Holian Settlement Payment Date: The Administrator Projected the First Quarter of 2026, Callers Were Later Told the Second, and Now Hear the Fourth — Nearly a Year After a Judge Approved $5.5 Million for Chemtool Fire Neighbors

No official Holian settlement payment date has been published. The official website, holiansettlement.com, read on October 2, 2026, still lists only the 2025 deadlines and the October 23, 2025 final approval hearing. Every later date comes from the settlement administrator, Analytics Consulting, and reached the public through the Rockton-Roscoe News:

• November 7, 2025, in an email to the paper: “We have over 5,000 claims to process and review. It should be much faster than for Grasley v Chemtool, as we have more information. Distribution of settlement payments is anticipated in the first quarter of 2026.”
• April 2026: a call center representative told a resident that “the timeline for payment has officially been extended to the second quarter of 2026.” The paper noted this had not been confirmed by attorneys or the administrator.
• Late September 2026: class members in South Beloit who called the call center were told payments could come in the fall — the fourth quarter. The paper asked Analytics Consulting for comment on September 25, 2026 and had received none at publication.

So the most recent date is a call center statement, not a court order or a notice on the official site. Treat it as an estimate that has already moved twice.

The signed settlement agreement lays out the order of steps. The deal becomes final (the “Effective Date”) 30 calendar days after the final approval order is entered if no objections are pending; if unresolved objections were filed, it waits until the time to appeal runs out or any appeal is decided. Within 30 days of the Effective Date, Holian’s insurer, Nautilus Insurance Company, pays the $5.5 million into an escrow account. The administration fee and the attorneys’ fee award are paid 35 days after the Effective Date.

Claims run on their own clock: the administrator has 30 days after the claim deadline to process all claim forms, 35 days after the deadline to send both sides a report of approved and rejected claims, and the lawyers then have 45 days to audit and challenge them. Disputes go to the judge. Only after that is the net fund “distributed to Class Members with Approved Claims.”

Our arithmetic from the agreement: the claim deadline was October 13, 2025, so the report was due by November 17, 2025, and the 45-day audit window ran to about January 1, 2026 at the earliest. On paper, that fits the administrator’s original first-quarter estimate. The agreement sets no deadline for the steps after the audit — resolving disputed claims, then calculating and sending the payments. Neither the official site nor the public reports explain the delay.

The fund is $5,500,000. Class counsel limited its fee request to no more than 35% of the fund, which is $1,925,000; the October 23, 2025 final approval order granted the fee application without stating a dollar figure. Reading the preliminary approval motion, the Rockton-Roscoe News also counted $47,674 for Huntington Bank, the escrow agent, leaving $3,527,326 for claimants.

That money is split in half by the agreement:

• Property damage (50%): only for owners of real property in the class area, one payment per property, pro rata by the property’s assessed value from the Winnebago County Supervisor of Assessments.
• Evacuation and loss of use (50%): for owners and tenants, by shares — 2 shares within 1 mile of the plant, 1 share from more than 1 up to 3 miles, plus 0.2 share for each additional person living in the home on June 14, 2021. Non-residential owners get 2 shares within 1 mile and 1 share beyond.

The agreement estimated that if the same number of people submitted approved claims as in the Chemtool settlement, “the average payment is expected to be greater than $500,” compared with an average of more than $10,000 from Chemtool and Lubrizol. But the administrator reported over 5,000 Holian claims, about double, according to the paper. Our arithmetic: $3,527,326 spread over exactly 5,000 approved claims would average about $705; more approved claims push that down, denials push it up, and the formula above means individual payments will differ widely.

The class is every Illinois citizen who, on June 14, 2021, owned or rented property in Illinois within three miles of the Chemtool plant at 1165 Prairie Hill Road in Rockton. The claim deadline was October 13, 2025 and has passed. People whose claim in the earlier Chemtool settlement was approved did not have to file again: the official site says their earlier claim form is automatically treated as a Holian claim.

Under the agreement, class members could choose Venmo, Zelle, PayPal or a paper check. Anyone who did not choose gets a check by First-Class Mail at the last known address, updated through the National Change of Address database. Checks become void if not cashed within 180 days of issue, and if an electronic payment fails, the administrator is to try to contact the class member within 30 days. If you have moved since filing, update your address with the administrator now.

A representative of Analytics Consulting told the paper that new claimants who are denied will be notified by mail and get a chance to fix their claim.

The fire started on June 14, 2021 at the grease and lubricant plant Chemtool operated in Rockton, a subsidiary of The Lubrizol Corporation. Chemtool settled the class claims for $94.5 million, approved about a year before the Holian deal; Holian’s $5.5 million brings the total recovery to $100 million, according to class counsel Miner, Barnhill & Galland. Holian, a contractor working at the plant that day, denies wrongdoing. The Rockton-Roscoe News reported that OSHA fined Holian $9,557 after finding that a scissor lift struck a pressure tap on a hot oil return pipe, causing the oil leak that led to the fire.

The case is Grasley, et al. v. Chemtool Inc., No. 21 L 162, in the Circuit Court of the 17th Judicial Circuit, Winnebago County, Illinois, before Judge Stephen E. Balogh. At the October 23, 2025 hearing he found the settlement “fair, reasonable, and adequate,” and, according to the Rockton-Roscoe News, set December 29, 2025 as the deadline for the next status report from the attorneys.

The official FAQ lists the administrator as Holian Settlement Administrator, P.O. Box 2009, Chanhassen, MN 55317-2009; toll-free 866-654-3125; email HolianSettlement@noticeadministrator.com. Class counsel include Robert S. Libman of Miner, Barnhill & Galland, Daniel R. Flynn of DiCello Levitt and Robert Foote of Foote, Mielke, Chavez & O’Neil. We will update this article when a payment date appears on the official site or in a court filing.