Common Council - Regular Meeting

Alright. We're gonna call this meeting to order at 06:02PM. Let the record reflect that all council members are present, and please stand for the pledge of allegiance. We recognize that the city of La Crosse occupies the land of the Ho Chunk people. Please take a moment to celebrate and honor the ancestral Ho Chunk land and the sacred lands of all indigenous people.

Thank you. I will now take a motion to approve the minutes from 01/08/2026. Motion made by council member Kahlo, second by council president Dickinson. Any, corrections or discussion? Seeing none, please vote.

And that motion passes unanimously. Moving on to reports. Twenty six zero one four five twenty twenty five La Crosse Police Department annual report. Motion to receive and file by councilmember Podesky says second by councilmember Northwood. Any discussion?

Alright. Seeing none, please vote. And that motion passes unanimously. Notices in discussion. First, I would like to acknowledge, I'm gonna do two acknowledgements. One is to our boy scout troop out in the back. Wave, folks. Thank you all for joining us, for our council meeting. And, the second acknowledgment I would like to acknowledge is, to pay respects to Pat Stevens who recently passed away. He was very instrumental in both Irish Fest as well as Rotary Lights.

And so, we know that his service is tomorrow as well as they have an event for him tonight. So, just wanna send our condolences to the family and thank him for his service and work that he's done in our city. Council member Weston.

Thank you, mister mayor. I wish to acknowledge that February is Black History Month and a time to honor, celebrate, and reflect on the rich history, achievements, and lasting contributions of black Americans. It's an opportunity to recognize resilience, innovation, leadership, and cultural influence that have shaped our community. As we celebrate, we also affirm our commitment to equity, inclusion, and continued learning, ensuring that stories, voices, and accomplishments of black individuals are recognized not just this month but every day of the year. We recognize local historical figures such as Olympian George Coleman Pogue, journalist and politician George Edwin Taylor, barber and real estate developer John Bernie, domestic staff at the Castle On Cass, Carilla Douglas.

We also recognize important folks with more recent impact on our history, such as Thomas Harris, Barbara Stewart, Levi Webster, Bobby King, doctor James h McCaffrey, Shy Jackson, Antwana Williams, Richard Burrow, and Shondell Washington Spivey. Some of these names are new to me, but they have impacted other residents and therefore have impacted our history. I will wrap up with an homage to sister Thea Bowman, who I first learned of this past Sunday at my church. She was the first black woman to take vows with the Franciscan sisters of perpetual adoration here in La Crosse and so wisely said, I think the difference between me and some people is that I am content to do my little bit. Sometimes people think they must do big things in order to make change.

But if one would light a candle, we would have tremendous light. Thank you.

Thank you. Councilmember Jansen.

Thank you, mayor. I'd like to acknowledge all the amazing things that are happening at the La Crosse Center. Obviously, most weekends in the wintertime are just jam packed. For the rest of this month, though, we have three amazing activities going on. Later this month, on February 28, is the Milwaukee R and B live event.

It's a free admission, so I would hope that everybody takes an opportunity to check that out. Starting tonight, the lacrosse sports show has began, which has been a ongoing event for years, and that goes through Sunday. And also on Saturday is the, Lacrosse Winter Roots Festival that started several years ago, which is amazing, put together by our Lacrosse Center staff. So, thank you to the La Crosse Center staff, for all that they do and how they do it so well. And I encourage, anyone listening online or in the room to, check out these special events.

Thank you. Councilmember Podeski.

Thank you, your honor. I wanna keep this light non confrontational under the discussion part, but I just wanna say that I really wish we we would sit in our district seats for various reasons. One, I have a day camp in my drawer. Two, obviously, you're the center of attention when the media takes up pictures, I'm no longer in it. And three, I guess if we are gonna do musical chairs, I wish Nikki would play music, and when she stops, we'll all grab that seat.

But I do understand you want people to talk to each other. I did have a nice conversation with council member Trost earlier, But I for me, it's a selfish reason. I just like my chair and I like my drawer. But like I said, I don't wanna have we don't have to discuss it, which we shouldn't argue about it. But thank you.

Thank you. Council president Dickinson.

I have a few items to share about the La Crosse Airport. First, I want to start with condolences to the family of William Blank. He was a longtime aviation board member and the well known acrobatic airshow person for Riverfest and others. He passed away on January 31, very close to Pat Stevens' time there. So we are going to miss him.

We also received the LADCO President's Award at the event at the January for the Allegiant Air service that has been added, and that first flight was January 6. Very well received and a full plane of 177 people. Third, I want to say I want to welcome Lauren Koss as our airport director. At the end of this meeting or close to it, we will be, approving her for that position. She is well qualified, well educated, and I'm very excited for the future of the airport.

That was my list.

Thank you. Thank you. Council member Goggin.

Earlier, last week, I believe it was, we were, honored to be invited to Jory Olson's promotion to sergeant at the La Crosse Police Department. Very I'm very proud of him, and, we're just really lucky to have him in our city. And I just wanna thank him and all the other officers for all they do for us day in and day out. It's a thankless job most of the time, but I wanna take this time to thank you and thank you loud. And then I also wanted to add to council member Jansen's comments about the lacrosse center.

I had the opportunity to volunteer at the Riverfront Revolt. I know you don't look I look like a person that would go to that. It was a blast. And the thing that amazed me the most was how seamless the work that got just the scope of that event, the amount of work, the running around that people were doing, and how absolutely pleased everybody that I came in contact was that they were at the River City Revolt. It was negative 13 degrees, I believe, one night and negative eight degrees the second night, so practically heat wave.

And it was it was just something to watch all of those folks at the La Crosse Center put on that show. I can't wait to volunteer again, and I encourage you to all do it too. Thank you.

Thank you. Seeing no other speakers, I will move on to our next agenda item. For council matters, starting with twenty six zero one five five, resolution approving the twenty twenty five, twenty twenty six bills and engineering estimates paid in February 2026. Motion to adopt by council president Dickinson, second by council member Northwood. Any discussion?

Seeing none, please vote. That motion passes unanimously. Moving on to board appointments. Item twenty six zero 147, arts board, Alex Fowler. Board of zoning appeals, James Turf.

Climate action plan steering committee, Stephanie Hanna. Floodplain Advisory Committee, Eric Crabman. Library board, Hannah Amon, neighborhood revitalization commission, William Bundurier and Taylor Keene. Motion to confirm by council member Tro, second by council member Kahlo. Any, discussion? Alright. Seeing none, please vote. Also, while you all are voting, I should publicly apologize for messing up people names. Alright. That motion passes 11 yes and two no.

I'll now take a motion to suspend rule 15 and rule nine for the following items, twenty six zero zero nine two and twenty six zero one six two. Motion made by council member Mendel, second by council president Dickinson. Any discussion? Seeing none, please vote. Alright.

And that motion passes unanimously. Moving to report of bids and quotes recommended to be rejected. Twenty six zero zero eight seven, report of bids for the 2026 citywide miscellaneous curb ramp and sidewalk replacement project. Motion to reject has been made by council member Goggin, second by council president Dickinson. Council member Goggin.

Oh, you're just listed on here as a okay. She's just listed as a speaker on the but it's green on our end. So if you can't see this yeah. Okay. No problem. Well, any other discussion? Alright. Seeing none, please vote. The motion passes unanimously. Nope.

Sorry. 12 to one. Report of bids and quotes recommended to be adopted. Starting with twenty six zero zero eight six, report of bids and resolution awarding contract to Larson Construction Company, INC, in the amount of 84,897 thousand, 50¢ for the Need Belaski Bridge repair project. Motion by council president Dickinson, second by council member Stein.

Any discussion? Seeing none, please vote. And that motion passes unanimously. Our next agenda item, twenty six zero zero eight eight, report of bids and resolution awarding contracts of following Hammer INC in the amount of $48,846.50 for the 2026 citywide miscellaneous, alley pavement replacement project. Motion to approve by council president Dickinson.

Second by council member. Any discussion? Seeing none, please vote. And that motion passes unanimously. Moving on to items to be item items, excuse me, with no recommendation.

Starting with item twenty four one two eight seven, a charter ordinance to create a section 19 of appendix a of the code of ordinance of the city of La Crosse, creating a position duties and responsibilities of the office of the city administrator and removing the duties of the office of mayor. Referred with no recommendation. Councilmember Schleszko.

Thank you, mayor. I would recommend that this resolution not be adopted.

The motion for this resolution to not be adopted, is there a second? Second by council member Northwood. Any discussion? Seeing none, please vote. That motion passes unanimously.

Moving on to our next agenda item twenty six zero zero six one resolution amending appendix c fee schedule regarding dumpsters permits under subsection 40 dash thirteen and forty dash one zero six parenthesis 11 of the La Crosse municipal code. Councilmember McKaylo.

Thank you, mayor. I would motion to adopt. And after there's a second, if I could retain the floor, please.

Sounds good. Motion to adopt by councilmember McKaylo, second by councilmember Newberry. Councilmember McKaylo.

Thank you, mayor. There is an amendment on, and I think, hopefully, everyone has seen it, to adjust the fee schedule for downtown businesses within the downtown business district to $75, and I would like to move that amendment.

So there's a there's an a motion for an amendment, second by council member Jansen. Can you just restate that amendment?

It would add to the fee schedule and

Oh, I see it. Adjust fee schedule for $75 for downtown district. Okay. Yes. Thank you. Any discussion? Council member Mendel.

I know the other relevant item to this was in the consent agenda. Can I ask, just for a reminder of the background of why this was brought forward?

Would you like me to call a staff person?

Or the sponsor, whomever you think is

appropriate. Attorney Maddie.

So this legislation and the legislation that's on the consent agenda was requested by, members of the public who indicated that they do not have, space on their property to, have a dumpster or or a place for the trash to be picked up. So they've asked that the city enact an ordinance that allow them to place the trash within the public right of way. So our office was asked to put that together, and that's the that's the legislation that's on the consent agenda. This then establishes a fee. Generally speaking, if somebody were to without this ordinance, if somebody wanted to have a dumpster, they would call up a trash hauler.

That trash hauler would bring out the dumpster. They say, need it for two weeks. They place it on the property. The trash hauler has to pay a fee of $35 a week to the city in order to do that. Now with this ordinance, the owner of the property would make a submit a street privilege permit request to the board of public works. There's a $75 application fee to do that. That's already in the code. That's not in the fee schedule here because it's already there. It applies to anybody who requests a street privilege permit. Then the minimum fee for the requester or the applicant for that, the minimum fee is $75 for a long term street privilege permit, which is ninety days or longer.

That lasts for an entire year. That's the minimum fee is $75. That fee would apply to the owner for that space that would be defined within the public right of way. Then the fee schedule you see here that's right now in front of you, this is the fee schedule that would apply to the hauler. So people have asked me, how do you get $1,820?

You get $1,820 because that's $35 a week, which is the fee you already have in your code times 52 is $1,820. So it establishes exactly the same fee. It's an extrapolation. Now the fee schedule you have on the original legislation also spells out lowering fees depending on the smaller size trash receptacle you have in there, a dumpster or whatever it may be. The idea is the smaller the size, the less of a burden it is on the public and the public right of way.

And you're trying to encourage having smaller size dumpsters within the public right of way. And therefore, that's why you also see within the original legislation that if people share dumpsters, that fee is also halved. That's the basis of the original legislation. That's the basis of the request. That That's what's that's what part of it. The substance of it is already on the consent agenda, and the fee issue is just what's in front of you right now.

Thank you, attorney Maddie.

Any other discussion? Council president Dickinson.

Attorney Maddie, this might be for you before you get back. Do you foresee a lot of different entities requesting to have this long term street privilege,

or is this

designed to meet the needs of those that have confined spaces or challenges with having their trash receptacles?

My understanding is it's not a large group of people. There's not a large class of people, but that's my limited knowledge of the subject matter.

Yep.

Thank you. What if they have more than one type of dumpster because they do different recycling ones or they have different sizes of dumpsters or totes? Will they have fees for each individual need?

Well, what what what ends up happening is if they're trying to put it in the public right away, they would submit an application, and they would spell out specifically whatever their need may be. So, typically, what happens if they need more than one, they spell out specifically what's needed. They have a diagram that shows where exactly it's gonna be placed so that the board of public works can then determine what kind of hazard does it create, what kind of externalities, and then what kind of conditions need to be placed on that because the board of public works has discretion to make those types of decisions and protect the public. So because because of that, people can submit more than one particular container for street privilege permit or any street privilege permit could have more than one specific encumbrance on the right of way.

I have another. Okay.

So will this, bill for this service go through the the person that applies for the permit or and then or through the the person that provides the trash receptacles, I e, the hauler?

Well so if somebody wants to put an encumbrance in the in their public right of way, they have to spell out what that is in an application. That's the $75 fee. And assuming there's not a different enumerated fee within the schedule, like, for example, if somebody tries to put a billboard sign in the public right of way, there's a different fee than the minimum $75 per year. So depending on what it is, they would have that. That's the fee that applies to the owner of the property.

So under the law, under Wisconsin law, 66.0425, the state statute identifies very specific criteria that have to be complied with in order for people to put things in the public right of way. One of the things is that the person who's making the request is a 100% responsible for whatever that is. In this particular case, it's the owner that's saying, I don't have room on my property for this. It's not the trash hauler. The owner holds the permit.

The owner is responsible for placing that in the right of way. It's not the trash hauler. So that person's paying that fee for that space, that application fee. Under your regulations that already existed, if somebody were to ask for a dumpster and they put it on their property, there are fees that are attached as the $35 per week fee that applies to the hauler. So there's still gonna be so the idea is you're not gonna create this ordinance and then the hauler avoids that fee.

That that would create a new problem. So that's why you have the extrapolation. So the short answer to your question is there's a fee that applies to both people, but the fee that applies to the owner is the minimum fee allowed under the ordinance. And the fee in the original legislation to the hauler is the extrapolated exactly same fee that you already have in your code unless people decide to take advantage of the incentives to have smaller encumbrances and to share the fee, share the dumpster or whatever it may be.

And I just wanna clarify something. So the $75 amendment would be the hauler's fee? Yes. Okay. And then another question because this came to me before this meeting. Bins versus dumpsters. There, I guess, seems to be some confusion to some constituents. Like, when they take this permit out for that particular space, if there's a bin, are we making them pay a fee for that, or is it just the dumpsters?

The ordinance that's on the consent agenda spells out specifically and and includes definitions of what's gonna happen in the future. So the exact terms of art that are used in there, there's a definition for a dumpster and a definition for a cart. Those are the official terms of art that are in there. And then the definitions for them, a cart is a wheeled, lidded 65 or 95 gallon container designed for automated collection from a motorized waste hauling vehicle in a dumpster would mean a two for six yard mobile trash container designed for automated collection from a motorized waste hauling vehicle. Thank you.

Alright. Any other discussion? Councilmember Mendel.

This may be for attorney Maddie. This may not be. We've we've gotten some emails with frustration that we are charging an annual fee to anyone with dumpsters. Is it possible that the community doesn't understand this as an optional application?

Right. So if you go back to my original example, if you have a property and you need a dumpster for whatever particular purpose, you call up the hauler. The hauler brings it out to your house. You place it on your property. There is no fee you're paying to the city for that. It's when you say you have no place on your property for that dumpster and you have to place it in the public right of way, therefore creating an encumbrance and a potential liability and public safety issue, that's when the city has to be involved because we're it's our jurisdiction to make sure that the public is protected, and that includes making sure there's not obstruction to the public right of way.

And a follow-up. Where so the downtown is really built out. There's not a lot of, like, frontage that these buildings have. So where are their receptacles currently? On the back alley? Are they on

their property? I don't know the information. I don't know the answer to that one.

Okay. Thank you.

My question will be for you, attorney Betty. Director Gallagher, can you just come and explain what the streets have done with working in partnership with the downtown businesses to move dumpsters? I was looking for, Nick. But

No. I told Nick to stay away. So the recycling coordinator has been working with with the owners and businesses that he could contact to sort of explain that if they can keep it on their private property, that's the best option. There's no charge. If they can share with a neighbor, our code allows shared dumpsters on private property as well.

That's another option they could do. Option three would be if there's a non walkable alley or city parcel where they could place it for free, that's also desirable to putting it in the alley. Alley. That if there is no other option, then they could pursue this route to put it in the alley. My understanding is we're down to a handful, maybe half a dozen places that really just have no place to go and that this could be mechanism for them.

Thank you. That's all. Councilwoman McKaylo.

I don't have a question for anyone. I did talk to Nick Smabie and he was very helpful. He said initially there were between thirty and forty total, businesses that had bins or totes in the alleys. And as we know, downtown has zero lot lines. In the past, this has not been an issue.

What we see on the fee schedule is nothing in the first column because there was no fee. So, what's happening now is we're going from zero fee to an additional fee. And while we heard this is on the hauler for this fee, I think we all know that the fees that the hauler gets will go back to the owners. So the reason for the reduction in this is to make sure that we, as a city, are not creating an undue burden on our small businesses downtown, who I will say are struggling to keep their doors open. It's been a rough time post COVID.

They're trying to come out of it. So whatever this council can do to make sure that we are being the best partners, I'm hoping we can do it. And I recognize and realize there should be a permitting process because the city needs to know who has the dumpster, where the dumpster is. They need to know there's liability insurance on that dumpster. So I agree with the permitting process, but there already is a $75 fee to the owner of property, and this will be an additional fee on the hauler, which will get passed on to the business owner.

So I'm hoping that my council colleagues will understand that we want to be fair to our businesses, but we also need to protect the city with the permitting process. So this, I think, covers administrative costs, and I hope that we don't charge any more than that. The fee that was extrapolated out to the larger fee, if you look in the ordinance, it really is on dumpsters put in the public right away for demolition. And so those are a different type of dumpster rather than an operating business. Thank you.

Councilmember Bedford.

I guess my question here is we have several different fees for different sizes of dumpster, and we have incentives for people to join together. I I don't know how that would then transfer to the downtown district. Are we saying $75 for you know, if you've got a dumpster or if you've got just a tote, same thing across the board for for these areas?

I'll give that direct, question to the amendor. Council member McKayla?

Yes. It's just a straight $75 fee, and it is defined as businesses within that downtown business district.

Does that answer your question?

Yeah. I believe so. Thank you.

Alright. Any other discussion? CNN, please vote. That motion passes 11, yes, and two, no. Alright.

Moving to the original, resolution as amended. No other discussion. Please vote. And that motion passes 12 yes, one no. Next agenda item twenty six zero zero eight five, an ordinance to amend subsection one fifteen dash one ten of the code of ordinance of the city of La Crosse by transferring certain property from the commercial to the planned development district, specific allowing for a mix of uses, including commercial, retail, and office spaces, a recycling facility, and future construction of approximately five apartment units and a building for a retail or food establishment establishment at 4329 East Avenue South, 434243444348, And 4354 Mormon Cooley Road.

Motion to adopt by council member Charles, second by council member Jansen. Any discussion? Seeing none, please vote. And that motion passes. 12 yes, 11 no.

I'm sorry. 12 yes and one no. Moving on to items recommended to be adopted. Excuse me. Twenty five one two six five, amended resolution providing course of action to the Wisconsin Department of Transportation with respect to alternatives for USH 53 corridor study from King Street to Lacrosse Street. Motion to adopt by council member Podeski. Is there a second? Second by council member Northwood. Any discussion? Council member Sleziko.

Thank you, mayor. There is an amendment, on Legistar to this resolution. And if it's okay, I will go ahead and just read the amendment. I did not pass the copy out to everyone. Added to the resolution as presented, another whereas at the 11/13/2025 common council meeting of the common council, the common council referred the decision of U.

S. Highway 53 alternatives for ninety days requested via resolution 20 five-fourteen-seventy one that the Wisconsin Department of Transportation develop project alternatives for the Highway 53 corridor study that maintain on street parking and add bicycle facilities. And whereas Wistot presented a hybrid alternative at the 01/08/2026 common council meeting that would meet their requirements while allowing the inclusion of bike lanes on 3rd And 4th Streets from Vine Street to La Crosse Street with minimal parking loss and whereas and I added all three alternatives, so this is adding one more alternative to the resolution as originally presented. Whereas hybrid alternative or in parentheses alternative three keep on street parking on two sides of the street, south of Vine Street, parking lanes are funded 100% by the City of La Crosse, add raised bike lanes from Vine Street to La Crosse Street. Left side parking is already restricted, and most of this three block section results in only six to seven lost parking stalls adjacent to the large surface surface lot, and bike lanes on Vine Street connect to the 2nd Street cycle track.

And whereas I am asking that this hybrid alternative, alternative three be the one that is selected. And I did have some justifications here. We did have that 90 referral. WSDOT did come forward the alternative at the common council meeting. Again, these bike lanes would intersect bike infrastructure already on Vine Street if they are brought down from La Crosse to Vine, allowing more direct connection to the 2nd Street cycle track.

And again, only six or seven parking spaces would be removed on 3rd Street adjacent to the old La Crosse Tribune site. The advantage is there would be direct bicycle infrastructure connection between Highway 53 North of La Crosse Street and the 2nd Street cycle track. These bicycle lanes on 3rd And 4th Streets between La Crosse Street and Vine Street would bring cyclists two blocks closer to downtown. It does not remove parking on 3rd And 4th Streets south of Vine Street. It is a compromise that improves bicycle infrastructure and cyclist access to the downtown area for a project that once completed will will not be revisited for decades.

And I urge council members to adopt this hybrid alternative. It is a compromise, and I know how much it is meant to businesses to try to keep the parking on 3rd And 4th Street. Again, this removes very little parking. It adds that infrastructure to allow a much smoother access to the 2nd Street cycle track and moving north on Highway 53. So I think it is a very worthwhile compromise, and I hope my fellow council members will move to adopt this.

Is that so a motion to amend made by council member Slazako, second by council member Troves. Council member Podeski.

Thank you, your honor. I will vote against the amendment just for two things that were brought up at j and a by council member Weston that I had forgotten about. One was we were at the trade meeting. We met with all the different trade unions. They stressed to us the importance of them having clear paths to get in and out of businesses to do their work. And the second thing is that nobody had thought of, Council Member Weston is what's gonna go into the Tribune Building there and how would this affect them. So, I will be voting against this. Thank you.

Council member Mendell.

Thank you, mayor. May I ask questions of the DOT?

Yes. It's Michelle. Oh, hey, Michelle. Michelle and Michael.

I saw you up there on the Zoom link ready to share your your screen. I appreciate that. Could you pull up alternative three, the hybrid option? I'll ask you a question while you do that. So this amendment, the legislation that came before us was only considering alternative one and two.

So the amendment that council member Slesniko put forward, gives us the ability to also consider the hybrid option, which you all created for us after the public was not satisfied with the the options. One of the concerns I'm hearing from the public is that they think the hybrid option, and if you could go back one slide because the visual, I think, is creating concern. I've had folks reach out to me saying that the hybrid option gives us a roundabout. Is the roundabout going to happen in any of the alternatives?

Yeah, the roundabout is separate from this decision. So the roundabout is planned regardless of what is decided here.

Okay. And maybe just for some context, so when we had the public meeting back in July when we presented full range of alternatives, we got feedback on the roundabout and through our process and our screening, that was selected as the preferred intersection type at that. So that was done through that public involvement process last year.

Thank you. And my sense was that since the visual was further south, that the roundabout was just not in view. And so now that people see roundabout all of sudden, they're concerned since that's a pretty busy intersection. Can you speak to the concern of construction workers accessing businesses or crossing streets? Certainly, this is not, like, the only example of infrastructure where utility vehicles need to pass. So if you could speak to that a little bit.

Yeah. Listen, This might be for you also,

I think, in terms of It could be Matt. Yeah. I think I'll I'll just state I think the concern is, like, we have semis downtown unloading that will take up one side of the street like they already do or if they'll be in parking lanes. So just wondering from the DOT standpoint if that's and if you do not have the answer,

I

will graciously invite director Gallagher up to to answer that.

Yeah. Think, like, the larger construction permitting process is probably something, like, how the city typically handles that within the right of way and and needs. And I think, like, for a traditional construction project, you think of how you create an alternate route for the sidewalk if you need to close it or something. So I think that's the type of opportunity that would be there for those types of situations.

Sure. And if I could just clarify, like, I think it's not necessarily, like, even it could be demolition of the Tribune Building and how we're, like, they're gonna traverse the area and park their vehicles so that they can work on the project. But I think it's also concern of how the bike lanes, which won't actually be downtown in the commercial area. Right? How could everyday vehicles be accessing businesses? Like, this plan won't actually impact that because alternative three is further down outside of the commercial core. Am I understanding that right?

So, I guess the alternative three is really a combination of one and two. We're just kind of changing the extents of those. Right? So initially, we were looking at this this section, King Street to La Crosse Street, and we were looking at this as as one contiguous section. We're gonna have one alternative here.

So and those options were one or two. So this hybrid option is just a combination of those two and just changing the limits of them. So it's effectively alternative two from King Street to Vine Street. No bike lanes, keeping the parking on both sides of the street, and alternative one from Vine Street to La Crosse Street. So we're as you can see in this picture, we're not actually removing parking on the left side of the road because where you see those red lines up there, there is no parking today.

So we're only we would only have to remove those six to seven spots that are just South of Badger on the side of on the left side of the road there of 3rd Street, which are adjacent to that lot. So right now, to implement the bike lanes from Vine Street to La Crosse Street, we're not actually losing parking. We just are utilizing that space that's right now kinda looking like an extra wide lane on the left side of the road. We could kinda shift that travel lane over a little bit to give room for that bike lane. So you'd still have parking on the right side of the road, though.

Okay. Got it. That's helpful. Instead of having director Gallagher come up and scoot you guys out of the way, I'll just wait to ask that question in case other colleagues may want to address you.

K. Council member Slazako. That's fine. Council member Slazako.

Thank you, mayor. I think to address the concern about trades folks having parking, my assumption is there would be space with this process, parking space, whatever, which would already be at that building. I can't imagine that the footprint for any development is going to take up all of that. There would be parking for this development. So my thought is in knowing that that area for parking could be used by tradespeople while they're working, I'm not sure how much.

There there could be some influence if larger vehicles are coming in, but we have that anywhere in the city. We had that across from the libraries with the development that's going on there now. So I'm not I'm not sure that that is truly a a real strong argument to say that because of that, we can't do this project. I think things could be worked around so that there is parking available for folks that need it in a development like this.

Thank you. Before I go to you, council member Budeski, are you gonna ask questions to the DLT? No. Okay. Are there any other questions for the DLT? Alright. See that. You gotta

I guess my my one question, and this is kinda just for the record, are there any other bike lanes in Wisconsin that are also on a highway?

Are you asking specifically these sidewalk level bike lanes? Yeah. So there are certainly sidewalk level protected bike lanes in Wisconsin. There are not other ones on state routes, so these are the first ones on state routes. But I think this is, as we said before, a really good example of a state route that is urban area, and so that context matters, and so that's why we feel that this could be a good fit to have the sidewalk level bike lanes, to have a protected facility away from the vehicles but in this urban setting.

Okay. Thank you.

Alright. Thank you all. I'm gonna let you all have, you know, seat. Appreciate you. Councilmember Podeski.

Thank you, your honor. I am being misunderstood. What it is, it's not parking for them to do the work per se on a bigger construction. It's if they pull up in front of, say, Big Al's and they have equipment, and they're not stepping over a raised platform and tripping to go in and out of the building or if they have a handcart with, say, a welding machine that they don't have to go down to the corner to go up on a ramp. They could go to straight out of their truck to the curb and pull it up.

And, it would be for people with disabilities If they're in a wheelchair or something or have trouble navigating, they can just get out of the car, and they're right there, and they're not stepping over a raised curb on the bike lane to the curb to get in. So I wasn't talking a bigger construction project per se that they had a place to park. I'm talking the convenience to being able to do their job in front of a downtown business. Councilmember Mendel.

If I may, mayor, ask director Gallagher a question? Thank you. Thank you, director Gallagher. Could you speak to the concern about

non,

commuter vehicles, I would say? So, like, industrial vehicles, service vehicles, semis, parking to deliver food, beverage, things like that. Maybe how that's addressed now versus how it would be should we have protected bike lanes, which, again, I under this proposal, my understanding is they wouldn't be in the commercial core, but I could be wrong.

Could you maybe rephrase that? I'm not quite sure. You talked about

So right now Yeah. Let's say downtown. When a delivery truck goes downtown to deliver the items that that business needs, how do they how do we like, what are the standards that they have to abide by? Certainly, we've all seen, like, a semi parked in one of the lanes, and we have to go around them because they're delivering things, and there's nowhere for them to park. But I guess I'm just wondering, like, is the hybrid option really going to make that worse, or is it just gonna stay the same?

Two thoughts. I think the question you asked before might be a little easier to ask answer. But with this question, I I think it's really a a police enforcement issue. If somebody is pulling alongside to service a business with a delivery, they either have to lawfully park in a parking area or else they'd be illegally blocking a traffic lane. That's not permitted by law anyway. To the idea of tradespeople accessing businesses. The council, in its wisdom, already enacted a permit that allows tradespeople, when they have a building permit, to reserve spots in front of a place. But that would require legal parking space anyway. So I believe the point the DOT was making was that if there's no parking anyway, there's no loss.

Yeah. Then

my brain says that it would be the same with alternative three because there is no loss of parking.

Well, whatever number they gave you. Six or seven spots or whatever.

Six or seven spots. Yeah. Outside of the delivery sort of area. Okay. Last question. I appreciate the time. Can you speak to the raised bike lanes and traversing those? I know there's certain white cane laws. And you know, speaking to, like, is it a tripping hazard for Well, our

our streets are all already curved. Right? That's our standard. So if a raised bike lane goes in, it's gonna be on something that's the same or lesser in height. It's gonna be no different than stepping over or pulling a dolly or a piece of machinery over a curb that already exists now.

Okay. Thank you.

Thank you, director Gallagher. Councilmember McKayla.

Thank you, Mayor. I appreciate the DOT giving us a hybrid option. And I also appreciate Councilmember Slesnikow putting this forward. As most of you know, this is my district, and there's been a lot of conversations about bike lanes. I think making the connection safer to the second street cycle track, and then having those bikes not on 3rd And 4th is what we want.

So, I appreciate the DOT coming up with this very modest hybrid plan. And regarding parking spaces lost, I just walked down 3rd And 4th today. There currently aren't any businesses that don't already have a lot of parking there. So it's a minimal impact to any businesses that are existing. It's mostly the courthouse that's there.

So I do support this as a representative downtown, and I think this is the council listening to the downtown business owners who said taking away parking along the entire 3rd And 4th Street may not have been good for their businesses. But it's also listening to the biking community that says they need connections in our biking infrastructure. And so I appreciate that.

Councilmember Weston.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I appreciate the context about what's legal and where vehicles are dropping off and things like that. And and I myself have found myself stuck on 2nd Street because I can't get around a vehicle. And so while I there are enforcement mechanisms that also requires our esteemed police force to be there to enforce.

I do while I appreciate that the third option has this, like, overhead bird's eye view of here's how the bike lanes work, But that's not how people that's not how I think when I'm driving, when I'm biking. I'm looking straight ahead. To be quite frank, the city is full of lots of bike lanes that seem to just randomly end, and that is a frustration. I've gotten numerous phone calls about that. We do have this 2nd Street cycle track that is accessible in multiple venues, multiple ways.

If I was starting from scratch as I design downtown La Crosse, I would start with bike lanes. We can have them. But we are trying to retrofit streets that were designed for trolleys that we've already retrofitted. And so while I generally support bike lanes, I also don't believe we need bike lanes on every single street. And I simply the busyness of 3rd And 4th Street is not not a place where I would like to also add bike lanes. And so I will not vote for any resolution that includes bike lanes even from La Crosse Street to Vine.

Thank you. Before I go to councilmember because this should be your second time, councilmember Newberry.

Thank you, mister mayor. I just had a a quick comment. I don't know if we have anybody here from the county courthouse. I assume that we don't. But the I just wanted to point out that there is a parking lot for the courthouse immediately behind the courthouse.

There's also a a parking garage a block away where once upon a time, I worked at the county. I know that the county contracted with the city to reserve spots for some of their parking for staff at the health department there, which is across the street on 4th and the the courthouse as well, that that was one of the options. So I'm just going to assume that that's probably still true. And if it's not, it's always still an option. So just that the parking of losing six spots wouldn't affect the courthouse is wouldn't be that disruptive. That's the only thing I

wanted to say as a comment. Thank you. Thank you. Are there any other speakers? Alright. Councilmember Madhu? Oh, sorry. Councilmember Janza?

So I don't support adding the bike lanes in that and using that hybrid option. I think there have been some changes to the county parking lot as far as some restrictions of who can park there. So I don't know how that is going to impact things. But I think it's important to have some consistency, and so that people can predict where the bicycles might be going. And so by just having them there for a short time just seems really a bit confusing. And I think we want to encourage people to use the cycle track and the new bike lanes on sixth. So for that reason, I won't support the hybrid.

Any other speakers? Alright. Councilmember Medell. I'm out here waiting.

Thank you, mayor, for anyone watching. We have a rule. You can't talk more than three times, so I'm being appropriately held. I first want to just acknowledge that the public has really weighed in on all sides, the businesses. When this was first brought forward, as my vote suggested, I was fully prepared to vote for alternative one because I believe that improving pedestrian and bicycle infrastructure will bring more business.

And I appreciated my colleague's suggestion to refer so that we could really be sure we are making the right decision. And for the most part, I think the the opposition specifically from businesses was really reasonable. Like, I don't think my kid would wanna carry a saxophone from the parking ramp to light holds. Like, I totally understand, those reasons, and so I'm extremely grateful to the DOT for putting their heads together and really thinking of an innovative solution. Obviously, I'm I'm gonna support the hybrid option, But I I just wanna share, you know, as a longtime downtown user, a lover of the downtown, I appreciate the fierce love our district downtown district council member has for the downtown.

I lived in the downtown for many years. And so it means a great deal to me that we keep revitalizing this space. This afternoon, as a single car family, I decided that instead of seeing my children for ten minutes and getting them to scream that I was gonna leave again, I rode the bus downtown. And I know that's, like, really relatable. Right?

I rode the bus downtown, and instead of taking the Grand River Station bus to, City Hall, I decided to walk it so that I could, just for the last time before this boat, experience the downtown on two feet. So we all know it's very different than when it's in a car. And I've driven downtown, through downtown many times. And when I was walking downtown, I really felt drawn and closer to the businesses, the business community, had a a big sense of pride. I wanted to spend money downtown.

I wanted to see those businesses open. And so that's one of the big reasons I support this infrastructure because we want to have connected bike ped paths so that everybody can can go downtown and want to be downtown and be proud of that. And I'm proud of this option that it preserves bike lanes on both sides and creates an opportunity for bike and ped, supporters to get downtown easier as well. So thank you.

Thank you. Councilmember Goggin.

Thank you, mayor. I just, will not be supporting the amendment and simply for the reason that thousands of residents, taxpayers, users have weighed in on this. We have reached a crescendo of people saying no to this. So as much as we try to turn ourselves into pretzels to make it work, the the community is speaking out loudly and saying no. So I don't know why we keep talking about it, but I want La Crosse residents and users to know that we saw everything they're saying on emails, in, petitions, in letters, in phone calls, stopping us out and about.

We just have to listen to the public.

Thank you. Seeing no other speakers, please vote on the amendment. And that motion passes. Seven yes and six nos. So we will vote on the resolution as amended. Correct? Alright. Alright. Seeing no other discussion, please vote.

Sorry. Can I do a point of order? So a yay vote for this is to also approve option three just for clarification. Yes.

Thank you. Okay.

Alright. And that motion passes. 10 yes and three no. So we can safely say to DOT that we have voted for alternative three, the hybrid model. Alright. And I just wanna say thank you all very much, for taking the time out to hear our citizens and our council members and to go back to the drawing board. I know, you all had a very, like, certain timeline. And so to just kinda deviate from that a little bit to help us out, we greatly appreciate that. So thank you all very much. Alright.

Now I gotta remember where I'm at. Okay. Moving to our next agenda item, twenty six zero zero five eight. An ordinance to create chapter six article one section 20 of the code of ordinance of the city of La Crosse regarding harassment of service animals. Motion to adopt by council member Northwood, second by council member Slesnico.

Any discussion? Seeing Seeing none, please vote. And that motion passes to l v s one. No. Next item twenty six zero zero seven one, an amended charter ordinance to create section 20 of appendix a of the code of ordinance of the city of La Crosse creating the position duties and responsibilities of the office of the city administrator and removing duties from the mayor.

Is this the new the motion to adopt and second is that for this? Okay. Motion to adopt by council member Troll, second by council member Northwood. Council Celeste Nicole.

Thank you, mayor. I actually have two sets of amendments, and I will bring forward the first one. I had double checked with, our clerk Nikki Ellison and said that I could go ahead and bring these amendments within the document all as one group of amendments. So I will go ahead and and do that. So the first set on, one thing here, on item C in the charter ordinance, I wanted to add that the administrator shall be evaluated by the common council and mayor using performance metrics established jointly by and adding the words, the director of human resources council and mayor.

That is the first one that I had. In number six, under roles of the administrator powers, serve as the city's public information officer or designate a department head, and I'm adding or city staff person to serve in this capacity. So it would add the additional option of appointing a city staff person to be the public information officer instead of only department chair. Under the role of the mayor, item two, set strategic vision and policy priorities for the city. I have added with collaboration from the common council.

I have amendments. One thing I will not mention for this one, Nikki, I'm not quite sure because I'm actually, my second amendment actually contradicts the one that I have on this. Should I put it forward as such and then the other amendment will supersede that? It's actually for the instruction for an acting city administrator.

So you're

not going to include that in your current motion?

Okay. Yes. Because I have another motion that's different than that. Will not

Tell me again what section that is.

That is section six, transition and acting administrator. And that's letter A. But for letter B, I do have upon the effective date of this ordinance, the city shall immediately initiate a transparent professional search for a permanent city administrator. The search process should include the participation again, adding by the director of human resources, mayor and one or more council members. And my last amendment is section seven has been added for retroactivity with the current term of the mayor.

Because of state statute, the council cannot change benefits of the mayor during their current term. So this is really unnecessary. So I am asking that be stricken. And that's the extent of my inclusions for this amendment.

So there's a motion to amend on the floor. Is there any discussion? Seeing none, please vote. And that motion passes 12 to one. You said you had another

Point of order, mayor.

Yes.

Do we want to have discussion on the charter ordinance before we're amending, or do we wait until after all the amendments are up before we have discussion?

It's my understanding as people start speaking. So, look. Because, council member Stasnikov was the first one to push the button that we just went with his amendment. But yep. So we're back to the original resolution as amended with the first set of council member amendments.

We already voted on the amendment and it passed. Yeah, you have the floor.

Thank you, Mayor. I do have one more amendment and this is under also section six transition and acting administrator. This would cross off A all the way through section F, would eliminate that section about an acting city administrator and add A, the office of city administrator is created effective December '2, upon the appointment and qualification of a city administrator by the common council, including without limitation the execution of a valid employee contract with the first date of employment in 2027, whereas whichever occurs first, it is the explicit purpose of the charter ordinance that the office of mayor shall continue with all statutory roles, responsibilities, and duties until the office of city administrator is created as provided. And if I might just add context to this amendment. The reason for the amendment as such is so that the enacting city administrator would not be necessary.

The mayor would still have duties through 12/31/2027 or earlier if a enacting if a city administrator candidate is found, approved, the contract is negotiated and approved by council whereupon if that person is hired and approved by council, the office of city administrator would be created and the duties of the mayor would be transferred over to the city administrator. So this is a way to do that without having to do an acting city administrator do a search for that. It is do appreciate the help of attorney Matti in working with the language here to try to make this work and provide flexibility.

Councilmember Janssen.

I would appreciate, Attorney Matti just weighing in on, the legality of all of this.

Attorney Matti.

So I drafted this. Sorry. Hold on, attorney.

Yes. So the motion was made by council member Staziko and second by council member Weston.

Okay.

So I drafted this language at the request of the council member. So what we talked about last week, there was an attempt to amend section five. That's what you cannot change. That's defined by state statute. But what you're doing here is you're still if you accept this amendment and you decide to adopt this charter ordinance, then what would happen is after its passage in publication, there would be a sixty day time period where people could try and get a referendum.

If no referendum occurs, then it becomes effective after sixty days. The legislation then says the office would be created on whichever of those two conditions occur first, either the date specific in December or upon that flexible date after that search function occurs. That gets to the spirit, I believe, of what was the the concept communicated last week, but and it also preserves the the compliance with the state statute that I had identified last week as well. Does that make sense?

Councilmember Newberry.

Thank you, mister mayor. Attorney Matty, thank you for your help with all of this. I just want some clarification because I have a competing amendment to this exact thing and I just want to try to figure out what the differences are other than the date. Is that something that you can

do? Sure.

Yeah. Thank

you. So as I understand it, the amendment that's in Legistar drafted for you, which is substantially similar to this one, has a date specific of 03/01/2027. After that was after council members saw that, the question then was posed to me, what if what happens if, for example, the administrator can't be hired until August? And then we were back to that situation of, okay, well then on March 1, the position is created and you now have that vacuum between March and August under the example that was given. And I believe what was the intent was to try and add the flexibility that was conveyed last week so that that issue would not be there.

Okay. Thank you. I'm in support of this just for everybody's knowledge. I think

my concern that I just want to say out loud is that by putting this date through 12/30/2027 that we might be encouraged to wait that long to do it, and that's not what I want. But, otherwise, I I think the language is fine. I just wanted to communicate my support. Thanks.

Attorney Mehdi, can I ask you a question? Because I'm just curious. What if the mayor declines to serve in this role?

The office of the administrator is not created so you would still have your statutory duties until that office is created. Alright.

Thank you. Any other questions? Alright. Seeing none, please vote on the amendment. Thank you, attorney Matti.

That motion passes 11 yes and two no. Now we're back to the original charter ordinance. Council member Weston.

Thank you, mister mister mayor. I also have two proposed amendments. Clerk Ellson, should I can I do them together? Should I separate them together? Okay.

So two amendments. The first, and I have shared this y'all paper in front of you, the first is to section one f two, and this is about clarifying administrator authority. And so the proposed amendment is to change this to manage the recruitment and selection process for department head positions, recommended candidates to the appropriate appointing authority as specified in applicable charter ordinances, and supervise, evaluate, and discipline department heads and all subordinate officers and employees in such departments in collaboration with human resources consistent with the statutes of the state of Wisconsin city charter ordinances, city policies recommend removal of department heads to the appropriate authority. That is the first amendment. The second is in section four, and it's, again, about clarify who to clarify who manages the search and, to reflect the recommendation from WCMA.

The proposed amendment is the search process shall be managed by the city's human resource department or an executive search firm as determined by the common council and shall include participation up by the mayor and the subcommittee of the common council in the preliminary screening before bringing finalists to the entire council for interviews. The search process shall be conducted in accordance with the best practices for municipal executive recruitment. This language is, recommended by the WCMA. It is not my language.

So there's amendment made by council member Weston, second by council member Trost. Council member Gagan, are you speaking no. You're speaking in general. Are you speaking to this?

I'd like to bring, director Frans into the mic for this.

Okay. Director Fransen.

Hello. Thank you for stepping up. On the First Amendment, on the new proposed language, do you agree with that language?

I think as long as it has the collaboration of human resources in there, I'm satisfied with that. Do you think

it wise that, we have a city administrator that would be taking all subordinate officers and employees in such departments in collaboration. They would discipline the employees of the city and take the department heads out of the equation?

I would respectfully ask that department heads are allowed to manage their staff in collaboration with human resources to ensure that we're not circumventing any policies or procedures. And really the department heads will be the ones who are working day in and day out with those staff. So my recommendation would be that that authority is left with the department heads in collaboration with human resources and

the city administrator. So would you want us to keep the current language that manage the recruitment and selection process for department heads, department head positions, recommend candidates to the appropriate appointing authority as specified in applicable charter ordinances, supervise evaluate and discipline department heads consistent with the statutes of the state of Wisconsin, city charter ordinances, city policies, and recommend the removal of the department heads to the appropriate authority. Leave it as is.

I think that section is fine because it aligns with state statute. Thank you.

Councilmember Johnson.

It appeared that Attorney Matti had some things that he'd like to offer, so I'd like to invite him up to give his perspective.

It just kinda touched on the same language that was in there. The language of the w c the WCMA, the language in the amendment is the language that the WCMA had asked for. And that language is problematic because what it does is it can create problems with a chain of command. So, for example, if you have an administrator that is then gonna be evaluating and supervising all the subordinates that I have or any other department has, then it begs the question, is administrator an attorney? Are they able to effectively evaluate my employees?

And actually, that is a problem that this council in this city specifically dealt with about ten years ago and at great cost to the city and with litigation tied to that. The same question would then apply to other departments. Like, if you don't if you have an administrator who's not an engineer, can they really effectively supervise and evaluate an engineer? It also begs the question too of if you if it says that an administrator is then going to evaluate those employees, what happens when I tell one of my subordinates, you need to go do project a b c? That person's gonna say, I'd rather go work on x y z, which is what the administrator said.

Oh, by the way, that person's the one who actually supervises me, does my evaluation. I really don't have to follow that chain of command. So the problem goes back to what the WCMA wrote. So I went back and read that letter. They had made three recommendations. One of the recommendations was that they wanted the administrator to be involved in the emergency operations. Okay. Then they had identified that that doesn't have to be in the charter ordinance. They made two other recommendations. This is one of them.

And the other one was they actually wanted language to say that the administrator also hires the subordinates, and they also wanted language to say the administrator also appoints the police chief, fire chief, and library director as well too. Now the problem with that and that entire letter, quite frankly, does not instill any confidence in me and I think a lot of my colleagues because it does if this is the organization that trains and brings the administrators, that just shows they don't understand the basic municipal governance. The administrator cannot appoint a a police chief and a fire chief. That's contrary to state law. That cannot be changed.

Same thing with police police officers, firefighters. They cannot change that. Administrator cannot do that even though this organization is advocating for that. Choosing court personnel, that's a decision of the municipal judge. Comptroller gets to choose subordinates. The city clerk gets to choose subordinates. The city attorney also gets to choose subordinates. So, again, looking at that, that does not instill a lot of confidence that this is what's gonna happen. I sit and worry, quite frankly, if that's what the administrator's gonna be coming in. I'm gonna spend all my time trying to make sure that that person's not stepping in line landmines. So I that's why I was wanted to speak about that very specific part of that and how it relates to the WCMA letter.

Thank you, attorney Matti. Councilmember Bedford.

Hey. I think this would be for head of HR, so I apologize for making you get some more steps in today. When I read this, I wasn't quite sure of the interpretation. One of the things that I have had some experience in is when you need to escalate in certain issues, it would make sense to me that city administrator would kind of be in the line for those escalations. So at first, I thought maybe that was what that was kinda talking about.

And I guess I that's something I would be okay with. I'm wondering if they would already be involved in those escalations or if you would need, like, extra language for that, And that's kind of my question.

Could you clarify more what you mean by escalations?

So if there is, let's say, an issue where a department head is dealing with a subordinate, but there is a counterclaim against the department head. And so you wouldn't want it to necessarily have that conflict of interest. You might wanna escalate that above the department head level. In that case, it would make sense to me for the city administrator to step in, not necessarily in every single case, but in, like, an exceptional case. And I'm wondering if that is already something that would seem to be in place or if if it's kind of more of this all or nothing look that it appears to be written as here.

I think that's a very loaded question and I'm trying to kind of filter through how to respond to that. I would say if there's an issue at a department head level, although they are my peers, I do believe that HR can assist with those situations with the training and education that were provided as professionals. So I think it is important that the city administrator would have some sort of collaboration with human resources to ensure that they're following applicable employment laws, that they're if they have a vested interest or potential bias, that we are also helping them work through that. So I think it's important to still delineate that human resources would be involved in those functions. It's not necessarily, a request to strip away that ability for the city administrator to assist with that.

It's really looking to have a collaborative partnership to make sure that we're covering all bases and protecting any liability of the city.

So in your opinion then, would you say that the city administrator position in kind of its daily workings with HR would already be somewhat involved but not directly responsible for, these issues anyways?

Correct. I would, hypothetically speaking, if we had a city administrator today, I would treat that relationship very similar to how I treat my relationship with our mayor where I'm keeping him abreast any of those issues that are going on. But really the primary, duties are still lying within the human resources department and we're making sure that we handle those, but the awareness is always there.

Thank you very much. That's clarified things for me a lot.

Councilmember Goggin.

I'm wondering if any other department heads would like to step to the mic for me. Jackie, I can see you. How about you? Jackie Greshner.

Is this in regards to the amendment?

Yes. It is. Okay. How would this proposed amendment, taking away your ability to discipline your subordinates and coach them and review them in general, how would that hurt or help IT? I would have

to mirror exactly what Director Matti and Director Fransen said. I do believe that that authority should still sit with the department head. Thank you. Director Odegaard?

Same question?

Yeah. I mean, I would I would fall in line also with the three directors previous to me. I think anytime and director Franzen probably said it best. The HR director is a vital component to helping a director if they need to discipline staff. And if that escalates, as council member Bedford said, that's the training that our HR director and staff have. So I feel very confident that they do a good job now and will in the future.

Can I just ask one follow-up to that? I should have asked director Greshner as well, but she can always come back up if she wanted to. How do you think that if this went through like this, how do you think it would affect the morale of the folks working for the department heads?

I would agree with director Matti in the fact that it's it's gonna create some issues as far as having two authorities that you answer to. But, again, I think that's gonna be the same issue with having two authorities, whether it's mayor and a city administrator. So that's my take on that. Thank you.

Thank you.

Councilmember Newberry. Director Franson.

Hello. Thank you. I just want to read the portion of the letter that's speaking specifically about this from WCMA and then ask you about the intent and just for some clarification. So the third area of the is this is in regard to city staff. The ordinance says the city administrator shall hire, evaluate, discipline, and remove department heads, the the original draft.

It would be clear for staff members and human resources if it were to say hire, evaluate, discipline and remove department heads and all subordinate officers and employees in such departments with the intent being this would make it clear that the city administrator is responsible for implementing a consistent city culture and employee hiring and discipline and not leaving it to individual department directors to have their own cultural norms. Is that a concern that is that we have, that you have as an HR director of of having individual cultural norms that the engineering department has ran differently than the the parts department, etcetera?

Well, I see this as two separate things. I see that, yes, I think each department does have a certain way. We're each individual leaders who are very skilled in our areas. And so I think, yes, we do all have individual ways in which we manage our staff. But the reason we want human resources involved, the consistency that we provide with policies and procedures is something that I hold all of our department departments accountable to. Will a city administrator create some sort of different culture within the city? Yes. But I think it's very hard to ask every single department to assimilate to the same culture. I think what what we all bring and the knowledge set that we bring works differently amongst our departments. However, as a group of department heads, I think we have worked very well together, and I think that there is consistency consistency amongst amongst that. That.

Thank you. So I I'm just trying to understand the the the pushback just so that I understand it. The the concern is that there would be a second like, an additional layer above the chain of command that would that could come in and and and get rid of any individual staff member superseding that what the department has wishes. Is that's that's what we're talking about right here. Right?

Well, I think the issue is that it's potentially taking that ability away from the department head to make those decisions for their department by having a city administrator that could come in and supersede that the vision, the culture, and the department that that department head has built. I think it's, taking that ability away.

Okay. Thank and my last question for you then is is can you do that?

I have the authority to make that recommendation. I don't believe I would ever go over a department an a fellow department head and make that decision for them. I think that that turns into a really poor workplace culture.

Okay. Thank you. Council member Bedford.

Hi. This is gonna be for you again. I'm pretty satisfied that what you already have in place is already pretty standard for what it is and would be bringing in the city administrator when necessary. And so my question here is actually on the second portion of this amendment where we're talking about the, transition and acting administrator portion. I'm looking here at the changes that we already adopted from council member Slesnikos in the same and what is proposed here.

I'm gonna just read them both out to you and then highlight some of the parts. So the search process shall include participation by the director of human resources, mayor, and one or more council members and shall be conducted in accordance with the best practices for municipal executive recruitment. So that is as is currently adopted. Here, we have the search process shall be managed by the city's human resource department or an executive search firm as determined

by order. I'm sorry. Hold on. We gotta talk about this particular amendment.

This is the particular amendment. This amendment was for both of them. Am I misunderstanding that correctly that they were both put up at the same time in this amendment? Yes.

Okay. Help me out. I was like, what's alright. Just continue. Okay.

The search process shall be managed by the city's human resource department or an executive search form as determined by the common council and shall include participation by the mayor and a subcommittee of the common council in the preliminary screening before bringing finalists to the entire council for interviews. The search process shall be conducted in accordance with best practices for municipal executive recruitment. What I'm seeing here, I think, is some of the things that you've already talked about that would kind of be under that best practices. And I think for me, the biggest thing here is the finalists coming before the entire council for review. If we don't put that into the charter, do you think that there is a honest chance of in the future as hiring a city administrator without that step?

Or is that something that, we should take an interest in putting down in this ordinance in your opinion?

In my opinion, I do think that the involvement of the entire council would be the most productive way to, select a city administrator. I think there needs to be a consistent message with that. So I would recommend that we have, or if there's a different subcommittee that would be more appropriate that consisted of council members such as the executive committee. But, I think, the more collaboration and the more feedback from our council members on that selected individual would be best. Okay. Thank you very much.

I don't know how I would want to go about this in particular. I am not for most of what is in here. I do think that getting in the bit here about bringing finalists to the entire council for interviews is important. I'd like to, I suppose, divide the question and then offer an amendment to the second portion?

Okay. Hold on. Okay. How are you wanting to divide? You wanted to divide the two the amendments and handle them separately?

Yes. Would like to divide the two, amendments here so that we can vote on them separately. And then when we get to the section four, I would like to offer an amendment to the amendment. Alright. Or sorry. Section six. Not section four.

There

we go. Section six. Okay. So then we will go to the first motion, section f, number two. We have to vote to divide. Oh, alright. Voting to divide. It's gonna be a fun night. Any discuss council member Northwood, are you commenting on the divide? Okay.

I'd actually like to ask for a point of privilege when it makes sense.

Okay. I got you. Alright. Thank you. Alright. So, we're voting on the motion to divide. Please vote. And that motion passes with 12 yes and one no. Alright. So we're going to vote first on section f two, as yeah. Speak to you yes. You can speak to it. Sorry.

Thank you, mister mayor. I do want to I hear the strong sentiment from directors, and I appreciate the healthy conversation. I I also trust our directors. This is a for me, entering this was an opportunity to talk about a recommendation from the WCMA. And so as we have reviewed many of their recommendations, I hear attorney Maddie say that this isn't a good option too. And so I just wanna put it out there that I I this is not something that I feel strongly we have to do, but it was recommended by a body that knows some things. And so that's why it's on the floor.

Alright. Seeing no other discussion, we are voting on the first amendment of section f two. Please vote. And that motion fails one yes and 12 no. Alright.

And now we're moving to section six. Correct? Section. I was like, look.

Okay. I didn't mean that. Yeah. It's right.

So section six letter b. I almost said number. Letter b. Any other discussion? Council member Bedford.

I would like to make a motion to amend, to use the language of council members Lesnikos and the language here. I'm gonna go ahead and read off what that language would be. And this is for section four subsection b. Upon the effective date of this ordinance, the city shall immediately initiate a transparent professional search for a permanent city administrator. The search process shall include participation by the director of human resources, mayor, and then here, I'm going to the language by council member Weston and a subcommittee of the common council in the preliminary screening before bringing finalists to the entire council for interviews.

The search shall be conducted in accordance with the best practices for municipal executive recruitment.

I have a question. Sorry. Point of clarification. Oh, alright. And council member amendment, that was already in there. Correct? So then when we just vote no or something? I don't know.

This Lesnico amendment was adopted. Yes. What I'm hearing is that council member Bedford's proposal, her amendment is combining, Sleznikov's amendment and a portion of the proposed Weston amendment. So this would require a separate amendment as is being proposed.

Alright. Thank you.

And just to to clarify, I'm taking the one or more common council members from Sleznikos out, and that is replaced with a subcommittee of the common council and then also including the, for the preliminary screening and also bringing in the finalists to the entire council for interviews. So those are the changes and additions.

Gotcha. Thank you. Councilmember Jansen.

I would appreciate if director Fransen could just weigh in on what she would say would be the preferred language regarding the selection.

Mayor, could I have

Yes. Amendment made by council member Bedford, second by council member Podeski. Director Franson.

Just to clarify, council member Jansen, are you asking how the selection process for that finalist should go and who should be involved in that?

Just basically reiterating what we currently have regarding the selection process that's being amended. Is this what you would be saying, yeah, this is great, or would you have a different idea on how this should be ordered?

I think the combination of the two language from both the Slesnikau adopted amendment and the presented Weston amendment, I think that combination, fits the needs that I would envision at this time.

Is there anything you would add?

I believe, the amendment in the beginning did state that the director of human resources or human resources department would manage the recruitment process. Again, just to make sure that we're following best practices, I just wanna ensure that that is still in there. Assuming, I believe, I heard that that that is still in there, then I would say there's no additional language I would add.

Council member Goggin.

Hello. I I was just wondering, how would the, subcommittee of the common council be chosen?

An option to that would be similar to how the city administrator working group members were chosen, where, that is a random selection of council members who would want to participate in that group. And who would make that decision if that's to move forward that way? I believe that would need to be a decision of this this body. K. You wouldn't feel that maybe the executive committee would be appropriate for this? That could be an additional option as well since that is already a formed committee. And I believe that the mayor is the one who holds the authority to, request those meetings. So that could be an option for that group as well. Thank you.

Councilmember Johnson.

Just one more question. There's been no mention of department heads involved in this selection process. Could you address that?

Thank you for pointing that out. I actually would maybe retract my statement and say that, yes, I think department heads should be involved. I would maybe also argue that there should be some community involvement in the interview process. What that looks like, I'm not entirely sure. And I would maybe recommend that if an executive recruitment firm is the wish of this body to hire that, they could have recommendations for that. But I have observed that other communities have engaged their community stakeholders or community members in some sort of participation process with that finalist.

Councilmember Newberry.

I think my question is for Attorney Matti. It's a charter amendment. Does that particular level of detail need to be put in here? I think that's a standard practice among this level of screening hiring process for something this high to go through a community panel and a stakeholder panel and a staff panel, etcetera. Does that need to be in the charter?

That's essentially a home rule question. So if that's what you would like to and the and the council would like to put in there, you can put as much detail or as little detail and solve those questions later on.

Then thank you. I would just end with I I think that that that it's I assume that would be the consensus. That's what everybody would want. I don't know that it belongs in the charter necessarily.

Council member Bedford.

I agree with council member Newberry on that. I think that some of this is going to necessarily have to be included in the best in the best practices, partially because we don't wanna be here going saying how many times we need to be going back to people. I think we're going to want to be doing that quite quite often, I assume. So I hope that this language, meets everybody's specifications. But if anybody wants to make an amendment to my amendment to the amendment, I suppose we can do that.

Alright. Seeing no other speakers, please vote. And that motion passes. Alright. Now we are back to the original.

Right. No. Point of privilege. Yes, please. When we do a point of privilege, that's for everybody. If you do a point of privilege, that's for everybody? Oh, okay. But individually, they can just go. Okay. Yeah.

Alright. Yes. Okay. So now we're voting on the amendment as amended. Alright. Council member Goggin.

My name is just up there so that the next break in the action, I can bring up some discussion.

Alright. Sounds good. Alright. So we'll vote on the amendment as amended. Please vote.

And that motion passes. 12 yes, one abstention. So now we're back to the original resolution. Correct? Yes. Alright. Let's take a five minute or two, three minute recess. Five Five sounds good. Five minute recess, please. Thank you.

Call this meeting back to order. And we are back to the original motion or the original resolution as amended. Council member Gaga.

Thank you, mayor. I'd like to ask Rebecca Franzen, director Franzen, excuse me, to step up to the podium. Director Franzen. Hi. 01/08/2026, we received a letter from the department heads signed collectively, unanimously by a 13 department head. Have you had a lot of counsel engagement about that letter? As of today, I've had two direct inquiries related to that letter. Okay. Thanks. About the questions that you and your fellow department heads posed, have those questions been answered? I believe some in part have been answered through

the amendments and the Newberry amended charter ordinance, but there are still a number of them

that are unanswered. Is there any that you'd like to bring up?

I would say a primary concern that's been discussed amongst department heads is the fiscal impact of hiring a city administrator. That question, we believe, has not been fully answered.

Okay. Thank you. Can I just ask, in the selection and transition,

we've covered the who will

be responsible for selecting applicants of the city manager's position for both interviews and and selection of a finalist? K. Just wanna I just, again, just wanna be clear. And then I'm going to actually give you a pause here. Could I ask, let's see, Matt. Matt Gallagher.

Director Gallagher, please come forward.

Forgive me for being so informal. I forgot to say, you know, director Gallagher. Have you had any engagement about the letter with any counsel?

No. I have not.

Okay. And how do you feel about the questions the information that you're were seeking? Had you feel that you've had enough input?

I think you'd probably find consensus among the department heads that's very much in line with what director Fransen said, that there are a lot of what we feel are very fundamental questions that have not been answered.

K. Is there anything that I maybe I'm not thinking to ask that you would like the question to be posed?

I would echo the sentiment about the fiscal impact, not just looking at how you fund it, but how you spend that money, looking at the the cost side of the equation. But I I would refer back to the letter and all the ones that are in that.

Okay. Thank you. May I go again? Yes. Okay. Adam or director Lorenz?

There it is.

Basically, same question. Have you had any interaction? Anybody asking any questions seeing what you meant by this or why you signed on type of thing? Okay. Is there and, again, I'll ask you. Is there anything I'm not thinking about asking or anything you wanna make sure that gets out here so that we know it, that we're aware of it?

Any questions per se? Yep. I don't have any questions. The questions are laid out in the letter, but I think there's still a lot that are unanswered. I think it goes back to what I stated a few public meetings ago that I think a lot of this is on the idea of a city administrator, where if somebody poses a question, are you for or against it?

I said that I was for it, but you have to understand what are the details with it. And we don't have those details. I'm sure my colleagues will probably say it more eloquent than me, but I guess I look at it as this is the biggest change potentially to the city of La Crosse. I'm a simple man, so a simple way to put it is if I were to buy a house would be the biggest fiscal decision I would make. And do I want a new house? Yes. But in order to buy that house, I'd wanna know what the mortgage is. I'd wanna know what the interest is. I'd wanna know what the maintenance is. I'd wanna know how to, if I have to furnish that house.

And when I'm getting ready to sign the dotted line, I'd hope that I had all that information. And right now, I don't have that information as a department head that represents my employees and the citizens of lacrosse. Is that what you're asking me?

Pretty much. Yeah.

So a yes or no question, don't think is the right way to state it because I can still say yes. But in this form right now, I don't have those answers, so I can't say yes to this form.

Thank you. I'll have to go again. Go ahead. Okay. What are yours? Director Wasik? Thank you very much. Yes. So you signed on to the letter? I did. Basically same question. Any?

I haven't had any questions from anyone about my signing of the letter. I would echo my colleagues that concerns are primarily fiscal, how it will impact departments. We know we've faced a lot of cuts already and we anticipate more. And so with that in mind, there are some concerns there.

Okay. Thank you. And is there anything else you wanted to say to counsel or anything that we're not

No. I I would echo Director Lorenz that, in theory I'm in favor of an administrator. And in actuality I still have questions. Okay, thank you. Appreciate that.

Are you gonna, I'm just gonna, are you gonna ask all the departments to pretty much come Yep. So if you have not spoke yet as a department head, how about you just start moving to the front? Save us some time, please. Thank you. Keep going, council member Gaga.

Okay. Chief making your way up

here. I

just wanna clarify my point being here that I think it takes extraordinary courage to come out and sign this letter. So I want you to have every opportunity to speak, not just you, chief but all of the department heads. If anybody's wondering what my intent is, it's not to to, say I don't want a city administrator, but I wanna give everybody that's got skin in this game to be able to talk. So thank you, chief Gudan.

You're welcome. I guess to just kinda fall in line with the with the questions that you had asked before, specifically to the letter, I have not had many questions from from fellow council members. I again, I mean, I I do echo what my colleagues, fellow department heads have said. Fiscally, it would would be the the biggest question mark for me that that really hasn't been answered at this point. And specifically for me and and with the size of our departments, coming into this 2026 budget, we've had to cut nearly a half $1,000,000, which is three sworn officer positions and a crime analyst.

And we know that we're gonna be facing struggles budgetarily moving forward. And so that really concerns me in terms of cuts to programming and and what we provide to public safety and service to the community. And so that is where many of my questions come from in terms of the the fiscal piece of this position and where that money would be found.

Thank you. Nikki, you're can we you can stay there, but do you wanna speak from over there?

Yeah. Thank you. To answer, I guess, the leading question, have I been approached or asked questions by any council members? And the answer is no. I have not been. I think really what matters right now is readiness. I don't believe the city is prepared to make this change right now. This is a significant, change to the city's government, and it shouldn't be implemented without key details, being resolved. It shouldn't be the expectation that we work out the details afterwards. Again, as stated, there's a lot of questions that that have not been clarified in the joint memo that department heads put forward.

Funding is a major concern. We just came off budgeting, and many departments, as they have said, have had to make reductions. So it's it's really hard, and difficult to justify, a significant increase to our budget. And again, just with the number of proposed amendments tonight, to me, that just kind of shows this plan is still evolving and not ready for approval.

Director Claus. To

answer the question about if I've been approached by any council members regarding the letter, I have not. I'd say collectively, the Spartan heads, we worked really hard to put together that letter. I don't have anything at this time that I would add to it, but I would say it is still a concern with some of those questions that go unanswered.

Thank you.

Director Trayne.

So I had one council member ask me if any council members have asked me any questions about it. Might know who that was. But I would agree what Lauren just stated is that we all worked very, very hard on putting this letter together and putting our ideas out there into this letter. I think we all have different perspectives on what a city administrator could or could not benefit be of a benefit to our department. There's still a lot of unknown questions. We all have different experiences in different communities, different educational backgrounds of understanding what a city administrator does. And so I would just really stand behind my colleagues that we have a really strong team and have put these questions out here and do strongly feel that there are still a lot of unanswered questions.

I just have a question, and I don't care which, department that answers it. But have you ever had such a united front about any issue in your tenure here?

That probably not. Not that something else that I can think about. And I think we've been very thoughtful about the process and making sure that we all have a voice in what we're feeling on this issue. So I don't think anyone's held back on being shy about holding back their feelings amongst department heads on where we stand on this issue. And also that we're very strongly we strongly feel that we want to have a strong collective voice on this issue. Thank you.

Director Schott or chief Schott, sorry.

Thank you. I don't have much to add. I think my colleagues have done a very good job explaining this, but just a word of caution. I'm I'm proud of the way that we collaborated, and I stand behind with that letter that went out. But it's been obvious to us that this particular item has been quite divisive.

And you expect us to be professional, concise, budgeting in line, taking care of our people so they can take care of our people that you represent. And I would expect fully that if we want this to move forward, it's in a way that is logistical, it's transparent, and it's very clear what the expectations will be for all the department heads and directors moving forward. So I have the same concerns. They're well illustrated in that document. And I did have one engagement with one council member, and I didn't feel comfortable talking about it where we were at. But, we did have one level of of questions and engagement. So, again, thanks for taking the time to listen to us and bring us forward. I appreciate that, and I'm sure our colleagues do as well.

Thank you. Thank you. Attorney Mehdi?

I have not had anybody talk to me about the letter, but that might be because I've had no qualms about giving my position publicly. I've also talked to many of you about my position on the matter, in various capacities throughout the time that this has come up. Just to put into context, back in 2012 when this went to a referendum before, I was one of the minority 40% that voted in favor of it. I am no longer in favor of it. And it comes back to the exact reasons that have already been stated. There's fiscal reasons for that. So, specifically, I'm I'm a lawyer. I like details, and I can go right into that. So, for example, I keep hearing this fallacy that it's gonna pay for itself. There's no evidence it's gonna pay for itself.

There's no evidence it's gonna find savings. So I went through the literature I could find. I also attended and listened to what was done at the city administrator working group. There is one example, one example only, that was given on how a city administrator will save money for a municipality. And that example was a city administrator in another community went went out and looked at all their insurance products and found savings on insurance premiums.

Well, I can tell you, the legal department took that upon ourselves in 2013. We recommended the changes you. You implemented them in 2014. The finance director at that time told me that that saved the city 600 to $650,000 a year. And I also as you know, I serve as the chairperson on the employee benefits trust fund committee.

The with the professional leadership of the HR department and the finance department, we recommended changes to you for the prescription drug plan just last year. That saved the city $1,300,000. We did those things without administrator, and we're gonna continue to do those things even if there is an administrator or not. This then begs the question, and as an attorney, I often get questions to predict the future. You want me to be Nostradamus and sometimes write it in French quatrains, but I don't.

But what if you play out the film, what's gonna happen? If you don't have if it does not pay for itself and there's no evidence it's gonna pay for yourself, then what are you gonna do? It gets added to the budget. It's another expense. Every year, we have a structural deficit, and you have to comply with the expenditure restraint program.

So you're adding three approximately $300,000 on there, which means you have to take $300,000 of expenses and you're on top of all the other expenses that are already on the deficit we already have to do. And if you play out the film, it's not difficult to predict what's gonna happen. An administrator being hired is gonna come in, and the administrator who controls the budget is gonna make sure the administrator is paid, and then it's gonna cannibalize the other departments. It's gonna and it's gonna affect departments like mine first, which are small. We have de minimis discretionary spending within our budget. My budget is essentially staff and labor. That's it. So when the administrator comes in and says something such as, okay. Do a 5% across the board because that's fair. My five percent is gonna end up being people.

And so we're gonna have to cut people who actually do the work and provide the services in order to hire a person at higher upper level manager just to keep telling me to do more with less. It's it's it's it's not a recipe for success in any shape or form. And and I already gave you my on the other the WCMA WCMA issue. So again, that's it. There's no proof that it's gonna save money. There's no proof that it pays for itself. And it's not difficult to predict what's gonna happen going down in the future budgets.

Who has it? Director Hawkins.

Oh, good evening. First question, no, not a single conversation from anybody regarding the letter. I would echo, again, the sentiment of all of my fellow colleagues. I think the letter that we wrote addresses collectively what we all felt needed to be addressed, and I don't think we've had even a small portion of those questions answered. I guess the biggest thing for me that keeps coming up is we talk about fiscal impacts.

And, again, not a single conversation with the finance director regarding fiscal responsibility in this. I work here Monday through Friday every day. I'm easy to get ahold of. Sorry. One, council member Goggin.

I just No.

You're right. But I guess that's where I'm at. I you know, we we came together collectively. So

Alright. Thank you. Director Odegaard.

Yes. Thank you, mayor, and thank you for the opportunity to speak. I would I would echo what my peers have said. But one thing I would like to share with this council, and I think it's very important, as somebody that runs multiple divisions of departments and a lot of people, one of the hardest tasks that we have as directors is keeping our employee morale up. Over the last, you know, five, six years, employee benefits have taken a big hit.

Our boots on the ground, people that are out working in the field. And while they're not online and they're not watching this, they do pay attention. They pay attention through us as department heads. They pay attention to what they hear on Wisdom. They pay attention to what they see in the in the media.

And when we're reducing our LTE budgets, when we're laying off individuals, when we're not filling full time positions, they see that. They understand that. When we are looking at adding a position and for a lot of them, it's seen as a suit. This is a suit. It's it's another high level person that's not out on the street picking up leaves.

It's not somebody that's mowing. It's not somebody that's cleaning the bathrooms. So we're asking these individuals to do more and more and more as we shrink their resources, as we shrink their teams. And we're gonna be doing again next month. I'll be bringing a resolution forward with the reorganization that's specifically aimed at our preparation for our 2027 budget cuts.

So to add a position that I'm not opposed to, but from a team leader, and I know a lot of my peers are in the same position, it's real hard for us to turn around and say, well, we coulda added four of you, but we got somebody else that's going to sit in this room and have these conversations. It's just very difficult in that translation to that employee morale. And so that's something that hasn't really been talked about, but I just wanted to share with you as the people making the decisions in our city that, you know, we have 500 employees. And while the vast majority of them never stepped foot in this council chamber, they are really paying attention to what's going on, and these are the types of the decisions that help us as department heads keep staff and also gain more applications of staff that wanna come here. So thank you for the time.

Director Greshner.

Thank you. Being last, there really isn't anything new that I can add. I 100% agree with what every one of my colleagues has said prior to me being up here. I would just say that this is one of the largest changes to La Crosse's history, and I do not feel that it's something that should be rushed.

Thank you. Councilwoman McGaughey.

I appreciate every single one of you coming up and speaking in the mic and and giving your thoughts. I will agree with the what you've said that this is a crucial decision, and it is huge for the city. So I appreciate it. Thanks.

Councilmember Johnson.

After sitting in council chambers for almost nine years, I've never been more proud of my department heads. Yeah. I've never seen it that you've all stuck together and spoke as one and followed through with some amazing examples. So thank you. With that, I've I've sat back, and I've observed, and I've received phone calls from many a council member wanting to talk about the city administrator position.

And I've given all of you the same story of the conversation needs to occur in the council chambers so the public can view what's being heard and hear. And so I look at that, and I what I've gotten out of it and I I have a page of questions that I was gonna ask department heads, which most of them brought up many of my the answers answers already, already, so so I'm I'm not not gonna gonna do that. But here's my summary, I guess. I heard at JNA that, basically, a statement of there was a rush to get this in. I think were referring to the amendments.

And tonight, we've had in the last twenty four hours, there's been a plethora of amendments because everybody's still trying to figure out what's the best way to do this. So maybe maybe we just need to take a step back, vote down anything moving forward regarding the city administrator, and maybe we need to ask our legal department or our HR department or our planning director, what would you recommend be the most efficient way and productive way in order to have conversation about what do we need as a city, what is the problem. Let's identify that. Because I think this whole process from over a year ago, we skipped that part for the most part. We didn't really go into what our constituents complaining about.

Because in reality, my first year on council, there were a lot of complaints about the the city hall. And as a council member, I was involved in coming up with solutions. One happened to be a a department head. But we worked together with the mayor, and we came up with some solutions, and the problem was solved. So to me, what we missed in all

of

this is that we didn't have we didn't get a chance to sit in a room and have a conversation like a committee meeting. So we could go back and forth. Instead, we rushed to a council meeting where we had to throw all these amendments together. And so it's kind of a you know, this is a better what we've got now is better than what we had. But is it the best?

Is it really been worked out? I don't think so because we haven't had the department heads around the table. We're really missing an important part of making this a great possible you know, if this is the direction we go. But, again, I'm going back to my years as an undergrad, and I'm listening to my adviser, the man that wrote Matt Bridges of Madison County, amazing instructor in business. And he would be having a heart attack if you saw the process that we took to get here today.

We violated all the rules, basically, from management decision making goals. So with that, I would just love to hear whether it's if we wanna start with the HR director or the planning director because Dave can give examples, or Steph and Maddie. What would you propose would be the next steps if we just deny all of these proposals regarding city administrator? And we take what we have right now and what would be the process moving forward to come up with what do we need as a city. Is it a city administrator?

Is it something else? But how do we identify the problems and then identify the solutions? Because to me, then the next step would be then you create a resolution if you need one.

Any director want to take that? If not, I'll I'll chime in. I got it? So if it's okay, can I answer that question? So, the conversations that I've had has been about, can we explore the municipal structure?

So meeting with department heads, council members, and talk about what are the issues that we're trying to solve for and figure out, are they currently solvable now? Or, right, like, is there another layer that needs to happen? In addition to we talked about the workforce study that will show and demonstrate the needs that we have and or that we don't have in terms of staffing structure. Myself and director Franson have also talked about maybe tweaking that workforce study into a managerial study, which would actually help us know if we're too top heavy and if there's another layer or a position that can be added into that. So there's just some things that we can be doing in addition to oh my gosh.

I'm I'm blanking. Sorry. We we talked about something else. Yes. Director Frazza helped me out.

But really also cleaning up the process that didn't happen. Right? So how do we have that conversation with department heads, council members, and community members so that they're coming along that process process and not just making that decision. But please.

Thank you, mayor. I may echo a few things that the mayor had stated, but, you know, some of my notes are really indicating. I think there's some really amazing things that are happening within the city and within our managerial teams right now that are gonna help us facilitate this process. Our mayor has initiated we're gonna be doing strategic planning sessions as a city. That is going to be a huge element in us really focusing on what is the mission, vision, and values of our city and what are we all aligned on.

I think we saw tonight that the alignment speaks volumes. And when we see this group of department heads aligned, I can only further emphasize, let's imagine what we can all do when we're all aligned on something. So between the strategic planning sessions, the involvement of our department heads in these conversations before there's active legislation, I think if we also focus on, yes, we do have a workforce study that's also going to help us identify where's our gaps? Do we have them? And if there are gaps, how do we fill them? Or maybe we are too top heavy in some areas and we need to look at that as well. I think there's a lot of things that need to be analyzed before we can bring a really solid amendment forward. And imagine if we brought one forward that we were all unified on. I think that that would really speak volumes to our community.

Thank you. Councilmember Johnson. All right. Councilmember Podeski.

Thank you, your honor. I have multiple things actually to talk about here. First, I really didn't have to reach out to the department heads. I know most of them. I'm friends with most of them. And I took their their, letter very seriously. And to be honest, there is no reason to reach out. Secondly, I really thought about, you know, when we talked about what the public wants, I thought maybe this should go to referendum, but I know then we would sit here and argue another hour about whether or not we should. I don't think we have to because I think if this was passed, the public will take care of that, to be honest, I think. Thirdly, I'm gonna have to put you on the spot for a minute, mister mayor. Is your amendment still on the table?

So I put the amendment out there, but I actually can't make the amendment. Okay. So that would be up to you all if you made that amendment. K.

Well, then, see, part of the problem with that was if we do have an administrator, it can't it can't be under your control. That that destroys the whole purpose of the administrator. Second of all, one of the things we had talked about was the communications director salary. But is this something that's coming from now I see us on the city website to hire another one. Is this a want from your office? Because I want a 32 waist, and that's that flew the coop. That's not gonna come back again. So I'm just trying to understand why when we're having money issues, if somebody left a position, why is that on the table?

Great question. So the reason why that particular position did not get absolved by any means is because it is a position that is needed at the city. So when you think about the communication needs and even just the job description that that particular position has, It's essentially almost like a government relations role that makes sure that we're communicating effectively to our constituents. We're con connect with our business partners. There's like a whole robust thing within that job description. And director Franson and I, we looked at that job description. We tweaked a little bit, but not too much. And then we decided to put it back out there.

Okay. Then then if I Yeah. Go ahead. Kelly? Okay. Thank you, sir. Then I would have to say again, all along, we heard that was gonna be part of the money for this position. And in all due respect, your honor, if we did have an administrator, a lot of your duties would go away. So to be honest, my impression would be you would be our chief or, communications officer within the city, to be honest. My other concerns are when we talked about 300 some thousand dollar or 250,000.

We have to be honest with ourselves. We have to tack on another 100,000 or so because the highest paid position in the city of La Crosse is gonna have he or she are going to have an administrative assistant. We also are we gonna put the administrator in a kiosk out there? I mean, we have to do remodeling, So there's just so many of these concerns going around that I'm really struggling with this. I will say from working with the county the last six years, I do see what a good administrator can do.

However, that was a process that took a long time, and it took years to get there. So, again, I when I see the faces of the directors and the department heads basically begging us not to do this, I really struggle with, are we doing the right thing? And this is something I truthfully I talked about since 2010 as a need. Now I'm I'm I would have to agree with some of my colleagues and the department heads that we we have the meetings you set up, which was very wise of you. Thank you.

And I think we just have to everybody take a deep breath and really do this where we're everybody's comfortable. Thank you.

Council president Dickinson.

Thank you, mayor. I had this prepared ahead of time, so some of this might not be in perfect context, but I'm gonna just plow on because then I'll be effective instead of stumbling. The city and community have spent the last sixteen months discussing, analyzing, and gathering feedback on the option to add a city administrator to the city of La Crosse and changing our municipal structure. While the conversations have started, they've been limited only to discussing active legislation that is in front of us. What Council Member Newberry's amended ordinance helps clarify a few questions, our department heads have clearly posed a number of questions that remain unanswered and many of which will take time to get the answers.

The questions span from governmental structure, fiscal impact and recruitment, all important areas that need answers before we activate this very important piece of legislation. Our department heads have put a significant amount of time and thought into providing this council a letter, not in opposition of this newly created position, but rather questions that we should answer to ensure the success of our city and anyone who may potentially fill the role of city administrator. We have spent sixteen months discussing one piece of legislation and only a couple of days or even minutes about the new charter ordinance and subsequent amendments. While I know we have delayed this decision a long time, it may be what is the best thing for us to do for our city and our constituents. I urge you to vote no tonight.

It wouldn't be voting no to the concept of city administrator. Rather, you would be voting no so the common council, the mayor, and the city department heads, and the community can have conversations about all of the options that could be available, not just the two charter ordinances that we've been looking at for the last few months. If we continue to have active legislation, we are limiting ourselves to just discussing that item. I encourage you all to consider voting no so we can continue to understand what the city administrator will bring to the city of La Crosse. I call this the seven p's.

Proper prior planning prevents really poor performance. Performance. Thank you.

Councilmember Trose.

Wow. If things are so bad, why would we want to continue with the status quo? I personally found our last budget cycle to be quite chaotic, and I certainly am looking forward to something that will be more comfortable in the future. We had council members jockeying with each other, districts fighting over different amounts of money. We had millions of dollars of changes that were offered on the floor at the very last minute, minute.

And I certainly don't look forward to that kind of process again. And I have also acknowledged that the department heads put that budget together, and so I appreciate that. And I know they work really hard. I just don't understand why we're here two years after we started the process. And I disagree with the characterization that what we did here tonight was happening quickly.

I actually think what we did here tonight was was based on these last two years. And so I guess I'm confused about what everyone thought was happening these last two years. And it seems like there is I get that there are things to work out, but it feels like folks are getting cold feet at the last minute. And I can understand that. We all are reevaluating what our power, what our roles might be.

We all are moving into new territory, and it sounds like the question of whether we want the devil that we know better than the devil that we don't know. And I'm very sorry that department heads feel that they haven't been listened to, But I would also disagree with that characterization of the kind of interactions council members have with department chairs. And so I'm gonna continue to support what we have here on the floor tonight. I think it's the right policy. I understand we have work to do. But you all are terrific, and you'll help us figure it out.

Council member Goggin.

I'm gonna echo, something that, councilmember Dickinson said, and and I agree with the bulk of what she brought up. What I don't agree with is that the last sixteen months we've been discussing a city administrator because we haven't been allowed to. We haven't been allowed to get into it. Like, I can't I can't call District 13109, whatever, and say, what do you think about this? Because it's a walking quorum.

It's unethical. So this, by voting no, we're not saying we don't want a city administrator. I think by voting no and, again, I'm sorry to echo the, previous comment similar to this. But I think we're saying, let's get a city administrator that we're going to pay a lot of money for, but we're going to do it right, and we're going show La Crosse that we care about how much that we're going to be good stewards of their money. I just really appreciate, again, the thoughtfulness of the department heads.

I appreciate the thoughtfulness of the council members, and I don't want this to be a divisive thing. I want this to be where this is a moment where they've all come together, and now we can all come together. Thank you.

Council member Weston.

Thank you, mister mayor. What I appreciate about one of of figuring out, with council member amendment and consultation with attorney Maddie of how to delay the the start of this position, I I'm still Forest City manager. Let's start there. I would I will vote for this tonight. And part of the reason is we we do have time to answer some of those questions, but we will stop saying if we get in a city administrator.

I'm not saying a city administrator is gonna answer all of the problems. But I'm saying if we start walking down a road of, well, if this, that that also changes how we solve problems. And while I appreciate I very much appreciate the solidarity of the department heads coming together, There's an irony of that the unity is about this item. And y'all, I'm telling you that what I've been hearing, why I ran, is the disunity that has existed in time. And so I appreciate the unity that's there, but you can go and look through our emails about people who are experiencing the incongruency incongruency of dealing with city hall, and that is up that is one of the things to solve in my mind.

That is one of the things. I appreciate that while directors shared, they many of them said, I'm not opposed to this and right? With some caveats. That's a that's also a fascinating observation to me. I also like, I appreciate questions. I appreciate proposed solutions more, and I think I'm having I'm having a hard time without the lack of proposed solutions and just questions. The there's also an irony, and this is gonna be divisive. There's an irony that there council members sitting around this table who

are

quick to in the less than a year I've been on council, who are quick to tell me who is helpful at city hall, who is not, who will get things done, who is not helpful, or who, doesn't play by the rules, so to speak. There are also department heads that make choices about which city council members they respond to or not. Part of a city administrator is that culture piece we talked about earlier. It's not gonna solve everything. But right now, to the point, we're not all on the same page.

We have an opportunity to get on the same page. I don't see it happening in our current state. And I that's why I'm still in favor of a city administrator with the opportunity to answer some questions of what are the problems that need to be solved, knowing that they aren't all going to be solved. Because at the end of the day, department heads and city council, we are not all going to agree on how to solve the problem. And there's a beauty in disagreement.

I'm quite comfortable with things that are not unanimous. They shouldn't be. Disagreement is healthy, but we've got problems to solve. And it's so fascinating to me that for years, city administrator continues to come up, and the problems still aren't solved, and we still don't have a city manager.

Councilmember Newberry.

I I would like to echo, council member Weston's sentiment in the next thing I'm gonna say, but I also wanna go back to council member Troast. I I I think that I completely agree with how much more eloquently she is going to speak what I am going to speak. So that is my vibe, I guess, guys. The, the question, I don't think that we need a delay to talk about this further. I think we need a deadline to figure it out, which is what council member that's what I heard council member Weston say.

So and the other thing I I do have a couple of questions. One for councilmember or I'm sorry, director Hawkins and attorney Matti. Director Hawkins, quickly, is ERIP mandatory? That allegation was made earlier. Is ERIP a mandatory decision that we have to follow?

No. You as a council can choose to forego the ERP payment.

Okay. So it's choice. Thank you. And then also our, if I remember correctly, our reserves policy is 15,000,000 How much do we have in reserves right now? It's not $15,000,000 it's 20% of our annual operating budget, which equates

to about $15,000,000

Okay. Yes. Well, how many how much do we have in excess of that number setting cash money in a savings account?

Last I looked, it was

about 21,000,000. Okay. So so $6,000,000 just hanging out for something cool and shiny and something that's worth investing in. I think this is worth investing in. And the expensive part to me that I would like to say is that the expensive part is the transition. It's the next two years. And then after that, the the this position that we would hire, this person would their job would be to find the money and to to figure that out. We're never gonna know that answer. That's that's never ever gonna be answered. That's never been answered by anybody that's gone this direction.

Attorney Matti, my question for you was if we vote this particular one down, what does that mean as far as being able to revisit it? We can still talk about a city administrator. Just can't talk about exactly this one. Is that right?

No. That's not accurate. If you vote this down, you can still have legislation that is, the same or substantially the same. There's no prohibition on that.

Okay. There's not a two year prohibition on on voting this down?

Well, there's there's a way it could be done through a parliamentary procedure, but that's Okay. Okay. Thank you.

The and also just to answer the the shared space, mister mayor, I think that you have moved offices and got rid of a conference room, and there's a shared space right up there in your office for a a helper, a helper of executive level that would have a nice big office that served the mayor for many, many, many years, that would be there. So talking about having to do any construction or anything like that, I think, is, it's not an argument that I put a lot of value in. Also, it is perfectly normal. And I think in the way that I'll say it because I wrote this part, and I thought it was important that the roles in this one are very clear, and that's the point. There's not a lot of ambiguity, but it's not overly detailed.

And it compares and contrasts the mayor's role, the administrator's role, and the council's role. And it says there's a paragraph in there that I put in there deliberately that says that I think the mayor and the administrator are partners, and it makes sense they would stare and share administrative staff and share office space. In my head, that's how I feel about it. So I I think that all of that's made up. And so when I look at the department head's questions, and I appreciate them very much for putting them together, the only question that isn't answered explicitly is the funding, and I understand that's critically important.

But determining the funding, making that decision today is not required for a charter amendment. That is a secondary step. It would be nice to have that figured out, but we have not nor will we have that figured out. If we decided this is what we wanted to do, we could figure it out. So I appreciate all the concern.

I I'm also going to vote for this. This is, I I think, what we need. I think the other thing, you know, we got to listen at J and A last week. Amplify came in here and told us a really embarrassing story, to be quite frank, about how they had to serve as arbitrator between two different departments for a project they wanted to work on. I don't know how much to put in that.

That's true, but that complaint existing from gigantic stakeholders problematic. The chamber has expressed that this is where they want to go, that they want consistent coordination from the city and to make things easier. So many people talk about how hard it is to work here and I think the department heads are great. I think the work that city does is great. I think it could be better.

I just think it's less than optimal and if there was some coordinated leadership from not an elected official that everybody would be better. And finally, I will end on the way that this was structured was very deliberate, and I think this has something to do with it, to be honest, is the power that the administrator would have comes from somewhere. It just doesn't get made up. And so the mayor gives up a little bit of power, and the council gives up a little bit of power and the department heads give up a little bit of power. But the idea is that the administrator is the value add to all of them to better serve the community, better serve the department heads, better serve the council and the mayor.

So if we need to talk about this for longer, then so be it if that's what happens. But I I think that we're on the right track and, whatever gets us moving forward, but the sooner rather than later is what my preference would be. Thank you. Councilmember Slesnikow.

Thank you, mayor. Council member Newberry already brought up some of the points, and I do appreciate all of the department heads coming up and, you know, having their comments or answering questions. In reviewing the letter that was sent, if you go through that now that council member Newberry had brought forward a new resolution around the around the city administrator and the amendments added, I think at least for the transition and the government governance, many of those questions have been answered. It does remain with the fiscal responsibility of where that's coming from. I do remember having a conversation with director Hawkins at one point about this, I think, early on when we were working with the city administrator, and there was some thoughts about funding such a position.

We've already talked about a communications coordinator. That position is no longer filled. My suggestion there, if this goes through, is please don't fill that position unless it's a limited term employment so that people understand whoever would apply for that that this position, you know, at least right now is is looked at not continuing. But director Hawkins brought up the point that a position such as this could be funded partially by operating funds, partially by utility funds, and partially by TIF administration. So there are ways that this could be done, again, in the long run for approval of this and moving forward in the amount of time for an actual search screen contract, everything else, there's a fair amount of time to work on trying to to iron out where the money specifically will come from.

I think that's doable. I'm completely confident that we have the capabilities and expertise here within our city staff to make that happen and make it happen well. The initial question that was put forward is is why is this position from the department heads? Why is this necessary? And I think it comes down to effectively managing the operations of a municipality of over 50,000 residents, over 500 full time city staff with over a $70,000,000 operating spec expenditures.

It's complex. It's ever changing. La Crosse is at a point where it needs a knowledgeable and experienced professional city administrator to oversee, manage, unify the operations of the city of La Crosse. I think we are at that point, and I think we can do this working together. I I hate to see the divisiveness here. This is something that's been discussed for over a year. We've engaged the public. We've had discussions. I know it's act it's active legislation which narrows our opportunities. But, again, when this was referred the first time, it was because we didn't have enough public engagement.

We really tried to do that, and we did reach out to department heads. You know, it's taken getting to this new resolution as well with amendments to answer some of those questions, but I think, again, many of those are answered. And in the meantime, if approved, the time frame allowed would allow us to come up with some answers to the actual, you know, fiscal usage for this position. Council member Newberry brought up location. That is definitely an option.

You know, whether a city administrator would have to have their own executive assistant or not, again, that's that's a question. But, initially, I'm not sure that that would be the case. We did answer the question about transition with the amendments that we didn't have to hire or do a search for an interim city administrator. The mayor would have that ability to continue with some flexibility until that position is actually approved and the ordinance would and the and the office would be approved. So I am urging our council members to move forward with this and approve this charter ordinance.

I think it's the right time for this. I'm concerned that pulling back again and moving forward whenever to have more conversation, I'm not sure what how much it's going to accomplish. I think moving forward, we can accomplish what we need to do do, having this ordinance approved this evening. Thank you.

Council member Goggin.

It was brought up, just a while ago to director Hawkins about the reserves. The and that just makes me have to ask. How long we we keep hearing that this position will pay for itself. Does anybody know what metric we're gonna use to determine when this position is paying for itself? And when we would if it was determined doesn't

have a point of order. Has anybody said on this counsel at all today that it would pay for itself? Or did those words come from the attorney? Order. Hold on. Hold

on. Gotta let council member Goggin finish.

So I'm just wondering about the metrics of how we're gonna pay okay. So I'll change I'll change my question. How long can our reserves handle funding a position that we are not sure of how we're gonna fund it? We are not being good stewards of the taxpayers' money to gut a reserve fund when we don't know what's coming. This isn't a shiny new car. This isn't something like that. We have a flood, a explosion, a tornado. $15,000,000 isn't gonna get us very far. We've already taken out $2,000,000 for employee trust benefit. We've taken out $2,000,000 to balance the budget. We just can't be gotten this reserve. Thank you.

Did you want that question to go to someone? Okay. Director Hawkins? Hawkins?

Thank you for question. I don't know if I can answer that question a 100% to tell you how long our reserves can sustain that. I think it really comes down to again couple other questions that we have to have answered right like are we talking about are we trying to preserve our expenditure stream program payments or are we willing to forego those. Those will make a lot of determinations on how long our reserves can continue to fund our operating budget. We know fact that this year we opted to balance our budget by the use of a million dollars of our fund balance along with additional million dollars of debt service levy.

If we continue down that same path year after year, again talking about keeping above our policy four to six years at that level. If we decided to forego ERP, we could see those reserves exhausted in a year, maybe two at best.

Council member Bedford.

Thank you all. I'm really conflicted on this because I came in in the middle of this conversation and not knowing all of the ways to speak, when my speech is, you know, confined. And I am really, really encouraged by what we did here today because it feels to me like the first time I've been able to speak about it, and I wanna be able to speak about it. But I also absolutely agree with councilor member trust that when you are dealing with a situation where, you know, things aren't working, we don't want to continue doing the same things. It's really hard when you are being asked to make budgets and the math simply doesn't work, when you're trying to claw and twist yourself into a shape, that means that you're cutting out parts of yourself.

And when you can see where it's going, but how do you stop it? Right? I think that that's a situation that, you know, anybody that's been low income at any point can really resonate with. I know that I can. And I've worked for businesses that were in similar situations, and I saw them end.

I don't wanna see that for our city. At the same time, one of the things that we have been doing to stay afloat to get ourselves here is this creative budgeting, where we're not necessarily taking things by highest priority. We're taking things where we can make them fit, and it still ticks off a couple of things here and there. And, you know, one of the things that was brought up here was that you don't want the city administrator to come in and just say, okay, 5% across the board. That's what I feel like I witnessed at this last budget was just coming off.

And the fair thing coming in not knowing stuff about peep about the different departments is to say, across the board, we're gonna try and do things fair and evenly. Making the city work is not necessarily going to look fair. I do not think I will be voting for this tonight. I really wish to see these conversations continue. I know that this is especially when it's tied in to people's livelihoods, especially when we look around at, you know, the state of things and we we don't necessarily see the way out, it's hard.

But I I do think that one of the things that was very heartening was that everybody was like, in a different situation, I'd be behind this. So there's still reasons why even the department heads would be for this. I think that we do need to have more open conversations, and I hope that that can bring us even farther, can help us get new ideas. Because one of the things that's been frustrating for me is that constraint where we're not able to have that open cross talk. And that, in my experience, is where the best ideas, the ideas that seem like they're completely obvious to one person and would never have been thought of by the other come from.

So I will be voting no on this tonight.

Councilmember Jansen.

I do have concerns about the budget, and I would hate to not utilize the ERP. That is a lot of money that we just let float away. We have a minimum. Our policy for our reserves is a minimum. And I think that we live in a very chaotic world, and whether it's the environment or other things that we can't control, so I believe we should have more than the minimum in our reserves.

And I think that what I've seen in the last several months is a transformation with our department heads. They are we have 13 experts in their categories. And I feel bad for them because, in a sense, with some of the feedback that's come in, they've been critiqued, probably unintentionally. But it comes across like they're being put down that they're not qualified. But they are very qualified at what they do.

And they've shown me, in particular, how they can work together and speak as one. And what they did with the budget, you know, they've never really done that before. That's awesome. And I think that we can learn a lot from them if we sit and listen to them. And a great example is the planning department. For years, there have been complaints about zoning and all of this. So what did they do? They're redoing the zoning. They're they're meeting with the public. They're coming up with solutions.

So they're gonna alleviate that. Other complaints that have come in, we sat at an an LBA meeting, the mayor and Aaron and Tamara and I, and we heard a plethora of complaints. So I would assume that the mayor has taken those complaints and he's addressing those in order to put an end to that particular problem. And we, as council members, also have that responsibility. So my point is that we are working on problems, and we're doing a better job.

Every mayor and council has dealt with that. So by voting no on this particular item, we already have meetings scheduled to have these conversations, and I think only good can come from that. So I would really encourage everyone to really think about that. It's not kicking the can down the road. It's making this the best that it can be and prevent problems.

Let's do it right so that we don't have to go back and fix things. Yeah, there'll be a few things, but we don't want to be like a car manufacturer. Put together a brand new car and then have all these recalls. That's expensive. Let's do it right.

Councilmember Troves.

Thank you. I'm wondering what's going to be structurally different this time around that we'll come up with a successful process this time compared to last time. So what are we gonna actually be doing? I'm just confused about what we'll be doing differently going forward so that we what is our deadline? I mean, when is any of this gonna happen? Who who

What are we

referring?

I think if we I'm really concerned that we've spent two years, and we're gonna stick with what we already have. So I will be supporting this, and I am deeply sorry to the members of the public who have come and said that they were excited about us moving into a professional way of doing governance.

Any other speakers? Alright. Seeing none, I would like to chime in. Oh, council member Bedford.

This is kind of in response to what council member Frost said. I am voting no because I want to see what we can do, what it's like to speak on this without this here because, again, that's not something I've experienced. If we don't make any further further movement on this within a small period of time, I will bring this back myself as something to be put up and to move forward with if if we prove that what we do need is a deadline and not this ability to openly speak. But

Yeah. I'm gonna relinquish the chair, but I'm not gonna move, if that's okay. Can I do that? No? Alright.

You got a board

I know. So first and foremost, I want to thank councilmember Newberry and councilmember Weston for taking a look at this and really getting us closer to a close to finished product. And to the department heads, I wanna say thank you very much because today you show bravery, you were honest, transparent, and you spoke your truth in a very uncomfortable place. For me, one of the things that I always go back to, and many council members have talked about this, is the process. And so coming in in April, the former mayor put this resolution out there.

It was delayed, and I feel like starting day one, it's kind of been this defense around this particular resolution. One, because I didn't agree with it and I still don't hold hardly support the need for a charter ordinance change, which I've been very transparent about that. But the one thing that I feel like was missing is the conversation about the options. The options of what can we be doing. But even before the options, what problem are we truly solving?

And I feel like as a new mayor coming in, as someone who was elected by the people, being able to do that process correctly is extremely important. And I feel like, to some degree, I was robbed of that by the previous legislation coming in. And so I really truly I've said it. I campaigned on it. I said I want a city administrator, but also said I want a right fit for the city of La Crosse.

And I think that we need data. We need to look at some things and truly have, transparent and open conversations about it and talk about the why and what are we truly trying to fix and, be able to work across entities, the council, department heads, community, etcetera. And I don't know that that's been able to happen. Well, it hasn't been able to happen simply because even from day one talking about the charter ordinance was like, no. You can't talk about this.

You can't talk about that. That's what I was told by council members that didn't wanna engage in the conversation of options and rationale and what are we truly solving here. And I like to address something else because one of the things that I did in playing into this defensiveness is, yes, I said, let's get a operations director because the reality is it costs less than a city administrator. And I hear people say, well, we don't want a city administrator that serves under the mayor. Well, the reality is is it exists in other municipalities.

But because, again, when I throw something out, then you won't well, people can get defensive, and then we're kinda having this clash, and now we're having this divisive issue instead of being able to work together to come up with solutions. And I think that that's a problem. And so, yes, I did put out our communications coordinator position because at the moment when we talked about that particular position salary being used, it was specifically for the operations director. It did not come up for the city administrator, and no one has asked me about that. But ultimately, what I want again, and I've been transparent that I don't agree with a charter ordinance change because I feel like we need to walk along this continue continuum to get to where we ultimately wanna go.

And I don't know that we've been able to do that effectively as a council as even as a city, to be honest with you. I know some people say, well, it's been years that we've talked about this. Well, I wasn't there, and I wasn't the mayor at the time. So I would like the opportunity to be able to lead this discussion in a manner that is more respectable, more collaborative, and honestly more effective. So I think that's pretty much all I gotta say about it. So if you have questions, feel free to ask. Counselor. Up there.

Okay? She just You're good. Okay. Oops.

I don't have any questions. I've just been sitting here trying to figure out how to eloquently say what I'm going to say, so here it goes. I think I think people want a city administrator. I want a city administrator. And for the reasons, I've talked to other city administrators, neighboring city administrators.

I asked what they thought were the benefits of their position, and they shared the same things that I've thought all along. It will help us be more efficient, more effective. It will support the budgeting process so it doesn't feel so crisis y and chaotic. We can do long term planning without the change of leadership at this council or changing mayors. That's a huge learning curve.

We're gonna have a consistent person that's going to be able to support all of the operation of our city government and support us in a strategic plan, hold us accountable, the learning curve will be able to continue to do things and not have to slow down for the learning curve of the change with elections and different folks in the position. I don't think it will pay for itself, but I do think it will be a benefit, and the benefits will help us with budgeting, help us with effectiveness, and help us support department heads when they look at their budgets. We'll be able to forecast years ahead and not just go from year to year trying to figure out a budget. We we can have a plan. We can have someone in that position.

We're going to start doing strategic planning. They can hold us to that. It just helps. And then we won't be impacted by the changes all the time. I think it's really going to help us be more effective, more efficient, be good stewards to our constituents. And it's scary because it's different, and I get that, and I acknowledge that. But I think we can still have really good decisions and vote yes tonight to move it forward. The working committee met with the public. They did things. Prior to that, Gary, you said this came up in 2010 or something. You were saying you wanted a city. It's 2026. It's not working. It's not the best. We gotta do something different.

And I get that it's scary, but I am going to vote for this, and I'm going to support it. I'm going to honor the work, all the conversation, and the challenges and just vote to move this forward so that we can start to do something to help structure we want in place. Thank you.

Councilmember Newberry.

Thank you, mister mayor. And for my final comment tonight, I I just wanna address the the the twenty twelve referendum vote. I a conservative estimate of the population change or churn that's happened in the last, help me do math, fourteen years, thirteen years, however, a lot, a long time ago. In 2012, I was 29. I take that back. Right? The population the conservative estimate's 35%. People that were four years old can vote now, and there's a lot of people that are no longer with us now that were with us voting then. And La Crosse is also an incredibly transient city. There are a lot of people who have lived here for a long time, but it's a college town.

People come and they go for careers. That's one of the first things I was told when I moved here is people love to raise families in La Crosse, and it it's a great place to be, but it's not necessarily the place they stay. It's in between Chicago and and Minneapolis, and it has always been a transient town. And so there have been people that don't live here anymore that voted in 2012. It is not the same. It's I I think it's a silly argument. I just wanted to say that into the microphone. Thank you.

Seeing no other speakers, please vote. And that motion fails, seven yes and six no. Moving to our next agenda item twenty six zero zero eight one, resolution approving application of Green Bay or sorry. Green Circle Recovery LLC for a junk dealer license at 3019 Commerce Street and request for waiver of the 1,000 foot requirement pursuant of municipal code section ten four six zero b. Motion to adopt by council member Goggin, second by council member Stein.

Any discuss council member Troz.

So I think this item is a good example of how our notification system works and has some flaws, some structural flaws. And there were a number of people who were notified well, they weren't notified. Notified. The La Crosse Housing Authority got the notification. So it went to a PO box. And I understand the applicant sent an additional piece of information to the PO box. And I spoke to the director of the housing authority. And they, in fact, told me they did not pass any information along to any of the residents. And so I know we're all following the process, and this is a process. But I think it's an important reminder about who we take into account when we're making decisions.

And just because someone the people who show up or the people who email are not necessarily representative of the people who live here or the interest that they might have. And clearly, our process is really tilted toward property owners. And so when we know that half of the city doesn't own property, so those folks are not getting their notification. And either that's someone else's responsibility, maybe the housing authority, maybe a council person. But in any case, I think it's important to remember why we have the groups reaching out to us because they are a selection of the larger population, and many folks' voice are lost in structural ways because of how we do our business.

Councilmember or sorry. Council president Dickerson.

I have a comment, but I'm wondering if we could ask a question of the applicant or have them speak. Is that okay?

Is that a okay. Okay. Who's the

sorry. Harter. Hi. Hi. We talked on the phone earlier, so I wondered if you could describe this particular item is the 1,000 feet is what the junk dealer parameters are. And one of the things you pointed out is there's a similar operation. And how close are you to the Great Lakes facility that has opposed this?

So my understanding is the waiver or the the thousand foot is from our property line, from the boundaries of our property line. So I went on the county GIS. I measured from our property corner to Great Lakes Cheese facility, not their parcel, to their facility, just to make that clarification. And it was about 990 feet, right to their facility. There's another facility that holds a junk dealer license currently down at the end of Hauser Street, I believe.

And the, the distance from their corner parcel to their facility is almost almost the same. And that facility does actually abut food processing facility, a separate one.

And just for the record, could you reaffirm some of the activities that will or will not be happening such as you're not using chemicals, you're not burning things?

That's correct. I I sent a I don't know. Not really an email anymore, but I I I put a submittal in there so it's documented of our plan. It's one thing to say a thing. It's another thing to document it. That's why I wanted to submit it just so we're very clear and transparent about this. So to reiterate some of the key points, there's no fire. I'd be talking to the fire chief about that if there was because it says in the junk dealer license that if we were to use fire, I'd have to have a conversation with fire department. So we're not. There's no chemicals, no nuisance in in my opinion.

I mean, there's a there's a rail yard in between. So we have a neighbor that a residential neighbor that directly abuts us. I spoke to them. They didn't have any concerns. And then from us to the bulk majority of the other residential, there's a rail yard in between it. We're gonna be a significantly smaller nuisance than that.

I just wanna add one more comment. I don't know that it won't be a question for you, Zach, but, there were 11 rental properties there are in my district, and that was those are multiple family dwellings. So it's a significant amount. You did due diligence trying to reach them, but unfortunately, the only contact we had was a PO box. And so I feel like the railroad is adequate barrier between those houses and your facility. So I will be supporting this. Thank you.

Any other questions for the gosh. My brain just went blank. Excuse me. I'm so sorry. Long day. For the applicant. No? Okay. Thank you.

Thank you.

Any other discussion? Alright. Seeing none, please vote. And that motion passes unanimously. I don't show proposal for actually, I'm gonna do this out of order.

I'm gonna do the consent agenda first and then close session last if I can make that decision, can I? Alright. Sounds good. Can I have unanimous consent to move the closed session item to the end of the agenda? Alright. That motion passes. Alright. So moving to our consent agenda. The following consent agenda will be approved with a single voice vote based on the recommendation actions unless an item is removed at the request of the mayor or a council member. Are there any items that you wish to remove from the consent agenda? Council president Dickinson.

I gave people fair warning, but I'm gonna do it.

It wasn't scary. I'd like

to remove two items, 20 five-fourteen 72. I would just like to be able to say the kudos about this as well as 20 six-ninety two, which is our air board

Are there any other items that we wish to have removed from the consent agenda? Alright. Seeing none, let's start with first twenty five one four seven two. Resolution approving amendment number one to the employee lease agreement by and between Tri State Ambulance Inc and the La Crosse fire department. Motion to adopt by council member Jensen, second by council member Kahlo. Council president Dickinson.

I would ask chief Shah if he could come forward and please explain the work that went into this. It's I'd like to celebrate that a little bit and put it on the record. Thank you.

Appreciate that. Thanks for pulling that out. I'll keep it as brief as I can, but there's a long history on this, starting way, way back in my career. So in 2021, we signed a leased employee agreement with Tri State Ambulance, which allows our personnel, which are paramedic level to, in effect, work under Tri State's logo underneath their care and then ride on their ambulance. Since that time, we've evolved that.

That ambulance operates thirty six hours a week out of Station 1 at 5th And Market with our personnel operating on their equipment. This agreement right now is an expansion expansion of of that. That. It's It's the first step in three steps to allow us for a twenty four seven operation, and it's called Tri State three twelve. With the amount of run volume that has increased over not only just the course of my career, but particularly in the last five years, Also, with the need for skilled paramedics that have experience, this is a nice fit.

And it's been a a working relationship and building with TriState for the last five years, and and now it's come to fruition. This is step one, your approval. I think the revenue piece is a little bit misleading. It's it's revenue coming in, but there is a special expense account where it goes out because we need to provide this level of service. This is almost like staffing another fire engine. So we need to be able to compensate our employees for the change in working conditions. We need to make sure that we have effective overtime backfill for the necessity of having to fill that truck. So that will be encompassed in the the revenue stream that's coming in. It'll be going out. Part two of this will be probably next month.

Hopefully, we can agree upon some terms with the local one twenty seven under the CBA agreement for an amendment to that, which will be coming to the finance personnel committee. And then step three will be implementation with the operational plan and hopefully sometime later this spring or early summer. Are there any questions that you may have for me?

Any questions? Thank you very much, chief Shunt.

Thank you. Appreciate it. Pulling that out.

A motion has been made and so has a second. Seeing no other discussion, please vote. That motion passes unanimously. Moving on to twenty six zero zero nine two. Sorry. I gotta read that out. Hold on. Resolution authorizing the appointment of Lauren Kloss as director of the La Crosse Regional Airport effective 02/13/2026. Motion to approve by council member Goggins, second by council president Dickinson. Council president Dickinson.

I just wanna give a warm welcome to Lauren. I know the aviation board is extremely excited for this to happen. I would like the counsel to also join in that excitement. I see really good things happening at the airport, as I did through the notices. And Lauren's going to do a great job moving us forward. Thank you. Yes.

I would like to add congratulations, Lauren. I am glad to have you on as one of the directors of the City of La Crosse. You've proven that you're ready and that you are excited and you're ready to make big things happen at the La Crosse Airport. And so I'm just excited to have you. And for council members, just so you know, when we talk about the hiring process, I worked with director Franson. We looked at other candidates as well, and Lauren really was the top candidate out of all of the applicants that we reviewed. And so we are excited to have her as our new director. Alright. Motion has been made. Second has been given.