The Common Council met 11/09/2022 and approved the 2023 Executive Budget. Although the budget ended up being approved without any changes, four amendments were introduced, all of which were voted down.
The first amendment was a proposal to reduce the aldermanic parking pass benefit budget and reallocate those funds for concrete reconstruction. It failed 12-2.
The second amendment was a proposal to reallocate the Council’s training budget to concrete reconstruction. This also failed 12-2.
The third amendment was a proposal to reduce the planned across-the-board pay raise for city staff from 5% to 4%. It failed 13-1.
The fourth and final amendment, at the focus of this post, was a proposal from Alderperson Chad Doran (District 15) to reduce the operating budgets of the various city departments by a combined total of $443,512 and reallocate that money to concrete reconstruction.
Although she opposed the amendment, Alderperson Katie Van Zeeland (District 5) made a motion to amend the amendment to reallocate the money specifically to the sidewalk replacement fund and pedestrian safety improvements. This motion to amend the amendment failed because 7 alderpersons voted for it (including Alderperson Doran who supported the change) and 7 alderpersons voted against it, leading to a tie.
The original, unaltered amendment, was eventually voted down 13-1 with only Alderperson Doran voting in favor of it.
I’ve prepared a complete transcript of the discussion which you can download below.
Alderperson Doran started the discussion out by expressing his concerns about the rate at which Appleton roads are reconstructed. “We’re supposed to be replacing our infrastructure every 50 years, and we’re at 200 years right now, and it’s not getting better. It keeps getting worse, because we continue to go down the road of using that as a place to push off projects and to cut [in order] to fund other services.”
Although Alderperson William Siebers (District 1) voted against the amendment, he expressed appreciation for Alderperson Doran’s concerns about the city’s infrastructure problems. “My feeling is we’re not going to resolve this problem with an amendment tonight. This is a problem that that we’re going to need to address throughout the year. And hopefully, by budget time next year, we’re not going to need to do an amendment to address the issue. […] I applaud Alderperson Doran for bringing up the concerns.”
Per Director of Public Works Danielle Block, the $443,000 would cover the cost of paving less than 1/5th of a mile. The general feeling from the Common Council members was that the negative impacts these cuts would have on the various departments was not worth the relatively small amount of paving that they would fund. Those impacts were described by the department heads.
THE FINANCE DEPARTMENT would lose their data analyst fellow who which would mean the Finance Department would need to take over updating and maintaining the department dashboards. They would also lose the assistance she was giving to departments in terms of analyzing data and making operating decisions. Finally, she had been looking for grant opportunities the city was not currently aware of and assisting in writing grant applications, which would also be a service that was lost.
THE IT DEPARTMENT would lose the new Deputy Director, which, on top of other staffing reductions would effectively decreasing IT staff by 1 full time employee. The social media archiving software the city currently uses would be cut, making it difficult to stay in compliance with Wisconsin’s public records rules. Finally, network security support would be reduced.
PARKS AND RECREATION would have their seasonable grounds maintenance staff reduced, negatively impacting not only grass cutting but also the emptying of garbages, the cleaning of restrooms, and the setting up of special events. Additionally, the department would have to reduce programming for youth sports, the pools, dance studios, and playground programs which would impact the revenue those could bring in.
THE PUBLIC LIBRARY would reduce substitute staff, part-time shelvers, and security which would impact the amount of programing they offered, their ability to restock shelves, and the number of times they needed to rely on the police department instead of their own security in order to resolve issues.
THE COMMUNITY AND ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT DEPARTMENT would have to reduce the hours for their Community Development Specialist to 1/4th of their current hours which would prevent the employee from being able to successfully perform their job duties supporting grants. Additionally, some of the grants the city received would be in jeopardy because they would not have the funds to match grants as some grants require.
THE DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC WORKS would have to cut the positions that handle planting, maintenance, and watering of flowers along College Avenue, Water Street, the library, and other areas. Part-time inspections staff would also be reduced hampering the department’s ability to follow up on long grass and noxious weed complaints.
THE HEALTH DEPARTMENT would also be impacted, but Health Officer Sepers was appearing remotely and none of his words were picked up on the video of the meeting.
Although there was no support for the amendment beyond Alderperson Doran himself, some alderpersons seemed to agree with the general idea that maintenance of the city’s roads needed to be attended too, albeit not through this amendment. As noted above, Alderperson Siebers appreciated Alderperson Doran’s concern. Alderperson Sheri Hartzheim (District 13) also found value in the amendment although she did not vote for it, saying, “This is an alarm bell. And I want us to remember the alarm bell whether we pass this amendment or not. I would be thrilled with a fifth of a mile to increase or add to Lightning Drive and increase the tax base in this city by multiple hundreds of thousands of dollars based on the new construction that could be done with that. But I’m not sure that this is the way to get to it.”
Alderperson Vered Meltzer (District 2), however, did not think that the rate at which Appleton’s roads were being reconstructed was a concern, pointing to the fact that Appleton was doing no worse than other communities in terms of road reconstruction and was falling no further behind than other communities. “I think also, when you’re in a situation where you say, “Look, we’re starving,” it doesn’t solve the problem by cutting off your foot. And I think that, you know, it’s important for us to go through every line of the budget with a fine-tooth comb. But if we’re not in a crisis situation—which we’re not. Our budget, our debt limit, our own restriction, which is below the legal restriction. We are healthy with that. Mayor Woodford has done a really amazing job targeting that in this budget. We’re doing a good job.”
Some alderpersons also expressed concern that, although Alderperson Doran had sent department heads a courtesy email letting them know about his plan to submit this amendment, he had not asked them about how the proposed cuts would impact their department operations.
The amendment was eventually voted down by a 13-1 vote with only Alderperson Doran voting in favor of it.
[While I understand that this particular amendment was, perhaps, not the most effective way to increase funding for road reconstruction, I appreciate that Alderperson Doran was actually trying to figure out some ways to increase the road reconstruction budget. I remember listening to Council meetings nearly 10 years ago and hearing the alderpersons at the time talk about how, in the next decade, Appleton would be facing a serious road reconstruction crunch because they were not repaving roads at a fast enough pace.
While Appleton may, subjectively, be doing no worse in keeping up with its infrastructure maintenance than other cities, that doesn’t seem like it would have any bearing on the objective physical reality of the age, physical condition, and wear and tear of our sewers, water pipes, and roads. And I find it difficult to imaging that residents who live in areas with chronic water pressure issues, water main breaks, or cracked roads feel that it’s fine because residents in other cities are experiencing the same issues.
Infrastructure and public safety are basically the two primary things that make a city. Libraries, parks, pools, programing, etc are all very nice ancillary benefits that certainly bring a great deal of value to the city, but I’m having a hard time seeing how it is appropriate to essentially start treating those ancillary services as if they are primary services at the expense of basic and necessary infrastructure maintenance. It’s more than a little disheartening that only one alderperson seems to be taking actively trying to figure out some kind of practical solution to this problem.]
View full meeting details and video here: https://cityofappleton.legistar.com/MeetingDetail.aspx?ID=1001699&GUID=79453C2A-9A80-4E2E-9871-B422793269CD
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