Fire Department Awards - Thank You to You All!
Administrator Kreklow Interviewing for Position in Port Washington; Why Does the Grosenick Deal Require a High Powered Environmental Attorney?
From Fire Department FaceBook page
Village Board meeting 5th February 2024 agenda packet here.
Video recording here.
Min 13:50 meeting starts
Min 15:00 President’s report - fire department awards for three separate incidents. Link to photos here.
Battalion Chief Asmondy, in behalf of Battalion Chief Holms, presents Life Saving Award to FF/Medics:
Chris Piette, Susie Weisflag, Alex Diamantopoulos, Shawn Schaeffer, John Wolf.
Battalion Chief Rodrigues presents Life Safety Award to FF/Medics:
Alex Diamantopoulos, Forest Rodman, and Mike Martinich.
Battalion Chief Asmondy presents Medal of Honor to FF/Medic Lt. Amy Boll and FF/AEMT Craig Rossman.
All were life saving incidents, some with potential life or death to the Fire Department personnel themselves.
Min 26:10 announcement of meetings coming up.
Min 26:55 public comments- More citizen input needed, board is tone deaf, too many secret meetings, costs going up, why are taxpayers funding developers, taxes going up, someone needs to say No to these budget increases.
Land on county line road for lift station 6 not needed if the Rupert and Mielke report is followed. Lift station is in the row and county could be responsible for paying to relocate, why would we? We don’t need to purchase the property.
We Energies upgrading voltage lines around the village. A pole placed beside police department sign is not needed, should be removed. (Hand out to board provided.) Did the village approve that?
To save money consider purchasing the bank property at Maple and Mequon for the new police department building. Instead of building a new large building like the DPW project remodel it. Makes sense based on proximity to calls’ volume with bonus better access to highway.
Referendum language is too all or nothing. Change the wording. Is the village trying to be the developer for the Grosenick properties? Ill equipped to do so, as shown by Holy Hill development results.
Why is Administrator Kreklow interviewing for positions in Port Washington?
Mail boxes damaged during snowstorm recently, why website why is there an automatic 5% increase. Quit picking on local entrepreneurs and favoring outside developers. Grosenick development looking like a bad idea due to the need for an environmental attorney.
Min 47:00 Consent agenda. Pull Items A, G by Trustee J Miller. Vote proceeds on the rest.
Agenda item A: road program dollars from previous meeting not included in agenda item.
Agenda item G: web hosting contract, when reviewed again to eliminate automatic 5% annual increase been in place since 2012. Contract expires next year, there are other alternatives. Motion made to review at GGF meeting, but decided not to act upon. Review options beyond current, motion amended. Motion fails because no one apparently wants to go there at this time.
Min 59:30 The Supper Club liquor license. Passes.
Min 1:00:00 The Supper Club
Min 1:02:10 Jr Warhawks lease agreement discussion regarding raise in costs for maintenance of fields of $1,000. No other changes. Baseball organization has been informed.
Discussion ensues regarding increase in inflation and number of players
Min 1:12:10 Request of $200 for financial seminar out of board budget item which has $500 in it. Prior approval and reimbursement are different. It would be precedent-setting to allow this cost. Policy question if this could be reimbursed or not. There is a $100 per month to pay for board related business.
“Geeky HR discussion.”
Attorney agrees he is not knowledgeable on the subject.
Min 1:26:00. Godfrey Khan Environmental proposal for engagement since village attorney is not qualified in this area. Apparently, there is some contamination associated with the Grosenick property. A price reduction is being asked for. The engagement is to lock up this attorney so that seller cannot. Hourly rates $330-$895/hour in proposal.
Q & A:
No attachments. What is in the proposal?
No accepted offer in place for Grosenick. No retainer.
Would this be used for eminent domain? Don’t think it will go to that end. Open to some level of price reduction.
What would they do for the village? If, village and seller cannot agree on price reduction, then ……
Need the attorney to achieve the exemption for the village for contamination. Is this because they gave up all rights in the deal before they knew about the contamination? If so, wow. More Fire, Aim, Ready. This is speculation, and worth asking about.
Could the property be considered blighted? If no deal, it’s over.
The administrator has no idea how much money has been spent. To date, the village has spent roughly $13,000 on soils testing, phase 1 & 2, surveys, and wetland delineation.
Village President offers his logic for why this engagement is needed. He’s all in.
We could walk away and keep $150,000 earnest money.
“…being irresponsible if you vote for this.” Trustee Pieper. No cap on the potential fees that might be paid out.
Min 1:46:50 Secret Meeting ensues. Not clear if Trustee Pieper was included or not.