The Municipal Services Committee met 01/08/2024. One of the items they took up was Resolution 12-R-23 which, if passed as written, would close the city’s Whitman yard waste site leaving only the Glendale site open, a change that would take place in 2025. The resolution suggests that Appleton is “one of the only communities to provide two yard waste sites for residents” and that closing the site would result in savings to the city of more than $50,000 a year.
The resolution was discussed during the 11/02/2023 committee meeting during which committee members asked a number of questions about the resolution and the yard waste sites. They then voted to hold the item until January to give staff time to research the various issues and questions surrounding the resolution.
After conducting that research, city staff came back with a proposal to keep both the Whitman and Glendale sites open but to shift their hours so that rather than each of them being open Friday through Monday, during the summer, the Whitman site would be open Tuesday through Friday and the Glendale site would be open Friday through Monday, thus reducing the duplication of services and the need for staff while expanding the days of operation.
The Appleton currently has an annual agreement with Grand Chute allowing Grand Chute residents to use Appleton’s yard waste sites. This brings in around $63,000 to the City of Appleton. Were the Whitman Avenue facility to be closed, the Grand Chute Director of Public Works had indicated Grand Chute would look at reevaluating that agreement.
The committee seemed open to the idea of changing the hours, but was less open to shutting the site down completely. They ended up voting to hold the resolution until the first meeting in February to give staff time to talk with Grand Chute and get a better idea of how they would respond if the Whitman site was shut down as well as to provide a better idea to the committee of how the site could be repurposed if the yard waste collection aspect was shut down.
I’ve prepared a transcript of the discussion for download:
It was unclear what sort of cost-savings would actually be realized by closing the Whitman Avenue facility. The resolution suggested it could be $50,000, but Grand Chute currently pays Appleton around $63,000 a year for its residents to access our two yard waste facilities. That agreement was based on having access to two facilities, and Director of Public Works Danielle Block told the committee that Grand Chute’s Director of Public Works had indicated they would want to renegotiate the agreement if the number of sites dropped down to one. Some of the committee members wondered if Grand Chute would be interested in continuing an agreement at all if only the Glendale site remained open and thought perhaps they would rather enter into an agreement with Outagamie County given that the county site was only 3 miles away from Appleton’s Glendale site.
The committee seemed interested in the proposal by staff to keep both sites open but have them open at alternating times of the week. That way, they would be able to provide service 7 days a week during the summer instead of just 4 days like they currently do. Director Block did not think this change would result in Grand Chute wanting to renegotiate their agreement because it was simply a change in hours, not in the number of locations. Additionally, a resolution was not needed to change the hours of operation, and the resolution (which called for closing the site) could just be voted down rather than amended to change the hours of operations.
There were questions about what the Whitman Site would be utilized for if the yard waste collection aspect was fully shut down. They already sometimes use it to store plowed snow in the winter and would probably increase its usage for that as well as leaves that were waiting to be mulched. There was also the potential for future storage of equipment.
Some committee members expressed concerns about removing existing services for residents. Alderperson Katie Van Zeeland (District 5) sounded like she said her constituents had expressed opposition to closing the Whitman facility. [I say “sounded like” because what she said was “the reaction has been very strong for my constituents that they want to have access to the Glendale site and that they don’t want to have to drive to Whitman from our side of town through the downtown,” but it seemed like she just accidentally flipped the names of the facilities around.] Alderperson William Siebers (District 1) didn’t really care about Grand Chute’s desires regarding the site, but he had a hard time voting to close the site to save money at the cost of convenience to Appleton’s residents.
The committee ended up voting 4-1 to hold the resolution until the first meeting in February with Alderperson Siebers casting the one dissenting vote.
[I like the idea of offering service 7 days a week rather than only 4, but it seems like that could all be done at the Glendale site and wouldn’t necessarily entail keeping the Whitman yard waste site open. I could see residents of Districts 1, 9, 10, and 11 (and, maybe, 15) opposing closing the Whitman yard waste site. I was, however, a little surprised to hear that District 5 residents opposed the proposal given that the Glendale site is quicker to access if you take the freeway, and even driving through town it’s a comparable distance to Glendale as to Whitman. I don’t know what kind of route one would take from District 5 to the Glendale site that would take one through downtown, since I would expect most drivers to turn north on Rankin or Lawe Street before ever hitting downtown.]
View full meeting details and video here: https://cityofappleton.legistar.com/MeetingDetail.aspx?ID=1161960&GUID=3435E572-917E-49A0-8DD2-BF52AF11696D
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