Loyal council approves summer road projects

By Valorie Brecht As the balmy days of summer draw nearer, the Loyal Common Council had to make a decision regarding which road project or projects were most important to complete while the weather was favorable to construction.

At its April 16 meeting, council reviewed bids from American Asphalt for repaving roads this summer, which were as follows: East Davel Drive (runs parallel to Industrial) for $103,795.20, North Division Street from Mill Street to Spring Street (including curb and gutter) for $72,108.40, North Union Street from Mill Street going north for $25,480, and the library parking lot for $31,740. The Davel Drive bid includes paving North Wolf Street north of Industrial Drive.

The total for all the projects is $233,123.60, but the city only has an annual street repair budget of $120,000, meaning the council would need to be selective.

“Talking with the city crew, we usually save like $20,000 for crack filling or chip sealing. And last year they struggled to find enough to do the crack filling. So our upkeep and our maintenance on our streets has been done very well, so we don’t necessarily need to save the money for that. But we would still have to make sure that we had enough for curb and gutter, even though the guys do it,” said deputy clerk Viki Pieper. “I know the guys, if they had the choice, would like to see East Davel done.”

“My question is, how bad are the other ones?” asked council member Tim Froeba.

“Well, it would just get put on the five-year street plan. It pushes everything back a year,” said Pieper. “I believe what Terry was saying was, the library parking lot, it’s going to have to be done, and so as long as they’re there, they could do Union Street from Lenny’s house on Mill, up that far to the parking lot and make an L. That’s why he really wanted to tie those together.”

Council member Curtiss Lindner said it basically amounted to pushing some of the projects back two years. Froeba noted it could be longer, because other streets could deteriorate in the meantime and be pushed higher up the priority list.

“Or, you know, when we have to put the new roads in our new industrial park (in the southwest corner of the city), because we’re going to have to take a loan out, you could put some of those projects in with the new loan too,” said Toufar. “Because we’re going to have to do water and sewer out there, anyway.”

She said the city was waiting on the engineering company to move forward with that project.

Lindner made a motion, seconded by Dave Geier, to just do Davel Drive this year, as it is highly traveled.

“That’ll give us a $16,000 cushion if something else pops up here,” said Lindner.

“Maybe, and nobody likes to hear this, but we may have to up our budget next fall from $120,000 to $150,000 or whatever, so we can at least start getting caught up. Otherwise if we keep backing up — doing just one (street) or a half of one or a third of one — and you know that the asphalt isn’t going to get any cheaper. So we’re in that spot nobody likes to hear, to increase our budget so we can keep up with our road maintenance,” said council member Tom Bobrofsky.

Toufar said she’d been with the city 16 years and the annual budget had remained $120,000 that whole time.

“And I will say, even with the guy who does our crack filling and chip sealing, he says we’ve done very well with our roads for the budget we’ve had. Are they falling apart? No. Do we want to get there before they’re totally shot? Yeah. But I think the guys are pretty happy with what we have to work with,” said Pieper.

The board voted unanimously to approve the $103,795.20 bid for repaving Davel Drive.

When American Asphalt comes to town, they will also patch the sections of street disrupted by any water breaks in the past year.

City View Estates sale John and Jean McPherson approached the city council asking to purchase two lots in the City View Estates. They recently bought lots 30 and 31 on Bluebird Road from Ryan and Jessica Kurz, but now want to purchase lots 40 and 41, which are directly to the east of the lots they own.

“You guys haven’t developed it yet and there’s no roads. And we realize that and that’s fine, but we would like to purchase those back two lots and make it one big parcel,” said Jean McPherson.

She said they would be getting a home from Stratford Homes and it was supposed to be completed by October. The house would be on the front two lots, closest to the road. The McPhersons offered to buy the other two lots for $3,000 each, which is the rate the city has been asking. Each lot is about 16,559 square feet.

“Well, you know what my thoughts are on that. You lose the tax base on two lots. They put the house in the middle of four lots, when we really could have two houses on those four lots. I mean, eventually we’re going to have to put a road in and we’ve got less tax base out there,” said Froeba. “But that’s my thought on it.”

Council member Jenae Weyer asked if the issue should be brought to the Finance/City View Estates Committee. City clerk Shannon Toufar said it could be discussed in committee or with the whole council.

“I lean towards Tim. It’s hard because we haven’t sold a whole lot of lots out there so I don’t want to limit selling more lots, but you’re right, that’s less tax base without a house on the back side there. And what’s going to stop the next person from asking and you end up with a whole road full of empty lots?” said Lindner.

Mayor Carmen Englebretson suggested sending the matter to the Finance/City View Estates Committee, which includes Greg Brock, Lindner and Weyer. Lindner made a motion, seconded by newly-elected council member Kayla Schar, to send it committee. The board voted unanimously to do so.

Other business At the start of the meeting, newly-elected council members were sworn in, including Schar, who ran as a write-in candidate to fill the Ward 2 seat previously occupied by Matt Prein, who opted not to run for re-election. Bobrofsky, Froeba and Geier were also sworn in for another term.

In his report, Police Chief Matt Kubista said he was looking into getting new defibrillators to replace a couple in city hall. The batteries still have about half a charge, but will need to be replaced eventually. A battery costs $400 per unit and a set of pads costs $200. Kubista said he contacted the sheriff’s office to get quotes from the vendor they go through and possibly a discount.

The library had a circulation of 1,396 items in March. Lindner gave an update on the Loyal Splash Pad. The City of Loyal is waiting for the DNR to approve one of the permits for the splash pad site before construction can begin.

The council also discussed keeping chickens in the city, as a resident had requested that. As it stands now, city ordinance does not allow for chickens. The council decided to have Kubista or Toufar research to see which other municipalities around the area allow for chickens and what are their rules, and bring back what they learn to the next council meeting. Last November, the City of Marshfield approved an ordinance allowing residents to have up to four backyard chickens but no roosters. Chicken permit holders must maintain housing and upkeep standards.

The council approved a bartender’s license for Kelly Schmitz at Rumors on Main.