Municipal Services Committee - Regular Meeting

All set? Okay. It is 5.30, so let's call to order this meeting of the Safety Licensing Committee for Wednesday, August 22nd, our second meeting of the day. We were here this morning. Please join me in the Pledge of Allegiance.

All right, thank you. Roll call of membership. All members are present tonight. I'm Chris Crote, chair of the committee, the representative from District 14, and to my left is... Maya Jones, District 10.

Denise Fenton, District 6.

Patrick Hayden, District 7. Josh Lambert, District 1.

OK, great. So next on the agenda is the approval of the minutes from the previous meeting, which was dated 8-19, August 19th.

Is there a motion on those minutes?

Move to approve. Second.

OK, motions and seconds on the minutes.

Any corrections or changes? Not seeing any. All those in favor of approving the minutes, signify by saying aye. Aye. All opposed? Any abstentions? 5-0. The minutes are approved. OK. We do have one scheduled appearance on our agenda tonight, 26-1005. It's a demerit point violation appearance for the Dirty Leprechaun, downtown Appleton. THIS VIOLATION IS A DISPENSING TO MINOR 80 POINT VIOLATION. THE ESTABLISHMENT HAS A TOTAL OF 160 POINTS. I'LL LET ATTORNEY BERWIN EXPLAIN THAT SITUATION. IS THERE ANYONE HERE FROM THE DIRTY LEPRECON? THANK YOU FOR COMING. IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO ADDRESS THE COMMITTEE, WHAT WE'D LIKE TO HEAR IS NAME AND ADDRESS FOR THE RECORD. I'LL TURN THE MICROPHONE ON. WHAT HAPPENED AND WHAT YOU'RE DOING TO RECTIFY IT FROM HAPPENING AGAIN? Yes, use the podium, please. We need you to state your name and address. Yeah, sure.

John Kuhn, address 402 East North Street, Appleton, Wisconsin. Thank you. My business is 343 West College, downtown. My bartender got stung with an underage. She hired the kid, but did bad math. And that's my responsibility. What have we done? I got a map now that tells them what age you got to be. So but and we card everybody. I just I don't know how that happened. I don't. And it happened again prior. So.

Okay.

We do take it seriously.

OK.

Thank you. I was going to ask you if you understand the points system and what the accumulation of points means. Yeah, I do. OK. So potentially. 21 years I've been doing this. I've never.

This is my only second time in front of this committee. And this isn't, yeah.

Thank you. And I just also wanted to mention that, and I'm sure you're aware of this having been in business that long, the resources that are available to you through the Eplen Police Department as far as training and other resources? Sure. OK. Yeah.

No, I mean. Yeah, we got stung. They didn't pass. Okay. And we're not an underage bar. We promote downtown, try to keep it clean, spend a lot of money doing it. Okay. Thank you.

Yep. Attorney Berwin, could you just comment on the status of the total and where we're at with, you know, how the one statutorily? Okay. Thank you. District 8. District 8. Okay. Go ahead. Thank you.

So this is one where THERE ARE 160 POINTS ACCUMULATED, BUT THE PRIOR VIOLATION THAT WAS NOTED IS WITHIN THE CITY'S COUNTING PERIOD, BUT OUTSIDE OF THE STATUTORILY PERMISSIBLE LOOKBACK PERIOD. SO THE NEITHER OF THE TWO CITATIONS THAT WERE RECEIVED UNDER OUR DEMERIT POINT SYSTEM ARE usable for any points for the purposes of suspensions or revocations had This one this most recent one occurred less than 12 months after the one prior to that Then this one would be 80 points that can be counted towards a license suspension So the points are still there, at least in terms of what they require for coming before the committee. In terms of action against the license, there aren't any points at this point that would be countable. This offense does make any future ones within 12 months countable, and that would be 80 points if it were to happen within 12 months of this most recent offense.

Okay. Thank you for clarifying that, because I think it's important for the establishment, but also for us to understand where they are in the process. demerit points system and the risk of a possible... We have 60 points, right? You have 80, correct, Attorney Berwin, that technically count towards... It is...

They have 160. Neither of the offenses for which there were citations are citations that neither one can be used as a basis for an action for revoking or suspending an alcohol license because neither one had an offense for the same thing within 12 months prior to that. It's confusing. I get it. This is kind of how we reconcile the points with what the statute requires. So there are 160 points. Currently, none of them can be counted towards suspension, though.

Okay, does that help? If you could, just use the microphone if you want to ask a question or two.

What are the other 60, or I know I got the 80 from this past guy. 80 and 80. But where did the prior one come from?

2024, I think. 2024? Oh.

The memo doesn't say when the first one occurred. It just says that you have a total of 160. Okay. I don't remember getting anything. Is that something APD or the attorney's office could follow up on?

You can find it right now.

Okay. It's fine. Thank you. I think what we're hearing is you're not at risk of suspension, but as these accumulate within a certain amount of time, they can quickly get to that level.

March of 2025.

So over a year ago. OK.

Understood?

Yep. Thank you for coming. That's all we needed. We ask you to come when you have a demerit point violation and just explain what happened and what you're doing to prevent it from happening again. So we appreciate your appearance. Thank you. Yep. Thanks. Okay. There will be no further action on that. Okay, going now to our action items, we'll take things in order.

26-1028 is the operator's license application for Delaine Henley. Before we get a motion on this, two things. Delaine Henley could not appear tonight. The clerk was... Oh, you are here.

Thank you. I was told you weren't going to make it, so... OKAY, THANKS FOR COMING.

I'M GLAD THIS WORKED OUT. WE WERE GOING TO POSSIBLY HOLD IT OR TAKE ACTION ON IT AND THEN INFORM YOU THAT YOU COULD SPEAK TO THE COUNCIL. LET'S START WITH THE ATTORNEY'S OFFICE AS TO THE STATUS OF THIS AND THE OPTIONS FOR THE COMMITTEE. I DID READ THE MEMO AND IT APPEARS THIS IS ONE OF THOSE WHERE WE DON'T HAVE A LOT OF OPTIONS.

ATTORNEY BERWIN? That is my assessment. There are statutory eligibility criteria that prevent the license from being granted in this particular case. I set them out in pretty substantial detail, but basically what it comes down to is even accounting for the offenses for which rehabilitation is provided for by statute, there would still be an unpardoned exempt offense of battery for which there's a conviction. and an unpardoned felony offense that relates to the manufacture or delivery of controlled substances, which is not an exempt offense per se, but there is a whole separate section in the statute dealing with those types of offenses and alcohol licenses. So there is no eligibility in this case. I do not believe the license can be granted, and it would not be valid even if it were granted. I will reiterate, as I did in the memorandum, that it does not prevent Mr. Henley from working in a bartending capacity. He just has to do so under the supervision of a licensed bartender or a proper permit or license holder at the establishment.

OK, thank you. So Mr. Henley, I'm going to give you an opportunity to address the committee. But just for the record and for transparency, we have in our packet your application, redacted version, a letter from the police department recommending denial of your license, a memo, and then the letter from the clerk's office. So if you could just state your name and address for the record and address the committee. THE FLOOR IS YOURS. GO AHEAD.

NEW SPEAKER THANK YOU. The only thing I can say against that is that everything that happened to me was 20 some odd years ago. I'm currently working on my pardon for both of those offenses that he stated. I'm not sure if I will get that or not. I can't promise anything for that. As far as the licensing goes, he did state that even if it was granted, it wouldn't be valid. So I do have a question for you guys. If I am pardoned, am I able to reapply and

I believe the answer to that is yes, but I'll let the attorney's office or the clerk's office answer. We have to take what's in front of us today, but he's throwing a hypothetical scenario up.

I don't believe there are any limits on applying, so I don't even think you would need to wait until you were pardoned to apply. There wouldn't be a change to your eligibility until that were to happen. If a pardon were to come through on those offenses, that would potentially change your eligibility. And then when you apply after that happens, your application would be evaluated under those new circumstances with those matters being pardoned.

No problem. Okay, understood? Okay. So just so you understand, the committee has very, doesn't have any options in this situation. We may in the future, by the sounds of it. So good luck with that. And thank you for coming. We appreciate you taking the time to come so we can take care of this tonight.

Thank you, Doug.

Thank you. Be well. Okay, committee, back to the committee. What would you like to do? Move to deny.

I'll second.

Okay, we have a motion and a second to deny. Any comments or questions? I think it's pretty clear. Okay, all those in favor of denial, signify by saying aye. Aye. All opposed? Any abstentions? All right, 5-0 on the recommendation to deny. Okay, that takes us to, oh, I better look at the electronic version because there's a change. 26-1127 is the special event application for Wisconsin lights of hope a recovery celebration and memorial walk This is before us because they did not apply within the required 45 days. I believe it was 21 if I read the memo, right? Clerk monitor. Do you just want to add to that please?

District 3 go ahead Sure, so this was a late revision to the agenda because we did just receive this application on Monday We have gotten Departmental approvals now at this point from every department except for DPW they haven't stated that there are any issues We just have not heard from them yet because it is a very tight turnaround I can provide an updated memo for the council agenda or an update at council if needed when it comes to that Okay, and I think that would be one of the reason where one of the things I would ask for if we're going to approve this and I'm guessing that we will based on what's happened so far, but I

like we've said in a lot of these situations. Is there someone here? Okay, I'll give you a chance to speak. We have had a number of these come up, and every time we say at some point we're going to start kind of sticking to the 45 days, I think in this case we're going to grant this, but just wanted you to know that there is that out there, and some of us are concerned about applications not coming in in time. So go ahead.

Well, I apologize.

Name an address for the record, please.

Okay. My name is Beth Kelly Miller, and I am the president of the Megan Kelly Foundation, and we have held this Lights of Hope. for more than the eight years but we have a block and so what we do is we have the signs posted of people who have died from substance use disorder which is a highly stigmatized brain disorder and Because of the stigmas, there's a lot of shame and stigmas associated. So we honor and remember our loved ones. This happens to be my daughter who died 11 years ago. And that's why I created the Megyn Kelly Foundation. I did bring along the paperwork to the flyer. And I apologize. I completely forgot I applied last year. And then in February is when my insurance renews. And that's when I normally go and give certificate of liability. But I just must have forgotten to do that.

All right. Thank you. Thank you for sharing that. Like I said, I expect this to get approved. I will actually make a motion to approve it contingent on departmental approval, the one basically that we're still looking for. So if we get that at the Common Council meeting, then no problem.

So should it come today?

one second is there a second okay so we have a motion in a second to approve contingent on departmental approval if this passes which I expect it will yes I would encourage you to come that's seven o'clock next Wednesday right In this room, there will be a sign-up sheet on the table back there. Just sign up ahead of time and put this item down as what you're going to speak to if you want to. You don't have to. And then we will take it up when we get to that part of the agenda. All right. Thank you. Yep. Okay. Alder Jones, go ahead.

I have a question for Clerk Molitor. Remind me again when this new requirement went through of the 45 days?

About a year and a half ago? A year and a half? More than that?

Yes, I believe it was.

What year is this?

I want to say 2023.

2025? I believe it was, yeah.

Yeah, so it would have been the beginning of the year 2025 is when we had the new special event policy. And this is just information gathering, nothing on this.

Is it just that recently we've had a handful of them, or has this been?

No, since the policy got adopted, we've had a number of them. Some of us were saying at the one year mark we were going to start drawing the line in the sand We did not do that although we keep making the comment about it. I think what? One of the comments that alder hearts I'm made it one of the last times we took this up was maybe we need to look at the policy and Make some adjustments to the policy and I not sure if that's happening or not But I think there's some been some discussions about the policy.

I think maybe internally I I think also the policy is perhaps working the way it was intended to work, which is that if an applicant applies late but we're still able to accommodate their event because it is something that has happened several years in a row and so departments are able to look at it and quickly approve it, then the committee is also able to approve it. So it's just kind of a question, I think, from the legislative body of

It's kind of frustrating, though, because it is working for you, but then we have to be the bad guys that consistently are like, okay, this time is fine.

Yeah, and I don't know what kind of strain it puts on the departments when they're asked to review and approve on short notice, because the whole intent of the policy in the 45 days was to give departments enough time to review, and I don't know what kind of feedback you're getting when you ask departments, hey, can you review this quick? Right.

And we could discuss that, and it's like they are clearly capable of reviewing things, you know, with priority if they need to, and perhaps what the policy might require is then something additional from the applicants if we're putting extra work into, you know, like there's multiple ways that we could go about this, whether it's shortening the period before which they would need to apply, or if it is some sort of punitive measure against people who apply late, like there's multiple ways, and I think it would just depend on From your point of view, if you guys are the ones who feel like the onus is on you, kind of what you would look for from us.

OK. More comments, and then we'll take a vote on your item. Thank you. Go ahead, Alder Hayden.

Thank you, Chair. I was just thinking, I'm wondering how many, if we're seeing the same volume coming through of applications, because part of me is wondering if we're getting applications for people that see the time that they have to apply and are saying I'm behind so I'm not going to apply or push my event back or things like that. So I'm partially wondering if this is working in ways that we're not seeing along with working for people who are applying with the right amount of runway in front of it. So Just my thoughts. And I'm also seeing some of the same people a couple times lately. So I was hoping that once they kind of went through this process once and had to come before the committee, that we wouldn't see them again. But that isn't happening. So that makes me wonder what else we could do.

And like you said, it's hard to prove a negative. Like, who is it working for? How are we seeing it work behind the scenes? We're not really sure.

I can certainly

information for the committee on the volume the number of late applications that we've seen I would say anecdotally it does seem like more lately but without actually looking at the numbers it's hard to know but I can get that data for you for sure but don't spend 150 hours

Okay, if there's no other comments. Let's take a vote on this particular application we got a little off on the side of the policy there, but Good discussion and thank you for coming.

Thank you for sharing your story So all those in favor of approving contingent on departmental approval signify by saying aye aye all opposed all right five zero so that goes as our unanimous recommendation from this committee to the full City Council and You are welcome to come, invited to come, but you don't have to speak if you don't want to. But if you do, just sign up ahead of time. About 6.45 would be a good idea to arrive. Okay. Okay.

Thank you. All right. That takes us to 26-1079 is the APD table of organization change.

Chief Olson, which microphone do you have? District 2, go ahead.

Thank you, Chair. I know that all of you have the memo in front of you or have probably had a chance to review it. Essentially, this is a no budget impact TO realignment. We are essentially looking to better align, I think, our workloads and moving the community resource unit back under Captain Cash, who was a longtime supervisor of that unit as a lieutenant and familiar with a lot of the processes. And in her new role, we found that she will be well-suited to continue with her leadership, but in a different role of that unit. So this is just realigning some of that work and shifting some things around just to, I think, make that strategically make sense.

Okay, thank you. Any questions? Guys, if you're going to have a conversation, have it out in the hall. It just disrupts the meeting a little bit. Any questions for Chief Olson? No? Pretty clear? Okay. Can we get a motion, or do we have a motion? Move to approve. Second. A motion and a second to approve the TO change for APD. All those in favor, signify by saying aye. Aye. All opposed? Any abstentions? 5-0. Okay. That takes us to The balance of the agenda.

Move to approve the balance. Oh, I'm sorry. Nope. We're going to separate one out. Okay. Move to approve the balance of the agenda.

Is there a second? Second. Okay. The balance of the agenda, and I'm going to read them all, and then we're going to separate one out because Alder Jones wants to, I believe, abstain. Be difficult. Her words, not mine. 26-1019, 26-1078, 26-1077, 26-1057, 26-1121, 26-0961, 26-1122. And is 26-1122 the one you want to separate out? Yes, please. Okay, we'll take that one up first. So that's included in the motion to approve with the second. Any discussion or questions on that one? Seeing any okay, we'll take a vote on 26-1 1 2 2 which is class B beer license application for the Fox City's Chamber of Foundation All those in favor signify by saying aye aye all opposed any abstentions Okay, so four zero one on that one and then on the balance Which is the rest of the ones that I read any questions or requests for separate votes? Not seeing any okay. We'll take a vote on approving those license applications and All those in favor, signify by saying aye. Aye. All opposed? Any abstentions? Five-zero on those. Okay. That takes us to, that takes care of all the information, or the action items. We'll go to information items. There's a number of them listed. We'll start with 26-1119 is a alcohol license violation conviction for Home Burger Bar at downtown Appleton. I would imagine they're going to be invited to come before the committee and explain the situation. Next on the information item list is the Appleton Fire Department 2026 mid-year report. It's 26-1034. Chief Hanson, anything you want to highlight or talk about? DISTRICT ONE SHOULD BE ON.

THANK YOU, CHAIR. BEFORE YOU IS OUR 2026 MID-YEAR REPORT. THERE'S A NICE NARRATIVE IN THERE THAT SAYS SOME OF THE WORK THAT WE'VE DONE, INCLUDING HIRING. ONE POINT WITH THE HIRING IS WE HAD FOUR OPEN POSITIONS. WE ONLY FOUND TWO QUALIFIED CANDIDATES THAT WE LIKED. SO WE ARE RUNNING TOO SHORT. THAT IS AN ANOMALY FOR US. WE'RE TYPICALLY FULLY STAFFED. And one of the next informational items kind of address where we're going to go with that. But through the first six months, we've done a lot of education. As you could see, different classes that we've been offering, academies and classes for those that are going to get promoted in the near future. We did a transition from records management software, which is a national database from a NIFRS, which was called NIFRS, and that was replaced with a new database called NIRIS. That was required by the federal government, and it has improved analytics. So we're very happy with that. But any time we change records management software systems, you know, there's always grumbling and griping, and nobody likes it because they don't know where anything is. But we've transitioned through that we also added a new position that was part of our labor agreement It's called an EMS shift coordinator those individuals Support our division chief of EMS and help out with various assignments now we have one that is an American Heart coordinator does all the CPR ACLS palace cards and And then another one that does quality assurance and reviews all our reports. And another one works on things like medical care protocols and things. So just those three positions are new. They're existing members of the department that just get a little pay bump to do extra work. And then I just want to highlight that we marked the seven-year anniversary of Driver Engineer MITCH LONGARD'S LINE OF DUTY DEATH WITH OPENING THE PARK PAVILION THIS YEAR, WHICH WAS A PRETTY MOVING CEREMONY WHERE MITCH'S OLDEST SON ACTUALLY SPOKE AT THAT CEREMONY. SO IT WAS PRETTY HEARTFELT. Moving on into the numbers, if you go to the very last page, you can see our budget is right on par. We're spent at 49.3%. You can see the resource development area or our training budget is at 74%, but that is because we front end the year with all of our academies and classes that we do in-house during the colder weather months. And that is our mid-year report. If you had any questions, I'd be happy to entertain them.

OK. Let's see if there's any questions on the fire department mid-year report. No questions? Alder Lambert, go ahead.

Fire prevention public education is a little under budget. I was just curious if there are opportunities for further fire prevention or public education that's going to be coming up later on this year or things that the public should know about so that we continue to have a good response and proactive prevention of any of those fire opportunities.

Yeah, our division chief is very frugal. He doesn't like to spend money until it gets closer to the end of the year in case something breaks. So I've talked with Chief Henson, and he said, well, I will spend my money. It's just we will load up at the end of the year with whatever we have left with prevention supplies and equipment. Excellent. Thank you.

All right. Any other questions? Okay, let's move on to the next fire department item, 26-1080, the AFD firefighter EMT LTE position.

I'LL CONTINUE, THANK YOU. SO THIS IS A NEW POSITION. WE HAVE BEEN TALKING WITH THE MAYOR, HUMAN RESOURCES, FOR THE BETTER PART OF TWO YEARS TO CREATE A POSITION LIKE THIS. SO RIGHT NOW, TO BE ELIGIBLE TO BE HIRED, YOU HAVE TO BE IN PARAMEDIC SCHOOL OR HAVE COMPLETED PARAMEDIC SCHOOL. SO WE ARE LOOKING AT A NEW LIMITED TERM EMPLOYEE POSITION THAT ALLOWS US TO HIRE FIREFIGHTER EMTs. AND THEN THIS POSITION WOULD BE BROUGHT ON FOLLOWING THE SAME PROCESS AND HIRING PROCEDURES THAT WE USE FOR OUR FULL-TIME FIREFIGHTERS, INCLUDING PHYSICAL ABILITY TEST BACKGROUND, INVESTIGATIONS, ETC., And once they are brought on, they would be immediately placed into paramedic school. So essentially, we'd be hiring somebody that we really like and then sending them to paramedic school for the next nine months. And why this is important is if we had this process in place, we would have been able to maybe grab a couple people in our last hiring process and sent them to paramedic school, which started this past Monday. No, this program that was developed was a combination of looking at what a lot of fire departments have been doing, and I say they've been doing it for years, like almost a decade, like Wausau, Kaukauna, Fond du Lac, Oshkosh. They all have a program like this because they have seen or they have had difficulty hiring staff. We have not had that until this last hiring process, and largely because Oshkosh was down I think there were down 12 firefighters. And then they implemented a program like this and hired 11 of them. And of those 11, I would have hired five of them myself. But they all went to a department that's paying them to finish paramedic school, which I would have chose the same. So what's great about this is we're going to get our hooks into some really good people earlier. They would still, like I said, meet all the EDUCATION REQUIREMENTS WITH THE EXCEPTION OF HAVING PARAMEDIC, AND WE WOULD HELP THEM GO THROUGH THAT. THERE ARE SOME NICE SAFEGUARDS FOR THE CITY, MEANING THAT IF THE individual is terminated, drops out of paramedic school, fails out of paramedic school, or just does not cut it once they get out of paramedic school and we hire them full-time, then they have to repay the tuition on a three-year prorated basis. So if they're here a year, they have to pay two-thirds back. And tuition for paramedic school is about $12,000, so we're not talking huge numbers. They are paid on a 40-hour work week when they're in school at 70%. OF WHAT A FULL-TIME FIREFIGHTER EMT MAKES. OKAY. SO THAT'S, WHEN YOU ASK WHAT IS THAT, IT'S ABOUT $25 AN HOUR. They are, when they successfully complete paramedic school, then they move right into our recruit academy so they don't have to go through another hiring process. They're basically brought right in. And then based off of who we hire full time and where that paramedic student sits, they might be number one in seniority, they could be five in seniority, so we adjust that based off of all the people that are coming in as that hiring class. This program also allows them to work overtime if their academics require it, meaning that if they have to go over 40 hours a week because of school, then they have to get approval to do that. But that shouldn't happen. There might be a rare occasion when it does, but it shouldn't. And we can control that because they need approval to do that. This is a limited term employee. So they are not a protected employee. They are not a sworn employee. SO THEY CANNOT RIDE A FIRE TRUCK IN LIEU OF HIRING OVERTIME. SO THEY CAN COME IN AND RIDE A FIRE TRUCK MORE ON AN EDUCATIONAL SETTING, BUT THEY ARE NOT A QUOTE UNQUOTE MEMBER OF OUR DEPARTMENT. THEY ARE BASICALLY A STUDENT AT THAT POINT. And the last couple pages of this document are like the job description that goes with it. But we're really excited with this. As long as everybody is comfortable with it, we are looking to possibly start it next February. But what's good about this is if we go through our normal hiring process, which begins in two weeks, we may never use this. But if for some chance we have open positions, then we could implement this. And the salary for these individuals would be covered by open salary dollars for the people that we have open positions for. So it's a safeguard. It gives us one more opportunity to fill our ranks without costing any additional money to the budget.

OK. Thank you. Thanks for the level of detail with this great memo. Alder Fenton, go ahead.

I just, I think this is an excellent idea. I think that it puts us in a more competitive position, as the city of Oshkosh has shown you, and I think you've got really good safeguards, and I think, you know, there are a lot of people who would like to become paramedics, and there would be a financial barrier to them, and I think that this really helps that. I think also it will probably instill a lot of loyalty in people that are hired that way, that the city has thought enough of them to put them into this program. I think it's a great idea. Kudos to everybody involved in developing it.

Thank you.

Other comments? Go ahead, Alder Hayden. Thank you, Chair. Just one question about the safeguards. You covered if they leave, we basically prorate the $12,000 over three years. So if they leave early, they pay it back, depending on how much time they spend with the department. What happens if they don't pass school? I'm assuming that they owe the $12,000 if they're not eligible to work. That would be correct. Okay. And I've There's no way we're getting back the money that we paid them to go to school since. Correct.

The hourly wage that we pay them will be, you know, basically a write-off at that point.

Okay. Other questions, comments? No? Okay. It's information items, so no action needed. But I think what you hear is support for this, so good job. You have one more item, a request for overhire with a long-term employee retiring. and I think the over-hire was 10 weeks, right? Not longer then? Go ahead, explain.

Yes, requesting approval to do an over-hire for our position currently called Assistant to the Fire Chief, but we are changing the name to Administrative and Finance Manager. And essentially, that's what that position has done. They've run all of our budgeting. They did all the documentation and grants and reporting for grants. AND THIS INDIVIDUAL HAS BEEN VERY ACTIVELY INVOLVED IN OUR SOFTWARE PRODUCTS THAT WE PURCHASE AND TROUBLESHOOTING. THEY'RE REALLY NOT MY ASSISTANT. I GUESS THAT'S A GOOD THING. I DON'T NEED A HANDLER, RIGHT? But the individual that we've had in this position just celebrated her 34th year in that role and working with the city and will be retiring in January. So we're looking to do an overhire for up to 10 weeks. And the reason I selected 10 weeks is that as of 1st of November, we'll run a process. If we find someone right away, then we don't want to lose them because we can't hire them until December or January. But if we don't find anybody right away, we might not have a whole lot of overlap. But the goal is to transfer some of that institutional knowledge and show the new person our systems and get them involved in troubleshooting and understanding what that job all entails. So like I said, just looking for support to do an overhire.

Thank you appreciate that and you have my support also my appreciation for the work that The person in this role has done I've been on council for long enough to see a lot of the work And it's just it has been exceptional so All right other questions or comments on the overhire.

Oh I know all of these are going to be action items for human resources and it later, but I All the other over-hire requests talked about where the additional salary dollars would come from. Good question. Is there vacant salary dollars in the fire department for this, or is this going to come out of general budget?

Great question, and it's the very last line of the second paragraph. We do have two open firefighter spots right now, so we're going to use those funds to cover this position. I should have, that's on me. I even had it highlighted to mention it. Good clarification. I forgot to do that.

I'm so sorry. I read this, and I just missed it. Apologies to you.

No, it's good to clarify that. OK. If there's nothing else on the fire department over-hire, let's move to the Appleton Police Department front desk over-hire. Chief Olson?

Yes, thank you, Chair. So we have five folks that staff our front desk. They're the first people that you see when you walk into our building. And so it's a very thin department. As you know, we had nine just a few years ago, and we've worked our way through. down to five. So, that being said, when we have vacancies, it's very difficult to cover the shifts with existing staff. And we're having two vacancies. One was just filled, and she just started about a week ago. And then the other is an employee we've also had for, I think, 34 years. Yeah. as well who is retiring. I think on the same day I'm retiring. So being able to overhire for a few weeks just so that some of those things can, those gaps can be filled would be very helpful. And I'd like to point out that we do have vacant salary dollars for that particular position even that we will use to pay this.

Okay. Thank you. Any questions, comments? No? Okay, all right, let's continue on here. And next on the agenda is a list of special events, one happening today, and then one on Friday, which is one that we might want to highlight, Light the Night Market Summer, downtown Appleton, Friday evening. Does anyone know what time that starts? No?

If I were to guess, I would say six.

Six-ish? Okay, we'll just go with that. Otherwise, check ADI's website.

Have some dinner?

Yeah, yeah. Patronize some establishments or some vendors that are out. All right, next on the agenda is director's reports. Nothing for city clerk. We do have a number of things for the fire chief listed as the hiring process. Firefighter, captain, battalion chief, administrative and finance manager, which we already talked a little bit about. Go ahead, Chief Henson.

Yeah, thank you, Chair. Just wanted to give a quick overview. So our firefighting hiring process, for those that we will start in the third week in May, will begin on September 14th. We're anticipating somewhere between four and six hires, and that would include the two open positions that we have right now. Because of the anticipated retirements, we are going to be running a captains and a battalion chief process to create an eligibility list. So depending on who retires from those ranks. We're just not exactly sure yet. We have some ideas, but we want to have an eligibility list so we can plug in those, the next leaders of our organization. And then the administrative and finance manager talked about that briefly just a little while ago, and that should be opening up here in the next two weeks and hopefully have that hired anywhere between November and December.

Okay. Thank you. Any questions on fire department hiring? OK. We'll move to police chief. And we have the combined focus reports. And this is the report for June, or July, I'm sorry. Yep. Chief Olson, go ahead.

Yes, this is the report for July. It is a little lighter than some of our other reports have been. And what I can tell you is that July, from a calls for service perspective, is the busiest month that we have of the year. And then you combine that with people taking their vacation time during the summer. That you have a just a less availability of self-initiated activity that can happen so Unfortunately, this is also probably a time period where we're starting to see more of the peak of these complaints coming through given that It's you know the peak of summer so you know given the meeting we had this morning along with you know just always trying to be creative about how we address some of these problems and We have had discussions even just within the last few hours of some strategies to try to increase some of our presence again and creatively using some of our budget dollars in a way that we can try to do this. So that's all I want to say about that right now yet, but there's more to come for sure. The report is what the report is, so I can answer any questions if you have any.

Any questions on the July report? Alder Jones, go ahead.

Adjacent to the July report, this morning you had mentioned what the downtown corridor consists of. What is that western boundary again?

So the western boundary, I'd have to verify that. Badger? I would say Badger if you're looking at what's technically considered downtown corridor.

Okay. And just wanted to follow up from this morning and state for the record that some of the individuals that had spoke seemed to imply that noise coming into downtown only came in from the eastern side. As the alder of West Appleton, I want everyone to know noise also comes in from the west side. But I also did need to commend, I have driven around a APD officer in West Appleton on College Ave in the last few weeks watching traffic there. So I don't know what the legal maneuver is to drive around someone doing tracking. So I'm sorry if I violated anything, but we've seen you. Thank you for your work.

Thank you, and I didn't hear that you violated any laws. Nobody reported that to me.

I wave at them every time.

I don't want to get too far off topic on this, but you make a good point because West College Avenue, outside of the Eplin city limits, all the way out to the airport, is a bit of a racetrack. My son lives out that way, and I cannot believe how many cars I hear racing down College Avenue. ANY OTHER QUESTIONS ABOUT THE COMBINED REPORT?

Thank you, Chair. I just wanted to commend your team on the work that they've been doing on Evergreen. As 41 is being worked, there's a lot of traffic going between Gillette and Mead, and a lot of people flying through the residential neighborhoods in that area. And I see your staff out there frequently. And everybody in the area really appreciates it. So thank you.

Yep, great to hear. Thank you.

All right, other questions, comments? All right, not seeing any. Let's see, that takes us all the way to the bottom of the agenda. Number eight.

Move to adjourn. Second.

We have the same two people making both motions. All right, we have a motion and a second to adjourn. All those in favor, signify by saying aye. Aye. All opposed? Any abstentions? We are adjourned. Thank you, 5-0.