Elk Mound discusses MOU for school resource officer
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By LeAnn R. Ralph
ELK MOUND — As the number of students has increased in the Elk Mound school district, the number of calls requiring a response from the Elk Mound Police Department also has increased.
The village’s attorney has said that most school districts already have a school resource officer before developing a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with the municipality, said Terry Stamm, village president, at the Elk Mound Village Board’s March 17 meeting.
The agenda item for the meeting was to discuss and possibly take action on a memorandum of understanding with the Elk Mound school district.
The Elk Mound Police Department applied for a grant that would have provided money for a school resource officer, but the grant application was turned down, Stamm said.
Elk Mound Police Chief Chad Weinberger applied for a COPS Hiring Program grant available through the United States Department of Justice in May of 2023.
The Elk Mound Board of Education approved an MOU with the Village of Elk Mound to apply for the COPS Hiring Program grant in April of 2023.
A school resource officer requires three years of prior experience.
Conditions of the grant include hiring one full-time police officer. The COPS Hiring Program grant provides $125,000 over three years, and 25 percent of the applications receive the funding.
One question for the village board to discuss is asking the Elk Mound school district to compensate the village for the time the police chief spends at the school, said Tim Benjamin, village trustee.
The Elk Mound school district has nearly 1,150 students.
By way of comparison, the Colfax school district has about 750 students.
For the past several years, Police Chief Weinberger’s monthly reports to the village board have included the need for hiring more police officers.
Which calls?
The questions would be — which calls for service from the school are police related? asked Julie Conlin, deputy clerk-treasurer who was filling in for the clerk, Karin Wolf, at the March 17 meeting.
Conlin also has been spending part of her time as an employee of the Village of Elk Mound working for the Elk Mound Police Department.
Other questions would be — what can the school handle? And which issues should go to the school counselors? And which issues require the police department to respond? Conlin asked.
How many calls to the school are not related to law enforcement? asked Tim Benjamin, village trustee.
At the November of 2024 meeting, Police Chief Weinberger reported to the village board that he had responded to 29 calls to the school district in October.
The police department had responded to calls concerning a juvenile with knives at school, battery to a teacher, disorderly conduct and attempted battery to a police officer, which occurred when a student knocked off the police officer’s body camera, causing it to turn off.
In addition, there were calls to the school district for damage to property, a vaping device at school and a juvenile fighting on a bus. During Homecoming, there was an incident of battery to a teacher and to a police officer, the police chief had said.
Police Chief Weinberger did not attend the March 17 meeting.
Dean
At one point, the school district had talked about hiring a dean of students, noted Mark Levra, director of public works.
A dean of students would determine which cases were actually law enforcement issues, but now the principals are handling the issues, Levra said.
The school district did not hire a dean of students and does not want a school resource officer, he said.
If the issue involves a crime or an ordinance violation, then the police department must respond, Stamm said.
The village board must pursue the issue and discuss it with the school district, Benjamin said.
In addition to a larger population of students in the Elk Mound school district, the village also has experienced an increase in population from the Settlers Ridge apartment development.
The increase in the number of students and the increase in the number of village residents have both contributed to the increases in calls for service and have put additional pressure on the police department.
Last summer, the Elk Mound Village Board discussed pursuing a referendum in the November of 2024 election to exceed the revenue limit by $100,000 on a recurring basis to fund hiring another police officer.
At the July of 2024 village board meeting, Benjamin, as chair of the public safety committee, said he had met with Eric Wright, superintendent of the Elk Mound school district; Travis Mayer, field services sergeant with the Dunn County Sheriff’s Department; and Dunn County Sheriff Kevin Bygd to discuss coverage of Elk Mound and calls for service.
Wright said the school district was not interested in supporting a school resource officer, Benjamin had said.
According to various on-line sources, the average number of police officers in the United States in 2019 was 2.3 officers per 1,000 residents.
Elk Mound’s population in 2023 was 986.
During the July of 2024 discussion, village board members were concerned about the impact of adding $100,000 to the property taxes of village residents.
A motion to exceed the revenue limit by $100,000 in the November of 2024 election died for the lack of a second.
The village board did not take up the question again to consider a referendum for this year’s spring election.
Trouble
You know that old saying, “If it weren’t for bad luck, I wouldn’t have any luck at all?”
That seemed to be case for the Village of Elk Mound when Levra gave his report for the past month to the village board at the March 17 meeting.
The wastewater treatment plant has been out of compliance with the permit issued by the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources on biochemical oxygen demand (BOD) and total suspended solids (TSS), Levra told the village board.
The DNR issued a letter to Elk Mound stating that the wastewater treatment plant was out of compliance on BOD and TSS, he said.
The letter from the DNR required a written response, which Levra said he had completed and had submitted to the DNR.
The DNR is fine with the steps being taken to try to correct the BOD and TSS, Levra said.
Stamm, who is the retired director of public works in Elk Mound, said he appreciated the level of detail that Levra provided in his response to the DNR.
The next bit of bad luck was that the back-up generator at the wastewater treatment plant failed during routine testing, Levra said.
If there was a power outage, there would be no way to keep the wastewater treatment plant running, so now there is a rented generator at the treatment plant until a part is delivered that is needed to fix the generator, Levra said.
A two-inch line coming into the wastewater treatment plant also ruptured, but that has now been repaired, he said.
Then, during the last snowstorm, the brakes failed on truck no. 1, Levra said.
Levra said he still used the truck — albeit very carefully — to plow snow. There was a disabled caliper on the brakes, so now the truck is running with three brakes until a replacement caliper arrives, he said.
Otherwise, things have been going fine, Levra noted.
Tree nuisances
The Elk Mound Village Board held a public hearing March 17 regarding the abatement of tree nuisances at N312 Holly Avenue, 206 Lincoln Street and 100 Princeton Drive.
No members of the public attended the public hearing.
At N312 Holly Avenue, there are several trees that need to be taken down because the power lines could be affected or the street could be blocked, Stamm said.
The dead and dying ash trees have been a problem in the village, and many people have taken down their dead and diseased ash trees, he noted.
The village could take down the trees and then put the charges on the property tax bill, Stamm said.
The Elk Mound Village Board unanimously approved authorizing Levra, as the director of public works, to solicit estimates for taking down and removing the trees in question at N312 Holly Avenue.
Levra asked for clarification — whether the village board wanted the trees cut to a height of eight feet, taken down to the ground, or to have the stumps taken out as well as the trees.
In Menomonie and Eau Claire, trees that are removed are taken down to a height of eight feet. At that height, they no longer pose a threat to anything, and with a large tree, the log is not able to be ground down below eight feet, Levra said
The village board clarified that they wanted three prices: removal of the threes down to eight feet; removal of the trees down to the ground; removal of the tree along with the stump.
At the Lincoln Street property, the trees have been removed. The stumps were left, but the village’s ordinance does not require stump removal, Levra said.
The property owner of the tree at Princeton Drive is treating the tree according to guidelines recommended by an arborist to try to save the tree, he said.
The treatment is annual, so the tree will stay on the list until next year to see whether the treatment worked and how the tree is doing, Levra said.
Other business
In other business, the Elk Mound Village Board:
• Learned that the Wisconsin Milkweed Alliance, a non-profit based in Menomonie that is managed and run by individuals with lived experience of mental health, substance abuse or other difficult life challenges, is renting space in the Elk Mound Community center on Wednesdays to provide counseling services.
• Approved the restated memorandum of understanding (MOU) and agreement with the Town of Spring Brook and the Town of Elk Mound to create a joint fire district. The fire board has been working with an attorney on updating the MOU for about a year, and the attorney has now reviewed the final version, Stamm said.
• Approved purchasing a Kenwood Viking VM8000 tri-band single head mobile radio with initial programming, WISCOM 24 pricing, antenna and other accessories for the police truck from Nielson Communications in an amount not to exceed $5,200.
• Agreed to table the item on the village park sign until a future meeting.
• Agreed to consider the cost of the U.S. Highway 12 Wisconsin Department of Transportation project while developing the 2026 budget this fall. Benjamin suggested earmarking $10,000 or $15,000 per year in the budget so that the money will be available by the time WisDOT is planning to do the project in 2030.
