Lake Mills City Council plows through paperwork Tuesday

By Rachel Primmer for the Daily Times
Wednesday, June 4, 2008 12:29 PM CDT

LAKE MILLS - The Lake Mills City Council plowed through the paperwork Tuesday evening with many ordinary council items on the docket. Most action items on the agenda passed unanimously. However, the council's newest member, Rudy Schaar chose the road less traveled on a couple of items, chalking up two no votes for the evening.

The council passed motion 08-6-1-3, authorizing the city manager to apply to the Public Service Commission (PSC) for rate adjustment with a 4-1 vote, though not without some discussion.

One city official explained the rate adjustment is not a rate increase for the light and water utility, it is a change in the way the rates are billed because of fluctuating seasonal prices, more of a budgeted approach.

Schaar asked about making changes that may not need to be made or considering what the citizens want instead of what the PSC wants.

“I guess I just don't like jumping because Madison says jump. That's just me,” Wilke said. “I love city government, because we're the closest to the people; we have a pretty good idea of what they expect and what they want; but the other ones all have the big hammers.”

ADVERTISEMENT

Resolution 08-07 was unanimously approved and authorizes the city manager and staff to submit the Lake Mills Wastewater Treatment Plant Compliance Maintenance Annual Report to the state of Wisconsin Department of Natural Re-sources.

The compliance report is divided into 10 sections for inspection, each of which is graded on a four-point scale. Lake Mills earned a GPA of 3.84 with perfect 4.0 (A's) on nine of the 10 sections. The last section, collection systems, only earned a “C” with two points.

According to Wilke and wastewater treatment Supervisor Bob Scherr, points were primarily lost due to the age of the system and three spills that occurred.

City council President Ed Grunden asked about long-range costs to the wastewater system in the future. Scherr indicated some maintenance and replacements on lift stations would probably be in order. Wilke indicated a sanitary sewer gravity pull line, lift stations and the manifold system would need work.

One section of the annual report refers to financial management. Schaar asked Wilke to explain the $2 million in estimated project costs for 2009. Wilke said the roadwork on South Main would require about $1 million. Adding a ditch to that project would add another $1 million. The Prairie Street, Owen Street and CP Avenue project could add anywhere from $600,000 to $1 million to the list.

Grunden thanked Scherr for the high marks on the report, saying, “Thank you for all the A's. Congratulations on the ‘A' report.”

The council appointed several individuals to boards and committees. Ron Korte and Daniel Weber will continue to serve on the Cable Board, Mary Lou Treptow and Doug Fritsch will serve on the Zoning Board of Appeals, Pam Rogers will continue to serve on the Police and Fire Commission and Glenn Zastrow will continue to serve on the Joint Rock Lake Committee.

Five tavern operator's license applications were approved. Applications from Brent Bergholz of Marshall, Hannah Dempsey of Jefferson, Laurelyn Geiger of Fort Atkinson and Todd Parish of Lake Mills were approved unanimously. An application for Manpreet Ghuman of Jefferson was approved on a 4-1 vote, with Schaar voting in opposition.

Many licenses were granted unanimously under a consent agenda. City Attorney Vickie Schmidt briefly outlined the basics of a consent agenda.

“A consent agenda is for items that tend to not be controversial. Usually we only use it on annual license renewals,” she said. She went on to explain that without grouping the items together, it would take a long time to approve each and every one.

Licenses that were approved under the consent agenda included Class “B” combination liquor, Class “A” and “B” beer, Class “A” liquor, Class “C” wine, mobile home, cigarette, wholesaler's and electrical licenses. Permits were approved for weights and measures as well as for private well operators.

A conditional use permit was approved for Robert Griggas at 103 Church St. The corner building, formerly the City Municipal Building, will be used by Griggas as a pottery business. Griggas will use the building to create and sell pottery, ceramics and possibly other handcrafted items. A dance studio will also be housed on site. The plan reveals a potential employee base of as many as 18 individuals.

The council agreed to the temporary encroachment of College Street between Cook and Madison streets on Sept. 13. The Moravian Church will close that section of College Street for a pig roast, music and youth activities.

Ordinance 1032, Public Urination, received a third reading and was promptly approved by the council. Ordinance 1033, Petition for Annexation at W7670 W. Pine St., was given a second reading and was moved to an immediate third reading as well, due to the fact the home currently has no running water. The petition was then approved.

Ordinance 1034, Supplemental Appropriations, received a second reading. This ordinance was given a first reading two weeks ago, asking the council to amend the budget to allow for more money to be funneled into street repair. Grunden asked Wilke to clarify why the city should be purchasing more equipment for city workers to use.

Wilke said, “We talked last time that more than 50 percent of the equipment that we have is ‘blue plate' equipment, which means that it's 25 years or older. You expect these guys to do more and more work for more and more streets and more types of conditions using equipment. Generally when you expect an employee to do more work per day, you give them the technology to improve and we're still using stuff that they were using when I graduated from high school. I don't think that's a realistic expectation. If you're going to expect these guys to do the work that we hired them to do, that's why we have a streets department, give them the equipment to do the job.”