The Municipal Services Committee met 09/12/2022. Around 40 minutes of the meeting was taken up with discussion about the proposed changes to the Street Terrace Policy. This had been referred back to the committee during the 09/07/2022 Common Council meeting. At the time, the refer back had been somewhat contentious with a majority of alderpersons opposing it; however, because the majority fell short of 2/3rd of the Council they weren’t able to block the refer back.
In spite of that history, at the Municipal Services Committee meeting it seemed that a lot of alderpersons, even those who had opposed the refer back, brought up questions and concerns about the policy as it was currently written.
Broadly speaking there were concerns…
- About the allowable height limit and whether 36” was safe across the city in all circumstances or if there ought to be a lower height limit implemented in some areas.
- About the confusing way in which the policy was currently written.
- About, possibly finicky, details such as who owned produce grown on terraces which technically are not private property but are owned by the city, in landlord/renter situations did would renters need permission from their landlords to plant on the terrace, and how should the terraces outside apartment complexes be handled under the policy.
The general consensus, not only amongst those who had supported the initial refer back but also among those who had opposed the refer back, seemed to be that the policy needed more work to answer some of these questions and be reworked into a form that was less confusing. Given that the growing season was nearing an end and the policy did not need to be implemented immediately, it made sense to hold it for a while. Even Alderperson Israel Del Toro (District 4) who has been the driving force behind these policy changes supported holding the item so that staff could work on it some more.
The committee voted 4-1 to hold the item until the first meeting in October which should be October 10. Alderperson Brad Firkus (District 3) cast the lone dissenting vote, but he didn’t really talk during the meeting and did not voice why he opposed the hold.
As a side note, at the end of the Common Council meeting on 09/07/2022, Alderperson Chris Croatt (District 14) addressed the opposition to the refer back which had happened earlier in the meeting. He said, “I just wanted to say something in regards to refer backs. Alder Van Zeeland expressed frustration with a committee member referring back an item that went there on the committee. I want to express frustration with objecting to refer backs. I just feel it’s a respect thing. When there’s a reason given to refer an item back, and that reason makes sense and there’s not a critical timing aspect, I just feel like we should be honoring that request, unless there’s some circumstances that wouldn’t, you know, that wouldn’t make sense. But I just wanted to say that because it’s—I served on this body 12 years and we didn’t do that during that time. I know that times have changed and the rules have changed allowing members to object to refer backs, but it’s a little bit frustrating for me and I just wanted to express that.”
[I think the wisdom of his words was amply illustrated by the questions and issues raised about this item during this committee meeting. Although no one seems to particularly oppose changing the street terrace policy, there were a lot of questions brought up even by people who had not wanted it referred back, so clearly the policy could benefit from some more work and brainstorming. City policy-making is probably not going to be well-served if the mere act of an alderperson referring an item back to committee gets turned into a chronic point of regular contention.]
View full meeting details and video here: https://cityofappleton.legistar.com/MeetingDetail.aspx?ID=982994&GUID=F2D6721C-BEC7-4542-9D09-6775375CDBEB
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