The Notes: Week of June 15 - June 19, 2026

Howdy, Neighbors!  Happy (officially) Flag Day!  I hope you were able to join in the crowds on College Avenue yesterday to view the City of Appleton's 75th Flag Day Parade.  If not, you can always watch (or DVR) the replay of the parade on WFRV Channel 5 on 06/20/2026 at 10:35pm.  It was a lovely weather day and the parade -- as usual -- was a great one!  Thanks to all who participated in this wonderful patriotic event.

This week in City of Appleton government is a Full Council Meeting Week.  There are a couple of meetings on the calendar in addition to Wednesday's full council meeting as well.  So... for more information, please read on:

Tuesday, 06/16/2026

Library Board - Cornerstone Conference Room at the Appleton Public Library - 5pm  The board will begin by reviewing and approving the May 2026 bill register and a proposed budget amendment for the receipt of a $9,000 grant to "enhance the Appleton Public Library's strategic planning process currently underway."  These funds are in addition to the $29,000 already allocated to this "strategic planning" through a Friends of the Appleton Public Library grant.  Then in non-action items, there will be a review of some current and near-future library programs, a "strategic planning update," and discussion on the potential (yet to be council approved - see below) solar panel project at the library.  

Wednesday, 06/17/2026

Appleton Redevelopment Authority - 8:30am  Since this committee has not met in a while, they will be electing a chairman and vice chairman at this week's meeting.  They will also be looking to approve reappointments of some members of their own Appleton Redevelopment Authority (ARA) Exhibition Center Advisory Committee.  The final real discussion item on this group's agenda is about "next steps" for the Authority.  Take a look at this document and let me know if you have any questions or feedback on the direction this group is planning to take for the city.   

City of Appleton Common Council - 7pm  This week, the mayor's portion of the full council meeting agenda is blank.  Could it be that we're in a bit of a proclamations lull?  

The rest of the agenda of course comes from items that were discussed in committee meetings last week.  Here are the items most likely to be further discussed:

• From the Municipal Services Committee: This five-person committee voted last week 3-2 to recommend approval of the city staff's recommendation for the 2028 reconstruction of Driscoll Street between Prospect Avenue to the dead-end railroad tracks.  There has been much neighborhood pushback against the recommended plan which includes sidewalks installed on both sides of the street (where there are currently no sidewalks in the city rights-of-way), a narrowing of the street from the existing 32' to 26', and on-street parking prohibited on one side of the street (where there is currently a winter-months prohibition of the same). 
  
  Most of the reasons neighbors have provided for their protesting the city staff's recommendations are related to the expenses that homeowners will incur for sidewalk installation and underground utility replacements/upgrades.  While I am sympathetic to those concerns -- no one wants added homeowner expenses! -- I also recognize that the timeline for street reconstructions throughout the city is very long and most City of Appleton streets will only have reconstruction take place once in 50 to 100 years.  As such, city leaders need to do the right thing now and continue to work towards sidewalk connectivity citywide.  The pedestrian safety all those who currently live on this street and who will live on this street well into the future requires appropriate action of city leadership now, during this planning of the reconstruction project... since there likely won't be an opportunity to do so again for another generation. 
  
  The narrowing of the street from curb to curb makes sense due to neighbor concerns that, for a dead-end street, there is still a lot of vehicle traffic.  Narrowing the street to 26' and prohibiting parking on one side allows for appropriately sized lanes of through traffic with a naturally traffic-calming effect.  This, too, is aimed at increasing roadway safety in the neighborhood.
  
  This roadway has also had many recent instances of aging infrastructure failure -- water main breakages, potholes, poor pavement.  The street reconstruction, including replacement of many of the private lines from the city's utilities to homes, is badly needed and should not be delayed any longer.  To get it into the Capital Improvement Plan with an appropriate budget amount now is very important.  Any further delay puts the project and these homeowners at risk.     
  
  Though I do not always agree with a "cookie cutter" approach to street reconstruction in the city, this particular project is one in which the recommendations of the city's Smart Streets policy make sense and are defendable.  What do you think?        
  
  
• From the Safety and Licensing Committee:  The chairman of this committee submitted a resolution that would give the council more time to discuss the results of the recent trial period for the city's latest iteration of a truancy ordinance and give the council opportunity to reinstate it if the majority of the council members find it of value to the community.  This resolution was discussed last week and this committee voted to approve it to at least allow for more discussion in this regard.  Approval of this resolution would not mean that the truancy ordinance has been or will be extended.  That ordinance (under its approved trial period) will still expired at the end of this month.  This resolution would, however, allow the council to fully review all that took place during the last school year as it relates to truancy in the Appleton Area School District.  I believe that we owe it to the community to not just completely shut down discussions regarding a city truancy ordinance and that we should further review the entirety of the school district results/data and feedback so that we can make a fully informed decision as to the future of a truancy ordinance in the City of Appleton.  Do you agree?  If not, please let me know why not? 
  
  
• From the Parks and Recreation Committee:  Very little discussion took place last week at the meeting of this committee in regards to a recent resolution (including a re-write "amendment") on the Appleton Sustainability Advisory Panel's "ongoing vegetation and invasive species analysis."  As I mentioned the previous times I've written about this resolution (here and here), I am not in favor of such non-action resolutions.  And this one did not get any closer to calling for any specific actions with its amended version.  While I do not have any qualm against an "ongoing vegetation and invasive species analysis" in the city, I will not add my name to a list of aldermen agreeing to this resolution which literally does nothing.  
  
  
• From the Finance Committee:  While some of you have expressed to me concern over approval of additional spending on a solar project for the Appleton Public Library, I did vote (as a member of this committee) to approve the latest request to double the expenditure for that from $350,000 to $700,000 due to the presented savings and return on investment (ROI) calculations:
  
  
  
  

  The added project dollars will not come from the city's general fund (Appleton taxpayer dollars) but from a large sum of money that the city received from the federal government "elective pay reimbursement" through the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA).  (Side note: The name of this particular act is an oxymoron if I ever heard one; but that's a whole other story.)  Anyway... after review of the above calculations, one could hardly vote against this request, right?
  
  
• Also from the Finance Committee:  After months of negotiations, a final management agreement for the Fox Cities Exhibition Center (FCEC) is up for full council approval.  You can review the agreement here.  Please let me know if you have any questions or concerns on this.  I hope that it will be successful in moving FCEC forward in the bets interests of the city and Appleton taxpayers.  
  

I believe that will do it for this week.  If you see anything above that's of concern to you, please let me know.  I look forward to any and all feedback on these items or anything city-government-related. 

Have a great mid-June week this week.  Let's hope it will warm up a bit as summertime is fast speeding past us and we can't afford to have so many cool days to try to fit in all of our "summering"!  Thanks for tuning in this week!