Council votes 6-1 to light alley for one year - The Northwoods River News
Ultimately, the council voted to light the alley for one year, at a cost not to exceed $230, but the vote was not unanimous.
The situation with the alley was previously discussed at the July 25 public safety committee meeting. Interim city administrator Keith Kost brought the idea forward after Downtown Rhinelander Inc. (DRI) previously suggested installing lighting in the alley because revelers from nearby bars frequently use it as a place to illegally relieve themselves. The project envisions a mural being painted on one of the walls, with the only cost to the city being the electricity to power the lights.
After much discussion, most of it centering on whether the move would set a precedent for other property owners to seek city payment for lighting on private property, the committee tabled the idea so it could be discussed at the next meeting in late August.
However, minds seemed to charge after an unknown person threw a concrete block from the roof of the Oneida Apartments at 28 North Brown Street July 30, striking an Oneida County squad car, causing over $7,000 in damage.
Committee chair Alex Young immediately asked mayor Richard Johns to put the item on Monday's City Council agenda.
Rhinelander Area Chamber of Commerce executive director Maggie Steffen, who originally suggested the idea while leading DRI, also spoke in favor of the proposal.
"Maggie put together a little handout with some additional information," Young said.
He added that there have been numerous law enforcement concerns with this alley over the years resulting in numerous citations being issued.
Steffen said the idea to light the alley is an offshoot of the streetscape project. The purpose is to make the alley look better and improve the safety of people utilizing it after dark while not becoming "a huge budget item" in the process.
"I've been working with several different partners, the two property owners because it is the actual property owner's alleyway," Steffen said.
Steffen has even talked to Oneida Apartments owner Earl Meinen of B & B Investments, who has not only agreed to leave the finished project in place at least 20 years, but also signaled his intention to contribute to the project, either financially or through donation of items such as benches or a metal archway.
Gaber Electric, Inc. presented three proposals for illuminating the alley, but two were ultimately discarded as unworkable. The plan selected involves the installation of five LED light fixtures at a cost of $2,800, using the electrical wiring from the two existing light fixtures, which would be removed and extending the wiring to the other three lights.
Young pointed out that many of the design elements had been in the original streetscape study, but were not done for budgetary reasons.
"With the cost of the lighting, I think we're going to save a substantial amount of money from the streetlight budget from the LED lighting we installed downtown. So I think for $230, for skin in the game from the city a year to light this thing, we are probably saving more than enough from the streetlight budget to offset that," Young said. "And it is a small contribution between DRI and some other partners to do some of the things in the streetscape project that we weren't able to finance."
Alderman Tom Gleason pointed out that since the block-throwing incident, the overwhelming response from residents on social media has been for the city to pay the $230.
"They all understand that it is a safety issue to light this alley up, clean it up a little bit," Gleason said. "All of the comments I've read have been supportive of the city taking part in this."
"Taking some of this as an eyesore and detriment to the downtown, for a little bit of skin in the game in partnership with some other folks, we're going to get something nice out of this," Young added.
Alderpersons Steve Sauer and Dawn Rog spoke against the proposal.
"There are two existing lights on the building, I know they are mentioned in the bid," Sauer said. "Will the electric bill go to the owner and the city would just contribute toward that?"
Steffen said that would be the case because there is no way to meter the electricity used just by the lights or to power them off city power such as a nearby streetlight.
Sauer said the project improves private property at taxpayer expense.
"That's DRI's choice, but DRI can install those lights," Sauer said. "I have no way of knowing how much the lights in place currently use, but I suspect that replacing those fixtures with LED fixtures will actually save the building owner money over what he is paying for these fixtures now."
He added that the present lights hadn't worked for years, but are now lit. He suspects the bulbs were changed sometime after July 30.
Steffen objected to Sauer saying the building owner would gain from the project, arguing the project is "for the betterment of the downtown" as a whole.
"I don't think you people realize the severity of that alleyway," Steffen added. "I reached out to the executive director at Tri-County Council, and while she obviously couldn't provide actual hard numbers such as that because of confidentiality, but (she said) and I quote, 'we are aware that there have been several assaults, some sexual assaults, in this space over the last four years.'"
Alderperson Dawn Rog also voiced her objection to the project, saying it would open the door for other property owners to seek city assistance lighting their properties.
She also asked Steffen why she didn't do something about the alley when she was head of DRI. Steffen replied she wasn't aware of the severity of the problem at the time.
"I knew it was a problem, but I didn't know it was as severe as it was," she said.
Over the next 10 minutes or so, Sauer and Rog pressed their objections before Rog tried to introduce a motion to table the plan for a month. Mayor Dick Johns denied that as there was already a motion on the floor.
Alderperson Mark Pelletier then called the question and asked for a vote on the motion already on the floor. Before the vote, the motion was amended twice; the first time capping the city's annual payment for electricity at no more than $230 while the second required the measure to be re-evaluated in one year.
When the roll call vote was taken, Sauer was the lone nay vote of the seven council members present. The discussion had lasted 26 minutes by the time the vote was taken.
Earlier in the meeting, the discussion on hiring Green Golf Partners to conduct a study of Northwood lasted just a couple minutes before the council voted unanimously to approve the measure.
Jamie Taylor may be reached via email at jamie@rivernewsonline.com.
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