Common Council notes for the week of 3/14/22

While Common Council weeks are normally a little slower given that most work is taken care of during the committee week prior, there will be a couple of additional meetings to take note of this week, including a special Common Council meeting Thursday. 

Before I dive into meeting news, I just wanted to share a quick election related update. Absentee ballots will be mailed out by the Appleton City Clerk's office this week. 

As a side note to that, some voters in District 15 will see my name on the ballot, though I will not be up for reelection to the Common Council until next spring. I am also running for the Calumet County Board in District 5 in the election on April 5th. That district encompasses parts, but not all of District 15. I'm happy to discuss that race with any of my constituents who want to reach out, using my contact information at the end of this post. 

Sample Ballot for the April 5th Election 

Library Board

Tuesday 4:30 p.m. - There are a number of items related to the library's temporary relocation on the agenda, but the big one to pay attention to is the presentation from the Friends of the Appleton Library Board regarding its capital campaign to raise funds to help with the construction of the library renovation and expansion. 

Last week the Friend of APL announced it was launching a campaign to raise $12 million toward the estimated $39 million dollar project. The group hired a fundraising consultants who conducted interviews with 30 people in the community. From those interviews and other data the consultants likely studied, they determined $12 million was an attainable goal. 

To reach that number, I would suspect that somewhere in the neighborhood of 50%-75% of the $12 million figure came in the form of commitments from that initial group of interviewees. We will see if any of that information is shared Tuesday, but it still leaves a large gap to fill. 

Appleton Public Library design by architect Skidmore, Owings and Merrill (SOM)

In addition, just over a week ago the City shared that it would not be getting an $11 million grant from the state that the staff and council desperately hoped for, to help with the library project. This is a big loss in terms of guaranteed funding vs. hopeful funding in private donations. 

I expect that the Common Council will be asked to vote on approving the library project funding in June. The Friends of APL noted their capital campaign will take 12-18 months. Mayor Woodford has stated many times the City's total commitment to the project will be $26.4 million. However the Common Council last year allocated an additional $2 million in APRA funding for broadband at the library, raising our commitment to $28.4 million. We also will receive an updated, final cost estimate on the library in May and I would guess given the volatility of the building market and high inflation we are seeing right now, that cost estimate for the project will cross $40 million mark. I hope I'm wrong. 

But we will have some tough decisions in the months ahead regarding the cost and amenities that we may want to see, but may have to cut if funding becomes an issue. That's why Tuesday's presentation by the Friends of APL will be important to watch. 

Utilities Committee

Wednesday 6:45 p.m. - The Utilities Committee meeting for last week was cancelled, so we will hold a special meeting prior to the regularly scheduled Common Council meeting Wednesday. The lone agenda item is to approve a special assessment resolution for the construction of sanitary and storm laterals and mains for projects on Alvin St., Durkee St., Morrison St., Lawrence St., and Oneida St. This is part of normal road reconstruction work and will be approved to go to the Finance Committee for determining the special assessment rates for property owners for those projects. 

Common Council 

Wednesday 7 p.m. - The major items on the Common Council agenda for this week include an amended resolution for "No Mow May", an amended resolution on communication, technology, and pedestrian safety and an award for the allocation of $250,000 in ARPA funding.

No Mow May

The  "No Mow May" resolution came back before the Municipal Services committee last week. There was a lot of discussion related to the proposal and the request to make it permanent as well as permanently change the city's long grass ordinance from 8" to 12".

A regularly manicured lawn vs. a lawn participating in "No Mow May"

In the end, the proposal was amended to become a one-year renewal without the grass height change. That is the way this pilot project has been conducted for the last two years and was the recommendation of the City staff as well. I am please the project will not become permanent because the number of people who actually participate in it is a very small segment of our community. I've also heard more negative feedback from it this year than I did last year, though I will also note that complaints directly to the Public Works Department have not risen much since the program started. 

My bigger issue with this program is the way it's structured. Based on research I've done and expert entomologists I've reached out to in two different state who have published peer reviewed papers on bee and pollinator habitat, an entire month of not mowing a lawn is actually not good for pollinators either. 

Their studies show the optimal time to mow a lawn is once every two weeks. More often than that, there aren't enough beneficial flowering weeds in most lawns. More than two weeks and regular grass outgrows the flowering weeds and pollinators have a harder time finding them. 

However, what this program has done and done tremendously, is educating our community about bees and other pollinators and their impact and importance. Through flyers and signs and online means, I know many people who have become aware of the importance of pollinators because of those efforts. That is the part of this program that I would enthusiastically endorse continuing, but based on the research and feedback I've received, I will be voting against continuing this proposal in this form. 

Resolution on communication, technology, and pedestrian safety

The amended resolution for communication, technology, and pedestrian safety is to the full council for a vote this week. The amended version is to hold off on a proposed website project for now, to allocate $60,000 for a technology and security needs assessment study proposed by the City's IT Director and to allocate $75,000 for a pedestrian safety study. All of these funds come from a citywide branding fund allocation of $400,000 that was scrapped by the Finance Committee earlier this year, leaving those funds available for other purposes. The original resolution called for allocating $100,00o of that money for a new City website, $225,000 for more enhanced crosswalks in the city and $150,000 for IT technology upgrades. I wrote in more detail about this proposal in last week's blog.  

As I expressed at the Finance Committee meeting, I support the IT study as proposed. We are facing some critical and overdue needs for network and security upgrades and this study will provide a comprehensive look at the City's systems and give us a detailed plan for how to address them. 

I don't support the $75,000 allocation for the pedestrian safety study at this time. I shared that point at the Finance Committee meeting last week. I don't think we need to hire a consultant to expand the enhanced crosswalk safety program. The staff created that program in 2017 and can expand it if it sees fit to bring a recommendation for that forward to the Municipal Services Committee. There are still three years worth of projects to go on the initial program from 2017 and doing a study now, is not the best use of funds in my view as we won't be prepared to add more projects until 2025 anyway. That's if the staff and potential consultant even feel more projects are warranted. Because every enhanced pedestrian crossing we add costs $30,000-$50,000 each and roughly $3,000-$5,000 in annual maintenance and repair costs. Not to mention an eventual replacement in the future. 

An example of one type of enhanced pedestrian crosswalk

Public safety is vitally important in our community. It's one of the major concerns our residents have. But given that we have heard zero complaints from residents about crosswalk safety, let alone asking for more enhanced crosswalks, I don't think this allocation is a good investment now when the study will sit on a shelf for several years and may need to be updated again before we can actually take action on it. 

ARPA Funding Allocation

The last item that I wanted to share about the regular council meeting Wednesday pertains to the allocation of $250,000 in ARPA funds recommended for approval at the Community and Economic Development Committee.

I opposed this allocation that was proposed by the mayor as part of his ARPA plan last year. Other council members also had concerns but ultimately voted for it. While I strongly believe in the work of all of these organizations that are receiving funding and those that applied but did not receive funding, I don't believe this is the right way to distribute these federal funds. 

$250,000 ARPA Grant Allocation proposal 

In my view, these funds should be used to pay for projects that impact all city residents, either through debt reduction or offsetting future borrowing. These non-profits do amazing work, but their scope is limited and their impact, while important, is narrowly tailored to a very small segment of our community. I believe elected officials have a responsibility to make decisions based on the greatest impact they can have on a community, and this allocation does not meet that standard in my view, so I will once again be voting against this proposal. 

Special Common Council Meeting

Thursday 5:30 p.m. - This special meeting is to take up a resolution asking the City to take a stand against two  Enbridge pipeline projects known as Line 3 and Line 5  in far Northern Wisconsin that extend from Canada and into Michigan. 

I will have a separate blog post about this meeting Tuesday, but some quick thoughts here: 

• This project has no impact on the City of Appleton from an operations or policy standpoint and is therefore outside our purview. 
• Per a memo from the mayor, City staff will not be required to attend. The mayor did not explain why the staff would not be required to attend, but I suspect it is because of the first point I raised. 
• The resolution is neither original (has appeared in many communities including Green Bay where it was voted down), nor is it factually accurate according to Enbridge and several others I have spoken to related to this project. 
• While well meaning, I would go out on a limb and say that none of my colleagues, myself included, have done more than cursory research on this topic and should not be making a recommendation to the Wisconsin DNR about the appropriateness of granting permits for these projects hundreds of miles from our community. 
• The Line 3 project was completed last year, making that portion of the resolution obsolete. 
• Both pipelines carry oil and natural gas. Two critical natural resources that in the current environment of $4/gallon gas and rising home heating home prices, coupled with almost 8% annual inflation, makes these projects important in my view. 
• Alternatives to the Line 5 pipeline would be much more costly and environmentally damaging compared to the pipeline itself. Michigan estimates it would take 90 semi trucks every hour of every day to deliver these resources if Line 5 is not built. 

This special meeting, as all committee and council meetings are, is open to the public to attend and to speak. And as usual, I welcome your feedback on these topics or any other issues in the city you want to connect with me on. 

Get In Touch

I am always available to answer questions at district15@appleton.org or (920) 419-1360. As always, agendas can be found on the agenda and meetings page of the city website. Meetings can be viewed live on the website or watched at a later date. Meetings are also open for anyone to attend in person and all meetings take place in the Common Council chambers on the 6th floor of City Hall, unless otherwise noted.