Appleton Common Council District 6 Update for December 12, 2022

 Greetings District 6 Neighbors,

I hope everyone is enjoying holiday preparations without too much stress this week. I’m headed into a bit of a whirlwind of travel over the next couple of weeks, but the chance to enjoy some time with family makes it worth the normal travel irritations.

The Common Council meeting last week was, as predicted, brief and without much drama. We approved the hiring of Kara Homan as the new Director of Community and Economic Development. Ms. Homan was in attendance, and we were able to chat briefly with her after the meeting. She comes to the city with great qualifications, and I believe that she will be a worthy successor to Karen Harkness, who is retiring as of January 3.

Only a couple of items were separated for individual consideration. The proposed $5 increase the price of a monthly parking pass (from $35 to $40) was a cause of concern for the Executive Director of Appleton Downtown, Inc., who urged the Council to vote against it. Although we were told that the price would have no effect on the number of passes sold, when I asked the Public Works Director if they had done any analysis that would support this idea, I was told that this was not done. For this reason, I voted against the increase. The fact that so many people who worked downtown have continued to work remotely since COVID is going to be a problem for the parking utility for quite some time, I am afraid. I am hoping that some of the new development, particularly the apartments behind City Center where residents would be encouraged to use the Yellow Ramp, will help. The other item separated was the updated “Fee in Lieu of Land Dedication” where the developers of subdivisions either set aside land for future parks, or pay a fee based on the number of units. The policy had not been updated since 2009 and I believe it was separated so that the policy could be explained.

Alders Croatt, Hartzheim and Doran introduced a resolution at the end of the meeting to try once again to move the funds budgeted for alder parking passes ($7200) to the concrete reconstruction budget. I have honestly lost count of the times that this has been attempted, most recently as an amendment before the adoption of the 2023 budget. I wrote to the City Attorney to find out if this was even allowable under the council rules that prohibit reconsideration of the same item within the council year and was told that we would have had to raise a point of order at the time the resolution was introduced. At this point, I can only determine that my colleagues are engaging in political theater. The Director of Public Works pointed out what a small amount of actual work could be performed for this amount. The parking passes are not a perk reserved for elected officials – every city employee who works downtown gets a parking pass. Alders are absolutely free to turn in their passes and the sponsors of this resolution generally make a pretty big deal of the fact that they do so. I personally use my parking pass. I like being able to park under cover in the winter when the weather is bad, and I generally feel safer walking back to the ramp with other people after meetings at night than I would if I had just parked in a random place on the street. I voted against a recent resolution that would discontinue alder parking passes and increase the pay by that amount, but I don’t believe that providing alders with the same benefit that every other city employee enjoys is extravagant. This item will be discussed in the Finance Committee meeting this afternoon.

Committee meetings for this week:

Municipal Services Committee – Monday, December 12, 4:30 p.m.

The committee will be voting to award two contracts – one for “Operation, Maintenance, Monitoring and Passive Vent Improvements” ($150,395) and one for “Cap Maintenance”, which includes grass cutting and maintenance and some road repairs ($38,400) at the city’s closed landfill site. They’ll also be voting on a permit for a construction site dumpster on Superior St. (through January 2023) and for a groundwater monitoring well near Oneida and Franklin St. and for a street vacation for portions of Appleton, Oneida and Pacific Streets between Packard and Atlantic. After the reconstruction, these areas are no longer needed for the right of way and would revert to the adjacent property owners. This item will also appear on the agenda for the City Plan Commission.

Finance Committee – Monday, December 12, 5:30 p.m.

The committee will receive a presentation of the financial reports for the Appleton Yacht Club for October and December of 2022. Action items include the resolution regarding alder parking passes discussed above, the awarding of contracts for HVAC upgrades ($259,840) and hardscape improvements ($39,600) at the Wastewater Treatment Plant. We will also be voting to award the contract for the 2023 budgeted Watermain Reconstruction to Kruczek Construction Inc. ($3,069,000) and to approve a change order to the Lead and Galvanized Service Replacement project to add more properties – this reduces the contingency but does not increase the overall project budget. There is also a standard request to write off  $44,867.60 in accounts receivable and $10,073.42 in delinquent personal property taxes. The city will still be attempting to collect those debts – the write-off is to clean up the books before the audit. Finally, we’ll be voting to close Tax Increment Financing District 6 in the southeast part of the city. TIF districts are sometimes a gamble, but in this instance, the TIF was a success. The base equalized value of the properties in the district at its inception in 2000 was $1,624,200; in 2008 it was $7,136,400 and as of January 2, 2022, the equalized value was $175,068,300 and the district has accumulated an excess fund balance of $1,431,082. Much commercial and retail development along the Kensington and Calumet corridors was attributable to the TIF.

Parks and Recreation Committee – Monday, December 12, 6:30 p.m.

The committee will be voting on the design contract for Lungaard Park ($322,420) and for a number of policy and rate changes for Reid Golf course and the city pools. Greens fees for 18 holes at Reid will be going up $1.00 for adults and seniors, and the price of an annual pass will be increasing $25. Daily passes at the pools will be increasing by 50 cents, punch cards by $10 and the summer swim pass (changes from annual swim pass as there will no longer be open swim at the West pool in spring, fall or winter) rates will be increasing by $20. The increases are necessary to keep pace with rising costs, particularly increased pay for seasonal workers who are necessary to keep the pools operating. There are also some changes to group rates and facility rental and special events policies.

http://cityofappleton.legistar.com/gateway.aspx?M=F&ID=39a337e5-3c8e-41a8-a5e1-4301d53126cf.pdf

http://cityofappleton.legistar.com/gateway.aspx?M=F&ID=be8c4767-3527-4409-8fa0-61b4522d3e94.pdf

http://cityofappleton.legistar.com/gateway.aspx?M=F&ID=de7db6f9-0d5b-46c8-8134-f4772edbecd7.pdf

There are also some updates to the Military Family Support Policy to clarify the language. The City of Appleton offers discounts to program fees for the families of any mobilized or deployed service member.

Fox Cities Transit Commission – Tuesday, December 13, 3:00 p.m.

The Commission will be voting to approve the October payments and to approve a number of contracts and agreements:

·       Cellcom for in-vehicle network communications system ($74,230,71 for year 1 including equipment, $11,832 for succeeding years).

·       Building commissioning for the Valley Transit Remodeling Project ($45,098).

·       Intermunicipal agreements with Winnebago, Calumet and Outagamie counties for Specialized Transportation Services.

·       Intermunicipal agreements with the City of Neenah and the Village of Fox Crossing for Dial-a-Ride services.

Utilities Committee – Tuesday, December 13, 4:30 p.m.

The committee will be voting to award several stormwater consulting contracts (total of $178,264). They will also be reviewing quotes for chemical purchases through the Joint Chemical Consortium (with Neenah and Menasha) and reviewing the Wisconsin State Laboratory of Hygiene COVID Report as well as the water main break report for October.

https://www.dhs.wisconsin.gov/covid-19/wastewater.htm#wastewater

 

Board of Health – Wednesday, December 14, 7:00 a.m.

The Board of Health will be looking at one action item – a noise variance request for sanitary and storm sewer construction for a number of streets for basically all of 2023:

There will also be information items for the quarterly report and noting the recertification of the Appleton Health Department as a Level III Health Department. I was able to sit in on part of the review process and was proud of the leadership and staff of our Health Department for their achievements.

City Plan Commission – Wednesday, December 14, 3:30 p.m.

The commission will be reviewing a request to rezone property at 1208 N. Oneida St. from commercial to two-family. This was the location of a closed day care center. The property owner wishes to convert back to residential. The commission will also be reviewing the street vacation request discussed under Municipal Services, and some changes to the floodplain zoning in the Municipal Code and a request to combine some parcels at the Banta Bowl.

Community and Economic Development Committee – Wednesday, December 14, 4:30 p.m.

The committee will be voting to approve funding for the city’s sponsorship of Appleton Downtown, Inc. projects ($15,000). There is also an item to approve the development agreement with EP Development Inc. for an 8-unit townhouse condominium project located on E. John Street on the former Foremost Farms property. TIF District #8 would invest the lesser of $595,750 or 25% of the Tax Increment Value as of January 1, 2024, plus interest thereon, to support the construction work for EP Development Inc. The estimated assessed value of the completed project is $4 million.

Safety and Licensing Committee – Wednesday, December 14, 5:30 p.m.

The committee will be voting on the Fire Department request to purchase a UTV to enable faster EMS response at events such as Octoberfest, Mile of Music, etc., and at locations where vehicle access is limited. ($27,153) The rest of the agenda is the normal slate of license applications.

 

Human Resources and Information Technology Committee – Wednesday, December 14, 6:30 p.m.

The only action item on the agenda is the request to approve the agreement with Axon Enterprise, Inc. for a cloud-based evidence storage system for the Appleton Police Department ($52,806 – the first year will come from 2021 excess fund balance). From the proposal:

Axon is the sole provider of the Appleton Police Department's body-cam hardware and video storage. Partnering with Axon to add third-party digital evidence storage allows the City to eliminate data silos in their evidence management system and store all criminal digital evidence in a single cloud-storage solution. Currently, digital evidence is spread out between body-cam cloud storage and two onsite City and Police Department servers. The APD’s Forensic Evidence Specialists spend a significant amount of time managing evidence storage as we frequently run low (or completely exhaust) digital evidence storage resources. Also of critical importance is that the Axon Evidence cloud-storage product is entirely compliant with all Criminal Justice Informaon Security (CJIS) standards enforced by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and Wisconsin Department of Justice.

As always, you can review meeting minutes, agendas and videos, as well as live streams of meetings here:

https://cityofappleton.legistar.com/Calendar.aspx

Have a great week!