City officials held a graduation ceremony for Peoria youth in a paid internship program this summer. The Mayor’s Youth Group lasted eight weeks with about 35 high school students participating in Public Works projects. Vikki Hibberd is with Peoria Public Works. She says the students also helped combating the flooding along the Illinois River:
“You had them sandbagging for 11 days, and they sandbagged about an estimated 20,000 bags. They were incredibly instrumental to saving the businesses and Fourth of July and everything down there on the riverfront.”
Hibberd says students also helped paint railings and garbage cans, plant flowers and cleaned-up the downtown as part of the internship.