Board of Public Works - Regular Meeting

All right. Welcome, everyone. I am calling to order the Tuesday, February 10 meeting of the Utilities Committee. Please rise and join me for the Pledge of Allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of The United States Of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Please be seated. Thank you. Roll call of membership, let the records note that Alder Heffernan is excused. And we will introduce ourselves starting on my left.

Adrian Stanson Martin, District 11. Vered Meltzer, District 2. Josh Lambert, District 1. Denny Dougherty, District 15.

Thank you. Now to approve the minutes from the previous meeting, twenty six-one hundred seventy, for the January 27 Utilities Committee meeting minutes.

Move to approve. Second.

All right. We have a motion and a second. All in favor say aye. Aye. Are there any nay votes or abstentions? There are none. The minutes are approved four-zero. We do not have any public hearings or appearances today. We have one action item, 20Six-one71, request to award the K26 Native Vegetation Contract to NES Ecological Services, a division of Robert E. Lee and Associates, in an amount not to exceed $193,052.01

Move to approve. Second.

Alright. And did staff want to comment on this at all? Alright. Deputy Director Newburger, go ahead.

As the memo mentions, we've been working with NES Ecological Services since 2022 RFP went out. This would be the fifth and final of had quarter nineteen,

of

working again with NES we Ecological Services. They've been doing a a fantastic job for us. They know our stormwater facilities very well and they work well with our staff and their prices are very good.

Wonderful. Thank you. Any comments or questions from the committee? Alright, seeing none, let's go ahead and vote. All in favor say aye. Aye. Any nay or abstention? Alright, that is recommended for approval, four-zero. We have one information item. I'm really excited about this one. Twenty six-one hundred seventy two, the Adopt Upon Program Overview. Director Youngworth, or Deputy Director Newburger.

I'll take this one. So the description is provided in the memo. And I believe we attached a full copy of the adoptive pond program handbook. So this was really a grassroots development. It was something that we kind of talked about within the department doing for a while.

And the initiative was really brought about by the people at DPW who take care of our ponds. So this was kind of a collaboration between the DPW operations side and then the DPW engineering side along with other city departments such as the attorney's office to help us develop a program to really help engage neighbors, help them feel a sense of ownership with stormwater components of our community, people who care about things like water quality and habitat that we have going on at our stormwater ponds. So we consider this an important part of our outreach efforts for information and education in addition to just providing some resources from some interested people who want to help improve those aspects of our next here may have taken advantage the of that in the past. We've started doing site education opportunities at Stormwater Ponds, I want to say, about three years or so ago. I think we did one that was focused on alders.

Since that time, I think we've done one or two pond education site visits with some homeowners associations. So I'd say this represents the next step in our ongoing effort to help engage our community and what Stormwater is all about in Appleton and how seriously we take it.

Awesome. Well, I think that this is really wonderful work. And I was really impressed with how accessible the program looks. It looks like something that is oriented so that people of all ages can participate. I like how it's a lighter lift as well. There's a lot of protections to make sure that people aren't overexerting themselves or doing anything dangerous. So I'm really excited to see this go out into the community and I hope everyone watching or listening to this video will take that packet out of the agenda and share it with school groups and other community organizations because this is a really great opportunity.

It's really good to bring awareness to residents of what stormwater ponds are. Why is this pond in my backyard? You know, is it okay to dump grass along the edge of it with my you know, after mowing or dumping of trash, anything of that nature. It's folks are directly impacting it, so to have an avenue for them to be able to buy in and learn about it in the process and take some ownership of it is really something we're excited for and wanting to do.

Awesome. All right. Do we have any comments or questions from the committee up here?

I would just like to add my kudos to the interdepartment teams who really worked on creating this and making it happen. That's a really great initiative that they showed and we're excited to expand that program and have it out there in the public.

Alright. Well that was an information item so we cannot vote on it. Although I'm sure we all know how that vote would go. So moving down, item number eight.

Move to adjourn. Second.

We have a motion and a second to adjourn. All in favor? Aye. We are adjourned. Thank you all very much.