By Ronald Hamm
The last major item on the Springfield City Council agenda ended up being the most contentious; Ordinance 2024-451, an ordinance proclaiming the second Monday in November as “Indigenous People’s Day”.
Ward 6 Alderwoman Jennifer Notariano, who is Italian American, proposed an amendment declaring the second Monday in November as Indigenous People’s Day and Italian American Heritage Day.
Ward 10 Alderman, Ralph Hanauer, strongly objected to this, saying that it would be demeaning and unfair to the Italian American community to share a holiday with Native Americans. Notariano responded by pointing out that Indigenous People’s Day already shares a day with Columbus Day, which is why the conversation was even taking place. Hanauer had no response to this.
A total of six residents came to defend the proclamation of Indigenous People’s Day.
Sister Marie Michelle Hacket, speaking on behalf of The Dominican Sisters, expressed a great deal of pride in those people advocating for Indigenous People’s Day, saying that the young people here today are the fruits of teaching critical thinking and open minds.
Maribel Cruz Hine stressed that Indigenous People’s Day would not be replacing anything else, it would only be a declaration. She also stressed that this declaration would be an act of pushing back against sanitizing the treatment of indigenous people in schools.
“When we say ‘indigenous, it means everyone,” she said.
Emily Anderson supported compromise, supported healing, and emphasized that Native Americans and Italian-Americans shared a story.
Mallory Seaton expressed sadness that indigenous history isn’t being taught in schools. She spoke for less than a minute.
Dreyden Goacher, a student, stressed the cultural significance of celebrating indigenous culture instead of Christopher Columbus and well documented crimes.
“In a world full of shadows, we have to be the light people look for,” he said.
Hine expressed a great deal of anger; both at the city council for needing to consider this at length and at the Italian American community for not engaging in conversation with the rest of the community.
“If these Italian Americans are mad about it,” she said. “Come here!”
Notariano withdrew her amendment, and the final decision on Indigenous People’s Day was put on hold.
Another contentious issues was with the zoning commission agenda.
The bulk of the discussion was preoccupied with resolution 024-036; which would increase the total square footage of signs a person can put in their yard from 12 square feet to 16 square feet. The resolution would apply to temporary signage at family residences. It would primarily be for political signs, but also include “for sale” and real estate signs, as clarified by Ward 9 Alderman Jim Donelan.
“We’re talking about total area.” he said. “Not one sign, but multiple signs.”
This resolution has been contentious among the city council since it was proposed, and has been pushed to a different date on at least three separate occasions. It was pushed back again to the Dec. 17 meeting.
Ordinance 2024-449, authorizing the first stage of greenway engineering along Third Street and North Street, also brought conflict. Notariano had spent last week going over the details of the project and how it would be funded in detail. This week, she asked the mayor about more specifics about the funding, and appeared to not receive adequate answers.
Speaking to the Illinois Eagle after the meeting, Notariano expressed concerns about the process, calling it a “cart before horse” situation. She also expressed a desire to expose the double standard in city funding, and expressed intense frustration over how Better Life, Better Living For Kidz was treated weeks prior. She said she was looking forward to voting to fund Better Life, Better Living in the coming weeks.
An item not on the agenda was the announcement of the vacancy of the position of City Clerk. The current clerk, Frank Lesko, won the election for Sangamon County Recorder. Consequentially, he will be required to resign his position as Springfield City Clerk by Dec. 2, and the city council will be required to appoint a new City Clerk. Anyone interested in taking the position should submit an application to the mayor’s office.
The full city council meeting can be watched here.
Springfield Post 