The Hancock-Henderson Quill, Inc.
by Jacob Irish, Quill Reporter
Henderson County will soon be getting a new, standardized, addressing system. The Henderson County board met Tuesday, January 12 to discuss issues pertinent to the community. The board spent some time discussing the resolution for rural reference addressing, before passing the resolution into effect.
According to the documented resolution, rural addressing has been deemed a necessity for the following reasons:
"1) Provide rural property owners, emergency services, and the general public with an accurate and systematic means of identifying and locating property in Henderson County.
2) Assist in the proper delivery of mail, packages, utilities, and other services.
3) Provide means of expedient emergency response by medical, law enforcement, fire, rescue, and any other emergency services.
4) Assign address numbers to new addressable structures or units: [and] units that currently do not have a site address:
5) Govern [Standardize] the display of property address numbers and provide for accurate road name signage, installation, and maintenance thereof."
In order to set this project in motion, county workers will be working hard to rename roads, reassign addresses, and make the changes accessible to the public.
Henderson County residents will still be able to decide whether or not to use the physical address for mail, or continue using their existing P.O. Boxes. However, all residences will still need to be visibly addressed for emergency reasons.
In other news, the Henderson County Board accepted the Henderson County Health Department's claims for December 2015. Administrator Angela Myers voiced her concerns about the Health Department's financial state.
Myers stated, "We are struggling, but we have made pay roll. Unfortunately, we will continue to struggle until we receive funding from Illinois."
She said the state of Illinois owes the Henderson County Health Department nearly $200,000 in wages. The Health Department is calling on the community to help them continue providing programs to Henderson County families.
The County Community Organizations Active in Disaster (C.O.A.D) has announced the dates of their National Incident Management Systems (NIMS) trainings at the Henderson County Health Department at 6:30 p.m. on January 27, March 23, June 22, and September 28.
The board approved the 2015 Annual Report of the County Treasurer and the inventories of county offices.
The county board is to meet again at 8:30 a.m. Feb. 8, at the Henderson County Court House in Oquawka.