The Notes: Week of October 17 - October 21, 2022

Happy Sunday, neighbors!  I'm so glad that you're back here to read the latest on city government in Appleton.  

We won't even talk about Packers football and instead go right to the business of city meetings this coming week.  I think that's for the best.  Don't you?

This Full Council Week, there are two other meetings besides the "main event." 

The Zoning Board of Appeals will again meet this week (Monday, 10/17/2022 at 7pm).  They have six properties with variance requests to consider.

• On East Haddonstone Drive in District 13: The owner requests a pool installation which would increase lot coverage to 55% where 40% maximum is allowed.
• On West Eighth Street:  The owner requests a rear yard fence of 6'10" where 6' is the maximum height allowed.
• On East Longview Drive: A car wash company requests two variances -- one for a drive-thru on the front yard of the property, one for a canopy 8' into the front yard (where a 10' setback is required by code).
• On West College Avenue downtown: The owner of the historic Zuelke Building requests large signage to overhang (project) at 48' above grade where 16' is the maximum height allowed.
• On North Oneida Street: The owners of a property on a currently commercial parcel would like to have the property rezoned to residential.  The home on the property (which they would like to return to a residential multi-family home) would then be out of compliance and need variances for a 18'7" setback (where 20' is required) and for a narrower-than-allowed lot width of 56'6" (where 70' is required).
• On East Minor Street: The owner of the property would like to construct a new garage because the current garage for the property is on the property line and shared (half and half, the same building!) with the adjacent property.  This is a particularly interesting one!  It's hard to believe that this city has neighboring homes where both share a garage ON the lot line between them!

On Tuesday, 10/18/2022, at 4:30pm, the Library Board will meet.  They will review and look to approve the September 2022 bill register, a 2022 budget amendment, and a city policy adjustment.  They will also review a document regarding the status of the library project.  It contains a question-and-answer for some questions which board members most likely have gotten lately.  Take a look and let me know if you have any other questions or concerns in this regard.  

Then, on Wednesday, 10/19/2022, at 7pm, the full Appleton Common Council meets as usual at City Hall.  Also as per usual, the same items which were discussed last week will come through for discussion and potential approval by the council.  Here is a run-down of what was discussed.  There were very few contentious items on the docket last week so I doubt that there will be a lot of heavy discussion on any of the topics on this week's agenda. Even the "Business Presented by the Mayor" portion of the agenda is blank this week!

The main thing likely on your minds at this time is the latest news on the 2023 city budget.  As reported in the local paper, property owners in the city are looking at a 6.6% increase in property taxes with the city's 2023 budget as proposed by the mayor and city staff.  (A copy of the proposed budget for your review can be found here.)  

The mayor noted when presenting the budget to the council that the state's revenue sharing (i.e. the dollar amounts that the state government trickles down to local municipalities from what's collected in state taxes) has not increased in proportion to state income taxes collected in the recent past and is therefore the reason for the increase in local property tax.  While I agree that there is a revenue sharing crunch due to the choices our state legislators have made, I do not believe that the state's revenue sharing should dictate what services local municipalities can and can't provide citizens.  As a true fiscal conservative, I always prefer that your money remain with you -- not go to the state of Wisconsin government for those legislators to decide what trickles down to municipalities or gets spent on other state budget initiatives.  Local municipalities like the City of Appleton need to live within their means without complaint that revenue sharing isn't providing the city "enough."  Instead of the complaint that the state is not doing enough to fund the City of Appleton, I believe that the city should instead take a good look at what services -- what budget items -- are not needed by the citizens of Appleton and should therefore be eliminated from the budget.  City government should focus on the core competencies of a municipality such as garbage removal, snow removal, street maintenance, etc, and reduce or cut other non-necessities.  This is the philosophy of true fiscal conservativism. 

The proposed 2023 budget looks to add a 5% merit-based increase for non-union employees.  This increase was suggested by the city-contracted consulting firm which recently performed an employment survey of all of the city's departments.  There is the fear that without increased compensation for city employees to meet private enterprise compensation rates there will be an exodus of city employees in this tight employment market and the city would do well to manage this issue before the it loses valued employees and feels a pinch like that of Outagamie County of late with their extremely high employment vacancy rate.  While absolutely agree that the city's employees should be fairly compensated, I would perhaps like to see that 5% somewhat pared back to strike a balance of a decent increase for employees without an even-larger increase (6.6%) in property tax payments for Appleton property owners.

With Appletonians facing a a sanitary sewer rate increase, this city property tax rate increase, and a proposed astronomically high-priced referendum on the fall ballot for the Appleton Area School District, members of the Appleton Common Council would do well to make a few cuts to the mayor's proposed budget.  There are few members on the council at this time who are interested in budget cuts and fiscal conservatism.  So any changes to this budget will be an uphill battle.  But I will look to fight the battle for you, District 13 neighbors!  Please let me know your thoughts on what cuts might be made, what city employee salary increase percentage seems acceptable to you, how you feel about all of the potential tax increases you're facing.  I will do my best to look for and propose budget cuts for 2023 and help you to minimize the heavy financial impact.  

Besides contacting me directly, there are also a couple of other ways in which you can provide feedback on this year's budget:

As always, I welcome and truly seek your feedback!  Please send me a note if you have anything -- not just budget concerns and questions -- on your mind regarding any of the happenings in our neighborhoods and the city as a whole.  

I wish you a great second last week of October and hope to see you back here again next week!