City gives preliminary OK to agreement for new apartments

A new 64-unit apartment complex on the city’s south side inched closer to reality Tuesday night as aldermen voted to recommend approval of the developer’s agreement for the project.

The unanimous vote came at the committee of the whole meeting with final approval of the agreement with South Ridge Apartments LLC set to take place at next week’s city council meeting.

Lack of adequate housing, has been identified as a major hurdle in bringing new workers to the community, stifling economic development efforts. To address this, the city has been working with the developer to convert 12.63 acres located at 1321 Pep’s Drive into an apartment complex. The parcel is located at the intersection of Pep’s Drive and CTH O.

The structure will have 64 units and 22 garages for rent. The units will be a combination of one and two bedroom apartments on two floors of the buildings. The agreement stipulates that the project must begin in spring 2022 and be completed no later than January 2024.

Under terms of the agreement, the city agrees to sell the land to the developers for $1 and to provide a $800,000 no-interest loan to help with the project.

The agreement will put the property back on the tax roll. Alderman Mike Bub clarified that there were no stipulations about the taxable value of the property.

City coordinator Joe Harris said it would go on the tax rolls as any other property. He said he suspected they would choose to use the income-based assessment method versus the comparable-based method, noting that other rental properties in the city used that method. He said it is up to the property owners to ask for that type of assessment to be done.

In other development action, aldermen recommended granting an easement to Charles and Linda Gelhaus to put in a driveway off of Allman St. to access lots four to eight in the Rogers Addition located to the east of Malibu Drive in the city’s northeast quadrant. The city had previously granted a driveway easement from Malibu Drive for the northern three properties in the parcel.

Staffing

The city continues to adjust staffing levels and job descriptions in the wake of the wastewater treatment plan superintendent leaving for another job last month.

Harris told council members that they anticipated promoting from within the department due to not receiving any external applicants for the job and as a result would need to fill a vacancy in wastewater. Public Works employee Mike Schaaf has been assisting in the wastewater department and expressed interest in taking an operator position there.

Aldermen recommended agreeing with the lateral transfer with Schaaf to stay at the same wage and benefit levels.

Harris told aldermen that it is not surprising that there were no outside applicants, noting that there is a shortage of wastewater treatment plant operators around the state. “There are not a lot of people graduating high school wanting to go work in wastewater,” he said.

Prior to approving the job transfer, aldermen reviewed the job description for the position. Harris and city clerk Ashley Lemke said the changes were largely housekeeping in nature with updates to reflect changes in city operations since it was last reviewed such as references to the previous union in the department and city administrators.

In other business, aldermen,

_ Recommended adjusting the rate charged for city workers to do work for private groups. The cost is going from $60.10 per hour to $61.61 per hour reflecting changes in the total burden cost of employees’ wages and benefits.

_ Recommended increasing the fee charged for the statement of real property. The statement is requested as part of property transfers. Currently the city charges $10 for statement and Lemke proposed raising it to $15 with the fee at $25 if less than 48 hours notice is given. The fee was last changed in 1998.

_ Recommended the purchase of a ChemScan Analyzer for the wastewater treatment plant for a cost of $21,589.50. The Veolia filters installed in 2018 have exceptionally low nutrient removal capability and the current analyzer does not detect that low. Having a more sensitive analyzer will allow the city to use less chemicals in the treatment plant. The expense was budgeted in the 2022 treatment plant budget.

_ Recommended revisions to the city’s emergency disaster plan to reflect changes in staffing and processes since the plan was last reviewed.

_ Received an update from Harris about a plan to accept pulp runoff wastewater from the closed Park Falls paper mill. The waste from the paper mill is landfilled and under state rules the runoff from that waste has to go through a treatment plant. The city was approached about accepting this waste since other, closer treatment plants do not have the capability to accept it. Previously the mill operated its own treatment facility. Harris said the total waste is about 18,000 gallons a week with the landfill expected to continue to produce the wastewater runoff for another 20 years. Before agreeing to anything longterm, Harris said they are testing how Medford’s system handles the new waste. The city agreed to take two loads and Harris said they are adding it to the waste stream at the plant at a rate of about 50 gallons per minute, which he described as being slow. The city would charge for the treatment based on the volume and a surcharge based on its contents.

_ Mayor Mike Wellner announced that he would be seeking another term of office next April.