Farmland Preservation Plan Steering Committee - Regular Meeting

I'm gonna call the meeting to order. Today is 08/26/2025, and we are the Dane County Heritage Preservation Commission. Do I have someone to move to approve the minutes?

I move approval. We have

a move. Do we have a second? Second. And a second. Any discussion? Comments? Corrections? Seeing none, all in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. All opposed? It has been approved. Presentations. So the first one is to discuss publicity for markers. And this is basically related to Alfonso's memo to us all about some of his thoughts about how to market the markers once they're in place, I think. Do you want to expand on your memo? Sure.

Son of a gun. I it's tied on. I said to myself, who whose agenda item is this anyway? Oh,

yeah. I said something. Who's that crazy guy, fantastic guy?

Okay. So so so, yeah, a few weeks ago, I came across this photographer. I'm I can't remember his name right now off the top of my head, but I have his contact information. He shoots historic stuff in the South and, you know, around the world, actually, but his particular interest is historical representations of of of the South, of its of its multifaceted, checkered history, you might say. He's very open to depicting every aspect of it that he can.

And and he's so we chatted for a while, and and it just made me think about a variety of ways that we could advertise our work and ways that it could become it could interact with things going on in the county or even in the state. So I thought, for instance, about, some of the research for this. I don't know all the sources that y'all used, but some of the resources for this were probably Wisconsin Historical Society or other things like that. But we could feed back into some of those sources, this sort of work in a magazine. Students could talk about it on campus.

It could be a this could be a presentation on campus. It could be what they call a badger talk.

I like that.

That, you know, people I deliver a lot of these around the state for food related things, market and food related things. But, colleagues in history could find it of interest. And I also think that actually colleagues in the information school, what used to be called the library school of live museum and library science. Wow. Yeah.

Folks, I suspect, would be interested in this and in building ever more sophisticated web representations of it. They're they're, that's their that's the way there's two branches now of of museum and library science. One is very web heavy, and one is very remains retains its original archival and book interest. Interesting. Yeah.

But they work across a variety of modalities. So and and I and I thought to myself, the I think that remember that let's talk about it, that big picture book Mhmm. Following the black lives movements and State Street, all the documentation there. I remember, and I've seen, a number of small presses, you know, around the area. That book was I have I have two or three copies of that. One I put in the department, one I have for myself, and I can't remember what I did with another one. I think I'm I don't know. Maybe I put in a little free library or something. I don't know. I carry Wow.

Anyways, I thought that I I I think that the work that we're doing would be I think it's sufficiently focused that there would be folks here in the county or spread around, maybe around the state and elsewhere who would be interested in a coffee table representation like that, not this month or not next year.

No. It would take But it would

years take

to it'd take a year or so to plan it, really.

Yeah. I think it would take five or ten years to actually have enough content for it.

Fundraising and planning would take some time.

Yeah. It would take some time. But I think that that's I think that would be a a a pretty neat project. I mean, and, again, it's some I think it's easily a five year project. Maybe maybe longer. But it's the sort of thing that that if you know, so the so I'm the kind of person that lets their mind wander,

and

it just goes in all sorts of weird ways. And so the the the impulse here is that we represent the work of the of the markers as a in in in as a constellation. Lots of different stars making up our work. Right? Each individual space, the marker, physical marker, its web representation, its place, you know, details about the sources of information, unanswered questions about it, deep you know, students who might answer those questions, who might represent that in their work in in classes or master's theses or other things.

Do you see what I mean? So so I know that that's a a big mouthful. And I recognize that that as a person who supervises a lot of students, I I recognize that having a student work on behalf of this is a mixed bag. Right. Staff time gets eaten up unless it's a really good student, then, you know, you get a lot of bang for the buck with the right student. Otherwise Right. You know, it's a recipe for frustration. I mean, right now, I have 17 students in my lab. So it gives you an idea. You know what I mean?

So so it's so I I I think that the history department would probably be interested in having students work on this. I think that they would probably support them. I'd be happy to try and establish connections. I have connections in history and in the high school and elsewhere. And that'd be could be useful.

Sort of. Yeah. Sort of thinking, well, you know, how do you know, whether or not we wanna begin to do something, whether or we wanna engage a professional. You know, we could we could engage a professional photographer, you know, who would who could do some really bang up stuff with the money if there was money there. Well I think this is a planning thing. So I'll just wrap up by saying that this is nascent. Right. Right. And that it may not go anywhere, and that's fine. But if it does go someplace, it will be plotting along about this past. Mhmm. And that's fine.

It's good to keep it in mind, though. I think the projects are kind of in this really young phase. We're just getting our first few markers hopefully on the ground sometime soon. But I think once we have a certain, what is it, a certain number?

Portfolio.

Portfolio. Yeah. Portfolio. Yeah. Once we have, I don't know, fifteen, twenty, or something like that, then we might be able to talk in terms of book form.

Yeah. Yeah. Or, you know, other, you know, especially students from History Magazine.

But the web could definitely be expanded, and we've we've talked about the web and how we wanna update that once we've gotten more Yeah. So Oh, cool. That's where students might be particularly helpful, at least in the beginning.

Yep. And the high school would be really I think they would be see this as a very in keeping with Yeah. Squarely situated in their wheelhouse. This is a high school type thing.

Right. I think we would rely on you for connections to people within the university because you're inside the beast there. Sure. But I'd be glad to keep this as an agenda item for further consideration. I think it's a good good starting discussion. Any other comments about that?

I'm really intrigued about the the looping through the students at the university. And I've and I'm if there were a you know, every time there's a submission window, there was a research project by a student that went found whatever issue is is called to them, and they have a submission into Right. The, you know, the 27 submission window. And, you know, there's a research project be a bigger than average research project behind it. I I can see that just kind of especially in Madison, so many different things are called to so many different people on the underrepresented communities, I could see it being a a beautiful thing.

I think you would I agree with you. This is the I think that's exactly the impulse. And so the thing is is should we want to do something, then we wanna we wanna get it in that bureaucratic behemoth.

Right.

Right?

Right.

Once that gets integrated into somebody's reason for being, you know, they they will I mean, it'll just happen. Yeah. You know? The know, if it's part of the public history colloquia, you know, that students take over there, you know, if it's part of the the high school representing community voices. I can't remember what they call one of their colloquia. You know? And and if it's

It's like it could plug into so many different areas.

Well, the the great opportunity is bringing a student from each of those areas. And then maybe even a LUS student. Our our undergraduate our our planning students, I think this could be a viable project, but probably not on an annual basis. You know what I mean? The undergrads, the landscape and urban study students, I think this could be.

I've I've worked with them. I've done some capstones with urban league and with other I think this could be something that we that that those students, they have a project. They have a there, they have a publication that's in print and web format. That's really beautiful. It combines urban planning and landscape architectural forms and really nice for all the seniors. So all the seniors do a project. You know, they could just pass one off in the student organization. Okay. Who's gonna be the the Dane County historic preservation fellow this year?

Mhmm.

You know, it could be just you know, you just call it that. Wow. Doesn't have any money associated with it. Right. It's just something somebody has to do for their project.

Right. Right.

Yeah.

Sounds very inviting. Tempting. Yep. And that that because

I remember senior projects were searching for the sub subject matter caused some angst way back when

Mhmm.

People finding the right project for them.

It continues to you know? I have, yes, I have held hands. Sure. I have watched students panic. Yes. Mhmm. Yeah. So I'm

very intriguing. Yeah.

There you go. So if it's something that y'all would like to do, then at some point, we should consider where how it fits in the calendar of this operation.

Okay. Well, this goes beyond publicity into all kinds of research and publish and publishing. And

Yep. Good publicity, though, requires right? Yeah. That's Yeah. Kind of the impulse was how do we integrate things such that products that we're associated with in their public form are really have a many have variety of manifestations.

Yeah. You know? I'd love to see something like that happen. When would the next round of nominations be? Do you have any idea if we're gonna do this again? Was it later in the year that we did it last?

It was open for quite a while, I wanna say.

Yeah.

I think I think Pat can speak to that a little bit. I think I'm not sure where funding will be. And so how we

Oh, I see. Right. How we pair It all ties back to that.

How we pair up the nomination process. So if I think if we get some awareness of, say, maybe in the '27 budget, some money is restored to continue the process, then I think we can look midyear twenty sixth to get the nominations. You know? No such thing as too much public input. So we can get the the nomination website out there. We can, Brian was big on, WORT, so we can get some publicity out there. We can probably pull into the university, pull the get the nomination windows open again

Yeah.

Say mid you know, if we have some sort of indication about funding for '27, you know, mid to late twenty six, we can open the nomination window up again. Okay. And then just hold.

That makes sense, though.

And and, you know, we still have all the ones that we didn't select from '24 as well. So I think Yeah.

And there's there's those are the ones that I was thinking of in particular to for to, build momentum. So, you know, if I was to do this as a presentation, that would have been the second part of my presentation. Everything that didn't happen, or we should hand those to students and say, hey. Do you wanna look into this?

Mhmm.

You know? And then the third thing that I was gonna say is, well, hey. You know? If we if we wanna do something about it, the the big thing is reconciling time horizons. Right? Because county time horizons are different from university time horizons. And and I'm not I'm not I I have and so for for for us to say '27 is great. You know what

I mean?

Right. Right. Right. Right. You need that much time to But get those two together.

Yeah. But on the other hand, it's good to signal the students because this is also something, right, to get it into their imagination and to get it into my colleague's imagination from a public history or high school perspective. It takes time. I see there was a hand up. Yeah.

Patrick had his hand up.

Oh, sorry,

Patrick. Sorry about that, Patrick.

I couldn't see as well. What what can we get from you?

Not a problem. I I I just wanted to address the the question here about opening this up. What's, you know, what's next? So I wanna so we have our initial recommendations for which we're gonna get some signs up for, and I wanna see how far the the current capital budget, how far that gets us. But we had a whole, you know, array a whole list of of options, and we prioritize those to hopefully, you know, fund those that we can with the existing capital budget.

And I, you know, I was thinking that we would just proceed down the list for those items that sort of match our criteria for, you know, having underrepresented cultural representation and historical significance outside of Madison but in Dane County, that we continued on that list recognizing those sites and with any money that maybe we are able to acquire through the 2026 capital budget. So I think the anticipation was with our existing budget, was enough to get I think it was six signs. Was that Mhmm.

Yeah. And

if if the list that we have doesn't, you know, sort of match those major criteria, then then, yeah, then we need to reopen and get more public input on extending the list and building up the areas that maybe we hadn't considered yet.

And I'll say I think that the I think we've pretty much exhausted the outside of Madison list. I think we had the one more in Maison that we weren't quite sure on for the Jamaican workers, the farm workers.

Oh, right. Great.

But, otherwise, I think we have exhausted the outside of city of Madison list, if I remember correctly, which means that we'd have to focus on the city of Madison where we can only put up Wisconsin Historical Society markers. So it wouldn't be a Dane County marker program then if we're looking at the city of Madison. So so the goal is, like Patrick said, to look outside the city of Madison. We might have to open that up again to get more nominees if we're doing a a Dane County marker because we can't put up Dane County markers in the city of Madison according to their their current signed regulations.

Right.

I have two questions or comments. We still have our original crowdsourced website. Correct? Where, you know and that is still a tool that could be fleshed out more now, regardless of the outcome. Right.

And, you know, hearing your great ideas, I appreciate you suggesting people who could do the things, because, you know, you can't, I would assume, take on, like, publishing a book and that sort of thing. But I just wonder who is the master of the or who is the owner, who is the creator, who's the person that runs the crowdsourced website, and how and do we wanna just continue to have public input to it, or or do we use that as our depository? Anybody?

We do run that. We're able to use a combination of mapping software and survey software that are linked through the same platform, and that also creates the the website that you can see where you can either see the map of the '25 or you can see the form the submission form is still out there, that kind of thing. So we have that stuff.

So we being Dane County?

We being the planning and development department.

Okay.

So that's interior to the department to kind of keep that up. I did switch the map over from all of the 24 submissions down to the 2,025 selections, on the map just so we could have that focus. The the submission map still exists. It's just not on the website anymore.

Okay.

And then we've been just talking about that today and yesterday because I had flipped the wrong switch, and it got broken, turned off, and so I turned it back on. But having that having that nominations, other people use that are using that for research into the Orton Park Festival, which this weekend, somebody wanted a picture they saw off that site for the part of the festival or something that, she was a part of. So it's it's already growing a little bit by bits and pieces. I think we, you know, we need to look into how do we make it more of that. You know?

Because we've got the timeline, which is more narrative and image. We've got the map, which is a certain piece of that. We've got the submission application, which is another piece of that, and how we bring it all together. And I'm as we talk, I'm still thinking back to the conference I went to in San Diego where it was the the keynote was the guy was the gentleman that runs the Smithsonian. Wow. And if you wanna talk about an impressive visual presentation, wow.

Was that Lonnie Bunch?

Yeah. I think so. Yeah. And and I've you know, I I had fantasies of linking our marker that sits in Shorewood Hills to the visual cornucopia that is because I'm if I'm remembering correctly, one of the dugouts is at the Smithsonian. Is that

I don't know that.

Correct or not correct? Maybe Bill knows. I'm not sure.

Think I've talked him. At the historical society, I think, aren't they? The two that are being dry now.

Talk of alone, but I don't know if it's there or not. Or

I I don't know. But I was just the the visuals just pulled me in. I'm like, if we could load link us to that Sure. Somehow.

But then furthermore, I just wonder if that's the stepping stool to get the students involved is to continue to work on what we already have. To vet

oh, yeah.

I think that's the right stepping stool because it's not a heavy lift, not big expectations, but useful for their projects. And I guess you're talking about the s three user conference? Yeah. Yeah. So was that is is this built in story maps, or what what what

are This is built in a handful of different things. The history timeline is in StoryMaps. The map itself is in Experience Builder. Survey one two three Uh-huh. Is the submission piece of it, and they're all kind of knit together in the background.

Gotcha. So the yep. I'm sorry. The I finished that. I apologize.

No. No.

So I think this is where the high school people so there's a couple of different things, both the planning students are pretty astute with the s three tools, and the the high school students will be as well. So I think that if if

base pardon me. Are you saying high school or I

So that I keep hearing base high school.

But The old infra yeah. The library science people.

Okay. Alright.

Museum and library science. You know, what a shame. The institute of Museum and Library Science in DC, I think about all the time. Buddy of mine was director of research there for a number of years. Anyways, yes, I think that the students from the information school

Okay. Or

planning students. Rum and drum in your back end and make it do other things that you wanted to do.

Well, one of the offshoot projects that we're running kind of in parallel with this is the prejudice in places project. And we have somebody

Is that the covenant project?

Yeah. It we have a high school through the Boys and Girls Club program through Dane County. We have a high school student that comes in and works on some basic Esri stuff in finding that information and mapping that information and getting that out to some of the places that we have for disseminating that information as well. So there's the Boys and Girls Club has been a ongoing thing for maybe eight years now in the department, and it's always been a you know, been really rewarding. We try and package a project for them to work on something that's, you know, something that's interesting and skill building at the same time.

That is totally cool. Well, I'm thinking if if more sophisticated stuff is if you're interested in more sophisticated work in the back end of the of the of the web page, where things are federated a little more tightly together, we can get that. And Okay. We can find support. And then with respect to, I guess, a more strictly marketing angle on it, Of course, there's a lot there are many, many students who would be interested, I think, in being in doing marketing for this and assessing.

I know that y'all can assess your your various the various things that you assess. For my lab, we're this is a constant thing. We have a donor in New York. Every six months, she wants a report. So the Google Analytics, I mean, they do every they we do all the things that we do. Every student award, publication, presentation by faculty or students, we push all that onto a semiannual report. Oh. But but the Google an analytics part and that's why I have 17 students in my lab. Six of them are membership in marketing.

Mhmm.

And they, you know, they that's what they do. Right. Build these.

Okay.

So the a lot of those students, again, they'll do it for a project. Right? But that might be the sort of thing where it's conceivable they could come in and and do something over the course of a year and leave you with instructions for how to how to use it regularly and get it to do what you want it to do.

Yeah. Because Nira set up the the original inception.

Say again? Nira? Nira? Oh, she was

She the was

one of our grad students.

Right. She was the one who set this up with Brian in the first place.

Yeah. Yeah. Of course she did. I shouldn't I of course. Yeah. So yeah.

She was at everything, wasn't she?

Under the PA program that we set up when I was department chair.

Yep.

So, yeah, this was part of this was work I did whenever I was anyway, it's different hat.

We've come full circle. Well, you've benefited yourself now. Yeah. Yeah. Nice work. Well, I guess

you would too. I mean, I'm I can't even remember sitting there.

I think that proves the potential for student involvement. Sure.

But on that note, I also wonder who is the fact checker.

Right.

Whose responsibility is it to make sure that the content that Dane County is putting out there is proven? Well You know? Like right?

Yeah. Yeah. That's a job in and of itself.

Kind of crowdsourced thing, then and I I don't know who decides that that needs to be a thing or not. It seems like it should. But

Well, in the case of the selected sites, specifically, it was in further looking into the Valentine Farm case where we figured out we were off by a township. And and and, actually, it was a mile and a half, but it was still Yeah. It was the so the original submission was under there was a a premise for the submission. But in the end, it it turned out that, John Valentine was part of the parcel that created the church and the cemetery, but his farm was actually the next township over.

Mhmm.

His family still was right near the site or much closer to the site than his farm was. Right. But so it's it be it it falls to Ben and myself to to

Yeah. A lot of that's not gonna be clear until you really get into the research.

And I think it I think, barring 20 more people working on the project, I think you just we I think we just use the selection as the filter for that Right.

That Right.

Further research on each one of these pieces. Yeah. Because I I think that's what we we we'd have to be be forced to

do. Mhmm. Okay.

Because we'd it it was in that kind of chasing some of those things down. We find out those things on the submission and or the selection pieces anyway.

Then I have one more question back to sort of the initiation of this conversation is, who's in charge of the PR? And I may have asked this before, but I know that, for instance, when we're talking about Sherwood Hills, they're all over it. And yeah, the mayor will or there'll be a city council conversation or something, and there'll be a thing. Maybe there'll be ribbon cutting. But who at Dane County or in the planning department does PR? Like

I think that's gonna be that's gonna be an agenda item.

Yeah. I mean, I just think it's worth

how to handle PR.

Before we pile stuff on you, we need to sort of understand your

Right.

Abilities, your time, your

There are there are venues in the county that are like, if it's a county board project, there are press releases from the county board or press releases from the county executive, and those are viable options that carry a little bit more weight than an email from a senior planner.

And those are written by?

Usually written by staff and submitted.

And can we have access to those writers?

I think you're looking at them.

I'm not sure.

Right. It's just food for thought right now and just, like, to know what what we have.

I think the breadth and the depth of the staff support you have is right here, until such a time, you know, as we find hopefully more resources, more people, more whether whether they be students or just other interested parties.

Okay. Thanks. Sure.

Alright. Let's wrap up that. Any last comments?

Can you talk about timeline real quick? So we talked about opening this up potentially for the next round. Do we want to do this? Again, it seems like we've hit our limit on our outside of City Of Madison operations. Right. So I don't know if we need some guidance on if we're skipping 2026, if we're wanting to open this up again, how how we wanna operate with that, and if it should only op be opened up to noncity Of Madison sites.

Yeah. Until we get some kind of until we actually do one in Madison, I don't know if we'll know for sure if it's viable. Mhmm. I think we have to maybe think in terms of trying to get one done in Madison and seeing if it's possible. And if not, then we just focus outside the city. But I I'm not sure. I don't have a lot of confidence it's gonna work at this point. I think maybe it will, but I think we have to try it first before we know.

You have something to say, Patrick or or not?

I was just gonna say this is falling a little bit outside of our agenda items and but also my immediate reaction here is let's get some markers up under our current budget and and work from there. We can have on a future, agenda, an item to discuss, you know, next steps, the next stages, or whatever, next rounds. So I'm ready to move on and hear an update on the historical marker markers in process.

Oh, yeah. Me too. Sounds good. Alright. Let me try and get this to share.

Come on.

Alright. Try one more thing. Right.

Alright. I

think yep. There it goes. Alright. So, again, we're talking about our six sites again, Ada Deer, Hairy White Horse, Ho Chunk Village, Lake Minota Dugout Canoes, Robert Valentine Farm, and the Vandenberg Heights keep hard housing in Sun Prairie. So there's some follow-up work that staff was gonna do on how these were all signs were gonna fit on the properties and working with other staff in the other municipalities, and here's a little bit of a report on that.

So the first one is the Ada Deer home in Fitchburg. If you recall, originally, the homeowner owners preferred a two post marker, a really large sign. Per Fitchburg regulations, that sign can't be in the road right of way, which we knew before this last meeting. But as long as it was on private property, there's no further limitations. So at that last meeting, we weren't quite sure where the property corner was located.

So Kurt and I went out there. We've got a picture, but the lot lines and the trees make it difficult if nearly impossible to fit a two post marker in the location originally discussed with the landowners and basically impossible to fit a single post marker as well. So we talk talked about a couple other locations on the site with the landowners. They preferred a sign that was in front of the house to draw attention to the house itself, and then option two would be on the south side of the property. And here are some pictures.

Originally, we're looking at this star that was up here or a little bit over, but get this out of the so I can see. So the, oh, my cursor here does come up. So the corner post was, like, right where my hand is, which would we can't go anywhere east or to the right of that. Otherwise, it's onto this neighboring landowner's property, and the sign would, you know, run into this tree if we put one there. So the landowners talked about putting the sign either right in front of the house between these two trees or off a little bit from this utility box, a little bit to the the right of that.

I think their number one preference would be in front of the house, and the second is is, again, by the utility box. So I don't know if the commission had any preference between those two locations, but that's the latest on that sign in property.

What is it what kind of is there a room for a person to pull over and read it? Not really?

Yeah. They they'd have to get a little bit onto the yard. It's just that the whole right of way thing. You see the fire number? The

Mhmm.

Like, if you drew a line across, that's where that that lot line is. So they could pull over onto the side here. But the otherwise, they'd have to go into the driveway.

And the owners are aware of that? Mhmm.

Yeah. Yeah. I don't think they'd prefer the driveway.

Right. Of those two to the left of the driveway, I think either one would work from my perspective. So putting it in front of the house, if that's their preference, I don't think there's anything

Yeah. There seems to

be prevent that.

A little bit more clearance there. Because the utility box on the south side of the property, there's a line that runs straight west straight away from the road from that utility box, so we'd have to steer clear of that.

Oh. Okay. Well, you call Diggers hotline, make sure you're not Oh, yeah. Digging up the gas pipe.

The tree line is is essentially the front lot line or pretty close to it. It it was much farther off the road than we knew that it was. So when we were out there swinging tape to kind of get a better, look at that, we knew we'd have to stay back because in talking to the landowners, there was also it's it's the rural part of Fitchburg. So when the snow comes heavy

Oh.

It's piled deep on that. So so we can't be routing the right of way because it'll be you know, we'll put a sign under the snow for whatever that is worth as well. So, you know, just taking those things into account that they seem to think, like, midpoint between those trees right in front of the house is the best place for them.

So Mhmm.

Okay.

Yep. And we figured the text would be the same on each side. So Yep. Even though it's one side's facing the street, it'll have the other text behind it just in case it does get moved at some point. Mhmm. But for now, we're just gonna have one side of text.

Okay. The next one is the Harry Whitehorse Home and Studio. Manona allows for the sign to be located in the right of way, but requires additional permitting. Nothing arduous, but it is an additional fee and permit that we'd have to pay. The committee last time looked at three locations and preferred the Eastern most location.

I'll show a map in a second. And the and we had not discussed that with the landowner at that time, but we did after the meeting, and she was agreeable with that spot. We revisited the property and found a spot that would be out of the right right of way. At the last meeting, there was a tiny discussion about whether or not Monona's Landmarks Commission or the city would have to approve this as well, and their staff said they would not need to be involved. So it can just be a Dane County sign that's put up.

Again, we can get into that the right of way, but it does require additional permitting. So if you recall, it was in this easternmost location that I'm circling with my hand that we were looking at. And here's a picture, kinda the same thing. You can see there's utility lines. This is actually flagged when we went out here.

Didn't get a picture of it, but this entire area was flagged for some sort of underground wires. So we're kinda getting closer to this tree here that we could put the sign. We did find the the corner marker too. It's set in maybe a foot, foot and a half from the sidewalk is where the property line is. So if we stay out of that area and put the sign up there, that shouldn't be an issue. And Kurt and I were were discussing I think we discussed this last time this too. You can actually see the house from this location. I don't no. I don't have a picture of the other location, but the other location was further up the road, and truly blocked by by vegetation. So the commission last time was discussing putting a sign up over here. Anything else from that?

I think the the actual corner we actually did find the spike in the corner.

You can be able see it.

Right? Right in the middle of the parking lot. So it was fortunate we're able to find the corner of the lot Wow. Which gives us a a good sense of how far off the sidewalk we have to stay. The vegetation is heavy. I don't wanna get too deep into maintenance on somebody else's house or causing too much. So there there is room there for a sign. Behind the telephone pole is probably not preferred. But

it's not a great location, but it's, like, the only one we got.

Right. I mean, the other one farther down was closer to the bridge, but it was also the the the greenery comes out to the sidewalk and then some. There's so there's a very small pocket in there, but it would definitely be a one-sided sign at that point because of the spruce that's sitting right behind it. And then we have but then you also have to know that that once we go closer that way, the creek goes through there, then we get into riparian riparian

Oh, boy.

Setbacks, etcetera, will have to stay so far off of wherever the designation is for that small creek that goes out to the so there'll be a riparian setback or permitting or something like that if we go too far up the sidewalk towards the

bridge.

And the city is replacing the bridge too Right. In the coming year or years, so that's gonna we have to move the sign again anyways if we put it there.

The bridge on Broadway? Yep.

Yeah.

Are we doing it? Yep. Oh, that's in '28, I think. Yeah.

Could be.

The the county it's a county road. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So yeah. I mean, not the

city. Oh, because Broadway. Yep. Yep.

County B W, I think. Yep. Yeah. Wow. Interesting. So and there's gonna be a lot of construction to the east of there. I mean, Chief Auto Parts is coming down. Mhmm. And they're gonna put in some sort of coffee shop or diner there. Does that affect what we're doing, or can we stay within the property boundaries in such a way that it won't be an issue?

Monona seemed to indicate as long as we stayed on the property, there shouldn't be an issue. Okay.

Good. I don't wanna have to wait for that.

Yeah. And you can see like like I said, I think you can even see the the painted marker right there.

Yeah. I think in the very edge.

Yeah. It goes it goes you know, I've got a little bit of room there between the driveway and where they're going. Okay.

So, again, it'll be a one-sided marker, but the text will be on both sides just in case it gets moved. Yep. Alright. It's interesting how

you found the corner in that spot.

Well, yeah, was

you got lucky. Did you

have a metal detector or something?

For this one With the with, with roads and pavement, a lot of times, they'll leave them proud of the pavement. So it was right there.

It was painted pink and oh.

Yeah. And somebody they they were I don't know if it was a what early construction team was out there painting lines and stuff like that, but what somebody painted the marker for us too, the the the spike that's on the corner, which was a good a big help for us because it was like we're looking at that spot going, it's a nice spot, but it is it on the property, or is it off the property?

Ada deer was a metal detector, though. Yeah.

That's a little

bit more difficult, actually.

A 100 foot tape and a metal detector.

That's for god. It's the old days.

So next one is Ho Chunk Village. The location and the style that we discussed last meeting of a rock marker with a plaque. We're not actually putting a post in and dis disturbing the village and potential artifacts there. That was supported by the landowners or or Dane County Parks. So county parks department is on board with that idea.

They did want some assurances that they would not be responsible for replacing or fixing the sign or or the rock if it broke for any reason or got graffitied. So we'll need to come up with a maintenance agreement as we will for all signs. And we talked about this last time. The park is undergoing reconstruction in 2026, 2027 to coincide with the Highway 51 reconstruction, but we may be able to install the marker sooner than that time since that area of the park that we're discussing won't be impacted by the construction. All they're doing is repaving the bike path that's there. They're not digging up the park or anything like that. So we might actually be able to get that in sooner than we originally anticipated.

And by switching between a post and a that, that cut rock, we don't get into much into more work and more effort by having to have a a representative out there for digging a post hole on a archaeological site, etcetera, etcetera. Oh, okay. That's I've we found out that that's an issue. So you can't just put a post hole on an archaeological site you need than a certified archaeologist or something on-site while you're doing that too. Yep.

Yep.

So Cool. And it just yeah. It feels better to just leave it undisturbed. And

Mhmm. We got that idea from Monona. They had a mound, and they don't undisturb it. So they put a rock, you know, on a mound with this.

Yeah. I remember that one.

Oh, and here's a a picture of the location. So where where the star is generally, where we'd be putting that. Some images of that bike path. Bottom right hand picture kinda circled what the area is too. Oh. There we go. I'm I'm thinking ahead of time. There it is. The Monona Mound is the example of what we were looking at.

You talked to Doug Blauman about securing a rock.

Yeah. Thor gave me a Okay. A lead on that.

That's good.

Lake Mendota dugout canoes. This one, I think we need to discuss a little bit more in-depth based on conversation that we had. Maybe let currently that one. So just as a a preview, our commission had a preference to place the sign closer to the water. There was that lookout. Do I have a picture somewhere? Okay. So this bottom left hand corner, there's that lookout that they're redoing. Remember, they're doing redoing this entire park. Mhmm.

And so we thought a sign overlooking the water would be nice down at the bottom of the park. That'd be located at this northeastern most location. And then our second option was at the boathouse itself. Do you wanna jump in and say what Brian had said?

Yeah. The essentially, the the village is looking for more because we I think we talked early on about the whether a sign is more prominent as a advertising type sign to pull you into site. And I think that's what they're leaning on more is to have something out on Mendota Drive as a draw into the site. They're preferring, the top left site or actually both of these pictures Yeah. Something in that area as opposed to something farther down on-site, like we had been talking about.

And yeah. And I

That's the main entry to

the park? So this the path here leads down to that lookout. The main entry to the how do I have a picture? The main entry to the park is this parking lot here.

Okay.

And that put that that's it goes down the ravine. Yeah. So that goes down this path down to the boathouse, which is down

The there. The park currently has not insignificant ADA issues Mhmm. Access, etcetera. The ravine from the parking lot down to the shore is steep in spots the way it's been construct constructed. I think they're trying to remedy some of that, but they were leaning hard on that spot up on Mendota Drive.

I may or may not have muddied the waters in our conversations with, Shorewood Hills because they had just finished up the Mendota Drive wooden bridge, which is one of the few wooden bridges on thoroughfares in in recent history. And it's and it's very nice, and it's very, you know, kind of historic. And part of it was, in my head, I was envisioning a bit of a crossroads because it was the park and Madison Park and Pleasure Drive going this way and the Native Americans going this way and, you know, this being a very kind of historic spot in and of itself, and that may have may or may not have seeded that terminated that idea to keep it in that spot or not. I'm not sure.

Mhmm. So one of their commission members emailed back and said, oh, can we put that information on the sign about The bridge. The bridge. And but that wasn't what the nomination was. It was based on the canoes themselves. So we feel that wouldn't really Yeah. You know, be part of this project. Yeah.

I'm glad you said that.

Yeah. Yeah.

Do you have to leave? I apologize. I do have to still have quorum with three?

I think

Ben and you guys.

We have

four still. Patrick, I think, has to leave soon too, which would not have quorum.

Oh, jeez.

I don't know. We still have four.

Yep. We're good for right now.

For

right now. Okay.

Right now. Do we have Bill? Yes. Yeah. Oh. Bill's on. Okay. Yep.

Great. So I I think we are looking maybe for some guidance from the commission on should we just go with what the village says and put this at the, you know, the that park entrance off to the side, or should we press it more with getting it closer to the canoes?

I guess my preference is to have it closer where the canoes are, and you can look into the wander water and almost see them if you look close enough. You know? So putting up there the marker should be as close to that spot in the history where it's talking about.

Yeah. Because it's not the park.

Yeah. It's definitely not the park. It's not the bridges. It's the canoes.

Mike, I'm trying to figure out if if seating the location to secure the language on the site sign. Seem is that a fair would that appear as a fair trade to this to the village or not?

I'm not clear. What

do mean? Well, they're looking for modified language and site on Mendota Drive. And if we Right. Split that and say, well, we the the language is kind of a nonstarter because the nomination wasn't for the park. It was for the the dugout canoes. And maybe that's we see the location to make sure the language stays the way we want it. I don't know. I I don't know. It's just just a thought that occurred to me.

We don't need to give it give up on anything yet, though, do we? No.

Nope. Yeah. It could be that if we push on the language, it'll say, oh, if we're not including the bridge, then maybe it does make sense to have it closer to the canoes.

True. I don't know. Yeah. I'd I'd like to stand our ground at least for now.

Okay.

Give it one one last try here.

Mhmm. One last push, you guys. Part of the deal.

Yeah.

Okay. So that's Sherwood. Robert Valentine, as we discussed last time, the narrative has been updated to reflect that Robert Valentine did not own the farm around the cemetery, but instead he was one of the three trustees that purchased the original church and cemetery. Robert lived in the town of Oregon to the West, and the other Valentine family members lived nearby. The the language that that Rick wrote was shared with the town of Rutland, and they you know, that that didn't matter to them. They were still happy to have it in the cemetery even if he didn't actually own the farm that surrounded the cemetery. So that one still seems like we're we're really good. So as a

oh, go ahead. And I did modify the language on the website to reflect that the property he owned was in the town of Oregon, and but he was part of the creation of the church.

And then super quick one. Sun Prairie staff reached out, and they're hoping to have a dedication in celebration when the k part housing goes in. So believe

I can get that done soon. It's my next mission.

Yeah. See, those are situations where the PR could be done for us pretty much. Like, they're gonna get excited about it, they're gonna promote it. We're just gonna say, you're welcome.

Mhmm. Yep.

Glad that And that momentum helps with the other ones.

Yes. Yeah. Having anything in the ground will help our momentum, I think.

Oh, that's Vandenberg Heights. Yep. Okay.

Yeah. So that's the the red sign is the one we pop out, put in a new one. Without I mean, this is super easy, hopefully. And they've already agreed to install the the sign

Mhmm. Have their public works install the sign and

everything. So Should have done this one first. Alright.

Okay. So next steps, the county requires a request for quotes go out to at least three companies. So following our the draft of that's all written up. We just have to modify a couple of things following the advice discussed at today's meeting. And when the quotes come in, the department will choose a vendor. The company that Wisconsin Historical Society works with, CEWA, they expected a turnaround time to be at least six months. Other companies may be similar. So we ask for delivery time line in the RFQ as well to see if somebody could be quicker than that six month time line. Good. Details on the sign question

on that. I I don't

know how to get rid of did that move?

I don't know. I

was trying to show the seal up there, but

the Patrick's in the way.

Patrick's in the way. Yeah. So but I did walk in, and I thought that sign right there

is

kinda what we were thinking about. Yeah. So details on the sign. So the RFQ that we wrote asked for cost on the sign, including possible including the a possible Dane County seal, the cost on post shipping, putting a QR code on a separate plaque like we discussed, putting a photo on the sign on a separate plaque like we discussed. And then one of the companies that we looked into, they make relief style portraits, I'll call it.

So that was a picture there on the presentation. Kurt and I were thinking that, you know, that might be kinda need for Hitta Deer or Harry Whitehorse, kind of more recent people that we have Oh. Images of. And language for the signs and possible photos, discussed under under the next agenda item. But a couple things for guidance. So first off, Ada Deer, are we okay with the single post sign? It sounded like we were okay. Last time, we were thinking it was gonna be a double post, but because of the tree and location, we kind of had to amend that. But I just wanna get confirmation from the commission that single post is okay.

It's fine with me. Have. Yeah. Right. So I hope so because that's what I I wrote. Yep.

Harry Whitehorse, we were all in agreement on a single post. As as Rick said, we would have same text on both sides for both of these in case they move in the future.

Bit of information. You said something about same text on both sides in case we have to move it. Right?

Mhmm.

Would that also be if it's perpendicular to the street rather than parallel? And it's does it cost us more to do that right now to have it printed on both sides? You're saying it's in the quote, right? You're asking for the quote? Mhmm.

It would cost more.

I mean, it seems like it would. I just wonder if that might be a place to save money, should we need to save money.

Sure.

Or our book or something else. I don't know.

Yeah. I think I could write the RFQ to some to itemize out this cost. Yeah. Single versus same side.

I was just thinking of the people living in the Ada Deer house and looking at their living room and reading it every day and being kind of annoyed.

I did ask, and they were okay.

Okay. So

yeah. I yeah. I I understand that.

Yep. Mhmm.

Ho Chunk Village, we're looking at small city marker on Iraq. Lake Mendota dugout canoes. So we're it sounds like we wanna still press for the I'll call it the waste level sign that would be on the lookout or a sign at the boathouse. So that one's still gonna be kind of up in the air, I think. Depending upon what Sherwood Hills says, then we can write our RFQ to to reflect that, or we can bring it back to the commission. We meet again, I think, on the eighth.

Do we need backup on that at all? Like, do we need to call in an underwater archaeologist to talk to them about where the canoes were? I don't know. They have a historian They know.

In their village. Yeah. They're very

Okay.

Knowledgeable about it.

Okay. Never mind.

It's interesting. So what's type of sign is the question?

Yeah. So, yeah, we've got

the It's really what they're gonna let us do. I mean Mhmm.

If Right.

If they want a big six foot sign, I think our budget would allow for that. But if they're if they're more interested in a smaller presence, you know, then the single postmarker might be might be better.

The the site they picked that they picked currently would require some serious maintenance to find a site for posts.

For two post marker, you mean?

Or for for anything. The the the vegetation is right up to the sidewalk.

And There's

Yeah. It's not really a generous site.

There's

not anything new there.

Can you remind me of the image that we saw of it's the rendering of the new park and the people sitting and looking at a thing. Mhmm. I don't I don't remember where that fits into the conversation, if that was just yeah. That one on the bottom left. That's Like, are they planning to do that anyway?

Yeah. Mhmm.

And what will that say?

I don't think they got into those details.

I mean, missing my point. Like, what are they gonna say that we're not saying? Are they gonna say anything about the duck canoes on that? And, I mean, we don't know.

But We don't we we don't know currently.

Because maybe this is another point of entry into a sign.

I think we've talked around that a little bit as far as, like, do we fund our sign or their sign? Yeah. And or do we have do we wait for them to finish their redo on the park, and they'll say, you can have this one. You have to meet these specs to fit on this thing. And then we go back and six months later, we have it I think it kinda depends on what they're planning for the visual. Because if they're I don't know what happens if they're doing their own thing on the the dugout canoes on those boards.

Right. And that would be redundant in a way. Right. But we also have this is not our only choice of Lake Mendota. Should we not get what we want, we still we have our own park across the lake.

Correct.

So I think this one might be a minute. Yeah. I think we have to

I could

see how see where they're how how set in stone they are with that spot on the road or not.

You know, because, like, if they really are doing those two panels and what are they're talking about what the, you know, the Yahara flowage and you know, it just seems it would be good to know if they intend to talk about the canoes or not.

Right.

And if they don't, that's where our where we come in and say, we're gonna.

Right. If you, yeah, if you put up if you give us one of the panels or we're able to put another post in there somewhere.

Because that isn't I don't think that that site is exactly where we're asking for, but it is closer to the water than the road. Is that true?

Yeah. Yeah. Very much. It's the think when Bill first brought it up, he was thinking actually inside under the cover of the boathouse.

Yeah. And that looks like it's up on the boathouse railing, maybe.

It's if you look at the picture on the right, it's off to the left in the green there.

Oh, even further up.

It it's it's a little further up the hill. It's slightly easier to get to than getting down to the boathouse. Okay. Just because the elevation change.

I could also do an RFQ for five signs and kinda leave this one for another you know, obviously, we still wanna put up a sign, but if we're not if we're getting some pushback and we're not sure and we wanna move the other signs along, I could just do those five and then put this one as follow-up.

Would you have to do a separate RFQ each time you put up? Wow. Mhmm. Might as well include it. You you don't have to use it,

do you? You don't have to actually I just need information in the RFQ to say what type of sign that we're doing. So that's where the the issue is. If we don't know if we don't have verification from Shorewood Hills what they want, then that just delays all the other signs in the RFQ.

Makes sense. Okay. Well Hate to postpone it any further, but

Mhmm.

We Well, I think their construction was scheduled through '27.

Mhmm.

So it would be through '27 be probably before we get to install anything anyway.

Yeah. This was gonna be one of our final ones to install because of that.

Mhmm. Okay. So we're in no rush.

So we just leave it separate?

Yeah. Yeah. Pull it from the RFQ. I think that's fine.

But, obviously, still, you know, reach out to their staff, try and get it to Yeah.

Where we want. So find an opening somewhere.

K.

Any other people on Zoom with thoughts on that before I move on?

Yeah. I I just a few thoughts on that. Yeah. The original intent for signage was in that, that gazebo or pavilion that they have there looking out over the water. If you look at the where they park on top and the the access to that is underneath that bridge, obviously.

But I I also noticed on Zoom or Google Earth here, they they do have a a trail along the side of the edge of the road that goes across the top by top of the bridge as well. It must be a walking trail on top as well. So but but I I would say the you know, personally, I would rather have it down there next to the water's edge versus away from the site of where the dugouts were, you know, located down there. And they are in real close proximity, by the way. If you look on Google Earth, for example, you'll see those moorings of the where they tied the boats out there, and it was just in amongst them and and below deeper in the into the water.

So but, again, you know, it is also suggested there is a Dane County Park on the north Side that you can talk exactly about the same, you know, matters of dugout canoes in Lake Mendota, and you don't need to be more than a 100 feet. You can be across the lake and still talk about it. You know? So that's another considerations.

Oh, wow.

Yeah. Definitely. I mean, you don't have to be on top of them to talk about dugout canoes, and it's, and just the the mention of, you know, the significance of, you know, those those ancient watercraft they're still discovering there. There's another recent find, of course, and, so the store only store only gets better. In fact, they had carbon tested the the latest one there, and it's close to 5,000 years old now. So

we're Jeez.

Yeah. It's quite a as they go down, you know, through the layers of soil there, you know, that washing away, they they just keep getting older and older. And just stop to envision, you know, on this Earth, how many sites do you have that are 5,000 years old, with materials so that be still won't be discovered. Right? And so and it's it's not only national news. It's international news. And Dane County has the ability to speak about that. Wisconsin speaks about it, you know, quite prominently, but it's right here in your backyard. And it's Dane County is where these are being found in that watershed, that Yahaira Watershed. And that Lake Mendota is playing a prominent role in that.

And if you can have large enough signage to encompass that, that's the key to that. You know, a small placard or a small stone isn't going to suffice, you know, so for that. And that's why you could almost sway towards Lake Mendota County Park up there and update that signage on there and create your own story about this, ancient, watercraft technology that they're finding in the shore shores of, Lake Mendota. So

Great thought, Bill. Thank you.

So if if they're procrastinating or if they want to, you know, have something that's less than what you desire, I would totally say, you know, look at at another resource for signage there. So

Yeah. I'd agree. Yeah. I think we only moved away from the the I can't remember the name of the park on the other side, but only because Shorewood was excited about it.

Yeah. It it's actually named Lake Mendota Park. So

Yeah. The the marker's named Lake Mendota.

Right. Yeah. So we still have that in our back pocket if this doesn't

work out. Well, I like the idea of killing two birds with one stone, updating that marker, and telling a bigger story about the canoes.

Yes. And they're gonna they're going to, I guarantee, a little signage that their idea is is promoting that to draw people to that location. I guarantee it, and they're just you know, they're they're you're gonna they're gonna have signage there no matter what anyway regarding those dugout canoes. And, I think they're just Yeah. Seeing an advantage of having some additional dollars and some, other expertise, helping them with signage there. So

Yeah.

Wow.

Okay. Give you guys enough direction for now? Mhmm. I think it does. Thank you. Thank you, Bill. I'm sure glad you made it today.

Oh, yeah. Definitely. I was struggling over here.

I think it actually,

I think it's my computer. My computer hates me anyway. So

You have to do some you have to do something to get your good graces back from the computer.

Yeah. Just get some real long fishing line and two bean cans and probably carry you guys

Drag it down the bottom of the lake.

I think we got budget for that.

So So that's, like, the dugout canoes. Robert Valentine, we're looking at single post, different text each side. That one's pretty easy. Same thing with Van Buren Heights, Capehart housing. We're we're set on that one.

Yeah. And Valentine's one on the one one story on one and one on the other. Right? The house and the civil war.

Yeah. Okay. As proposed. Great.

Bill Bill, did you have something else?

Yes. I I sorry about this, but it it just kinda caught me odd that, for at at Adeer's place there, single post signage, but then it's, same characters with text on both sides. And is that sign to be facing,

you know,

parallel to the street, or is it gonna be, you know you know, the other direction? Because traveling one way, you'll see it. On the other way, you'll never see it from across the street. At least you wouldn't want the traffic to unsafely stop and come across the Rita from the other side. So

So the question is what what the text is gonna or how it's gonna be positioned on the road?

I would think because if you're pulling, you know, along the length of the road where you pull alongside to look at it, that's, you know, safe enough. But if you are across the road looking at that sign, there's sometimes this draw where you, you know, you you follow where you look to steer. And then there's always a question whether that's less safe or not. And it's just a thought, especially if it's on the edge of their property or not. You know, that's it's up it's up to you folks, of course, but I'm not I'm not the sign expert. So but I'm just thinking that I know dealing with past signage along major highways, they it's critical to try to get the signage from across the opposite side of the road so you're not drifting towards this time while you're driving. So

And how do you do that? I mean, what do you what does

it driving, you look you steer where

you look. And if you're going 70 miles an hour, you're looking across at some billboard that says uncle Billy's, you tend to drive that towards your sign.

So Well, how do you prevent that?

You don't put signage across the opposite side of the road. I mean, you can if it's on the same lane line that you're driving on, you look to the right. That's, you know, acceptable at times.

And Okay.

You know what I'm saying is that if you're driving

Oh, right.

From the side

of the road, you'll you'll drift

towards your sign. So no. Nine 99 times out of a 100 at that speed, you're not going to, you know, hurt anything. You don't wanna be that 1%. Right?

They were talking, I think, parallel when we got there. Parallel.

They were talking parallel.

Yeah. So you're driving, and you look, and it's like this. Right? Yeah. Which is why I was saying, like, then the rest of it is they're seeing it from their living room.

Right.

Why are we why are we doing that instead of this?

You could do either one.

I guess I guess based on what I just heard, it might draw attention from people driving the opposite way from the opposite side of

side of the road coming the other way.

Yeah. Yes. They tend to do that. I know dealing with Wisconsin DOT, they still allow sign and stuff from private lands because they're grandfathered in, but they're really shying away from putting anything that could distract the driver from pulling them across the road. That and, you know, if there's characters on one side and the exact same on the other, it's for the family only to see, I would think. So but maybe they maybe they maybe you you want them to see that too. But

Or or is this the case where we as you suggested, we'd look to save money by having the backside not being signage.

Yeah. But, again, I just wonder at what point did we decide that it was gonna be like this and not like this?

My assumption was it was we kind of always see those same things where the the big two posts down to the smaller ones are always they generally run parallel with the roadway. They're always there's one that one side that faces the road. There are cases where I've seen some of them spun sideways. Yeah. But, like the one out in front of the out in front of the Valentine's Church, there's a there's a smaller historic marker dedicated to the church that's this way.

But since they put that marker in, the highway dropped 25 feet, so you can't see it from the road anymore. You have to go into this and drive around to the front of the church to actually see the mark. So it's it's in a sense, the high since it became a highway,

it was

it was there, but then they they dropped it for, you know, modernization of the road or whatever they did. Yeah.

But, yeah, I think Kurt's right. That's what our thought was. It was just gonna mimic kind of those roadside signs that you see Yeah. Driving around, but doesn't have to either.

So where does that leave us?

I think we're we'll do the RFQ that talks about, you know, give us a quote on single side, give us a quote on double side. We can kinda decide from there if it fits in our budget.

Alright.

But we'll only do five signs in that RFQ and work with Shorewood Hills or not work with Shorewood Hills depending upon how things work out for that last sign. Yeah. Final I think this final slide, other guidance, any interest in that idea of a relief where the the photos or images popped out? Is the Dane County seal okay? Is there a different logo for the commission?

We looked into having somebody develop a logo, in house, but that ran into some issues, bureaucratic kind of policy issues. And then final question, is this a new Dane County signage program? Were we using Wisconsin Historical Society markers? Were using were we using Dane County Historical Society markers? The Dane County comp plan language for historic and archaeological resources under the policy and program section says that the county was trying to develop a Dane County signage program identify sites and locations important to county and local history with links to detailed online resources.

So our staff was kind of under this assumption that we are making a brand new signage program for the county itself that the county would pay for, but wanted to just get clarification from the commission on that. So I think again, I think that's the last slide, but let me just double check. Yeah. So those are just last three questions that staff needed guidance on before we put that RFQ out.

So you wanna go one by one? Or

Sure.

So the relief idea is gonna be part of the RFQ. Right?

Yes. It would be a separate line item to let us know how much that would cost.

You're thinking of a relief image of some of the people?

Yes. Yep. And that would

well, I have to say that the the the markers I've been writing have been based on the CWA marker. I hope that we don't have to rewrite the markers to allow for

Yeah. You lose space.

Different companies that have different allowances. And with that relief image on the marker face, it's gonna cut into the text, I would think. So it would be a very different character count. And I think we'd kinda set ourselves back if we if if things are different with other other companies besides CEBA, that would kinda put us on square one in terms of writing text. So I just thought of that as an issue,

but we'll have to see. So getting more text on the sign is of more importance.

I just I don't know what the text the character character counts are gonna be with other vendors.

And they are acute well, it we wrote in there that it would be roughly the same amount of letter, eight forty eight or whatever it was. We're looking at a sign that would be Oh. Roughly the same size as Siwa, same character count. We tried to make the RFQ match that Oh. So that they were all even playing field so we can compare the

actual samples. That's good. But I do with the relief image. If it does eat into the text, we might have to edit the the ones that have been written so far. But I thought what you were talking about earlier was having a different logo on top as compared to the State Historical Society or the Dane County Historical Society.

Yep. The Dane County Society one has their logo, which was based on the Dane County logo. So it might look similar to what's already out there with our marker, but it's possible you guys could have your own logo on top of the marker if you want. But I don't know if you've talked with other staff people, but once you create a marker type, you want to commit to it. I've seen some marker programs come and go with the best of intentions.

And if it doesn't stand the test of time, they're eventually going to be orphaned. And the maintenance will flag. And you'll have a program that has created an issue more than a resource. Those markers won't be kept up, and they'll become an issue for who knows when, who knows who. So I guess I'm leaning very much with CIWA and very much with the Dane County marker.

That that was my assumption when we first talked about it, but I certainly understand if Dane County wants its own marker. I understand that, but just be aware of the commitment issue and how these marker programs sometimes fall by the wayside.

I don't think anybody out there in the world is gonna notice who actually put this marker up in the big scheme of things.

Now, there's a lot of confusion between us and the state, because we modeled ours on the state historical marker.

But again, it doesn't really matter. People just need to know the information.

Oh, I think I wouldn't agree with that. I wouldn't agree with that.

To the person driving by.

I think it would matter to us. Yes. And if we want our program to have its own impact, being specific to this issue of underrepresented people, then I think we'd want that to be recognizable to some extent. So there there are plus and minuses, but I wouldn't say it's not important.

Okay. No. I see what you're saying. But the way they look, going back to the way they look, I'm agreeing with you that I think if they all look like the ones that well, the only one never mind.

Strike that?

Strike that. Okay. But I was drawn to the picture one because I think that will draw more people over to look at it.

Which picture one?

The one we're talking about having a

Oh, the relief image? Mhmm.

Yeah. However, at the expense of losing text, I don't think that's a good idea. So I'm agreeing with you on that. But I think the happenstance of somebody actually just driving by all six of our markers and realizing it's part of the same program, it needs some other anchor. It needs the website, it needs the QR code, it needs the publicity for people to understand that that one aida deer marker is part of a bigger thing.

Mhmm.

And I don't necessarily think that the way the plaque the marker is designed is gonna drive that because of the

Because it's so similar

I'm just, other ways like, did a little, like, who pulls over to look at markers? You know? And there's it's it's already a small amount of people that

Mhmm.

Wanna do the history. So I think I guess I'm not getting too hung up on it it of it making sure that Dane County, you know, is such the main thing that you're seeing rather than the content. Because the people that wanna know the content are gonna pull over them no matter what it looks like. And then, again, them understanding that it is part of a program, then they need the resource to find what are the other things in this program and how can I find them until we have 200 markers? You know?

Well, yeah, that's what I mean by commitment.

Yeah. Yeah. Good point. Right.

Patrick is one of the, I think, originators of the program. Do you have any thoughts on how that should be set up?

Yeah. First, couple things. I'm agnostic on whether or not there should be an image. I think the content of information is what's important. Also, I thought at some point, we had talked about if it's possible to include a QR code that that would be Yeah. Desirable. Yep. Is it

not That's in the RFQ to to do a QR code on a separate little plaque. Yep.

Got it.

And then as far as logo or attribution of the source of of the the sign, the information, the program. Obviously, this is a county funded effort. I I guess I I I take Rick's point that there needs to be a commitment to the maintenance of of the markers and so forth. I think there's also you know, people may look to an attribution for credibility of the information. I I don't know to what degree people look for that in historical markers.

But if you know, I I had gone into this thinking that this be this is a new program, new effort on the county's part to recognize the historical contributions of underrepresented folk. And, You know, I guess I would welcome the idea of this maybe being something in partnership between the county and Dane County Historical Society if that's something that brings both credibility and assurance of maintenance of of markers going forward. But, again, it is a county funded effort. You know, if if there is if we put and I thought we had talked about this as well at some point, noting on the sign rather than a logo at the top, some sort of attribution in a different different typeset, different font at the bottom

Right.

Noting the Dane County, what do we call it, historical preservation program. And, you know, maybe we could do have the attribution say something like that in partnership with Dank and Colony Historical Society.

Mhmm.

That's true. Historical marker project.

So I think so too.

And and that would also leave more room without any logo than, you know, just focus on design and content, room for content.

Okay. Thank you. Bill, are you still there? Oh, I hope so. Otherwise, we lost Quorum. Do you see if he's still