Music >> Rameen Karbassioon: City Spotlight is supported by Consolidated Communications.

CCI is honored to salute the cities and their leaders in the area as well as providing TV, internet, and phone service to local homes and businesses.

We live where we work and are proud to support the communities we serve; more information available at consolidated.com.>> Rameen Karbassioon: Welcome to City Spotlight, where we're focusing on the communities in east-central Illinois.

Today, we're talking about Charleston.

With us today is the mayor of Charleston, Larry Rennels, welcome.

>> Larry Rennels: Good morning.

>> Rameen Karbassioon: Thank you for being here.

Before we get started, tell us a little bit about yourself.

>> Larry Rennels: Well, I was born and raised in Charleston.

Educated in the Charleston school system, graduated from Charleston High School.

And then I went to college at Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology in Terra Haute, majored in electrical engineering.

When I left there, I went to work for Motorola Incorporated designing pagers and portable two-way radios.

And when I left Motorola 11 years later, I was a product manager for international communications products.

My wife and I decided it was time to come home, so we came back to Charleston.

And my father had owned a television and appliance business since 1959.

I joined him and then he retired a few years later and I kept the business until I retired in 2010.

>> Rameen Karbassioon: Just a short while ago.

So, you are a lifelong-- a longtime resident of Charleston.

You've been involved-- you had a business and you've been involved in city government.

Talk about being a lifelong resident of Charleston, was that a natural transition for you, and also running a business, to get involved with the city government?

>> Larry Rennels: Yes, it was.

I was serving on the Board of the Chamber of Commerce, and I was the chairman of the Board of the Chamber of Commerce.

And as a result, I was involved with a lot of things involving not only the business community but the city as well.

In 1996, there was a referendum that changed the form of government from the commission form of government to the council manager form of government and I was elected to take office in May of 1997 and that was exactly the same time that that new form of government went into effect.

So, it was an opportunity to make a transition, and at the same time learn something a little bit new.

>> Rameen Karbassioon: And can you recall what was Charleston like as far as the city roughly nearly 20 years ago?

>> Larry Rennels: Sure, of course it was very similar to what it is now.

Of course, it was a college community.

One of the reasons that I ran for office, and one the things that going to the new form of government helped with was I had always been concerned that there wasn't a lot of planning.

You would find that the city would resurface a street one year and the next year they'd tear it up to replace a water mane underneath it, or something.

And when we formed the city manager form of government, then at the same time, the council decided that we would implement a five-year plan process.

Every year we review the plan, update it as necessary, and that way we coordinate things and it's much more efficient.

>> Rameen Karbassioon: And before we talk about what transpired under your term as mayor, the importance of having those short and long term plans?

>> Larry Rennels: Sure, well, like I said, planned changes, planned improvements can be coordinated in such a way that they make sense rather than random.

And as a result, it saves a lot of money for the tax payers.

>> Rameen Karbassioon: So, you've been mayor for a couple years now.

What are some things that you're proud of that have transpired that have helped Charleston out?

>> Larry Rennels: We've done a number of infrastructure type improvements.

We've rebuilt 9th Street from Polk Street all the way around to Lincoln.

That was done totally with in-house labor.

We didn't have to have a contractor do it, our own employees were able to do that.

We have taken on some rather large projects, particularly in public works.

The new forced sewer mane on Reynolds Drive was installed this last summer.

In fact, the engineering firm that designed the plans for those changes told us that they had never seen another community that was able to take on a project of that magnitude by themselves, most communities will have to hire an outside contractor.

And that was a direct result of going to a city manager form of government.

Years ago, under the commission form of government, you would find that each council member had responsibility for one department or sometimes two departments and shifting personnel from one department to another was very difficult under those circumstances.

But with a city manager form of government, you've got one manager that's responsible for all of the personnel, they can shift man power and make things work much more efficiently so you can do large projects like that that hadn't been able to be done in the past.

The other thing that we are ramping up and working on right now is retail recruitment.

We are looking to fill some of the areas where there's maybe a gap in the market for different kinds of businesses.

Not only that serve Charleston but are also attractive to students or perspective students.

>> Rameen Karbassioon: Okay, some things that have transpired here to start 2015 in the first month, we'll start with the medical marijuana.

>> Larry Rennels: Okay.

>> Rameen Karbassioon: The city council approved the policy on that subject.

First of all, explain what was the subject matter of it and what facilities, does that affect in Charleston?

>> Larry Rennels: Okay, well, last year, the state passed the law that allowed for medical marijuana but they didn't have all the regulations in place and we knew that we would have the opportunity to direct where it would be appropriate for either cultivation facility or a dispensary to be located.

But without the rules from the state, it was pretty difficult to change the ordinances to accommodate that.

So, we passed a moratorium last February that expires, in fact it just did expire, and during that period of time, we waited one for the state to complete all their rules and regulations, and then we proceeded to write an ordinance that allows for medical marijuana facilities.

One of the things that it does, it determines exactly what zoning districts they're allowed to be in.

The state rules have some requirements that they have to be so many feet away from residences and so many feet away from schools and things.

And when you started looking at the city, it turns out about the only place that either of those kinds of facilities could be located and be in compliance with the state regulations was in what we call the I2, the heavy industrial zoned district.

So, we included that in the ordinance and we included certain things in the ordinance such as the kinds of fencing they needed around particularly a cultivation facility, the security they needed and those kinds of things.

That ordinance was passed, what the end of January, and it went into effect just prior to the expiration of the moratorium.

>> Rameen Karbassioon: Okay, also changes made to the liquor code.

There's been a change in the number of hours bars or establishments can be open.

>> Larry Rennels: Yes, we made a change to the liquor code, we made several changes to the liquor code.

Many of them were simply clean ups.

Over the years, one section of the code would be changed and another section that was similar to it wouldn't be consistent.

So, we fixed those areas, but then we made a few specific changes and one of them had to do with the hours that they can be open on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday nights we're allowing the bars or the restaurants, the establishments that sell liquor for consumption on premises to remain open an extra hour until 2 a.m. We still require the package liquor stores or any organization that sells packaged liquor to discontinue that sale at 1 a.m.

There were a number of reasons for the change.

One, we made it a temporary change because it's a trial period, we want to see whether it achieves the goals that we had.

One of the thoughts was that presently, or prior to the change, with the 1 a.m. closing time, at 1 a.m., everybody seemed to leave the bars at the same time.

And as a result, there was a large crowd that sometimes would congregate in the parking lots and from time to time, there'd be disagreements and fights break out and that kind of thing.

We were told that possibly by adding the extra hour, people would tend to trickle out of the bars a little more gradually than all leave at 2 a.m. And that's one of the things we're going to be looking at.

I heard a report this morning that maybe this last weekend they may have seen a little bit of that.

One of the other things that we were looking at is other towns nearby have later hours and we don't like the idea of Eastern students driving 50 miles to drink for an extra hour and then driving back after they've been drinking for an evening.

So, we kind of hope that maybe if we had the same hours as the other cities, maybe it would discourage them from leaving Charleston.

So, that was part of the change as well.

>> Rameen Karbassioon: And Charleston is a college town, so addressing making modifications to the liquor code has to be a necessary thing, you have to look into every once in awhile.

>> Larry Rennels: We do, we work with the Illinois State Liquor Control Commission.

They have something every year called the college town summit where the-- all of the college towns in the state get together, both representatives from the colleges and universities and from the communities as well as the state.

We talk about various in sundry ideas, problems, suggestions, and that's where some of the ideas for some of the changes come.

I also serve on the Alcohol Coalition here at Eastern represented from the police department, the EMTs, and myself and we meet monthly with that group, which includes people from student standards, student health services, and everyone basically with the university that's involved with alcohol and any problems that might be associated with it.

So, we discuss these kinds of things there as well.

>> Rameen Karbassioon: And one last issue that came about here the start of 2015, changes to the building code and maybe this affects business owners and area contractors.

Can you elaborate on that?

>> Larry Rennels: Sure, we-- for a number of years, our electrical code had required that in commercial establishments all the electrical wiring has to be in conduit.

The national electrical code does not require that on all commercial establishments.

It does in some classifications of commercial establishments, but not on all of them.

And one of the things that we've found over the years is that's expensive, that adds to the cost and it's difficult for someone who's going to build a building, the contractors don't like it because they have to do extra work and charge their customers more money.

So, we took a look at it and we decided that, you know, if it's good enough for the national electrical code, and we talked to the fire inspectors and people like that, why are we being more restrictive?

So, we went back to the national electrical code requirements.

The other change we made had to do with sprinkler systems in stores that display and sell furniture, upholstered furniture.

The code had required those, all of those, kinds of establishments to have have sprinkler systems in them.

Well, a sprinkler system's expensive, and you take a store that maybe only has a small quantity of upholstered furniture such as the Habitat for Humanities Resale Store or some of the consignment stores, it isn't really that big of a problem.

We looked at the code, the national code and it allows for an exception for those that display ability that's less than 5,000 square feet of upholstered furniture will not need to be sprinkled.

So, we changed our code to allow for that as well.

Hopefully that will help the businesses a little bit as well.

>> Rameen Karbassioon: And let's stick with businesses, you're a former businessman here in Charleston, how would you describe the current landscape of businesses in Charleston.

>> Larry Rennels: We've been seeing some improvements, some changes, some new businesses come to town, and some expanded businesses.

Here a few years ago, Walgreens expanded or built a new building and Starbucks came to town.

More recently, CVS and County Market has built new buildings.

Then, within the last year, we've seen Ruler Foods open, we've seen Dollar Tree move from the east side of town to a larger location in the old Wal-Mart shopping center.

We've seen the Habitat for Humanity Resale Store open.

We've seen major improvements and upgrades to the Unique Suites hotel.

And so, we're very encouraged with what's happening with our businesses here in town.

Obviously, we'd like to see more, but we've had a lot of success recently and it happens gradually enough that sometimes people don't notice it until you sit down and start making a list.

>> Rameen Karbassioon: And I can be one to attest to that, being a Charleston native myself, I can remember going to high school and there was the Dog 'n Suds there by the high school.

>> Larry Rennels: Oh yeah.

>> Rameen Karbassioon: And it's not there anymore, there's a auto parts store.

So, my question for you is locations in Charleston, are there some challenging locations that you have to-- that are kind of hard to get businesses to come or for you to put?

>> Larry Rennels: Sometimes that happens, it's kind of cyclical.

Sometimes you'll find a business that will go out for one reason or another and maybe be vacant for a while and somebody will fill that spot.

And then you'll have another vacancy pop up somewhere else.

I believe the old Wal-Mart shopping center area is seeing some renewed interest now.

I mean, we have the new AT&T store that opened here just recently and there aren't near as many vacancies there as there were before.

And I think they're working to fill some of those as well.

The one I think that people have seen quite often and we'd like to see something done with that one of these days is the old How Y'all Are?

restaurant, Lulu's, there on Lincoln Avenue.

But we're working on some of those things as well.

>> Rameen Karbassioon: Excellent, last question about businesses.

Obviously, you're a college town, so how does that work into the business landscape and having to cater to those needs of college atmosphere?

>> Larry Rennels: Sure, one of the things that businesses have to be aware of is that it is a college town.

And particularly, some of the businesses that are heavily patronized by the college students need to realize that in the summer months, the college students, or many of the college students, are gone and they have to be able to be able to withstand that.

Sometimes, that's a bit of a challenge for a business.

The other thing that we find is is some of the businesses that a lot of the college students would like to see, we don't have here.

And we'd like to get them, businesses that they're used to from when they come from a larger city or something like that.

When we go to recruit those kinds of businesses, we run into the problem that because it's a university town, they look at the statistics from the census bureau and those kinds of things and they find that gee our median income is low.

Well, it's low because a third of the population is not employed, by choice, because they're getting and education.

And as a result, sometimes that's a challenge because a lot of retail businesses simply look at numbers like that and make a decision that they're not interested based on that.

One of the things that we've done this year, actually started it last year, is we are working with a retail recruitment firm that specializes in recruiting retail businesses in college towns.

And they've had success in college town as a result some of the national chains have recognized that they're credible when they explain the difference in demographics and what that really means.

So, those are the kinds of things that are a little bit of a challenge but we find ways to work around them.

>> Rameen Karbassioon: Now, buildings in Charleston.

Briefly just tell us some of the buildings that might be modifications made to or unfortunately might have to be demolished this year, that you're looking at.

>> Larry Rennels: I don't really have any specific ones in mind.

We look at buildings that are in bad shape, that need to be demolished, we work with the property owners, attempting to get them to either demolish the building or repair the building, or demolish it and build a new building.

And over the last few years, we've been pretty successful; there've been a number of those that have been demolished.

We don't like to do it ourselves.

One, it costs the tax payers money, and then someone usually ends up losing their property if we have to go in and demolish it and put a lean on it.

And we don't like to do that.

So, we work with property owners as much as we possibly can to get those kinds of things cleaned up.

And we have been having a good deal of success recently.

There's more to go but we're gradually getting there.

>> Rameen Karbassioon: Excuse me, our time is moving fast here, so let's quickly talk about roads.

Lincoln Avenue obviously sees a fair share of work on it, what other streets in Charleston might be looked at for some revamping?

>> Larry Rennels: Yeah, Lincoln Avenue obviously is Illinois Route 16, which is a state route, which is maintained by the state.

So, we don't have any direct control over what they do there and sometimes we're not pleased with what they've done there.

We would like to see it totally resurfaced, last year they went in and did some patches, I was not really pleased with the patchwork that they did, but they tell us sometime within the next two to three years, they are going to resurface it entirely.

We've got some areas where we've worked with them and we're going to get some of the center islands and curbs repaired, particularly the one out in front of Old Main and the one out by the high school.

Through a joint effort, we're going to do some of that with city funds, motor fuel tax funds, and the state's going to do some of it themselves.

But the other city streets in town, this next summer, we're going to be resurfacing Division Street from Lincoln Avenue to Harrison and we're going to be resurfacing Fourth Street from Roosevelt Drive on where it goes down around the curve to where it meets up with University Drive.

So those are the major ones that are going to be done this summer.

>> Rameen Karbassioon: All right, Charleston is a university town, we have Eastern Illinois University, it's-- they've been together for about 120 years.

Let's talk about the benefits of Charleston having a university here.

>> Larry Rennels: Sure, there are a lot of benefits.

One of them, is there are a lot of activities that go on here at the university that are residents can go to.

Cultural type things, concerts, count basic was here just recently, and those kinds of things wouldn't be available to a city the size of Charleston without the university.

The other thing is the university being a third half of the population brings a lot of people in for the businesses; faculty and staff are good people for our businesses here in town as well.

So, there are a lot of benefits.

The other benefit we see is is the opportunity for the citizens of Charleston to learn different kinds of cultures.

We have a lot of international students coming to Charleston and it's an opportunity for Charleston residents to get to know people from other cultures.

>> Rameen Karbassioon: There's a lot more we could talk about the Charleston-EIU relationship.

Briefly talk about the relationship of a city mayor and a university president.

You and President Perry are only going to have a few more months to work together on things, so talk about that relationship.

>> Larry Rennels: Sure, sure.

We have an excellent relationship.

He has my cell phone number; I have his cell phone number.

Any time there is a question, concern, or information we think we need to share, we'll get on the phone.

It's not uncommon for us to be talking with each other at nine o'clock at night or seven o'clock in the morning.

We meet formally once a month, regularly.

The city manager and I meet together with Dr. Perry and his senior staff at least once a month to go over any issues, coordination type things.

Dr. Perry also has something that he calls the president's cabinet, which involves the mayors of both Mattoon and Charleston as well as other community leaders that meets at least once a semester to talk about things going on at the university, things going on in the cities and how they fit together.

>> Rameen Karbassioon: There's obviously going to be a new president of Eastern Illinois University here soon, so being able to set forth what Charleston's goals are with the university, you're obviously going to have to visit that here soon.

>> Larry Rennels: That's true, and I hope that the new president has the same philosophy as Dr. Perry as far as working together with the city.

I've served on the search committee and I'm confident that the candidates, the finalist candidates, that the board of trustees will select one from, I'm confident that all of them will have that same same approach and welcome the opportunity to work together.

>> Rameen Karbassioon: We just have a couple minutes left, so let's talk briefly about tourism and I know there's an event coming this summer that you're rather excited about.

>> Larry Rennels: Sure, and we've had a couple of exciting events.

Last year, of course, we had the 150th anniversary of the Charleston Riot.

I had the opportunity, and so did my wife, to dress up as the mayor and his wife of the 1864.

And that was a fun weekend.

This summer, from July 1st to the 5th, we are going to have the traveling display of the Vietnam Memorial Wall.

It's going to be located out at the fairgrounds near the Lincoln Douglas Debate museum.

We're also looking at the Lincoln Funeral Train is going to be making it's way from Washington D.C. to Springfield.

It's going to be displayed in Springfield for a while and we're looking to see if there's a possibility that we might be able to bring it to Charleston for a few days as well.

>> Rameen Karbassioon: Excellent, briefly, strengths of Charleston that you can look to build upon?

>> Larry Rennels: Obviously, the university is one of the strengths.

One of the other strengths that we have is our relationship with Mattoon.

We work very closely together.

Mayor Gover and I meet again at least monthly, talk whenever we need to.

We have a number of inner-governmental agreements together with the city of Mattoon.

We have a set of valves for the water system out behind the hospital that if there's a problem in one city's water system, we can open the valve and let the water flow or vice versa, and that has been used a few times recently, within the last few years.

I believe our businesses are a strength and a growing strength.

>> Rameen Karbassioon: Well, we appreciate your time Mayor Larry Rennels of Charleston, for coming on and we obviously have a lot more we could talk about in future times.

So, thank you very much.

Now, let's take a look at some of the upcoming activities going on in Charleston.

Music >> Rameen Karbassioon: And welcome back to City Spotlight, we are at Charleston City Hall and we're talking with the city manager of Charleston, Scott Smith.

Thank you for joining us.

>> Scott Smith: You're welcome.

>> Rameen Karbassioon: Now, tell us a little bit about the position.

I know it's a newer position here in Charleston, the city government runs through a city manager position.

What is it that you do as the city manager?

>> Scott Smith: As the city manager, I'm responsible for the day-to-day operations of the city government here.

All the employees and all the division directors report directly to me.

So, that includes fire/police protection, engineering, all the public works, planning, code enforcement, the clerks office, finance, human resources, and information technology.

And we have a quasi-governmental relationship with the library.

That also includes the parks and recreation and maintenance.

>> Rameen Karbassioon: And it's a new year, 2015, so what are you-- if you could go into maybe a couple things-- what are some of the things you're kind of working on that maybe Charleston residents should know about?

>> Scott Smith: Well, right now we're working on the city's budget, so I'll spend about the next six weeks knee deep and elbows deep in that.

We'll hopefully have a budget trap prepared and ready for council about the second meeting in March.

Budget will go on file for four weeks and be approved the second council meeting in April.

And then, our new fiscal year starts May 1st.

So, that's a big thing for me, one of the bigger projects I work on each year.

Given that our budget's about 26 to 28 million dollars depending on some of the larger capital projects, that's where I spend a considerable amount of my time the first part of the year.

And in looking forward, we're still working with the university and the chamber and the business community recruitment and working with some of the private owners and developers here that own land and around Charleston on trying to recruit new businesses in the community.

And that's a big focus for us right now.

>> Rameen Karbassioon: One more question, talking about bringing businesses, working with the university, what are some of the challenges in trying to bring new business or maybe the challenges of working with the university because Charleston is a university town.

>> Scott Smith: We have a great relationship with the university.

President Perry and his staff, we meet on a monthly basis and just have a very good cooperative relationship with Dr. Perry and his team.

So, in that regards, I feel like we're very fortunate.

I'm not so sure that all my counterparts in the state have the same relationship that we do and I think some may be jealous of the relationship that we have.

And so that's positive.

But we have some challenges, it's no secret that enrollment is an issue and a concern and certainly when we're into retail recruitment project that does create some challenges for us.

We're just going to continue to remain positive and optimistic that we're going to have some success.

So-- >> Rameen Karbassioon: Well, best of luck on those challenges as 2015 continues along in the city of Charleston.

Thank you very much Scott Smith.

>> Scott Smith: Thank you very much for having me, I appreciate it.

>> Rameen Karbassioon: And thank you to all of you for watching this episode of City Spotlight.Music >> Rameen Karbassioon: City Spotlight is supported by Consolidated Communications.

CCI is honored to salute the cities and their leaders in the area as well as providing TV, internet, and phone service to local homes and businesses.

We live where we work and are proud to support the communities we serve; more information available at consolidated.com.

Music