City gives preliminary OK to Pep’s Drive plat

Area maps out 30 lots to develop for residential housing in Medford

A planned residential subdivision for the south end of Pep’s Drive moved forward Tuesday night with the city council’s approval of a preliminary plat for the area.

This is the first step in the plat approval process with it next going to the planning commission for review and approval before ultimately coming back to the city council for final approval. Making the entire process more streamlined is that the parcel in question for development is entirely owned by the city.

The city had previously approved working with a developer to put a 64-unit apartment complex on the north end of the road near its intersection with CTH O. This section is located on the southern portion of the road bordering a branch of the Black River to the south.

The plat calls for the development of a 30-lot residential area with a roughly triangular looped road coming off of Pep’s Drive and running through the proposed subdivision. The proposed development is part of the city’s ongoing efforts to increase availability of housing in the community.

According to city coordinator Joe Harris, the city council in the future will need to decide on a formal name for the road loop to establish addresses. He said as a working name he has been using “Fran Circle” for the loop section after Joseph “Pep” Simek’s wife Fran Simek.

Alderman Greg Knight praised the name choice saying he felt it was very appropriate to name it after Fran Simek.

In related action, council members gave final approval to hiring Ayres Associates to do the plat development and engineering work for the project at a cost of $82,900. This cost would be assigned to Tax Incremental District No. 14 a multiuse TID which includes this area. Under TIDs, the taxes collected on improvements in the district are retained by the city to pay off development expenses over a number of years.

In addition to the engineering expenses, council members also approved asking the planning commission to vacate a portion of Pep’s Drive as it was designed in order to match how it was actually built.

According to Harris, the curved part of the southern portion of the road was designed and platted to be a more gradual “swoop” however when it was constructed it was built with more of a hard 90-degree turn. Vacating the road area as planned, but not built will clean up the plat map for future development in the area.

Reorganization

As the first council meeting following the April election, the council held its annual reorganization including the election of a council president, approval of committee appointments and commissions.

Christine Weix was elected council president on a unanimous vote with alderman Mike Bub absent. The council president serves in the mayor’s place at the mayor’s absence.

Greg Knight was elected to serve as the council representative to the planning commission. Council member Laura Holmes had initially proposed Dave Brandner for the post, but Brandner declined because his wife, Kris, already served as a citizen member on the commission.

The council subcommittees remain largely unchanged with new council member Erica Petersen filling the spots on the public works and public utilities committee that had been held previously by her predecessor Tim Hansen. Hansen had not sought reelection.

In the boards and commission appointments there were few changes.

On Library Board, Drew Weimer will replace Wendy Plawski, whose term was up.

On the zoning board of appeals, Mayor Mike Wellner appointed Laura Holmes and Peggy Kraschnewski as new members replacing Hansen and Marvel Lemke.

In other business, council members:

_ Approved switching to Civic System to operate the city’s core financial systems at a cost of $87,950 paid in 2022, 2022 and 2024 after which point the city will have an ongoing fee of $13,250 for the software. The city currently used Incode with an annual fee of $38,000. In addition to being a cost savings, staff supported the change due to the easier to use interface and increased access to training.

_ Named The Star News as the offi cial city publication and approved the following depositories of city funds: AbbyBank, Associated Bank, DMB Community Bank of De Forest, Forward Financial Bank, Nicolet National Bank, Prevail Bank, Taylor Credit Union and TD Bank, N.A. of San Diego, Calif.