Appleton Common Council District 6 Update for October 4, 2023

Photo from the Farmer's Almanac

Greetings District 6 Neighbors, 

I really hope the forecast is right and we are feeling the last of the summer heat. Regardless of the summertime feeling, the leaves are turning and falling and it’s time for fall leaf pickup to begin. District 6 is all in Zone 2, so our pickup will start the week of October 16. There will be pickups the week of the 16^th, the week of the 30^th, and the week of November 13. Some of us are in the vacuum area, so we need to put our leaves on the terrace on the Sunday before our collection week. The Zone 2 vacuum area runs from Richmond to Meade and from College to Northland. 

 

More information from the public works guide: 

Branch and brush piles must be kept separate from leaf and small yard waste piles. Branches and brush must be cut down to four-foot lengths and bundled with biodegradable twine and not exceed 45 pounds.  Max branch width is three-inch diameter. No containers, except lawn and leaf bags, will be collected.  Bundled and bagged yard debris will be collected by hand in the vac areas. Other areas will be collected using front end loaders. Pumpkins will not be collected. 

Please keep piles low and close to the curb to help protect children and not block motorists’ view. 

It is crucial to our leaf pick up operations to be able to work during the night. For that reason, starting on Sunday, October 8, the Police Department will not grant permission for overnight parking all week in the zone scheduled for collection.  Vehicles that are illegally parked overnight (between the hours of 2:00 a.m. and 5:00 a.m.) will be subject to ticketing and towing. 

I got a helpful flyer with my quarterly water bill last week as well. 

The web page for leaf collection and the public works guide are linked below: 

https://www.appleton.org/residents/street-maintenance/leaf-yard-waste-collection 

https://www.appleton.org/home/showpublisheddocument/25731/638204356637930000 

Normally, weather permitting, there is one additional collection pass starting November 20. 

Moving on to tonight’s Common Council meeting, Mayor Woodword is issuing six proclamations: 

• Indigenous Peoples Day 
• Mental Health Day 
• Coming Out Day 
• White Cane Awareness Day 
• Fire Prevention Week 
• Domestic Violence Awareness Month 

There will be a presentation of civilian fire department awards and a commendation of service presented to Cory Asimus, the Appleton Firefighter who ran the Fox Cities Marathon carrying a 100-pound rucksack. His world-record setting feat helped raise money for veteran cancer screenings. 

And, then…the biggie. The mayor will present the 2024 Executive Budget to the council. We’ll get our giant binder (I always keep track of the number of pages; this year I intend to weigh it.) Alders will spend the next several weeks going through the budget and presenting any questions to department heads in preparation for our “Budget Saturday” session on October 28, where each department will get a chance to speak to their proposed budget and alders will have the opportunity to propose amendments. There will be a public hearing on the budget in November, with the vote on final adoption after that. There is a public listening session on the budget scheduled for October 17. I’ll send out more information on that event closer to the date. 

On the regular council agenda, I expect a few items to be separated for individual discussion and votes. The first item is a resolution from alders Meltzer and Del Toro regarding the reconstruction of Lawe St. between College and Wisconsin. The resolution asked city staff to evaluate removing the truck route designation and proposing an alternative truck route when  the reconstruction is completed (in 2026). As I noted in the last update, staff had really completed the evaluation in the memo to the Municipal Services Committee – the ultimate recommendation was to keep the truck route designation for Lawe St. Some of the considerations were that the redesign would include bike lanes and traffic calming features that should mitigate some of the concerns about safety and noise and the fact that the nearest possible alternative truck route (441) would result in a 50% mileage increase, with a corresponding increase of 109 tons of CO2 for Appvion truck alone. The committee eventually voted to recommend approval of an amended resolution that called for a number of additional studies. Since that meeting, I understand that the authors have met with city staff and plan to bring forward another amendment that would only ask city staff to determine if different speed limits for trucks and other vehicles would be legal and to determine if changing the truck route would result in a different designation of Lawe St., possibly jeopardizing the federal/state funding that would pay for 80% of the project. My inclination is to vote to leave the truck route in place for environmental reasons, knowing that the new construction will include safety and noise reduction features. 

I would also expect the item from the Community and Economic Development Committee recommending approval of the contract for consulting services for the newly created Appleton Housing Development Policy Task Force. The contract would be for $32,000, $25,000 of which would come from the mayor’s budget from last year’s fund balance and the remainder from the Community and Economic Development Department budget. I found the proposal from Green Bicycle Co. to be impressive and the cost for the deliverables proposed seems reasonable. The members of the task force come from different business groups and interests, and it seems like a good idea for a third party to help bring the ideas together. When I served on the climate task force, we had brilliant people from many disciplines who all had great ideas. One of the best things that happened there was that the city had some consulting funds available to conduct the greenhouse gas inventory and to help us bring all the ideas together into the task force report.  

We heard some pretty strong objections to this contract in committee, however. There were alders who were not happy that there was only one response to the request for proposals, and they also questioned the qualifications of the team at Green Bicycle. Finally, they were concerned that the contract came to the council after the task force was announced. I expect to hear these objections raised again tonight. 

In a time where Appleton has a shortage of houses at ALL price levels, it is important that the Home Builders Association of the Fox Cities, REALTORS Association of Northeast Wisconsin, the Fox Cities Chamber of Commerce, and Habitat for Humanity Fox Cities are willing to work together to try to remove obstacles to housing development. If the council does not approve this contract, my understanding is that staff would rework the scope to get it under the $25,000 that the council has to approve and rely on city staff for more of the work. The funds are already allocated for housing development, so I plan to vote to approve the contract. 

There may be a couple more items separated, but I don’t think anything else on the agenda will elicit too much discussion. 

Enjoy the rest of your week—cooler weather is coming!