City Council - Regular Meeting

This meeting of the Eau Claire City Council will come to order. Please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance.

Thank you and welcome, everyone, to the Tuesday, September 22nd meeting of the Eau Claire City Council. Item on our agenda, and agendas are in the back of the room if you need one, is the consent agenda. Some of you may be here for the consent agenda items, and those are items number 1 through 11. Please know that unless an item is pulled out, all the items will pass or fill with one vote. You are good to leave if your item passes with the consent agenda, but you are also welcome to stay. Do council members have any questions regarding the consent agenda or wish to remove any items for separat

Seeing none, Deputy City Clerk, please call the roll.

Aye. That passes unanimously. All right, we have one proclamation for this afternoon, and that's for Fire Prevention Week. And I'd like to invite Deputy Chief Bob Haller up to the front of the room. Whereas the city of Eau Claire is committed to ensuring the safety and security of all those living and visiting our city, and whereas fire remains a serious public safety concern both locally and nationally, and the presence of lithium ion batteries in many household devices introduces fire risks. And whereas most of the rechargeable electronics used in homes daily include smartphones, tablets, la

We should go into our business agenda and onto agenda item number 12. And this is a resolution authorizing the city manager to enter into a subdivision infrastructure agreement with Linden Hills Development Team, LLC, for street and utility improvements within the plat of Linden Hills. And we have our engineering Director Leoness to present on this item. Welcome.

Thank you, Director Ness. Are there any questions from the council? Oh, Vice President Schoen.

Thank you, Council President Gragert. Director Ness, I'm wondering if staff have any position or recommendation related to the deferral request?

Thank you. Any other questions from council? Okay. Okay, thank you. Thank you. So on a motion by council member Werthmann and seconded by council member Orth, this item is moved. Is there any discussion? Council Member Miller.

Thank you, Council President. I guess my question for the city attorney, if we wanted to honor the request for deferral as was supported by staff, what's the best way to award such an amendment? I don't know the exact length or side or what can I refer to to properly note this.

I have a point of information, maybe. Yeah. On page 73 of our agenda, there's suggested amendment language. I just wanted to make council members aware of that.

Yeah, and the particular streets are mentioned of Siena Boulevard and then County Line Road as well, so... So those could also be named in a motion. Council Member Miller.

Thank you, Council President. That being said, then, for brevity, I would move to amend the item with the verbiage indicated on page 73 of our packet.

OK, we have a motion to approve the requested deferral of sidewalk from Council Member Miller. Council Member? Brewster. OK. So with a second from Council Member Brewster, is there any discussion on that amendment to the resolution? City Attorney Nick.

We do, yeah. From Council Member Werthmann and seconded by Council Member Orth. And then the motion by Council Member Miller and seconded by Council Member Brewster to amend the resolution for the sidewalk deferment. Is there any discussion on that amendment? All right. Deputy city clerk, please call the roll on the amendment.

Brewster. Aye. All right, and that amendment to the resolution passes unanimously. Any further discussion on the amended resolution? to approve the subdivision infrastructure agreement. All right, seeing none, Deputy City Clerk, please call the roll.

Aye. All right. And agenda item number 12 passes unanimously. And we'll go on to agenda item number 13, resolution amending the city of Eau Claire handbook for public officials and guidelines for resident public forums at Monday city council meetings. And we have our city attorney, Steven Nick, to present on this item.

Thank you. Council Member Werthmann has a question.

Thank you, Council President Greger. City Attorney Nick, I'm looking at this big substantial change on the first bulleted paragraph. There's two things that jump out at me. One is that it used to be that people could present on things that had citywide application or things that we legislatively could do or make some impact on as a local government unit. And my understanding is now that this change essentially opens up beyond, unless I'm misreading this, opens up beyond simply things that are policies that we can impact. So we could have people coming in here and talking about state and nation

Thank you, Council President Greger. City Attorney Nick, so for context, last year I went to the National League of Cities conference and I attended a session on public comment periods and heard a lot about case law that City Attorney Nick is likely referencing indirectly. I concur I think that there's changes needed here. My question is in the last paragraph there's additional language added that you referred to just recently about this further defining what a limited public forum is and specifically stating that it's an opportunity to present to City Council subject to speakers following rul

Thank you. Council Member Werthmann. Thank you, Council President. I wanted to pick up on that point. And that is on the reference to profanity. And so I can imagine, let me pull up my packet here real quick. Profane. You can imagine profanity being used in a way that's probably First Amendment protected, where you say such and such policy is expletive, you know. Hurting my family or whatever where you add it. They're not disruptive, but it's probably allowed versus profanity. That's like You're swearing at some of the members or something It's it's a in a different context and so that seems l

Thank you, Council President. I'm not an attorney, but I'm just trying to try you to dissect to me so I can understand. Is there a municipality which has adopted this resolution?

Yeah, I'm saying is there other municipalities in the state of Wisconsin who just adopted the same resolution we are trying to adopt?

Okay, thank you. Any other questions from the council before we... Move this item for discussion. OK. So on a motion by Councilmember Miller and seconded by Vice President Schoen, this item is moved. Is there any discussion? Vice President Schoen.

Thank you, Council President. As I alluded to in questions, I just wanted to share with Council that last fall when I attended the NLC conference, I sat in on a session, and I have to say it was quite shocking what falls under the umbrella of protected speech and so I think that it's necessary that we adopt these changes to be compliant with First Amendment laws but I also recognize and some of my questions were around how do we differentiate between what is protected speech and what's something we can point of order and and remind speakers to adhere to decorum. And I hope that we have an oppo

Thank you, Council President. Yeah, I'm proud that the state of Eau Claire has had this public comment period available since 2018. This is not required, I understand, by our ordinances to have, you know, there are the public discussions, which are, but, you know, this was an idea crafted, I believe, Council Member Werthmann was probably on the council at the time, that allows people to come in front of the city council and to say whatever they're thinking. You know, of course, you know, emails, in-person contact, phone calls are available, but we got all 11 of us here. This is a great opportu

Thank you, Council Member Miller. Council Member Werthmann.

Thank you, Council President. I'll be supporting these changes, and I want to also let my fellow council members know that I think that this policy might actually need some additional conversation around this specific piece, the 20-minute public comment period. And I don't know the answer to this, but I would like the... council to also weigh in at some point about who gets to speak during this period this was a policy set eight years ago and I think it's important that we clarify maybe we like the limited nature of it but maybe we want to open it up more broadly and so I intend in coming week

Thank you, Council Member Werthmann. Any other discussion? Because I'll just say, Council Member Werthmann and I were both new. Well, I was a new council member Council Member Werthmann had been on already for nine or so years at the point of the creation of the public comment period, but a former council member, Emily Berge, really led the way on it, too, and that really opened, I think, a lot of opportunity in our community for engagement and sharing ideas, and it you know, these are pretty minor tweaks in a sense, basically, you know, related to like, you know, how we respond, you know, to,

All right, and that passes unanimously. I want to move on to agenda item Number 14, resolution authorizing the issuance and sale of $12,645,000 in general obligation promissory notes, series 2026A. And we have a few other notes. I'm not sure if you're going to want to present on all of them or just this one. But we have our finance director, Kitsie Winters, to present.

Okay. Let's see, we have a question from Councilmember Miller.

you council president thank you director winters um if you go back i think two or three pages to the winning that one there um is there a particular reason why the middle bid um had the 5.6 percent rate where the other are in the four three and the four six range what about this particular uh promissory note caused a higher interest rate

So we'll be making money off of it so then we have to pay a little more upfront to borrow the money to do it?

Thank you. Any other questions about any of the three? Okay. Should we have Sean come up at all?

Yeah, thank you so much. And it looks like we have a question from Council Member Brewster.

Thank you, Chair. Could you talk just a little bit about how interest rates on this sort of municipal promissory notes interact with the economy at large? Sure. In a way, like if the economy is looking a little shaky, then maybe this is a more desirable product for investors or vice versa.

Thank you, Council President Greggert, and thank you so much for the presentation, and thank you to Director Winters as well. Can you just, all of this I think is interesting for the public to understand as well. I saw your chart says interest rates are higher, and I heard you, can, do you remember like How much, what's the difference between last year and this year on these kinds of, this kind of borrowing for the city?

So we're talking over a point and a point and a half. Interest rates higher this year compared to this time last year.

Thank you. Any other questions from the council? Council Member Orth.

Thank you, President Gregert. Yeah, I'm just wondering, is that kind of in line with what you expected bids to come in at last?

OK. So on a motion by Council Member Mboga and seconded by Council Member Otto, agenda item number 14 has been moved. It's the first of the promissory notes, 2026A. Is there any discussion from the council on that particular item? OK. Deputy city clerk, please call the roll on agenda item number 14. Orth.

All right. And that passes unanimously. On to agenda item number 15, resolution authorizing the issuance and sale of $7,390,000 taxable general obligation promissory notes series 2026B. No further questions about that one in particular. So on a motion by Councilmember Reed and seconded by Councilmember Serrano, agenda item number 15 is moved. Is there any discussion? Seeing no discussion, Deputy City Clerk, please call the roll.

That passes unanimously. Go on to agenda item number 16, resolution authorizing the issuance and sale of $6,260,000 waterworks system revenue bonds, series 2026C. Not seeing any questions on that one in particular. So on a motion by council member Brewster and seconded by council member Werthmann, item number 16 is moved. Is there any discussion? Seeing no discussion, Deputy City Clerk, please call the roll.

All right, and that passes unanimously. On to agenda item number 17. resolution creating tax incremental district number 18 approving its project plan and Establishing its boundaries and we have our finance director again See winters to present.

All right, Council Member Bruce has a question.

Thank you, Chair. guess the my first question is is a little bit more of a comment but i know uh at least at the plan commission public hearing there were a lot of people with a with a misunderstanding of the like legal definition of what blight is and um you know i think it's important that you know it's it that we make it clear that it's not like we think your building is trash or something just because it's here. There's a lot of different ways that buildings or areas fall under that. And I was wondering if maybe you or Director White could speak to what actually meets the legal definition

I guess personally I have a pretty good understanding of it. This is more for the public who might be confused by that. Because we've had a number of things come up lately with the redevelopment districts with the discussion of blight and I think just a lot of general confusion

Thank you, Council President. I wanted to ask something about just a couple of boundary things here. There had been discussion a few years back about road connection potentially up to, I think it was Ball Street from Galloway. And I'm wondering if that's still something in the consideration. Do you remember this, City Manager Solberg? Could this potentially fund something like that?

And I assume that the boundary doesn't have to include the end of Ball Street in order to get funding for a project like that?

Thanks. It was just a little unclear on the map, so I appreciate the clarification. And then I wanted to bring up this idea because it's helpful for the public to know. One thing you put on there is that this doesn't impact people's taxes. It's probably the number one pushback we've heard on these two other TID districts in downtown when they were first founded. and I think there's that perception is like if we're increasing our overall valuation in our community how would that potentially impact uh the the you know folks across the community who pay taxes uh how should they think about that t

Thank you, President Grygert. Director Winters, I wondered if you would speak to the project outside the TID that's included in the packet, the Putnam Rail Crossing project of one million and then remediation and acquisition costs. So I'm just curious more about that particular project.

Can I have one more? Another, just to follow up on the impact of the tax increment district, could you speak to the potential impact it has on school districts and CBTC and the other taxing authorities until it closes?

Thank you, Council President Gregert, and thanks so much to the both of you for the presentation. I have two questions. So first question, I know we've reached out to all the property owners. This is the first time I've been on council involving creation of a TID. um how um and i'm curious what the property owner's reaction is to this people generally favorable to this i'm assuming if i'm understanding all this correctly this opens up more municipal funding for bigger development better development of this whole area clean up if needed all of this so My assumption would be they're great, but w

Thank you. And my second question, if that's OK. I think you guys know I'm really, really interested in the representative for the city on the St. Croix Chippewa Rail Commission. Are there ideas? Can you comment at all? I mean, I know this is very early because we're just creating this TID. But what could this mean in terms of a future rail station in this area?

Any other? Council Member Brewster, if you have another.

Thank you, Chair. I also have two questions. One of them is relatively brief. Just wondering why Putnam was chosen as the cutoff and not Dewey, because there's a number of. what I would consider blighted properties in that region as well. I mean, there's good stuff there too, don't get me wrong, but like the hip slot and...

OK. Does that ratio that you speak of, is that like a ratio of number of properties or a ratio of total land area? It is my area. Okay. All right. Totally makes sense. And then my second question was... Are blight tids, like the one we're looking at creating here, also eligible for the two-year extension for affordable housing?

Fantastic. Thank you. Thank you. I actually had a question that's kind of maybe a strange one. But I see that half-mile boundary. you know going into Altoona and overlapping even with one of their tax incremental districts is there any implications of that with regard to working with Altoona on any on any investments or like Is the money prohibited from being able to be used on anything that would cross the boundary into another municipality?

Indeed. Thank you. Council Member Amboga, I think, has a question. I have a question for you.

What happens with the city finance if the projected development or tax increment does not materialize on schedule?

A question kind of about the outreach. You mentioned some of the business, like the property owners were contacted. Was there, and I believe we had a letter, at least some of us got a letter from the Neighborhood Association of the Northside Hill. Could you maybe describe the outreach to Neighborhood Associations? or contact we've had with them?

Okay. Yeah, I would just mention that, you know, the Eastside Hill Neighborhood Association has decided has contacted me in the past at least about the overpass potential on Galloway because of just because they would have a view of it potentially depending on how it's designed and also be users of it directly and you know because it would bring the trail over from the Boyd Park area so with that overpass but anyway I think we can move this item and discuss. I appreciate all the work that went into this, and thanks for answering all of our questions. So on a motion by Councilmember Ortt and se

Thank you, Chair. I just want to say this is one of the better tools at our disposal in a time of pretty significant budget constraints to work on economic development in collaboration with private partners within the city limits. So I'm excited that we were able to put together another one that will help us get some projects and improvement done. So thank you.

Thank you, Council Member Brewster. Council Member Werthmann.

Thank you, Council President. I just want to thank staff and elders, everyone who worked on this. This is a huge deal for our community. As someone who has been a part of some of the decision making on these other blight districts and seeing the transformation truly impactful for our community, I'm really excited for what this can provide. There's a number of things that I think are incredibly promising. One is the potential of new housing projects within this corridor. Anyway, I think we've been waiting for that kind of new development for some time, and this will help kickstart those kinds o

Thank you, Council Member Werthmann. Any other discussion?

Thank you, City Attorney Nick. Any other discussion from the council? All right, seeing none, Tobey, City Clerk, please call the roll.

Reid. Aye. Council Member Otto, would you like to vote on that item? No. Otto. OK. OK. So. We were, so that item passes unanimously with Council Member Otto abstaining, because he presumably didn't know what we were voting on. So thank you. We've completed our business agenda, but I'm going to read the two items that we have for ordinances for introduction. Agenda item number 18 is ordinance to rezone two properties from CCP Corridor Commercial with a planned development overlay to CC Corridor Commercial District located at 6375 Scully Drive and unaddressed lot located at the east corner of th

Council member Brewster. Just a reminder that after this is the comp plan update launch. I believe that's either 6 or 6.30.

Okay, so both of those times were relevant to what I was remembering, and that's on the third floor of the library. So hopefully you can make it.

Thank you, Council Member Brewster. Just a couple things. We do have, perhaps the city manager will announce this too, but there are little cards that are a reminder that we can help recruit poll workers for the city. As we need probably 100 or so more poll workers is my understanding for the election and there is an email from like in your inbox about some of the details around that and then you all should also have an email about a educational event around data centers and that's coming up next Tuesday. Let's see, the 29th from 7.30 to 2.30 at Eau Claire Events District. So there's an opport

Okay, thank you, City Manager Solberg. Council Member Werthmann.

Thank you, Council President. If I could request an update, is that allowed? for next for maybe yeah for next council meeting um and it's regarding the biodiversity fund that was in the budget last year i think council member sean and i sorry um vice president sean and i worked on i'm wondering if we could get an update on the progress on that fund uh kind of where it's at and um yeah just anything that you might have on it for for next council

Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Werthmann. Any other announcements or requested updates? All right. Well, then we'll move to adjourn the meeting. If there's no objection from the council, this meeting is adjourned. Thank you all.