Appleton Common Council District 6 Update for the Week of November 17, 2024

Greetings District 6 Neighbors,

This past weekend was certainly a busy one around town. Arriving at the Performing Arts Center for the Fox Valley Symphony concert on Saturday night, it seemed like most of the city was downtown. I remembered that in addition to the concert, the Holiday Edition of Light the Night Market was wrapping up, and that the Hmong New Year celebration, which continued into Sunday, was taking place at the Fox Cities Exposition Center. It’s great to see so many people enjoying all the events that the city has to offer. I’m making my shopping lists for Small Business Saturday on November 30 and would encourage everyone to shop local for the holidays when you can.

I want to share the good news that a bonus round of leaf collection has been planned. For us in Zone 2, we would need to have the leaves out on December 1 for collection during the following week. Almost all of District 6 (other than those of you north of Northland between Oneida and Meade) are in the vacuum zone, so we would put our leave on the terrace, separating brush and other yard waste. This is not a guaranteed collection – if we get any substantial snowfall before then (nooooo!!!!!), operations would switch to snow removal.

I’ve written about the project to update the Appleton Comprehensive Plan, which was last updated in 2017. The city would like to get input from the community about your vision for our city. One of the subareas that the update will focus on is the Richmond/Northland corridor in our district. There are several opportunities to provide input for the new comprehensive plan. The first is an open house that will be held tomorrow, Tuesday, November 19 from 4:00 to 7:00 p.m. in the Ironwood Conference Room at ThedaCare Regional Medical Center, 1818 N. Meade St.. Use the Western Entrance on E. Grant St., Door #38. This is a drop-in event, so come by whenever you can during the open house. You can learn more about the project on the website https://www.planappleton.org/  Using links on the site, you can learn more about the project, provide input, and sign up for updates. If you are part of a civic, faith or other community group, there is an at-home engagement toolkit that groups can use together to help plan the future of Appleton. The link to the toolkit is on the “Get Involved” tile on the project website.

Another reminder that the last day that the temporary library location will be open is November 25 as library staff prepare to move into the new library building in early 2025. E-books lending will continue as usual during the closure, and you also check out physical books from any of the InfoSoup libraries: https://infosoup.org/libraries/. The Friends of Appleton Public Library is within $300,000 of their $12 million goal for the public/private partnership for the new library. You can donate here: https://friendsofapl.org/donate-to-new-library/

The special common council meeting to adopt the 2025 budget might have set a record for brevity. Since we started sending our questions about the budget in the weeks prior to our “Budget Saturday” workshop and getting the collated list of all the questions before the meeting, the process has gone much faster in recent years. In addition, the 2025 budget did not involve any structural changes. There was only one amendment proposed – just a technical shift – that was adopted during the budget Saturday workshop. The budget was adopted unanimously last Wednesday, but for some reason, Alder Doran voted against the resolution that formally establishes the budget. As I noted in the last update, most of us should see a small decrease in our tax bills, because, while the Outagamie County portion of property taxes increased a bit, both the City of Appleton and Appleton Area School District rates decreased.

In addition to the Common Council meeting on Wednesday evening, the Library Board will be meeting on Tuesday, November 19 at 4:30 p.m. The Board will vote on the October bill register and on a budget amendment to reflect some donations for various library programs. They will vote on updates to the naming policy established as part of the library fundraising campaign and on the creation of two limited-term, part-time internship programs that will be grant-funded. One of these would be for a graduate-level student in Library and Information Science, and the other would be a teen student position. The Board will also vote on the contract for the final (!) move to the new library – Boulevard Relocation Services - $175,855.80 plus a 5% contingency. The other action items are a couple of policy updates and the holiday closure schedule for 2025.

The regular Common Council meeting on Wednesday does not include any business presented by the mayor. I don’t expect too much discussion on any of the agenda items as most of them were approved unanimously in their respective committees. The Community Development Committee will have a special meeting immediately before the full council meeting to approve another extension of the closing date on the sale of the Blue Ramp site to Merge, LLC., for the second phase of their Urbane 115 project. There was a delay in Merge receiving DNR clearance for the site and thus a delay in their securing funding for the second phase. City staff is recommending approval of the extension until February 28, 2025.

Because we received and filed the update on the College Avenue Reconfiguration Project during the Municipal Services Committee, this item does not appear on the council agenda. However, I’m linking this Post-Crescent story on the report. I’m really pleased with the good results. We are approaching the end of the 18-month evaluation period, and, at this point, I’m happy to make the change permanent. It does not appear that the fears of major congestion and delays have been borne out, and the reduction in crashes is certainly good news. https://www.postcrescent.com/story/news/local/2024/11/18/appletons-college-avenue-road-diet-shows-29-reduction-in-crashes/76290803007/

I would expect some or all of the committee meetings for the week of Thanksgiving to be cancelled – more on that next week.

Don’t forget about the 53rd Downtown Appleton Christmas Parade, which will take place on Tuesday, November 26. The parade will kick off at the corner of State St. and College Avenue at 7:00 p.m. https://www.appleton.org/visitors/appleton-parades/christmas-parade/about-christmas-parade

Have a great week!

Denise