County staff to engage municipalities on Avon Fremont Drainage District dissolution option
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Summary
Staff will contact the five municipalities in the Avon Fremont Drainage District and include the Stormwater Management Commission in discussions after the Financial and Administrative Committee reviewed statutory dissolution mechanics and directed outreach; no resolution to dissolve was adopted.
The Financial and Administrative Committee discussed the potential dissolution of the Avon Fremont Drainage District on July 31 and asked county staff to engage the five municipalities that lie within the district and include the Stormwater Management Commission (SMC) in follow-up conversations.
Staff overview and statutory pathway Assistant County Administrator Ruth Ann Hall said the Illinois drainage code allows dissolution by resolution when 75% of a drainage district’s territory is within municipal boundaries; the meeting packet map shows Grayslake contains about 74.67% of the Avon Fremont district’s land, with smaller shares in Hainesville, Libertyville, Round Lake Beach and Round Lake Park. Hall said that if municipalities adopt parallel resolutions and the county files a petition, the court can order a financial report and schedule a dissolution hearing; remaining funds would be distributed to the member municipalities for drainage purposes.
Why it matters: dissolution would end the separate drainage-district assessment and distribute remaining funds to municipalities, which would then be responsible for the district’s drainage work within their borders. Committee members emphasized the need to clarify which parties are responsible for ongoing maintenance and whether SMC or the municipalities would assume operational duties.
Committee comments and next steps Several members urged conversations with SMC and municipal officials before any further action. Member Maine and others expressed concern about shifting responsibilities and costs to other municipal budgets or to SMC, noting SMC’s staffing and grant roles differ from direct maintenance responsibilities. Hall said the Avon Fremont district did not levy the assessment for the current tax year and that any remaining funds would be distributed by percentage of territory in each municipality.
Action taken The committee directed staff to contact the municipalities and include SMC in the discussions and to return with an update and, if applicable, a resolution for municipalities to consider. No dissolution resolution was adopted at the meeting.