City Council Meeting Recap: New Alderman, Stormwater Rate Increase, Funds Transfer

It was a busy City Council meeting Tuesday night, and we ended it with a new alderman.

After several rounds of voting, the council appointed Frank Van Dusen III, 914 Minnesota Ave., to replace Mike Karbowski as a First District alderman.

Frank, who will be sworn in at the Aug. 16 council meeting, joins Craig Maass as aldermen in that district. He will serve until next April, when an election will determine the person to serve the remainder of Mike’s term into 2013.

It was a close vote and a good debate because we had a strong pool of candidates, and I’m excited to work with Frank, an electrician with Patrick Cudahy and lifelong South Milwaukee resident who you may recall was out front as a complainant against The Frozen Rope this spring. Welcome!

The council also voted unanimously on two other items:

• Stormwater fees. We voted to raise the city’s stormwater utility rate to help fund commitments we’ve made to upgrade our stormwater infrastructure. If you recall, we borrowed approximately $1 million for stormwater management projects earlier this year, and the increases will help pay down that debt — and build up a cash balance that we will use to take on additional projects and perhaps add manpower we desperately need to address these issues. How much will you pay? If you are the owner of a single- or two-family home, your annual stormwater bill will increase $18 this year, from $48 to $66. In 2012, it will increase to $72, as the cost per “equivalent runoff unit” (ERU) increases from its current $4 per month to $5.50 to $6. Owners of large multi-family homes and commercial property and the school district will obviously see bigger increases, some measuring in the thousands of dollars. This is because the utility fees are based on the amount of “impervious surface” properties have, and these properties have a lot. I voted “yes” because this is money well spent. We need to pay back the money we borrowed — money that will be used to improve our stormwater management system and alleviate some of the longstanding flooding concerns in certain areas of the city.
• Fund transfers. The council also voted to transfer various funds … something we do regularly. Of particular note this time was the transfer of $285,000 from the general fund to the “tax stabilization account.” This is an account we use to “offset” our tax levy, keeping that amount relatively stable from year to year and keeping taxes low. This year, as you will recall, we plan to use about $160,000 to “pay down” our levy and cover our budget. How much will have to set aside for 2012? With sharp cuts in state shared revenue and other declines in revenue on the horizon, that remains to be seen as we enter next year’s budget process.