The Appleton Common Council met 11/17/2021. At only 30 minutes long, it was one of the shorter Council meetings of the year.
Interim Health Officer Sonja Jensen provided a Covid-19 Update to the Council which I posted about yesterday.
The council voted unanimously to approve hiring Corey Popp as the city’s new Information Technology Director. Since the previous IT Director’s resignation in May of 2021, the IT Department had been operating under the interim leadership of city Finance Director Tony Saucerman. The newly minted Director Popp will take over starting November 29.
No one spoke during the public participation portion of the meeting or during the two public hearings that were held, one for the rezoning of the Lightning Drive/County Highway JJ annexation and one for the Ziegler Mackville Rd and EE annexation.
Although no one signed up to speak, there were some members of the public in attendance, so Mayor Woodford went out of his way to ask if any of them wanted to speak.
The Council had one special resolution which assigned polling places as a result of the redistricting.
Alderperson Vered Meltzer (District 2) asked, ahead of the January 1 effective date for the new district lines, how could people find out whether their districts were changing and where their polling places were going to be. Was that information going to be available in the “My Neighborhood” portal? What was the timeline for that information being disseminated?
City Clerk Kami Lynch answered that currently the GIS Department was working to get the addresses of everyone who would be affected by the redistricting. The city was going to mail notices to all of those people. The GIS Department was also working to get that information in the My Neighborhood site as well.
She said it was a big project and that, as the Council was aware, the entire redistricting process had been condensed this year. She was not certain when everything would be done, but all affected residents were going to be notified by letter either by the end of this year or in January. She also expected the online property information to probably be updated before them.
Alderperson Nate Wolff (District 12) said that the polling location for his district (Saint John United Church of Christ at 1130 W Marquette Street) was for sale. He asked how that would affect things.
Clerk Lynch answered that the church had agreed to remain a polling place until they are bought. And that point, they would give the city notification that they had been sold, and the city would talk to whoever the new buyer was [presumably about remaining a polling place]. She also said that the city was in the process of attempting to find other suitable polling locations.
There was no further discussion and the resolution declaring polling place was approved 15-0
The Council held separate votes on the lease extension requests for the three sculptures that have been making their way through various committees. The reason for these lease extensions had been hashed out fairly well in the Municipal Services Committee, the Public Arts Committee, and the Parks and Recreation Committee, so these three items were separated out for individual votes not to facilitate more discussion but rather so that Alderperson Alex Schultz (District 9) who is the Executive Director of Sculpture Valley, the organization that was requesting the lease extensions, could abstain from voting on the items.
The Council voted 14-0 to extend the leases for the Gyan/Gesture of Conscience sculpture in Jones Park and the To the Moon Alice sculpture in Vulcan Heritage Park by on year until November 2023.
The Council also voted 13-1 to approve extending the lease for The Collective sculpture (also known as the Big Head sculpture) on College Avenue until April 30, 2022 with the understanding that this would be the final extension. Alderperson Kristin Alfheim (District 11) was the one alderperson who voted against the extension.
Three items on the agenda were referred back to committees.
1. Alderperson Michael Smith (District 10) referred back the Washington Street speed limit change to the Municipal Services Committee. He had just been made aware of this issue at the last Municipal Services Committee meeting, and he had some questions in to city staff about it.
2. Alderperson Denise Fenton (District 6) referred back to the Municipal Services Committee the proposed changes regarding food truck vendors. She asked if it would be possible to refer it back to the December 6 meeting instead of the November 22 meeting. Attorney Behrens told her that it would have to go to the next meeting, but at that time the committee could vote to hold it until a later date.
3. Alderperson Katie Van Zeeland (District 5) Referred the River Tyme permanent premise amendment application back to the Safety and Licensing Committee because the applicant had made known their intention to withdraw the application so that they could make changes recommended by city staff necessary to get the application approved.
During the “Other Council Business” section of the meeting, Alderperson Alfheim touched on this item and thanked city staff for the amount of time they were putting into this issue and the effort they were making to help a business in the city accomplish things. She didn’t think Appleton residents realized how hard the city works to help businesses and residents get what they need and she thought staff was doing a good job.
Alderperson Joe Martin (District 4) also took the opportunity during the “Other Council Business” to draw people’s attention to the Reid Golf Course revenue numbers. He was encouraged to see those numbers and he thought the city and staff had really turned the golf course around. It was a pleasure to see the amount of money Reid was generating.
View full meeting details and video here: https://cityofappleton.legistar.com/MeetingDetail.aspx?ID=901917&GUID=B42EA738-EF61-405C-86AB-9EBF6DC315A9
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