Cicero Police Department spends over $170,000 on 3 new fleet vehicles and over $40 million in taxes
The Town of Cicero trustees during their bi-weekly board meeting on Tuesday, December 10, 2024. April Alonso/ Cicero Independiente
By Melina Pineda
The Town of Cicero Board of Trustees and President Larry Dominick met once in the month of December 2024 to discuss various permits and resolutions.
In December, the town approved various ordinances and resolutions, including how taxes collected in 2024 will be allocated for town needs, the purchase of Cicero Police Department vehicles, and three referendums set to appear on the April 1 ballot. The referendums will address lead pipe replacements, vaccine mandates for private businesses, and noise complaint penalties.
You can access the documents shown in this recap by clicking here for the December 10 meeting. For live streams of these meetings, visit our Facebook page.
Ordinances
The board passed an ordinance that sets out how the Town will use the taxes collected in the 2024 year to pay for various town needs, such as salaries, maintenance of vehicles and machinery, and office needs. For the 2024 fiscal year, $20 million were spent on their corporate operations, $8.2 million were spent on police pensions, $7 million on fire pensions, $1.8 million on judgments, such as workers comp in insurance premiums, $1.8 million for the Cicero Public Library, $140,081 for general assistance, such as printing and auditing, and $644,798 for their mental health commission, for a total of nearly $40.5 million total spent.
An invoice for three new vehicles was approved for purchase by the Cicero Police Department. These were a 2025 Buick Enclave with a price of $52,187.77, a 2024 GMC Acadia worth $48,899.89, and a 2025 GMC Sierra with a cost of $69,665.53, totaling $170,753.19 spent on three vehicles.
Resolutions
Trustee appointments effective through April 30, 2025, were also approved. Appointments were made for 13 committees, including the Finance Committee, chaired by Joe Virusso; Public Works, chaired by John Cava; and the Anti-Gang Committee, chaired by Fran Reitz.
List of all trustee appointments can be found on pages 87 and 88 in the December Town Board agenda.
The board also approved the appointing of several individuals to various boards and commissions that would run through April 30, 2025. The appointments included the Animal Welfare Board, Cultural Affairs/Historic Sites Commission, Board of Health, Housing Board (Cicero Housing Authority), Housing and Real Estate Board. List of all approved individuals can be found on pages 95 through 107 in the December Town Board Agenda.
The Town also passed a resolution regarding amendments made to the Town’s contract with the company SAFEbuilt Illinois. The new amendments mention the Town’s agreement to work with the company will extend through December 31, 2027, in which every 3 years, beginning December 1, 2024, the two parties will negotiate their fees due to price increases and stipulate specific consulting fees for different needs. Fees will range between $200-$14,000 depending on the needs of the Town, according to the agenda.
The Town of Cicero received $44,230.80 from the Illinois Department of Transportation for assistance in implementing the Sustained Traffic Enforcement Program. According to the agenda, the program is meant to increase traffic enforcement during times of year when there is a higher risk for accidents. The Town will be assessed on whether the fund helped by measuring the statistics on various measures, such as traffic fatalities, alcohol-impaired fatalities, racial profiling compliance levels, bicyclist and pedestrian fatalities, and crash data. In a 2024 story from Cicero Independiente, Cicero residents raised awareness for better transportation regulations to avoid crashes and accidents.
The town board also approved three referendums that will be included on the ballot in the upcoming April 1, 2025 election.
“Shall the Town of Cicero require the replacement of lead services lines either by current property owners at the time of the transfer of the property or by new property owners within six (6) months of the transfer of the property?”
“Shall the Town of Cicero cease requiring that employees of private businesses including food establishments be immunized against communicable diseases?”
“Shall the Town of Cicero increase penalties for violations of the Town of Cicero’s noise ordinance?”
Cicero residents who are eligible to vote will have the option to vote yes or no.
A contract renegotiation between the Cicero Police Department and Axon Enterprises, Inc was also approved. The Cicero Police Department had a contract with Fusus, which facilitates body cameras. Due to their acquisition by parent company Axon, they had to renegotiate their contract now with Axon.
Their contract renegotiation consists of a projected cost of 1,325,000.00 for 7 years with Axon. The board was told they would save the department nearly $250,000, considering estimates of 2025 pricing.
A $340,500 grant agreement with the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity was approved for streetscaping Cermak Road from Lombard Avenue to Central Avenue. The project is set to begin on March 1, 2026.
Comments
Cicero Chief of Police Thomas Boyle discussed the arrest of Giovani Saldivar, a 19-year-old, who is being charged with attempted murder against a Cicero police officer on December 7th. Boyle states that he is a gang member during the meeting. He further went into more detail on recent arrests, such as robberies and aggravated assaults.
An organization that did not name itself during the public comment section of the meeting, which focuses on creativity, spoke to the town board about a complaint on the Cicero Public Library being closed due to staff training with no prior communication. The organization had over 20 members ready to meet at the library. The group alleges that there must be at least a 30-day notice by the library of the days they will be closed. They continued by discussing the importance of a library, the community, mental health benefits, and overall great things that residents gain from the library or potentially lose with such actions.
The board then informed the organization of a 3-minute speaking limit and told the group that this was not a matter in which they should be involved because the Library is a separate entity from them. One of the group's final remarks was questioning why the chief of police had over 10 minutes to talk. Still, they were being cut off initially at 3 minutes and continued to be cut off thereafter. The board responded that it was different because he was the chief of police.
A Cicero resident, Sarah, ended the meeting by saying a short prayer, praying for the Board and everyone in the meeting.
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