The LaSalle County Board and the city of Ottawa are looking at an alternative location for a generator at the downtown LaSalle County Courthouse. The County Board wanted to place the generator next to the courthouse, but the Ottawa Historic Preservation Commission said that wouldn’t work. Ottawa Mayor Dan Aussem spoke to the County Board Property Committee about possibly knocking down a vacant building on Court Street and placing the generator in a forty by eighty foot space with other equipment from Ameren in the alley. He says it might help Ameren as well because the power poles in the alley in the area would be moved underground. He also wanted to correct some inaccurate comments made at a previous property committee meeting about the possible project.
There are some issues with the building the city could knock down. Aussem says the building owner next door told him that the vacant building and his business share a wall and it could cost more to knock the building down than what it’s worth.
The project could cost about $300,000.