Boyceville to move ahead with Main Street Project

BOYCEVILLE — The Village Board approved hiring MSA to start to design the Village’s Main Street Improvement Project. This is a project that members of the village board have discussed for some time.

Erik Evenson of MSA attended the village board meeting Monday evening, January 8th and explained to the board about the need to conduct a survey of village residents to find out what percentage of the population falls within the low to moderate income levels.

Evenson noted that a half million-dollar grant is available to the village, but the survey must show that at least 51 percent of the village residents fall within the low to moderate income levels. Evenson told the village board, “We need almost all residents to do the survey.” He was asked what would happened if many people did not complete the survey? “We would need to apply to the DOA (Department of Administration) and ask if what we have would be acceptable. But Evenson cautioned that he had little hope of getting the grant if the survey was not complete.

Evenson noted that time was short for the application of the grant and the survey needed to be done within a couple of months. Evenson also informed the board that the village could not place special assessments against property owners along the project who are in the low to moderate-income levels.

The Village Board approved moving ahead with the survey and designing of the project.

Shoveling snow from sidewalks

Village President Gib Krueger addressed the other members of the board by saying that he had some feedback over the sidewalk snow removal billings. The village had received comments from at least four people regarding the $150.00 bill they received after village employees had to shovel snow off their sidewalks. After some discussion, Kruger moved to reduce those bills to $50.00 for this time only, and the board voted 6-1 to accept the motion.

Moving village offices

Board member Bud Gilbertson reported on the progress of moving the village offices from the basement of the Village Hall to the Community Center. In his report he noted that a second egress door needed to be installed on east side of the community center. He also noted what other improvements were necessary at the Center to allow for the village offices to be located there.

The board agreed to the new door and also requested that re-keying of the locks at the center be done.

Reports

Police Chief Greg Lamkin informed the board that his department handled 1048 incidents last year and noted that they made 86 arrests and wrote 138 citations in 2017.

He addressed the board with his financial report, which showed the department had a $10,769 remaining in the budget at the end of the year. He also told the board that they received a $700.00 grant to help pay for body armor for two officers.

Don Rose, public works director, reported about keeping up with the temperature of water at home owners water service. “We are running water at residences that have had freezing problems in recent years,” he told the board. He also noted that the sewer line at the fire station was frozen on Monday morning and that the problem was taken care of.

The board approved two operators license to Ian Fontaine and Abigail Kegan.

Following a closed session, the board voted to make an offer on a piece of Bank owned property.