of taxes in the city.

Mayor John Lewis stated, in his opinion, government doesn’t do a good enough job explaining and being transparent to its citizens of why they make certain decisions.

Mayor Lewis then explained the increase.

In the levy phase of a property tax cycle each taxing district in Jefferson County develops their budgets. Mayor Lewis says the question that boils down to the citizens is what level of service do they want provided to them from the city.

Mayor Lewis tried to put what other Illinois cities are doing into perspective for the council as well as those attending the meeting.

The Council also approved the seeking of bids for a resurfacing project on South 44th St in Mt. Vernon.