The Notes: Week of November 8 - November 12, 2021

Welcome back to the blog, neighbors.  Thanks for tuning in!

Well, we made it through Budget Saturday last weekend and the Appleton Common Council is poised this week to discuss final adoption of the 2022 city budget.  This week is Committee Week... but a modified one.  I'll chronicle the scheduled meetings for this week and end with the budget adoption special session... so you can "cheat" by jumping ahead if all things non-budget are not of interest to you!

We'll start with the non-news.  There are a number of cancelled meetings this Committee Meetings Week so there's nothing exciting to talk about here: 

• Finance Committee - They've had their hands full with budget meetings recently so they deserve the week off!  
• Fox Cities Transit Commission
• Utilities Committee
• Appleton Redevelopment Authority
• Safety and Licensing Committee - The special budget session is taking up this committee's meeting time in council chambers this week.
• Human Resources and Information Technology Committee

Next, the committees which will meet this week have a few items of interest to discuss:

• Monday, 11/08/2021, 4:30pm - Municipal Services Committee: These committee members will hear a presentation regarding the BIRD E-Scooter Pilot Program.  There will be a presentation on the service, what's been learned from the pilot program in Appleton thus far, and a review of the public surveying that's thus far been done regarding the program.  Here's a snapshot of how the BIRD folks have been working with city staff during the pilot program:
  
  
  
  
  You can peruse the survey responses here. Let me know if you have any additional feedback for us via email. 
  
  The Municipal Service Committee will also discuss and decide on the following: 1) whether there should be a municipal code change for on-street food trucks in the downtown business district (increasing the number or licenses available to vendors and removing a "same or similar" products sales exclusion), 2) whether to approve staff time for the development of a parklet policy for the city, and 3) whether to grant some parking and speed limit restrictions/changes on a couple of streets in the city.
  
  
• Monday, 11/08/2021, 6:30pm - Parks and Recreation Committee: These committee members will discuss a proposed rate increase for Reid Golf Course.  The proposal includes a $1 increase for weekday 9-hole play and a $375 annual increase for a business pass.  Then the committee will also discuss and vote whether to approve a couple items already approved by the Public Arts Committee last week (discussed here) -- the "RISE" installation in Houdini Plaza and the one-year extensions of placement of the "Gyan/Gesture of Conscience" and "To The Moon Alice" sculptures in the city.  
  
  
• Wednesday, 11/10/2021, 7am - Board of Health: Weights and Measures is the primary focus of this board's meeting this week.  For those who are not familiar with this...Certain businesses (most notably gas stations) require that anything that is measured or weighed and priced based on said weight or measure must have their scales/pumps be certified by an inspector.  This is to assure purchasing customers that one gallon is truly one gallon and that one pound is truly one pound.  This is a service that Appleton offers to surrounding communities for business weight scales certifications, gas pumps, price scanners, etc.  The board will decide whether Appleton should offer these services to the City of Neenah for approximately 35 days per year at $446/day (without a need to increase our staff).  There are also a couple fee increases for Weights and Measures services being proposed to the board. 
  
  
• Wednesday, 11/10/2021, 3:30pm - City Plan Commission:  This commission will be hearing a proposal for a Special Use Permit to allow a proposed painting and craft studio on Morrison Street to sell alcohol.  The business requesting this permit has also requested liquor licenses from the city before the Safety and Licensing Committee.  One permit -- to sell liquor in containers for removal from the premises (like gas station liquor sales) -- has already been denied by the Safety and Licensing Committee.  The second -- to sell liquor on site while crafters craft there (like at Pinot's Palette) -- is still up for debate.  I expect that the result of this commission's decision on this will weigh heavily on those of us on the Safety and Licensing Committee when the liquor license application comes back up on our agenda. 
  
  
• Wednesday, 11/10/2021, 4:30pm - Community and Economic Development Committee:  This committee will vote to approve the allocation of funds to community partners through the Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) program as follows:
  
  
  

  They'll also discuss whether to approve an extension to a planning option agreement with the potential developer of the former Blue Ramp site (next to City Center).  This developer is already going to build a mixed-use building on the old Conway Hotel site next door to the Blue Ramp site but needs a bit more time to get their ducks in a row for the Blue Ramp site.  They'll pay the city $1000 for the agreement extension.
  
  
• Wednesday, 11/10/2021, 6pm - SPECIAL SESSION of the Common Council - Adoption of the Proposed 2022 Executive Budget:  The council will go into the Committee of the Whole -- a fancy way of saying that the full council will essentially become a committee, doing committee work under informal rules -- to take up everything that was discussed and approved on Budget Saturday.  On Budget Saturday, we went through all lines of the proposed 2022 and asked a lot of questions but no amendments were proposed.  In this session, there will be amendments proposed and discussed.  The Finance Committee (on Budget Saturday) voted to recommend approval of all lines of the proposed budget.  In Committee of the Whole, the whole council will hash out any small disagreements that the whole council has with the proposed budget.  Here are the four amendments that have been proposed for discussion:
  

1. Add $6,300 to Information Technology Department for Computer Replacements and Delete $6,300 from Common Council Budget for Parking Permits (proposed by Alderman Chad Doran of District 15):  Alderman Doran thinks it wasteful of the city to allow its alderman to use parking permits for the Yellow Ramp to attend meetings at City Hall.  The total of $6,300 for a year for all 15 aldermen does seem a bit steep.. but it's $420/year/alderman.  That's the cost of those passes to the general public so that's the budgeted amount.  Some aldermen do not use parking passes so this will not affect them at all.  Some of us do use these passes... but there are alternatives for us which would cost us on a per-meeting basis however much it costs us individually to plug a meter downtown.  While the grand total amount seems steep, I don't necessarily agree with this amendment as it won't go terribly far to improve the computer replacements budget in the city and the parking passes are used by many aldermen.  It would be good to allow those aldermen who use these passes to use them and the remainder who don't use them to turn them back in to the city and not have the Common Council budget charged for them and that total (the unused portion) be applied elsewhere in the city budget wherever it is most needed.
   
   
2. Add $3,360 to the Common Council Budget for Training and Delete $3,360 from the Common Council Budget for Parking Passes (proposed by Alderman Matt Reed, Council President, of District 8): Alderman Reed has taken another approach to the excess parking pass spending in the common council budget.  He has surveyed all of the current aldermen and applied the total amount of currently unused parking permits ($420/year/alderman) to the training budget for common council members.  Some aldermen have complained that they are unable to attend training and networking events for aldermen because the training budget for common council members is too low a dollar figure.  So I appreciate that Alderman Reed has attempted to do something about that here.  However... there are a couple problems with this proposed amendment: 1) those who are on the council now are potentially not the same people who will be on the council after the April 2022 election and a new member may want to use a parking pass that has been "surrendered" by his/her predecessor for the purposes of this budget amendment and 2) I believe that the training budget for common council members is satisfactory as is and not in need of an increase.  The training and networking events available to aldermen do not, in my opinion, benefit the citizens of Appleton as much as they benefit individual aldermen.  As such, should aldermen wish to participate in extensive training and networking events, we should be asked to make the payments for those events at our own expense.  This should not be an expense that taxpayers should have to bear.  
   
   
3. Add $500 to the Common Council Budget for Training and Delete $500 from the Mayor's Budget for Training (proposed by Alderman Denise Fenton, District 6):  Here again is another option for increasing the common council's training budget to allow for more dollars to go to individual aldermen for training and networking events.  I disagree with the premise of increasing the budget for aldermen training (as mentioned just above) as it doesn't benefit taxpayers as much as that same $500 could benefit city staff for their training and networking.  We need well trained city staff and these dollars, I feel, will better assist those in the mayor's office in receiving valuable training.  I do appreciate, though, that this is a relatively small amount and that it might be a "meet in the middle" way to satisfy all council members without too much argument or strife.
   
   
4. Reduce the 2023 Borrowing for the Library Project CIP from $13,542,000 to $11,542,000 (proposed by Alderman Chad Doran, District 15, and Alderman Kris Alfheim, District 11):  Don't fret, library proponents!  This is not an attempt to cut the overall budget for the library.  It is merely a way to help the city keep its promise of maintaining the library budget already agreed upon!  How?  Well... the common council just voted to approve a $2M addition to the library budget for broadband infrastructure through the American Rescue Plan (ARPA) proposal from the mayor's office.  So... with this amendment, the overall budget for the library will remain at $26.4M but $2M of it will be paid for through ARPA funds instead of through City of Appleton borrowing in 2023.  This is a good amendment.  It keeps the city honest to our taxpayers while removing some of the heavy borrowing for the library project that's proposed in 2023.  Unless I hear salient arguments to the contrary, I will be voting to approve this amendment. 

Let me know your thoughts on these proposed amendments, your concerns, your opinions on the 2022 budget. I want to hear them!  

Thank you again for stopping by and reading.  I'm happy to share this information with you and always look forward to your feedback.  Have a fantastic "modified Committee Week" and I hope you'll join me again next week!