Normal recognizes water tower success

Posted on January 21, 2015

The water tower featuring the ISU Redbird logo finished as the runner up in a tank of the year contest. (Adam Studzinski/WJBC)

By Adam Studzinski

NORMAL – Normal's town council on Tuesday took time to recognize the Redbird water tower which finished as the 2014 Tnemec Tank of the Year runner up.

Tnemec spokesman Erik Otten said they've been running this contest for about a decade and Normal's tower stuck out from among the nearly 200 entries this past year.

"If it wasn't for some voting irregularities that we usually only find in Cook County, this one would have been ours," said Otten. "(A) site went down and in the end a small tower from Lebanon, Mo. with a guy fishing on it took that one from us."

Town councilwoman Sonja Reece was excited by the recognition.

"How many times does a town get an award for a water tank? But we did," she said.

Also on Tuesday, the town council approved the purchase of about 13,000 square feet of land at 1001 Franklin Ave., which will likely be used as a site for two single-family homes to be built by Habitat for Humanity.

The purchase will be made using $35,000 in federal Community Development Block Grant funds.

Adam Studzinski can be reached at [email protected].

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