The Grand Chute Town Board provided residents with a survey earlier this week, offering three options to pay for road improvement work. The survey was sent to residential property owners in the form of a postcard with a link and QR Code option to get to the survey. A paper copy of the survey is also available to print at the Grand Chute website and in the Town Hall lobby. Town Administrator Richard Downey stated that residents will be able to provide survey responses through about mid-October.
The three options offered to residents by the Board include:
Option 1 – partial funding with Special Assessments on property owners, which would represent the return of a practice used by the Town from 1993 – 2020. Use of Special Assessments was discontinued in 2021 following a series of Special Assessment lawsuits that were filed against the Town by residents and businesses.
Option 2 – establishing a Dedicated Road Improvement Fund. Based on a future annual road improvement need of $9 million, Downey calculated that annual property taxes would increase by an amount of $705 for a residential property valued at $250,000, $988 for a residential property valued at $350,000 and $1,270 for a residential property valued at $450,000. A referendum would be needed to approve the increase.
Option 3 – issuing a municipal bond of $9 million every other year to pay for road improvements. The bond would be paid off over a 10-year period using property tax proceeds. Based on the value of one’s home, Downey estimated that residential property owners would pay between $100 and $140 every other year, or $500 – $700 over a 10-year period. A referendum would not be needed to pursue this option.
Under Option 1, the Special Assessment option, residential property owners would either pay a capped amount of $5,000 when the road in front of their home was worked on, or $802 per year over a 10-year period, if they choose to pay using installments. Commercial property owners would receive a capped Special Assessment levy of 50 percent of the cost of the road improvement work in front of their businesses.
For residential property owners, the $802 amount includes an annual interest payment based on a seven percent market rate of interest. In addition to paying a Special Assessment, all residential property owners would also see an annual increase in property taxes of $90 – $163, depending on the value of their home. As with Option #2, this increase in the property tax levy would need to be approved by a referendum. If the Board would choose to reinstate Special Assessments, it would also have the authority to change the amount of the special assessment cap amount at any time in the future.
With Option 1, the Town would still need to issue municipal bonds to pay for all road improvement costs not paid for by Special Assessments or by the property tax increase of $90 – $163. Downey did not offer an estimate of the amount of debt that would be needed using this option as compared with Option 3.
When asked for his opinion about the road funding survey Grand Chute Town Board Chairman Jason Van Eperen stated that “Option #3 best reflects the direction the Town has taken over the past four years. Our direction has been to refurbish all roads when their PASER (pavement) rating diminishes to a ‘3’ on a 1 – 10 scale (where 10 is the best and 1 is the worst). We have been able to fix the roads that have been identified to us by staff, and we have done so without Special Assessments and without requesting a property tax increase for road improvement work. We have been keeping up our roads and still living within our means.”
Included with the Road Funding Survey is a list of 60 roads that have been identified to be worked on in the very near future. That list includes:
| 1st Ave
4th St Amberwood Ln Appleton St Bluemound Dr N Breckenridge Ct Buran Way Chippewa St College Ave Service Rd N College Ave Service Rd S David St Division St Earthrock Rd Edgewood Dr W Fraser Fir Ln Gillet St N Glendale Ave Grand Chute Blvd Highland Park Ave Highview Dr |
Holiday Dr
Honeysuckle Ln Kools Ct Kools St Mason St N Mayflower Dr Mc Carthy Rd (1) Meadow Row Ct Melmar St Memory Ln E Montana Ave Mutual Way N Colorado Ave N Rexford St N Westfield Nicolet Rd Nordale Dr Olson Ave Oneida St N Outagamie St N |
Park Site Pl
Parkview Dr Pershing St Preservation Trl Rosenberry Ct Rynders St Seneca Dr W Spencer St Spencer St W Sunridge Dr Thornberry Dr Timmers Ln Tyler Dr Van Dyke Rd S W Brewster St W Capitol Dr Woodhaven Ct Woodlawn Dr Woodside Ct Wren Dr |
If Option 1 is desired by survey respondents, the residents, businesses and non-profit organizations located along these roads would be the first ones to pay a Special Assessment.
Two road funding options Downey said the Board decided not to offer residents were a Wheel Tax, which is used by the City of Appleton and A TARF (Transportation Assessment Replacement Fund). The City of Neenah currently uses a TARF. The Town of Buchanan had also initiated a TARF in 2019. However, in 2022 the Wisconsin Circuit Court declared the Buchanan TARF to be an illegal form of taxation. This decision was affirmed by a Court of Appeals and also by the Wisconsin Supreme Court in 2023. It was noted by residents who attended a Road Funding Survey open house conducted by Downey on September 24, that Special Assessments may similarly not be legal if they are used to fund roads. Like a TARF, Special Assessments may be judged to be an illegal form of taxation if they are used by municipalities in place of the property tax levy or a Wheel Tax to fund routine annual road improvement work.
Downey said the Town has not researched the legality of Special Assessments used for road funding, but stated that the Village of Little Chute uses them. In 2021 the Wisconsin Circuit Court granted a Summary Judgment decision in favor of Grand Chute residents and businesses located along Mc Carthy Road who filed a Special Assessment lawsuit against the Town.
Residents attending the Road Funding Survey open house also expressed concern that the survey has no safeguard to prevent respondents from completing multiple surveys. Downey acknowledged that shortcoming, but stated that the survey consultant, the Strategic Research Institute of St. Norbert College, has the capability to determine if multiple surveys are submitted from the same internet IP address.
The Grand Chute Town Board approved a contract with the Strategic Research Institute for $40,000 to prepare and conduct the survey. The Board approved the contract by a 3 – 2 margin, with supervisors Gehring, English and Bantes approving the expenditure. Chairman Van Eperen and Supervisor Wolff opposed the contract.
Downey shared that two additional survey open house sessions will be held on Wednesday, September 30, at the Grand Chute Town Center Park building. The sessions will be at 12:00 PM and 6:00 PM.
