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Weekly Blast!: Last week the Town of Grant hosted the Portage County unit meeting of the Wisconsin Towns Association (WTA). This week I attended the WTA Annual Convention in Stevens Point. Town and village officers from all over the State of Wisconsin were present; hundreds of them. Each year this event helps to educate officers about state statutes, current legislation, road maintenance and construction, budgeting, ambulance and fire protection, and so much more. No one officer can attend all the sessions available (we need the entire board to do that!) but these are the ones I attended: 1) Cypersecurity Attacks; 2) Fire Protection Service Fees; 3) Legal “Cracker Barrel” (where officers can ask the WTA attorneys ANYTHING); 4) Large-Scale Wind & Solar; and 5) Industrial Development. Each session was extremely interesting and educational. Of particular interest was the session on Fire Protection Service Fees. Currently we pay for fire protection services from our general fund to the Town of Grand Rapids and the Village of Plainfield. The first uses equalized value to determine what we pay whereas the second uses a formula that is proportional to each contracted municipality. The former does not and so unfortunately, we pay a disproportional amount to T. Grand Rapids. In this WTA session they recommended two options if we don’t want to continue pulling from our general fund: 1) referendum to increase our levy; or 2) using a formula based on square footage of homes/businesses/land size, etc. to have landowners pay proportionally based on the anticipated expense of a fire to their parcel. It’s a very interesting option and several towns are working with their assessors to create a fair formula for landowners. For example, an agricultural field would pay far less than a large commercial building, or a small home would pay less than a large one with several accessory buildings, etc. Moving forward the Town of Grant will be looking at options as the price of fire protection increases every year. We need to find ways to make it fair with the greatest protection for all our residents, their homes, businesses, and land. Enjoy the anticipated stunning weather, Sharon

Posted on by vanja

Weekly Blast!

I’m going a little crazy listening to the sump pump run day and night! Got rain? And more on the way…geez. Unfortunately, there is little we can do about the weather. We have received a few complaints about potentially blocked culverts and filling of ditches and are investigating these. The amount of tree fall in our road rights-of-way is adding to potential blockages. Our Public Works crew is doing their best to clear this debris.

 

You may have noticed what looks like discing along some of the road edges of our unsurfaced roads. That’s what’s being done along some road sections so that we can reclaim some of the road base materials before being graded this spring.

 

The Plan Commission was being proactive this week by looking at sample ordinances from communities where data centers are being proposed. Because of the large-scale solar projects now slated for our community, plus easy access to plentiful groundwater resources, we may be of interest to these large-scale developers. As such, the Plan Commissioners met with Lynn Markham, UWSP Land Use Specialist to learn how other communities are dealing with these types of industrial developments. Fortunately, unlike large-scale solar developments which are decided by the Public Service Commission of WI, data centers would be under local control should one be proposed in our community.

 

Always something to worry about… Sharon