Appleton Common Council District 6 Update for September 26, 2023

(Home Builders Association of the Fox Cities)

Greetings District 6 neighbors,

I’m writing a day late this committee week because I wanted to be able to watch the video of the Municipal Services Committee meeting to get some insight before I wrote about the action item they took up yesterday. More on that as we get into the committee agendas.

I am happy to share the big news of yesterday’s announcement of the formation of the Appleton Housing Development Policy Task Force. The task force will be a collaboration  between  the City of Appleton, Home Builders Association of the Fox Cities, REALTORS Association of Northeast Wisconsin, the Fox Cities Chamber of Commerce, and Habitat for Humanity Fox Cities. I attended the press conference yesterday and heard Mayor Woodford, Community and Economic Development Director Kara Homan and representatives from all the partner groups speak on the importance of the city working with external stakeholders to reduce barriers to housing construction in Appleton.

Appleton has a shortage of housing at ALL levels, a condition which has existed since well before inflation and higher interest rates have put even what has generally been considered a “starter home” out of the reach of more and more people making the average income in our area. The labor shortage is made worse by the shortage of affordable housing. The task force will be charged with producing recommendations “recommendations aimed at streamlining housing development, with particular focus on increasing financial accessibility of housing at various income levels.” The primary objectives include:

• Identifying areas for process improvements and policy recommendations  
• Evaluating policies and best practices to accelerate the development of higher-density, more affordable housing.  
• Fostering collaboration between external and internal stakeholders to achieve mutually beneficial solutions.  
• Ensuring adequate utilization of city infrastructure, capital, and service delivery resources for both short and long-term housing development projects.  

I am excited to see the recommendations that will come out of this task force and I’m grateful for the willingness of the external partners to take on this crucial challenge with the city.

I also attended the community open house that Thrivent held last week to discuss their plans for the redevelopment of their 600-acre campus on the north side of town. Per the presentation, the planning process will “create a framework to guide development of the land for the next several decades.” They showed a number of conceptual posters and had attendees mark things they liked and didn’t like with green and red stickers. (Not very many votes for anything that looked like multifamily housing, I noted.) They have created a website for the project and have promised to update it as the planning proceeds:

 https://www.thriventdevelopment.com/

You can also add your information to get email updates on the project.

Parks and trails were mentioned often in the presentation, which I as a frequent user of the Apple Creek Trail was happy to hear.

In last week’s Common Council meeting, most of the discussion was around the items that I had noted in the last update.

As noted about the Mental Health resolution, I was unable to watch the video, so I had a discussion with Health Officer Sepers about the Health Department’s position. However, others clearly had the same problem with not being able to watch, so the item was referred back to the Board of Health for their next meeting, should be on October 11.

 The rezoning for the Clearwater Creek Subdivision Fourth Addition passed 12-3 and the preliminary plat approval passed 11-4. While there was nothing to allow us to deny the application for either, the residents brought up some valid points and I expect that we’ll be working with our county and state partners at the intersection at N. Haymeadow and JJ.

The Bird Glass resolution failed 10-5. I do plan to work with city staff and my colleagues to try to implement some specific cost-effective measures for reducing the incidence of bird strikes on city property and to share information about the options available to homeowners. This link has some good resources:

https://www.sossaveoursongbirds.org/help-birds-at-home

The resolution regarding the additional state shared revenue was recommended for denial from the Finance Committee, and the council upheld that denial 11-4. The objection seemed to be largely based on the fear that the council would approve a budget that would use these non-guaranteed funds for salaries into the future. Act 12 actually ties local aid to the state sales tax going forward, allowing for growth in the future. Mayor Woodford and city staff have been careful in the past not to fund future obligations with one-time payments such as those from ARPA, so I don’t have a great deal of concern in this regard. I WAS concerned that the resolution attempted to circumvent the normal budget process.

In committee agendas this week:

Municipal Services Committee – Monday, September 25, 4:30 p.m.

The only item on the agenda was Resolution #10-R-22, which says ”staff will explore removing the Truck Route designation from Lawe Street between College Avenue and Hancock Street and finding an alternate route for truck traffic to travel north and south.” The resolution does not call for changing the designation at this time. Lawe St. between Wisconsin Ave. and College Ave. is scheduled for 2026, with 80% of the funding coming from the federal government through the Wisconsin Department of Transportation.

The meeting lasted for almost 1 ½ hours, with several members of the community appearing to express their views. The discussion among the committee members, other alders present, including the authors of the resolution (Alders Meltzer and Del Toro, who represent districts affected by the Lawe St. truck traffic) mostly centered on whether the work requested had been completed. City staff had recommended leaving the truck route unchanged when the street reconstruction is completed. The committee eventually approved an amendment to the resolution which called for some more specific studies to be completed (the amendment text is not available yet) and the amended version was recommended for approval 3-2.

City Plan Commission – Wednesday, September 27, 3:30 p.m.

We have another rezoning request to address, this one presumably much less controversial than the last one. Prospera Credit Union purchased a property on N. Ballard Rd. that was annexed into the city on September 6. This zoning change will change the residential zoning from the Town of Grand Chute to commercial. The new owner plans to remove the existing residential dwelling and redevelop the property.

We also have the final plat for the Fourth Addition to the Clearwater Creek Subdivision. The council approved the rezoning and the preliminary plat last week.

The contract for consulting services related to the City of Appleton Housing

Development Policy, Process and Stakeholder Engagement Services comes to City Plan Commission as an information item. This is related to the Housing Development Policy Task Force discussed above.

Safety and Licensing Committee – Wednesday, September 26, 5:30 p.m.

In addition to the normal license applications and renewals, the committee is being asked to approve a sole-source contract with Flock Safety for Automated License Plate Reader (ALPR) cameras. The purchase would be 19 cameras for $36,150. The pilot program had 29 cameras in order to determine the effectiveness and the best locations. My understanding is that these cameras cannot be used to “catch” citizens violating traffic laws, but rather, to help with cases of stolen vehicles, missing persons, etc. The sole source contract is utilized when the purchase uses proprietary or unique technology.

Community and Economic Development Committee – Wednesday, September 26, 6:30 p.m.

Our single action item is the contract for consulting services discussed above. The proposal calls for a team with “experience in stakeholder engagement, housing, infrastructure and development policy and process design.” The team would meet with the stakeholders several times over a three-to-four-month period and be responsible for facilitating the discussions and the liaison with city staff. The main deliverable would be a written report summarizing the process, findings and recommendations. Staff has recommended awarding the contract to Green Bicycle Co. out of Sheboygan. The team has a combined 45 years of experience in urban and economic development planning.

The proposal is to fund the $32,000 contract with $25,000 in excess fund balance from 2022 that was earmarked for an Economic Development Study aimed at improving the city’s economic development experience, along with $7,000 from the Community and Economic Development Department New/Redevelopment Projects budget.

The Finance, Utilities and Human Resources and Information Technology Committees are not meeting this week.

 Have a great week! The forecast says it’s not fall yet, but the gorgeous maple down the street apparently doesn’t have a weather app.