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Logan County Board
Regular Monthly Meeting - Continued
[January 21, 2026]
On Tuesday, January 20th, the
Logan County Board held their Regular monthly meeting. The first
half of this meeting was covered in another article, mainly focusing
on the large number and content of the public comments relating to
the proposed data center near Latham. To read those comments, please
read LDN’s other article on
this meeting.
After the public comments, the Board then moved on to action items
from their various committees, starting with Building and Grounds.
Conahan had thirteen items on the agenda from his committee. All of
these items were covered in greater detail in the article on the
Building and Grounds Committee meeting from earlier in the month,
which can be read
here.
All of the following items were unanimously approved with little to
no discussion:
● Restoric change order for $84,075 from the Restoration Fund.
● Widmer invoice in the amount of $29,769.44 for the benches in the
second-floor courtroom.
● Young’s Security burglary alarm in Scully Park for $1,500 from the
Community Benefit Fund.
● Young’s Security burglary alarm in the Logan County Courthouse for
$15,945 from Restoration.
● Young’s Security fire alarm in the courthouse for $14,483 from
Restoration.
● Young’s Security controlled access to the courthouse for $8,395
from Restoration.
● Young’s Security burglary alarm replacement at the Logan Building
for $5,845 from the Building and Grounds account.
● Young’s Security burglary and fire alarms at the Logan County
Animal Control building for $9,795 from the contingency line item.
● TK Elevator change order in an amount not to exceed $30,000.
The next two items were in regard
to a new server from Heart IT and the cost to transfer all the
county computers to this new server. The server itself would be
$23,851.94 for the device and installation, and the cost to move all
the computers over would be $25,606.60. Leesman stated that he had
some issues with the plan, stating that the details were lacking in
specifics. He also stated that the service fees were not stated, and
that the server was only about $8,000 of the cost. He wanted to know
where the other, almost $16,000, was coming from.
Conahan shared that he knows the server needs to be replaced and
encouraged Leesman to reach out to their Heart contact to get his
questions answered. Conahan also stated that he has had problems
getting questions answered and has “about had it” with Heart,
stating that there has been an “information flow issue.” It was
decided to send these two items back to committee so that more
answers could be obtained before the county spent that money.
Next, Conahan brought forward a motion to approve Gibson Teldata for
a cloud phone system, something that was voted on in the
Special Building and Grounds meeting from last week. Leesman
asked if the county’s current internet service would be sufficient
to support a cloud phone system. Conahan stated that the
representatives at Gibson stated they were fairly confident that it
would, but that they were conducting another test. This item was
approved unanimously.
The final Building and Grounds item was a motion to approve Mulkins
Painting for the Restoration Project for $15,600. This was also
unanimously approved.
Next was the Executive and Personnel Committee. Nelson brought
forward one motion, that being to pay $11,000 to terminate Logan
County’s current contract with American Central, the county’s
previous insurance broker. This is in favor of the new company,
Alera Group, that the county voted to be their new insurance broker
going forward. This motion was approved unanimously.
Glenn asked Schmidt, the chairman of the Finance Committee, and
Knauer, the chairman of the Safety Committee, if they had any action
items. Neither of them did.
After that was the Transportation Committee. Chairman Wessbecher had
one motion which was “to award 2026 MFT contract for aggregate
materials to lowest responsible bidders.” This motion was also
approved unanimously.
Last was the Zoning and Economic Development Committee. DeRoss, the
chairman of this committee, had three items to bring forward. The
first was an amendment to the Logan County zoning ordinance that
would put penalties in place for solar and wind companies that
violated the ordinance. This was approved unanimously.
[to top of second column] |
The final two
motions were in regard to two new community solar projects that
the Board approved, with some conditions, back in 2022. These
conditions were to develop a drainage plan, and to remove the
salvage cost from the estimated bond that the company would need
to pay the county for decommissioning of the project at the end
of its life. Some companies include this cost as an estimate of
what the county could get for scrapping the solar panels,
subtracting this amount from the money they give the county to
put toward the cost of decommissioning it. The Board has long
had an issue with this practice, stating that they would prefer
the companies to provide the full amount, rather than try to
guess what the scrap would be worth in several decades.
Sheets spoke for a moment, stating that her company Trajectory
Energy would be building the two projects, known as the
Stovepipe and Redbird projects. Fitzpatrick asked about the
locations of these projects. Sheets stated that the Stovepipe
project would be south of the park district on Primm Road, and
the Redbird project would be on Highway 10 near Lincoln Ag. Both
projects would be 5 megawatt facilities, the largest amount
possible to still be considered community solar.
Nelson then clarified that community solar, regardless of the
name, does not necessarily go back to the community. He stated
that the energy produced would be sent back into the Ameren
substation and then sent to wherever Ameren wanted to use it,
including Midcontinent Independent System Operator (MISO).
Sheets stated that Miso and Ameren are separate, and that the
energy would not be going to MISO. Nelson stated that after
conversations with Ameren, he learned that this can be the case.
He also stated that the people who get that energy are on a
“first come first serve basis.” Sheets said that the energy
would stay local in Ameren Illinois and Ameren Missouri, and
Nelson stated that the energy would not necessarily be staying
in Logan County.
Both solar projects were passed in a vote of 7-3. The three no
votes for both projects were Knauer, Schmidt, and Conahan.
This then took Glenn to his Chair’s Report. He shared that there
is going to be a Special Transportation meeting on Friday,
January 23rd at the Oasis Senior Center about Show Bus. He
encouraged members of the community who either use Show Bus or
who know someone who uses it to come. This meeting is to help
the Transportation Committee determine if Show Bus is meeting
all the transportation needs of the county. Glenn then also
thanked the members of the community for showing up.
DeRoss reminded Glenn of the Special Zoning and Economic
Development Committee meeting on January 21st. This meeting is
to discuss potential changes to the Logan County zoning
ordinance in relation to data centers. The current zoning
ordinance has no regulations on data centers.
DeRoss continued, stating that the
meeting was supposed to be held in the Blue Room of the Safety
Complex, but that Sheriff Mark Landers asked him to move the meeting
due to space concerns. DeRoss said that he may have missed the
48-hour window of location change notice required by the Open
Meetings Act (OMA), but that he would accept responsibility if he
was reported for it.
Nelson stated that he did not like the idea of breaking OMA, stating
that if the Board was going to be more transparent, they should not
be breaking rules. DeRoss stated that, due to not voting on
anything, he felt it was still important to hold the meeting and not
have people show up to the courthouse and not be able to get in if
they do not get the message that the meeting was moved to a
different date.
Ultimately, it was decided that, for sake of not breaking OMA, the
meeting would be moved to a different date. DeRoss and Kuhlman
stated that they would still be at the courthouse on the 21st to let
people in and hear their concerns about the proposed data center. As
of the writing of this article, a new date for the Special Zoning
and Economic Development Committee meeting has not been set.
After this decision, the Board voted to adjourn.
[Matt Boutcher] |
