​No meeting of the Board of Commissioners held in January; notice of cancellation of January 24 meeting is currently posted. Meetings changed to first Monday of each month at 4:30 PM. Schedule of Board meetings for 2019 are posted on website. Next meeting will be February 4, 2019, at The Frank Campbell Community Center, 312 S. Merriman, Peoria IL. I will attend February meeting and continue to monitor PHA website for update on meeting minutes and Board meeting packets.

​The Peoria City County Landfill Committee met January 16th, 3 pm at Peoria City Hall room 404 with Chairman
Steve Morris presiding.
  Karen Raithel, Peoria County Sustainability and Resource Conservation Director announced that recycling drop-off locations at the Northpoint Shopping Center off of Knoxville Avenue and at Sterling Bazaar off of Sterling Avenue would soon be closed and that Peoria residents should use their city-wide option of curbside recycling pick-ups.
   The first part of the Foth Engineering report covered continued monitoring of pollutants. Repeated incidences of acetone were decided to be false positives from contamination in lab testing and not actually showing high landfill levels. 

The Peoria County Board of Election Commissioners met on Tuesday January 8, with Commissioner Burke absent.     During the discussion of bills, it was learned that the many miscellaneous charges listed would finish paying all expenses from the November election. 
   Early voting for the primary election on February 26, will only be held in two locations: the election office and the downtown library.  The only race on the ballot will be for Peoria City Council.  Early voting will begin on January 17, and run until February 25.  State statute requires that the election office be open for voting during that whole period.  The downtown library will only be open Thursday through Saturday, February 21-23.  The Federal Companies was the low bidder for delivering the equipment to polling places.

​What You Can Do to Reduce Your Part of the Gulf Dead Zone: LWV Upper Mississippi River Task Force Update

The Dead Zone is the area expanding from the discharges of the Mississippi River into the Gulf of Mexico where water oxygen levels are absent or so low that fish and aquatic life must leave the area or die. The area is larger than the state of New Jersey. Much of the Dead Zone is the result of nutrient pollution caused by high levels of common fertilizers like nitrogen and phosphorus.
An excellent series of articles researching this issue is listed at the recent LWV UMR blog https://www.lwvumrr.org/blog/frustrations-lack-of-progress-environmental-groups-are-maddened-but-epa-is-pleased
More information about the LWV Upper Mississippi River Task Force is at https://www.lwvumrr.org/ and a full listing of their blog posts is at https://www.lwvumrr.org/blog
Lack of progress in reducing the size of the Dead Zone is noted. Goals set in 2008 have not been reached and the Dead Zone continues to increase in size.
Voluntary compliance for nutrient pollution reaching the Gulf is contrasted to the mandates set by the U.S. EPA for clean-up of nutrient pollution in Chesapeake Bay, which did make significant reductions of the problem in the targeted time-frame.
You can reduce your part of the Dead Zone by buying locally grown organic produce, meat and eggs from small farms and by buying phosphate free dish detergents and soaps and purchasing only phosphorous free yard products. Find out what your lawn service uses and insist on phosphorous free lawn care.
The Peoria LWV is a member of the LWV UMR. Peoria Board members Elaine Hopkins and Joyce Blumenshine attended their pre-conference session held last summer in Chicago at the National LWV Convention. Additional background on nutrient pollution and tips for what you can do are at https://www.sierraclub.org/illinois/our-work/water/nutrients
                                                                                                                                             LWVGP is a member of the UMR ILO