Happy New Year, Neighbors! Thanks for tuning in today after a couple of holiday weeks with no city government meeting activity. I hope that your Christmas and New Year holidays were full of good things and quality time with family and friends. Here’s to 2025 treating us all well! I look forward to another year of serving our neighborhoods on the city’s common council and working with you to help answer questions and inform you all on the happenings in our city government.
This first full week of the new year is a Committee Meetings Week and we’re starting it off right — with a few meetings cancelled but other meetings with agendas heavily laden with action items. And just like in the alderman blog posts of old, a rundown by date and time follows:
Monday, 01/06/2025
Municipal Services Committee – 4:30pm We get right back into the swing of things with this first meeting of the new year. These committee members will be asked to approve the awarding of contracts for “illicit discharge detection and elimination” in the city’s stormwater systems and for materials testing and contaminated soils response/analysis (during concrete/asphalt/sidewalk, sanitary sewer, stormwater installations throughout the city). Both of these contracts are renewals with a contractor who has performed well for the city in previous years. On this meeting agenda are also a request for the semi-permanent placement of a dumpster in a parking space near the 222 Building downtown (from 1/2/2025 to 11/30/2025) and a request for a permanent street occupancy permit for Hilton Paper Valley directional signage on the pedestrian walk over Superior Street between the hotel and the parking ramp.
Finance Committee – 5:30pm This meeting will start with the annual update on the Appleton Yacht Club. This committee hears from the Yacht Club once a year since the city leases the land on which the Yacht Club operates. The annual update keeps city leadership and the general public aware of the overall success of the Yacht Club operations to ensure that the city’s lease of this land/waterfront access remains a good use of this public land. If you’re interested in this information, see here and here.
There are also two action items up for approval by this committee — 1) a contract amendment for an additional ~$17k for temporary shoring measures needed to mitigate the damage by a personal vehicle to the city’s Green parking ramp and 2) a contract with an architect for $67,400 for the design services for a renovation of the Community Development Department office space. The latter is another sole-sourcing request since the city staff recommendation is to use the same architect firm that has last been in charge of design of the most recent renovations of staff offices throughout the city in the last year or two. It seems so costly to me. While I understand that keeping office spaces in the city up-to-date and ergonomically safe for staff, it seems crazy that the design alone on one department’s space would be nearly $70k! What are your thoughts…? Share them with me via email to your alderman’s newest email address.
Parks and Recreation Committee – 6:15pm This meeting has been cancelled due to lack of agenda items.
Tuesday, 01/07/2025
Fox Cities Transit Commission – 2:50pm This meeting has been cancelled due to lack of agenda items.
Utilities Committee – 4:30pm Members of this committee will discuss and likely approve the additional contract amount of $4,000 for additional drawings and 32 extra labor hours by a contractor for engineering on the Appleton Wastewater Treatment Plant (AWWTP) sludge/biosolids storage projects. In the grand scheme of things — and considering government spending lately — this seems very reasonable. There is also an informational item detailing an additional $10,250 in spending the AWWTP outlaid for biosolids (compost) processing in 2024. The good news is that despite the additional cost, biosolids processing remained under budget.
Wednesday, 01/08/2025
Board of Health – 7amThis meeting has been cancelled due to lack of agenda items. (How fortunate for these board members who might get to sleep in on this date!)
Appleton Redevelopment Authority – 9amThis meeting has been cancelled due to lack of agenda items.
City Plan Commission – 3:30pmCommissioners will not be asked to take any action during this meeting. Instead, they will be updated on the city’s current process of updating the Comprehensive Plan and Sub-Area Planning. You can view the status update here.
I also highly encourage you to take the public survey on the city’s long-term Comprehensive Plan here. Get involved by sharing your opinions on the current status of the city and what the city should be doing to plan for a prosperous future!
Community Development Committee – 4:30pmA public hearing will kick off this committee’s first meeting of the year. If you have comments or questions on the funding available and the community needs which should be met with the 2025 Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) funds, please come and share them with this committee (6th Floor, City Hall). The proposal of how the estimated federal award of ~$588k (to be discussed and potentially approved by this committee) is outlined here.
Also of note on this committee’s agenda: There will be a review of the upcoming Neighbors in Action Workshop (formerly known in the city as the Neighborhood Leadership Academy). The city used allocated American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds and is now rolling out an update to this program. Here’s the summary on the program and information on how you can get involved!
The City of Appleton is excited to offer a new training opportunity for neighborhood organizations. The Neighbors in Action Workshop series will equip residents with leadership and engagement skills, provide educational opportunities related to event planning, grant management, and neighborhood development, and help neighbors across Appleton connect and build community together.
The workshop sessions will be held the first Thursday of the month in Winter/Spring 2025, starting February 6th. This project is being facilitated by Julie Filapek of NeighborWorks Green Bay. Julie is an Appleton resident with extensive experience in neighborhood development and neighborhood organizing across northeastern Wisconsin.
The workshop sessions will cover a wide variety of topics related to neighborhood organizations and provide many opportunities for connection and collaboration with neighbors. Areas of interest for the workshop sessions include:
• Identify and leverage the strengths you have to build on in your neighborhood
• Set a vision and goals and take action to achieve them
• Build a team that works together well and gets other neighbors excited to participate
• Establish and communicate your neighborhood’s unique identity
• Use traditional and creative methods for communicating with neighbors
• Build partnerships and raise funds to help you realize your goals
• Work with City of Appleton elected officials and department staff
You can learn more about the Neighbors in Action Workshop here and register for the Neighbors in Action Workshop here.
Safety and Licensing Committee – 5:30pmAnd the topper on the week’s meetings is this one with lots of contentious items on their agenda. Here’s a snapshot of what will be discussed:
- A revisiting of the potential denial of the operator’s (bartender’s) license for a woman with one conviction of possession of cocaine (for which she is serving 12 months of probation) and a pending charge also regarding possession of cocaine. This item was held by this committee when they met in December due to a recent conviction on the first pending case on her record. At that time, the city attorney needed more time to review the case and update his legal opinion on the matter. The most recent recommendation from the legal staff of the city is to deny the license unless this applicant shows “evidence of rehabilitation.” I don’t think that a pending case for the same illegal activity on this applicant’s record shows rehabilitation… do you?
- Another (new) denial of an operator’s (bartender’s) license. This applicant has been thrice arrested and convicted of Operating While Intoxicated (OWI). Her first two OWI convictions were in the 2010’s and the third was in 2021. While it may seem like there was some rehabilitation time between them… there is still an issue here. I empathize with this applicant’s position but I believe that being a server of alcohol would not be wise for her or safe for residents/consumers in the city. What are your thoughts?
- A revisiting of the liquor license revocation for the Speakeasy Ultralounge. This was mentioned here. During that December meeting, a majority of this committee (3 of the 5 members) voted to allow the bar to keep their license to “help keep the sale of the bar moving forward.” In my opinion, this was a dangerous move as this bar had already racked up enough demerit points to have their license revoked… and yet they were allowed to continue to operate through the holiday season when more social drinking and more visitors to the city could have led to further public danger at this establishment. I am interested in what will take place at this week’s meeting on this held item. The establishment should be required to surrender their liquor license immediately or the committee should finally proceed to revoke the license this week.
- Another revisiting of a liquor license application for a proposed establishment called Delaire’s where there is an indication that there might be some planned illegal gaming/gambling. This was mentioned here and here. There are no updates on this week’s agenda in this regard so it is unclear as to whether this item will again be held by this committee or if there will be discussion of denial of the license for this proposed establishment.
- A review (information item) of the Gold Cross Ambulance Service in the city. This past year was the first under a new service agreement between Gold Cross and the city. This review of the overall results shows that the formal written agreement has been beneficial for Appletonians in need of ambulance and emergency medical services.
- Notice of two substantial demerit points assessments for the following liquor licensed establishments: Broken Tree Pizza — 120 demerit points for serving a minor and no licensed bartender on premises — and Mr Frogs — 160 demerit points for serving a minor and underaged persons on premises. (Note that, according to city ordinances, demerit points of 200 or more in a 36-month period results in revocation of a liquor license… unless you get 3 of 5 members of this committee to allow otherwise, I guess.)
Human Resources and Information Technology Committee – 6:30pm This meeting has been due to lack of agenda items.
And that will do it for this week. Do you have any questions, comments, or concerns on any of the above items? Do you have other city-government-related questions? Please reach out to me and let me know if so. I’m always happy to hear from you and help in any way that I am able.
I hope that your first full week of 2025 is a good one. I think it might be tough to get back into the swing of things… but I know we can do it! See you back here next week for another alderman blog post.
