 I'd like to call order the city planning commission. First item is to pledge of allegiance. Please stand and join me. On the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Next item is to identify a potential conflict of interest that any of the commissioners have anything on the agenda. Seeing none. Next item is approval of the planning commission minutes from May 9th. So moved. Second. Thank you for that motion and support. Is there any discussion on those minutes? Seeing none. All those in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion passes. Next we'll go on to item 2.3, the color annexation and public input. First of all, I'd like to turn it over to Steve Sokolowski to give us a brief explanation of what we're doing today. All right, thanks, Mayor. Welcome, everybody. What we're taking a look at today is a petition for direct annexation by the Kohler Company, basically what the plan commission. The plan commission today is a recommending body. So they will only are making a recommendation. What they are taking a look at today is the annexation request by Kohler Company. So the decision is that they'll be making is whether or not the property should be annexed into the city. And then along with that, they are looking at establishing a zoning designation. And that zoning designation that we'll be discussing will be a suburban residential five. And they will make a determination as to whether or not that is the proper zoning if the property gets annexed into the city. Once the plan commission has made the action on the items today, like I said before, they're only a recommending body. This is not a final decision. It's a recommendation that's made to the council. The council will then have a hearing as well on these same matters in terms of whether the property should be annexed with that SR5 zoning. So today, Mayor, what the plan commission is doing is making a decision as to whether or not this property should be annexed and whether it should have a zoning designation of suburban residential. And that will be a recommendation to the council. Thank you very much. I'd like to ask the Kohler company, the applicant, to come and make a brief presentation of their project. Thank you, Mr. Cassidy. And planning commission members. My name is Steve Cassidy. I've got responsibility for corporate operations at Kohler company. What I'm going to share today, just a few summary comments on the documents that you received as a planning commission from us last Wednesday. So those two documents were submitted as record for the meeting today. And I'll make these comments as brief as possible but to summarize what those documents contain. So first off is to give you a little bit of history on the efforts that we used and have been involved with to construct an 18-hole golf course on the land just east of Terry Andre State Park, east of 12th Street, south of Stahl Road in that general vicinity. That effort began with a conditional use permit submitted to the town of Wilson back in March of 2014. So it's been a little over three years that we have been active on this project. From that use permit application, the town of Wilson, we requested to present to the town of Wilson Planning Commission shortly thereafter and they received that meeting in May of 2014. Following that meeting then there was a public hearing request from the Planning Commission in June of 2014 upon which the town of Wilson Planning Commission asked the Kohler company to go out and work with the regulatory bodies to receive the proper permitting requirements for the development, the proper development itself. From that meeting we did initiate that permit process, pursuing permits from the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, the US Army Corps of Engineers, the US Fish and Wildlife Service, National Park Service, and Wisconsin State Historical Society. That process actually has taken quite a journey, as you can imagine. Each of those regulatory bodies having various oversights to the project and development itself and a thorough review, including engineering studies that were conducted. So as that process began the primary agency, the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, held a public scoping meeting in the summer of 2015. That was conducted at UW-Sheboygan and solicited input from the public prior to the WDNR initiating a application for environmental impact report document from the Kohler company. That report was a document that we worked on for about another 12 to 18 months. It actually started a little bit before the scoping document with a few of the site studies, but then continued after the scoping process and up to the summer of 2060s, actually late spring, that we submitted to the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, a draft EIR, which is Environmental Impact Report. That draft EIR then by the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources gets taken and processed through a public input process itself. That was held July 20th at Sheboygan Falls High School. From that meeting and the continuation of the public comment period through August 26th, the Wisconsin DNR then had the information that they needed to be able to draft an environmental impact statement, a document that does govern the overall project. And so up until that point, we had continued work with all of those regulatory agencies conducting the necessary site studies to address the questions and regulatory obligations of our development. And as I said, closed out the public session for input in July of, excuse me, in August of 2016. As we got towards the end of last year and having conducted about two and a half years at that point of work with the regulatory agencies, we evaluated all aspects of this proposed project and determined that the city of Sheboygan would provide better long-term municipal services for a project development of this magnitude and for the duration that we were looking to operate it. So we continued through that process, but that actually started an internal review of annexation and making sure that we properly met all the rules and regulations associated with the annexation process. And ultimately, I get to this point, but submitted the annexation petition May 15th of this year. Preceding that annexation petition submission, we did have a meeting with the WDNR. It was actually a culmination of all of the EIR work and then they're draft EIS to conduct a pre-application meeting, and that meeting was held February 28th of this year. And then that led us to actually spiling our formal wetland permit. I believe it was March 15th of this year as well. So that has been gone into public record as part of this project. April 28th, we published the notice of intent to circulate the annexation petition in the Sheboygan Press. We then filed on May 15th. Following the filing, we were asked by the city of Sheboygan to host public input sessions, some informational sessions. They were not obligated as part of the annexation process, but we felt that that was a good suggestion, again, given the magnitude and complexity of this project. So we did coordinate two public input sessions, Tuesday, May 16th and Tuesday, May 23rd to solicit public input. We collected registered guests to that session and we will provide a summary of that, those findings into the planning council, or excuse me, in the city council itself. And then today, we're here today to have the Planning Commission consider annexation of the zoning requirements. But like many aspects of this project, the annexation is not being rushed through. We've been a very patient and committed developer to this project and this process is no different. Definitely appreciate the time to work with the commission today. Next slide. So the petition itself filed on May 15th contains a couple of important factors. One is the territory is contiguous to the city's municipal boundary. The connection is 650 feet in width and consists of parcels not exclusively used just for roads or utilities. It does have a diagonal crossing at 12th street. But again, that road is comprised of contiguous properties that make up the right of way for the road. The petition has been signed by five of six qualified electors, so well above the 50% required for passage and owners of more than 90% of the territory's assessed value. Statutes require that only a majority, so greater than 50% of the qualified electors are in support and owners of at least one half of the territory's assessed value. So we're able to satisfy both of those criteria. And the proposal is consistent with many of the previously approved annexations throughout the state of Wisconsin. Next slide, please. This is simply a map. I know it's legible for the people in the room, but each of the planning commission members and in the filing should have a more legible copy of this map, but certainly available to discuss it in any follow-up questions that the planning commission may have later in this meeting. Next slide, please. So what is the project itself all about? One is about its economic benefits and impact. Growing the city's tax base and creating hundreds of new jobs. As we pivoted the project towards the city of Sheboygan with the annexation petition, we commissioned SB Freedman, a outside third-party consultant based in Chicago, to revise an economic impact study they had conducted for us previously as part of the town of Wilson. They also included more recently the half-scent sales tax that has been approved and implemented by the city. So in total, non-school property tax revenue will increase $87,000 associated with the annual operation of the golf course. Another 117,000 annually will go to the Sheboygan schools as well as the Lakeshore Technical College. 271,000 per year in new revenue, revenue, new room tax revenue, excuse me, including roughly 88,000 annually for the city. And all of those figures are, as of full year's operation and continue for the life of the development, we anticipate with following the continuation of the permitting process and then construction period necessary for the project that full operation will constitute roughly 2021 in our timeline. Once that project is in place and along with that, there would be 227 equivalent full-time jobs into Sheboygan County, 124 of those into the city alone. And 95 positions separate from the 227 will be in the construction of the course itself for that three-year period roughly from 2018 to 2021. 68 is estimated to be in the city of Sheboygan. Next slide, please. So following the summary of all the tax benefits, if you look at just the economic benefit that this course would derive for the county, it's actually an 11-county area, but the majority of this would apply, the 21 million would apply to Sheboygan County alone of those 11 counties that were analyzed. It would drive, this course would drive 23,000 additional rounds of golf per year, about 1.267 million in tax revenue and that is made up of the bullet points that I shared on the slide previously, as well as some state taxes that would be included. 22,000 additional room nights within Sheboygan County hotels, 6.5 million a new annual spending for local hospitality, retail food, beverage industries, et cetera. As I mentioned, some state sales tax revenue and personal income tax driving about $600,000 in value annually. Next slide. The goal of this project is to construct one of the top 50 golf courses in the world. It's a pretty lofty goal for anybody to shoot for, but fortunately we have the experience of two courses in Sheboygan County today, Whistling Straits and Black Wolf Run, that have that distinction and as a destination really draws Sheboygan County into the top 10 destinations in the world. For this course alone, it will provide a new public course to enhance the city of Sheboygan's reputation as a destination, great place to visit. We'll compliment the four other courses that we have, drawing back interest to revisit Sheboygan County, not only to play Whistling Straits or Black Wolf Run, River or Meadows, but to now experience the new course. And the course has been actually designed, will be constructed by Pete Dye and will bring further notoriety to the city as he is one of a very few golf course designers that have been inducted into the golf hall of fame. Next slide, please. So the design and management of the course, really around responsible operations. As I said earlier, we've got practical experience over the last 17 for Whistling Straits and over 20 years for Black Wolf Run in managing those courses responsibly. Our practice minimized the use of pesticides and water consumption by using computer controlled sensors, regular inspections on pesticides and herbicides and other steps. For those interests, particularly around fertilizer and pesticides, we have engineering studies to confirm that no runoff using our methods would get into the Black River or into Lake Michigan. The Kohler golf courses on average have applied fertilizer to only 20% of the authorized state and federal levels on the fairways of the grass that we choose. And a lot of that also has to do with the species of grass and how we apply that to the grass. And we have a proven positive record for the use of these pesticides and herbicides and fertilizers having never been sited with an environmental violation since those courses have opened. The clubhouse will also enhance public access and opportunity with a restaurant, incorporating environmentally sensitive design standards as we'll work to achieve lead green building certification for that clubhouse. Next slide, please. So I mentioned earlier the regulatory process, it's quite extensive. Jurisdiction covers a number of agencies. When it comes to the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources and the US Army Corps of Engineers, those regulatory agencies still must approve and issue all permits related to environmental and use and development of the property. There will be no change with the annexation petition before you today. We've worked with both agencies for over two years, including topics from wetlands, botanical, plant life, rare species, ground and surface water, floodplain, traffic control, geotechnical, stormwater management and archeology resources amongst others. The plan avoids impact to rare interdunal wetlands, includes steps to remove, manage invasive species for example, Japanese barberry and plant native species. We intend to plant native species and trees to enhance the natural habitat in return. The current plan reduces wetland impact to under 3.7 acres from what was 25 acres originally when we submitted our plans to the town of Wilson back in 2014. A lot of that, those modifications, I'll talk to them in just a minute, came from a number of modified course designs, 16 in fact, and eight separate entrance design alternatives that we've evaluated with the regulatory agencies to try and mitigate at all costs our impact and if we, or excuse me, to avoid at all costs our impact and if not, we then would propose a mitigation strategy for those items impacted such as these wetlands. And our plan includes a well-insured assurance program similar to what was extended to the town of Mosul residence in proximity of Whistling Straits and we experienced minimal impact therefore requests for cure and in every case, Coal Company was able to cure the situation of the well impact. When I get to the Kohler Andre State Park entrance, next slide please, we analyze these different alternatives from a course design and entrance routing to determine the most suitable options. I will say that some very good suggestions have come in through the public input process, both the original conditional use permit public session as well as the scoping public input process that the WDNR has provided. And then lastly, even just general input solicited into our Kohler website of the www.proposegolfcourse.com, all of that input played into our process of looking at the course layout and entrance designs. So the proposed entrance wrote itself and maintenance facility would require 4.46 acres of easement from the state park, represents less than half a percent of the total park area. There would be no impact on existing trails or camping areas. And in fact, the area that's being contemplated is not currently used by or even open to the public for use as it's on a piece of property within the state park that houses the current maintenance facility for the park. The proposed entry does include a roundabout and the interest of the roundabout is to improve circulation at the park entrance, providing better access for park goers and hopefully even better continuity between this public course and the park itself. Next slide, please. The site archeology offers opportunities for new learning and that can't be stressed enough in our area, especially along Lake Michigan. Archeology resources were an important consideration in studying the different course designs that we have. Some of you may be aware, if not, I'll share with you this afternoon that burial mounds do exist on the parcel of 247 acres that Kohler owns, but they are outside of the project footprint and will remain undisturbed. Meaningful consultation has occurred with the US Army Corps of Engineers, the Wisconsin Historical Society, the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, and importantly, the Native American tribes to understand the findings on this property, discuss the development intent and work to complete a memorandum of understanding that all parties would sign into before the project would proceed. It is certainly a sensitive site and we have taken a very respectful approach. The opportunity, we believe though, for discovery, learning, and ultimately public benefit is significant and we want to participate in that process. Next slide. So in summary, the proposed Kohler Golf Course represents a major positive opportunity for the city of Sheboygan and the area overall. It has major economic benefits. It minimizes and mitigates environmental impacts. It opens up private land to public use and it remains regulated by both the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources and the US Army Corps of Engineers. Additionally, Kohler has approached the subject of archeology with sensitivity and appropriate respect and sees this aspect of the project as an opportunity, as I said earlier, for discovery, learning, and public benefit. Kohler Company itself has long believed that environmental responsibility and business operations can and should go hand in hand. And we've taken a thoughtful approach to the environmental protection and sustainability development for this project. I appreciate the opportunity to present our plans to you today. In addition to the two public information sessions that we've held over the past two weeks, we also look forward to future discussions about a conditional use permit for our proposed golf course if the annexation and rezoning here today are successfully recommended and then approved by city council. And we fully recognize that the details of our golf course proposal while we shared some of the highlights for your benefit in context here today, the details will receive another whole round of scrutiny through the conditional use permitting process in order to satisfy all applicable city standards. Just as we have to satisfy the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources and the Army Corps to obtain our development permits. Today is a first but essential step in the city approval process that has several steps yet to come. We respectfully request that you to evaluate the questions in front of you, which are annexation and zoning with the city's planning goals in mind as the planning commission. And I appreciate again having your time, mayor and commission members. On consideration today, we look forward to working with you on the project. Certainly will remain available through the public input session and to any questions that the commission or yourself mayor may have for follow up after that session. Thank you very much for that presentation, Mr. Cassidy. Next we'll move into the public input session of this matter. I'd like to call on Jerry Jones. Thank you mayor. I've moved to open the floor for public comments with the following guidelines. The purpose of the public input session is to hear testimony as it relates to proposed annexation and establishment of the zoning through the suburban residential five classification. Please limit concerns or suggestions to three minutes per speaker or less because we do have a full agenda. For the public record, please state your name, your address and whether you are a city of Sheboygan resident or a town of Wilson resident. The names of those attending who checked on the attendance clipboard that they wanted to provide public input at this meeting will be called first. After that group, the chair will ask if anyone else would like to provide input. If you wish to speak, please raise your hand to be recognized. After being recognized, please come to the podium, state your name, your address and city or Sheboygan or town of Wilson resident. The plant commission normally receives input only and will not respond or debate individual speakers. Thank you for your assistance. Is there a second? Second. Thank you for that motion and support that motion is before us. Is there any discussion on it? Seeing no discussion. All those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion passes. What I'd like to do is begin calling up the people who have signed up and I'm gonna call the first person who can come directly to the podium and give us their personal information on their address and residence. And I'd like the next person to be taking the chair being on deck so we can have a quick circulation. And if one of the people I'm calling is in the adjoining room where we're streaming this broadcast, then they have some time to get here. So the first person to speak is Dane Czekolinski and on deck is Nancy Disjardens. Thank you. And now we'll be timing the three minutes and when we get to two minutes and 45 seconds, we'll just give you a little notice that you have 15 seconds left to wrap up. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor. My name is Dane Czekolinski. I live inside the city of Sheboygan at 3217 West Apache and I'm also here on behalf of the Sheboygan County Economic Development Corporation. What an amazing opportunity for the city of Sheboygan. My team, city staff, we work hard to advertise, talk and encourage development because we believe that growth is essential for a vibrant community. The community even puts incentives in front of developers to build projects that are half the size, half the economic impact and with far less prestige. Kohler Company is looking to join the city of Sheboygan community as special as the city has a first chance in several years to expand its borders and open up more opportunity for growth. Just doing back of the envelope math, the tax revenue and the impact to the community, I had 80,000, they had 87,000, mine was just back of the envelope, is a great modest windfall for the community at a time when conversations on how to maintain roads is front of mind for almost everybody. At any, if you look at every square inch of the city, at one time it was an unincorporated area. Our forefathers were wise to understand that cities grow and as cities grow, economic opportunities are open. If we provide opportunities, perhaps our next generation, my children included may actually stay and thrive in this very community we all call home. I'd like to thank Kohler Company for strategic investment because the day they stopped being so passionate about investing in bold projects in Sheboygan County is the day I start losing the rest of my hair. The Planning Commission, I want to thank you for your consideration and I urge you, not only on behalf of myself, but also the Sheboygan County Economic Development Corporation to look favorably upon this annexation request. Thank you. Nancy, you can step up to the podium and Dave Aldeig is on deck. Thank you, Mayor, Plan Commission and residents of the city of Sheboygan and the town of Wilson. I have maps for the Plan Commission. In all honesty, is there any way that the proposed annexation area appears homogeneous with the city? Is it identical, consistent, alike with, similar to the city? You must believe that it is homogeneous with the city to vote in favor of this proposed annexation. The area is instead a deeply contrived, narrow, irregular patch, together chain of bits of land leading to a satellite, a large mass of land, which is the true objective. This is the perfect example of a balloon on a string annexation. The targeted homes at 5721 Sherwood Drive and 1131 Zintek Lane were purchased in 2017. These homes were purchased by Kohler so they could place the necessary signers they needed for the annexation petition. By state statute, Kohler needs 50% or more of those signing the petition who must currently live in the proposed annexation area when who have voted in the 2014 gubernatorial election. Kohler company in the town did the research. We knew that Kohler only needed three people from the six that voted in 2016 to sign the petition and Kohler installed four renters into the homes they had purchased. A few actually worked for Kohler. Stunningly, five people, four renters and one landowner, will make the decision for the petition to go forward to file it. Deciding for the whole town of Sheboygan to the whole town of Wilson were these five people. Is there a better example of deeply contrived? As for town and country's Riverdale golf course, Kohler would have you split the Riverdale golf course in a third in the city of Sheboygan and two thirds in the town of Wilson. Guy Miller would have legal, municipal and tax responsibilities in the city and in the town. Will he have a water bill for a third of his course? A large thing for a golf course, a water bill and continue using free wells in the two thirds that resides in the city. People need a town and a city liquor license for his beverage carts if he wants to service his whole course. Finally, it is an insult to all Wisconsinites who own the Wisconsin State Parks that Kohler company has included approximately 250 acres of Kohler-Andre State Park in their proposed annexation area. They obviously realized they were short on land. You have 15 seconds, ma'am. Thank you. They were short on land and needed cart and maintenance building. We, your neighbors to the south of Wilson, ask you to see the flaws in this balloon on the string. We feel that it is a personal agenda of a man with a great means who did not even complete- Time is up. Thank you. Dave, you may step forward and give us your residence information and James Ubrowski is on deck. Thank you, Mayor. I'm Dave Aldeg, I live in the town of Sheboygan. We have a business in the city of Sheboygan and I'm the chair of the Sheboygan Economic Development Corporation. INR organizations support the annexation of the proposed Kohler golf course property into the city of Sheboygan. It is our opinion that the course can be better served by the city of Sheboygan for several reasons. City leaders have told us they welcome the opportunity to have the course in Sheboygan. The town of Wilson has demonstrated they're less than supportive of the project. The project as stated will bring millions of dollars of annual revenue into Sheboygan County as well as a large number of full and part-time jobs. The tax revenue can be used for countless needs such as road repairs, infrastructure improvements, et cetera. The city through no fault of its own knows what lost opportunity feels like when Aurora recently decided to build its new facility in Kohler. Do we want to miss another opportunity? As an economic development corporation, we support projects that have a positive economic benefit to our community. This aligns with our mission. Our board made up of business and community leaders voted overwhelmingly to support the project. We as Sheboygan County residents watch with great pride as the major TV networks showcase the Kohler golf courses that hosted the three PGA championships as well as the U.S. Women's Open. We have an opportunity to add to that positive exposure of our wonderful community. Public opposition to the proposed golf course has been noted and the Kohler company has to go through DNR and the Army Corps of Engineering Reviews to pass permitting and become reality. Not to mention the city would also have its own requirements. The city can provide water service to this golf course thereby eliminating any concern of water depletion for air residents about their water supply. I had a conversation the other day with the former leader of the Tauna Mosul and I asked what his opinion was of whistling straights as a neighbor to their community. His response was that they were a good corporate neighbor and that every obligation they made to the town and this residence was kept over 15 years plus the course that has been in existence. There were issues with residence wells and Kohler made good on all the required repairs at the expense of Kohler company as promised. In closing, we believe this project will be a benefit to not only Sheboygan, but Sheboygan County. It would be a shame to have a loud minority influence the outcome of this project just because they don't agree with it when the facts suggest otherwise. We'd hope these people would understand that we're all neighbors. You have 15 seconds. Regardless of the outcome, we should refrain from threats to those who oppose the project since this is America where the right to express our opinions even if we don't all agree we should all respect those rights. We're blessed as a county to have many companies like the Kohler company who are willing to reinvest in the community. Okay, thanks, Chad. Jane, you may step forward and give us your information and Lisa V. Host is up on deck. My name is Jane Zabrowski. I'm a resident of the town of Wilson and I'm speaking to you as a member of the town's ad hoc committee for its 20-year comprehensive plan. We just completed a 10-year update to our plan. The town began comprehensive planning in 1997, a full decade before state law made it mandatory. Our general use map shows the same type of future land uses as the city's future land use plan for the Kohler land. This use being park and open space, which is shown as green on both of our maps, not yellow, which is residential. The proposed zoning does not conform to either the city or the town's comprehensive plans. Your agenda item does not refer to any golf course, only annexation and rezoning park and open space to residential. This property was never slated in your planning to become SR5 zoning until the Kohler proposed annexation was presented recently. SR5 zoning allows private golf courses under outdoor institutional, but only as a conditional use. The city's CUP standards state that it must consider impacts to nearby properties in the city and consider undesirable impacts on nearby properties. The problem with that language in the code is that no city residents are nearby the Kohler property. Town of Wilson residents surround the proposed golf course. Town of Wilson government should be making the permit decisions because it's the town residents who are affected, not city residents. The city of Sheboygan is the wrong local government to do the permit review of the golf course. The proposed annexation will create a situation where a more distant government makes decisions with the potential to create large negative impacts on residents who don't reside in the city. In the annexation process review with the state, the DOA asked, is the annexation consistent with your comprehensive plan? All one must do is look at the future land use map to know the answer to that question is no. I've recently been concerned by a written statement from the plan commissioner, Mr. Ballinger, which I read yesterday which states that he's already come to the conclusion that Kohler's request for annexation should be granted, that he has a hard time imposing his opinion or belief as to what someone should do with their private property as long as they adhere to local, state, federal ordinances, statutes, laws, and permits. I ask you to consider the private property rights of the people who are being forced to annex to the city against their wishes. Is it okay for them to have to give up their property rights for the demands of Kohler? I hope you do understand that this is a hostile annexation attempt by the Kohler company. I wonder how you can make up your mind on annexation prior to the DOA's ruling as to whether or not it may violate state law. For that reason, I ask you to vote no, recommend no to this annexation request. Thank you. Thank you. Lisa, you can step up and give us your address, information, and Claudia Bricks is on deck. Thank you, mayor. My name is Lisa V. Hose. I live at 1825 Barrett Street in the city of Sheboygan. I moved to Sheboygan in 2002 and I've come to city council meetings, but I've never spoken. So that tells you that this is something I feel very strongly about. I just represent myself and I'm speaking from my heart. I don't have a lot of facts and figures. Other people were sharing those things. I'm just speaking as a citizen of the city and I look at this situation and I say, why do we need another golf course in this area? We have several. I understand, there was very reasoned list of reasons how this could benefit us economically, but again, I just ask at what cost? What are we giving up in that stretch there of the parkland and the lake shore? We say city of Sheboygan's spirit on the lake. We should honor that and be very careful about giving this over to something that I see as a use of an elite group. So it makes common sense to me that we don't need another golf course. Although I do agree, we wanna first protect our natural resources. We want to create jobs. We want to have an economically sound place, but I think we can do all that in other ways and because I'm a poet, I'm going to read you a poem that I wrote. I wrote it many years ago, but I think it applies because it shows how money and natural resource can be in opposition and we need to bring this together. So the poem is called Whisper. These days, there are all kinds of whispers. Horse, dog, cat, you name it, someone is whispering to it. American idols, who are they? There are politicians whispering behind closed doors on cell phones to large piles of money. Who are these faces? And what lips can whisper such secrets designed to hurt so many? As for me, I am whispering to the trees. For so long they have whispered to me and now I beg them, please teach us to be more like you. Steadfast, but flexible. Don't just hug a tree, be a tree. Root, stretch, shade, blossom. Then when the wind blows, whisper, thank you. Thank you for those comments, Lisa. Claudia, you can step up and give us your address, information, and Bob Fuller is on deck. My name is Claudia Bricks. I live at 314 Pioneer Road in the town of Wilson. I've lived there for over 30 years and I've enjoyed the peace and quiet of the forested rural life of that area. We are not like the city. We have no street lights or paved sidewalks or lots of traffic or sirens or big buildings. We have lots of beautiful, life-giving trees. Dear Possum Raccoon Fox, you name it, it's all out there. A championship golf course would change all of that dramatically. Destroying the forest and its ecosystem to plant trees for fairways and greens just doesn't make any sense to me. For the last three years, I've been diligently studying the golf course, Kohler Project and all its depths and breaths and twists and turns and convolutions. This is a very complex process. I've read books, spoken at all the public meetings that Mr. Cassidy talked about and queried professors, scientists, and other experts on the potential impacts of this monumental project. This whole business of annexation has concerned me greatly. I've been studying this along with many other people who are in the audience for three years and the permits aren't even in yet. The governmental bodies haven't weighed in yet. You folks in the city have looked at this for maybe three weeks and now you are ready with dollar signs in your eyes to make the annexation decision that will affect not only the town residents but your constituents as well. There is much more to this than you think. Urban planning and growth without a thorough assessment of the adverse impacts is not only uneducated but it's foolish and maybe a bit dangerous. No one, not even the experts, knows what will happen when an entire ecosystem, when 60% of the forest is bulldozed. No one will know what happens to our wells when 16 million gallons of water are pumped from the same fractured aquifer that we all share. He's got five wells in the property already. I'm not sure he's gonna take city of Sheboygan water. No one will know what happens when the pounds and pounds of chemicals, herbicides, pesticides, and fertilizers eventually by gravity make their way into the Black River, our wells, Lake Michigan. And just because Kohler says everything is going to be fine doesn't necessarily make it so. What they have said is only part of the truth. Town residents will suffer the consequences of your uninformed decision. Sadly, all I can say is that this is all I can do about making you possibly making a huge mistake. I encourage you to do your due diligence, study the total cost to the city of Sheboygan, of all the impacts involved in this. We don't, we know what you don't know. So thank you very much, I urge you to vote no. Thank you for your comments. Bob Fuller, if you could step up and give us your address information and Jason Peters is on deck. My name is Bob Fuller, 4593 Beaver Dam Road. And that's in the town of Barton. This really is not so much a hearing on a zoning proposal as it is an end run to avoid the many citizens of the town of Wilson and their genuine and overwhelming concerns about water quality, supply. You've talked about some of that traffic, but not to mention that there is no need for a fifth championship grade golf course in Sheboygan County. You already have four. There's a lot of talk about projections of how many, 23,000 I think I heard about new rounds of golf on this new golf course. And I'm saying I challenge those projections greatly because who's gonna play? They talk public access, you know, restaurant only. Who's gonna play? One-tenth of the 1% of the wealthiest people now play on those championship level courses. Those same people happen to be a little bit older and the young really rich, the millennials, do you think they're golfing? No, they are not golfing. So these projections of 23,000 net new rounds of golf are challenging totally. All the new jobs, how many are going to be permanent and how does that jive with what the Kohler company told the town of Mosul before they wanted to? I'm just saying verify your numbers. We have not heard, it's just wishful. And the other thing is, this is just a good example of money and Kohler, God bless, has a lot of money and money gets power and power yields influence. And I hope we don't see that today. And then in the near future on this project. Thank you for those comments. Jason, you can give us your address information and Kathleen Romer is on deck. It's Jason Peters, 1225 Kauffman Avenue, City of Sheboygan. I'm here for a little different reason. The land east of 12th Street up until Black River for the last 10 years, I've used for gun hunting. My hear is still going to be open for public use, but if I'm wrong, I'm trying to think about this. If that's annexed to the city, we got to file city ornces. What's going to happen to the bull hunters and gun hunters for this land that's already been used for hunting? Along with that, so I'm asking if it does get passed if the common council can make an ordinance to allow that area to still be hunted. Right now it's still managed through the rangers from Terry Andre and there's been no hunting accidents for the last 10 years for sure. I guess there's people in here probably against hunting, for hunting, but I think we're all in agreement about the slaughtering about nine years ago because if you have this unhuntable, it's deer, it's going to turn into a refuge. Deer are going to go and tear up this gulf course and what's going to happen would happen in Black Wolf and I saw it, the higher sharpshooters and they pile up the carcasses like cordwood. I wish I would have had a cell phone back then when I saw that, it was pretty disgusting. So I want to be proactive, other than reactive and I'm hoping the common council, the common planning can think about that if it does get passed. Hunters are somebody in Wisconsin that they're tourism also and it's a big thing in Wisconsin. So I really feel bad for both sides. I don't have a dog in the fight, other than hunting so maybe I sound selfish, sorry, but it's something I actually enjoy with the land and that's all I got. Thank you, Jason. Appreciate those comments. Catherine, you could step up and give us your address information and Debbie Desmalen is on deck. This is for the chair and the board to review. He's the chair. Thank you for the chair and the board to review. Okay, thank you. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to address at this public open comment session. I appreciate it. My name is Kathleen Romer. I live at 3010 Old Park Road. I'm in the town of Wilson and I love the country. My parents came to the country, three, four generations of us have lived out on Terry Andrews Old Park Road. I still call it Terry Andrews because the people that originally gave that land had it named after them until it got changed. I would like you to consider the main thing today being our community. I'd like you to consider the makeup of the rural country setting of the town of Wilson. No, we are not a city. No, we don't want a lot of tourism and development in our township. We have a 20 year plan and that 20 year plan has been reviewed. We do not need nor do we want to be developed into city. We don't wanna be annexed to the city. If this could be voted upon, you would see that. Black River is a quiet, peaceful, serene community of a beautiful rural beach, adjoining a great state park, the second visited state park in the state. The town of Wilson prides itself and all its neighborhoods on being trails, shoreline, riding trails, biking trails, neighbors, neighborhoods encompassing a rural coastal shoreline area full of dunes and wetlands. We have over 240 species of migratory birds. We have eagles who are probably planning to nest right now on the color property. I see them regularly, almost daily. There are four imitators and two adults. The birders can tell you how many species and this morning, again, which is very rare, today 21 pelicans right outside the color property on the beach, which I hope we still will be able to have the right, as we should, along a great lake to walk its shoreline, unlike what happened on other golf courses owned by the Kohler Company. We love, and like our natural setting, one person, you have 15 seconds, wants this annexation. One large, powerful billionaire. One person really wants this annexation. We don't. Don't let them throw you a bone for profit. We didn't bite. Time is up. Please don't. Thank you. Debbie, you may step forward and give us your residence information and David Bruggingk is on deck. Okay. My name's Debbie DeMara and I live at 1704 North 35th Street, Sheboygan, Wisconsin. Okay. Private property owners' rights stop where others start. If this annexation is allowed, the immediate neighbors' property rights are being ignored, along with those who are being strung along for Kohler to obtain the annexation of the Black River Forest, a full-fledged wildlife refuge, sandwiched in the town of Wilson, where it belongs. Golf course pesticide and herbicide runoff will pollute all three of the following, the groundwater, which supplies neighboring well water, the already-impaired Black River, and Lake Michigan, which are not Kohler's private property. Lake Michigan is a super asset which provides tourism revenue. When golf course runoff increases Lake Pollution, tourists will lose interest in coming to Sheboygan and our state park, a wonderful resource for those who come to spend a short time or stay there for a vacation. Kohler also wants to take public park land and share the entrance with Terri Andre State Park. This is no longer his private property either. Also, if Kohler pumps water from the several high-capacity wells that he has already drilled, then the neighbors will see their wells dry up as some did in the town of Mosul, home to Kohler's Whistling Straits golf course. This will then impede their right to water and necessitate drilling deeper, adding financial costs. Kohler's golf course will comprise the neighbor's health because golf course chemicals have been positively correlated with cancers and Parkinson's disease to name two of the health risks associated with living close to a golf course. How can we justify these public infringements? This is where the private property arguments ceases to be relevant. Sheboygan has the most polluted air in Wisconsin. The Black River Forest is the lungs of the county because it cleans the air. Carbon dioxide emitted into the atmosphere is absorbed by forests, which give us back oxygen. We need forests. Kohler can buy land elsewhere that is not a wildlife refuge and migratory flyway as is the Black River Forest. Also, keeping forests intact and non-fragmented results in a balance of animal and plant biodiversity which would cease to exist with deforestation. Please refuse annexation of the Black River Forest. Think of all private property owners' rights, not just Kohler's, to clean air and potable water and good health. Respect the town of Wilson's residence and protect Lake Michigan and our state park. Thank you. Thank you for those comments, Debbie. David, you can step to the podium and give us your residence information. And Ali Z, Desmaline, you're on deck. Thank you. I'm David Bruggank. My address is 231 Beach Court, which is in Sheboygan County. It's also in the town of Wilson. I mentioned Sheboygan County because I'm hoping both town of Wilson residence and Sheboygan residence will recognize a bit of a wider area of Sheboygan County and kind of what's best for everybody. I'm not really a speaker. I'm more of a listener and I just wanted to share a couple of things that I've heard. Mr. Cassidy from the Kohler Company said that they're not rushing anything. But it was only April 28th, he said that this application was filed in the press. So it seems like on a very short timeline things are coming to a vote without being studied very carefully. At least it seems that way to me. He spoke of the length of time that Kohler has been working with the DNR and the Army Corps of Engineers. But he didn't let us know how many permits are required for this whole project and how many permits they already have. I think it might be none yet. So again, I guess my premise that I would like to express is that it wouldn't seem like there's any rush to arrive at a decision on this annexation. Also as the town of Wilson resident who's been following this process somewhat, myself and some of the other residents feel like we're hearing what we call spin from the Kohler Company where they tell us maybe what they think that they what they think we want to hear but may not necessarily be accurate. On the slide presentation up here before I saw no fertilizer or pesticide runoff. They also said that at one of the public hearings and that statement was scoffed at and I'm not aware of any other golf course that claims that there's zero runoff or zero fertilizer or pesticide runoff. So if you guys are gonna be scrutinizing the things that are said, that might be one. How do they arrive at the ability to make a statement like that? These are gonna be concerns. If it's annexed into the city, these are gonna be concerns for the city. I guess lastly, I just wanna say that I feel if you guys think it's a good idea today, you'll probably feel it's a good idea in a month or two and there doesn't seem to be a rush to arrive at a decision today. My advice would be to table the idea for the moment. Also I got today's Town of Wilson newsletter today. It says the town says we have retained attorneys and are prepared to protect our interests to the full extent to the law if the attorney, if the city attempts this annexation. So my encouragement is to just everybody work together. Thank you. Thank you for those comments. As Leigh, you can step to the microphone and give us your address information and Alexandra Nugent is on deck. All right, my name is Alizé de Moulin. I live at 1704 North 35th Street in the city of Sheboygan. So for the planning commission, I think we should think about planning as a whole on the city. So I would like to bring your attention to co-order companies and negative environmental legacy. In particular, the Environmental Protection Agency's scorecard report. You can even Google it, scorecardgoodguide.com. So some of the highlights for Kohler is in comparison with Rock, Milwaukee, Manitowoc, and Dane County, Sheboygan County has the greatest overall amount of recognized toxins released to the environment. Sheboygan County releases 546,000 pounds of pollutants. Of these, Kohler Company generates roughly half of them. Thus, Kohler ranks third in Sheboygan County as the most polluting industry. The factories of Kohler Company release benzene, lead, chromium, and nickel. Other chemicals include manganese, antimony, copper, zinc, baryon, and one that I can't even pronounce. So honestly, the power plant on the south side is the only one that is more polluting than Kohler Company. Of the two Environmental Protection Agency, recognized super fun sites in Sheboygan County, the Kohler Company landfill is located in Kohler, only 300 feet from the Sheboygan River. The site has been used to dispose of industrial waste, municipal waste, and foundry sludge. The groundwater benes is contaminated with cadmium, chromium, and phenyls, and according to the Environmental Protection Agency, has contaminated drinking water sources. This groundwater feeds directly into an aquifer that is used for drinking. The Sheboygan Harbor and River landfill site extends eight miles through the towns of Kohler, Sheboygan, and Sheboygan Falls, all within Sheboygan County. This landfill has been leaching heavy metals and PCBs into the Sheboygan River, and it's two tributaries, the mullet and onion rivers. These contaminants are at such high levels as to initiate a ban on ingesting fish from the Sheboygan River and its tributaries. The site is still being decontaminated through national funding. So when we keep thinking about everything that Kohler represents, we have to look at all these things that Kohler has done in the past. So when we're thinking of statements that Kohler acts as being an environmental steward, I mean a superfood site is about the worst landfill that you can come up with. And as members of the council, you should even know that we've been trying to decontaminate the Sheboygan River of the PCBs. We've been dredging it for years, so please consider that in kind of some type of balancing act with what Kohler will pretend about their environmental record, thank you. Thank you for those comments. Alexander, you can give us your residence information and Kathleen Wessel is on deck. Hello, my name is Alexandra Nugent and I'm a resident of the town of Sheboygan, but it concerns me because I'm a resident of Wisconsin as well. So good afternoon, thank you for hosting this session. I'd like to start with two quotes. The first is from the DNR, clean air, clean water and healthy landscapes. These are the foundations of Wisconsin's economy, environment and quality of life. The second quote is from Kohler Andre State Park. Kohler Andre State Park is one of the last natural preserves along the Lake Michigan shore and is open for everyone to explore and enjoy. Now I know that Sheboygan is only a small part of the world and these 247 acres in question today are a smaller piece still. Yet if we don't do our part to protect the environment, how can we ask that of other cities, of our state, of the nation and of the world? Future generations are depending on us to do what's right. Given that, and I quote again, Kohler Andre State Park is one of the last natural preserves along the Lake Michigan shore, there's no margin for error. This state park is all we have left. And I know that instinctively, we know that protecting the environment benefits all of us and we instinctively know what hurts us. The proposed annexation would cause the draining of millions and millions of groundwater every year. Filling precious wetlands, leveling ancient sand dunes, busing tourists in and out while rerouting traffic away from our local businesses, contaminating our drinking water, which is shared between ourselves and our children and will continue for generations. I'm sure no one here today in their heart wants any of those things. We know it feels wrong. And we have an obligation to leave this world a better place than we found it. Okay, we're only talking about 32 acres of state park when it comes down to it, but that's not the real issue here. The real issue is the precedent we are setting for future annexations. If we allow state park to become developed, what's to stop us from the next 32 acres or the next or the next? It's a dangerous path. Kohler Andre State Park is one of the last natural preserves along the Lake Michigan shore. We can't risk giving even one acre of it away. It's ours. It's all of ours. And we have to do what's right. Just imagine how proud our community will be when we say that we safeguarded our home. We protected our water. We defended our state park and set an example for the rest of Wisconsin and for the rest of the world of people doing what's right. So that's why we're counting on you to vote against this annexation. Thank you. Thank you for those comments. Kathleen, you can step up and give us your residence information. Yes, I'm Kathleen Wessel. And Jerry Willis-Sand is on deck. 62, 67th South 18th Street, town of Wilson. I really didn't prepare a statement, but I have some questions and I was wondering if one could answer some of them. One of them is what are non-school taxes that this gentleman was referring to from Kohler about all the benefits that she would reap from this situation? I don't understand. He was talking about school taxes and he said, well, be that as it may, let's go on to something else. The speaker also said that they had been working on this for such a long time and someone else alluded to this problem. If they've been working on it such a long time, why was there such short notice given? They were saying they started thinking about annexation to Sheboygan in, well, I don't remember the date given, but after one of our meetings. And yet, we didn't know or town of Wilson in here, we heard mutterings and rumors, but we didn't hear much. And now all of a sudden, April 28th, they're ready to annex and seeking permission from Sheboygan. That is very short notice. Also, I was wondering when they were talking about all the benefits that Sheboygan County is going to gain from this golf course. And if the golfers weren't built, there would still be golfers and they would get meals, rooms in Sheboygan, whether golf course in town of Wilson or not. I mean, this is a county, why town of Wilson has one motel and what, two, three restaurants? I mean, obviously we're not looking to benefit from this. So Sheboygan would benefit no matter whether where the golf course is located. So really to speak how it's going to benefit the county is well, to me, a tad absurd. How has the county, I have another question to the city. One gentleman said the city is, it's a real windfall. Well, how about considering town of Wilson? Is it a windfall for town of Wilson also or does just Sheboygan count? And also he said laws, I know the laws are written so cities could grow and move out into the townships. That's what it did many, many years ago. Now I'm warning about because Sheboygan has been moving into the townships, how much has Sheboygan grown? So I feel this runs rub shot over the township through dubious, macinations, and property attainment by Kohler, I guess we know what is important. Shoddy, in development with little study. Thank you for those comments. Terry, you can give us your residence information and John Holsworth is on deck. I'm Terry Lillisand, I am president of the Sheboygan County Chamber of Commerce. My address is N 6847 Charter Road Town of Sheboygan. My neighbor is Town of Country Golf Course but I do own a business in Sheboygan. In the Sheboygan County Chamber's mission statement is we mean business. Mr. Cassidy's representative from Kohler Company did a great job of explaining the economic benefits of this project to not only the municipality that it's located in but to the entire county. A strong economic environment benefits us all. We hope that the Sheboygan City Planning Commission will appreciate and understand the economic benefit that this project brings and will say yes to annexation. Thank you. Thank you for those comments. John has not yet arrived so we'll go on to Stacy Barr. No, John's here, we'll take him. Please give us your residence information, John. Thank you. It's an honor to be here. My name's John Holtsworth. I live at 1225 Herman Court in the city of Sheboygan. I'm a homeowner and I'm also a small business owner in the city of Sheboygan. And I grew up visiting my grandmother and her family on Evergreen Drive in Black River. So, oh, I'm trying to catch my breath here because I guess I feel pretty passionate about this. I mean, I really enjoy driving into the town of Wilson and I smell the pine needles and it takes me back. And then I think of how that could change and how I don't wanna smell roundup or, you know, I think, you know, I mean, our representative from Kohler mentioned, you know, briefly mentioned the use of pesticides and herbicides. Well, last I checked, anything with side means death, doesn't it, right? Homicide, genocide. So what we're doing if we green light this project is we're passing a ticket of death to our next generations, right? We're gonna be launching chemical warfare on a pristine environment, right? This is not some abandoned, you know, army bunkers in Cleveland, right? This is woodlands that is home to a variety of different animals, plant species, things of that nature. And I just really wanna oppose this with everything I can. So thank you for your time. Thank you very much for your comments, John. Stacey hasn't come forward yet, so James Schusler is up next and Greg Hopkins is on deck. Good afternoon, I'm James Schusler, 35 await Willow Circle, city of Sheboygan. And I also serve as business development manager for Sheboygan County Economic Development. I speak to the members of the Planning Commission with great enthusiasm for what the opportunity this does bringing to the county and specifically to the city of Sheboygan. I read the Sheboygan Press every morning. I read the Milwaukee Journal every morning. And last Thursday, a story came out in the business section, population growth and population declines. And a very dubious distinction for the city of Sheboygan is we're in the top 10 list of communities with population decline. Puts us alongside South Milwaukee, the city of Milwaukee, West Alice. And there we are, the city of Sheboygan. As a resident of the city, revenue's crucial. Right now, we've got a housing crisis in Sheboygan County, but I can tell you, builders don't wanna build in the city of Sheboygan because buyers are hesitant to buy in the city of Sheboygan because of the mill rate. Revenue is crucial. Mr. Aldegh pointed out something very important is the news that came with the choice was made for Aurora's medical facility. There'll be tax base ultimately leaving the city of Sheboygan to another municipality. This annexation provides the opportunity for revenue. And I think that that's crucial. So I say that as a resident and as a taxpayer. Now as an economic development practitioner, I wanna tell you that we assemble business plans, get business plans funded every day, many of which get funded for the city of Sheboygan. And all of those, virtually all those I should say, with a retail component, all identify the golf amenities that are owned by the collars in particular is benefiting their businesses. This new proposed golf course proposed to be in the city of Sheboygan ultimately at this point will provide tremendous benefit as well to the businesses within the city of Sheboygan. I do say as it relates to the environment, my qualifications are on revenue or on economic development, but I do trust the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources and I do depend upon the Corps of Engineers to do their work. Thank you very much. Thank you for those comments. Greg, please step up to the podium and give us your address information and Linda Shemin is on deck. My name is Greg Hopkins. I live in the town of Wilson. I'm the chairman of the Town of Wilson Park and Forestry Commission. The Town's Park and Forestry Commission oversees the parks, conservancies, and cemeteries in the town of Wilson. This responsibility includes recommendations to the Town Board of Supervisors for ordinance changes, seeking grants and donations for improvements, land acquisition and coordinating the maintenance of the parks, conservancies, and cemeteries. The seven commissioners represent a varied background and a common bond to protect and enhance the recreational spaces of the town. The Kohler and adjacent properties west and south are zoned P1 or Park Space. If you have not had the pleasure to walk through the quiet woods and dramatic sand dunes of that area, you have missed seeing a beautiful natural setting unlike any other in the state of Wisconsin. The Black River forms the west boundary of the property. The Kohler-Andre State Park, the south boundary. A low density, wooded residential neighborhood the north and Lake Michigan is the east boundary. To rezone the land in the proposed annexation area to SR5, the city's highest density single family resident zoning is not consistent with the subject or adjacent lands. This area is not suitable for high density housing but rather recreational uses such as state park hiking and horseback riding trails, snowshoeing and cross country skiing, beach bathing, bird washing, and so on and so forth. The SR5 zoning allows small lot sizes of 6,000 square feet. For example, 75 feet by 80 feet, 80 feet by 60 feet or 60 by 100 feet or 66 by 90 feet. Picture in your mind, the densest housing in the city is that what you would now consider suitable for this land even though it conflicts with your comprehensive plan? There are other much more suitable areas in the town of Wilson already zoned to offer suburbanized development. Thank you. Thank you for those comments. Linda, you can step to the podium and give us your address information and Roger Miller is on deck. Linda Shemin, 1326 North 27th Street, Sheboygan, Wisconsin. I am pro worker. I feel that without the individuals who directly touch customers, companies and corporations would have no profit. That said, yesterday I started gathering thoughts I would use during my turn at this podium. While researching ideas, I landed on a website, fortune.com 2015, that featured an article glorifying the millions of dollars PGA championships could earn for Wisconsin. How millionaire and billionaire attendees eagerly spend hundreds of millions of dollars that enhance the bottom line of golf course facilities and area businesses. I was immediately crushed. How could I possibly say anything here that could counter the lure of big dollars to a money-starved city government council? I closed the website, shut down my computer and walked away. Later in the day though, I remembered a conversation with an employee of a Kohler restaurant. The person told me the job earned the minimum wage of a tipped worker. The person added something that surprised me that 10% of all tips received from patrons are absorbed by Kohler. I asked why? The person didn't know. If you are not aware of the tipped worker minimum wage according to the Wisconsin website, it's $2.33 per hour. When I asked the Kohler representative at the May 16th information session about compensation for the jobs created by the golf course, he said it would be competitive. Does that mean pay the same tipped wages as other golf facilities? I found one job description and Kohler's help wanted webpage for that of a sous chef with compensation of $30,000. A sous chef is second to the head chef. With such responsibility, how can this position be paid less than a middle-class salary? Other job listings included conference services manager, golf operations and golf course maintenance worker. None had compensation listed. Without a minimum of $20 hourly, these are poverty wages and could result in more of my tax dollars subsidizing a very wealthy corporation. That hurts communities such as Sheboygan financially. We are paying corporate payroll instead of investing that money in education, roads and bridges. The middle-class lowest income levels are listed as 40 to $65,000 yearly. If an employee is earning $8 to $9 hourly, the social safety net kicks in, connecting dots with fewer dollars going into payroll, owners and CEOs of corporations see their finances grow to the hundreds of millions of dollars while the labor force who produced the wealth is forced to apply for food stamps, earned income tax credits, Medicaid and low income housing just to survive. I ask that you refuse a petition because of the negative financial impact on our community. Thank you. Thank you for those comments. Roger, you can step to the podium and give us your address information and Michael Heunink I believe is on deck. Good afternoon. My name is Roger Miller. My day job is president of Miller, engineers and scientists, but I'm here speaking to you at the moment as the Town of Wilson Plan Commission Chairman. I do have an agenda item later on that I'll put on my other half representing a project in the city. I'm gonna speak very, as an engineer and plan commissioner and because I sit in your chairs one night a month also I'm gonna briefly describe some of the information on utility services focusing on water supply and sanitary wastewater collection because that's the city stated primary reason for colder's need for annexation. All the other utilities are supplied by non-municipal providers. In contrast to some of the objecting opinions you've heard tonight, I've been talking on a public forum for several years on both our surface and groundwater supplies of the area and I don't see well water supply as problematic for the colder golf course or for that matter for many other applications. The limestone bedrock of this region provides high quantities of good quality ground water to the many private residential water wells in the high capacity wells of industry. The highest well consumption is all-ditch chemical, now Sigma millipore in the Town of Wilson's large plant several miles southwest of the proposed golf course. The water level that rises in these private and high capacity well casings is typically 10 to 20 feet within the ground surface at some locations it's artesian. So pumping is very economical and this water requires no treatment for irrigation. Kohler has installed a number of test wells on the property to verify this and they have included in their applications to DNR and ACOE that they will use drilled water supply. In contrast, the closest city water main is about a mile away but there's no practical route to get from there to the Kohler property. So the city's when feasible description of supplying water to Kohler's property is certainly not in time for the proposed project for 2001 to depend on its feasibility. Jumping to wastewater collection, the Tented Forest which was the prior plan for the subject parcel, had in its plans to use small diameter pump sanitary line into any one of the four manholes, low town sanitary manholes right along the north boundary of the Kohler property. You have a figure of that. In contrast, Kohler's state and federal permit applications call for private onset systems for the golf course even though town sanitary service is close and economical but either way there's no need or even ability for the city to provide sanitary collection to this property because the nearest city sewer is over a mile away and that like water there's no practical route to get from there to the Kohler property. Aside from this annexation subject I've included an email that I sent to Mary Lynn Donahue the council's chair of the committee the whole talking about a bigger picture context for making decisions such as this and something that we do need and Town of Wilson has in the past been at least as negligent or even adverse is collaboration between Town of Wilson government and this government and our plan commissions. Thank you for those comments. Michael you can give us your address information and John Edmund is on deck. My name is Michael Hoytank. I live in Wauwatosa, Wisconsin 9628 Harding Boulevard. I'm an attorney for the Town of Wilson. You've heard a lot of speakers today say a lot of things about what you, the committee should do or shouldn't do. I'm gonna ask you to step back for one second and ask what you can do. You see an annexation is not born out of what we think is best for one city or the other it's born out of statute and I want you to remember four words and those four words are balloon on a string because that is exactly what this annexation is. This isn't a contiguous annexation. This is an attempt to take property that is not contiguous with this city from the Town of Wilson by attaching a narrow strip to it. That ladies and gentlemen I'm gonna posit to you is not inappropriate use of the annexation power and why does that matter? It matters a lot and there's a reason for the statute because what happens to those people in the Town of Wilson who surround those property? In your own ordinances you are charged with making decisions and when you do asking yourselves how those decisions affect the neighboring property owners. If this annexation goes forward let me ask you this. Who's gonna represent those property owners? Here in the city of Sheboygan when they live in the Town of Wilson. And that sets aside even the confusion and disorganization you get in terms of city services and regulations when you attempt an annexation like this. The fact is this is not a proper annexation and not a proper plan but let me give you one more thing before I sit down. This isn't the proper time either. There's been a report issued to the state and you haven't gotten a comment back on it yet. As a matter of fact the city just got an extension on that a short time ago. I posit to this committee you need to hear back from them before you make an informed recommendation to the council here. How can the city move forward on an annexation project such as this without all the information in front of it? So if you're not inclined to agree with me and say this is the wrong plan and it's not a proper use of the annexation process at a minimum you wait. Wait to hear back to see what the city says. But the reality is I want you to remember those four words, the people on this committee, the balloon on a string and before you act on what you think you should do, think about what you can do and then think about whether the time is right. The answer to both of those questions is no. Ask you to vote no. Thank you for those comments. John you can give us your residence information and Matt four is on deck. 231 Edgewater Road I live in the town of Wilson and I'm representing the town of Wilson board as the chairperson. I'm going to limit my remarks this evening to providing the commission with an update on the history and status of the Kohler company's conditional use permit application with the town for the proposed golf course. I feel this is important because I'm finding many city leaders mistakenly believe the town has somehow compelled the Kohler company to seek annexation of its land of the city because of the town's inaction on this project. On the contrary the town board has been waiting patiently for Kohler company to procure their state and federal permits and to complete their CUP application with the town so that we can begin our work. As Mr. Cassidy stated it started back in February 2014 when Kohler informed the town that they were abandoning their tenant forest product to pursue building another championship golf course. In March 2014 Kohler company filed its initial but incomplete application for a conditional use permit after which the town conducted an initial public information meeting with Kohler's consent for the purposes of disclosing to the public the general nature of the project. While helpful this initial public hearing was preliminary in nature as it was based on very limited information that existed at the time. Kohler company itself acknowledged that it had not yet completed the various studies necessary to proceed with the CUP. As such Kohler company consented to an indefinite extension of all town timelines in order to address the many open issues and indicated they would notify the town when they were ready to go. During 2015 the town board in an effort to fill its legal obligation to evaluate the impacts of the proposed project and to do so in an impartial and technically accurate manner hired three very reputable environmental engineering firms including the firm of Rukert Milky which was at the request of Kohler company. These consultants also stand ready to go once Kohler submits their complete application. On April 6th, 2017 skipping ahead the town was notified by the WDNR and Army Corps of Engineers that Kohler company had submitted their chapter 30 wetland permits and that we now had the opportunity as a town to provide public input. In an effort to rely on the work of the WDNR and Army Corps as much as possible the town retained Rukert Milky to provide public comment on behalf of the town essentially requesting these agencies to consider additional areas of concern in their evaluations. On April 7th the WDNR issued a three page letter to Kohler company asking for additional information missing from their chapter 30 permit application to which I presume Kohler is still working on. On April 26th the town board was informed of the annexation request like everyone else by reading it in the newspaper. Personally I was shocked for your clarification. Here are a few examples of the item missing from the application. There is no detailed site plan grading plan on the certified survey map and the project has not been updated. So I guess in closing I'm gonna ask you to make sure you have all the information necessary that you need to make this decision to vote no for now until you have all the information. Thanks for those comments. Okay Matt you have the floor. David Sanderson is on deck. I'm Matt for resident of the town of Wilson and also a volunteer firefighter for the town of Wilson. Here to address the standpoint that the argument is made that the city can provide better emergency services in the town of Wilson. In a letter to the state they specifically referenced the MABIS system which is the Mutual Aid Alarm Box System that we all use. In discussions with the city of Sheboygan Firefighters there's no difference in standard operating procedure whether that call comes to us or to them. They're both handled the exact same way. There's no difference in how we're going to respond versus how they're going to respond. In that same letter they also state that the city maintains 24 seven three full time firefighters slash paramedics at their stations. And that again is not correct. In discussion with the two firefighters the station five which is closest to the south side closest to this proposal, the two firefighters at the station so that the station is staffed only 70% of the time by only two firefighters. Now you have the city chief Romas who just this month stated they need more firefighters. You have a local firefighter union president Brandon Hughes who said that engines often leave stations with fewer fighter fighters that are needed to work on putting out conflagration. And last year an international firefighter union indicated that trucks frequently leave stations in Sheboygan with only two firefighters which while industry standards would call for twice as many. With the fire department that's one issue. The structure fire, the risk of a structure fire at the new development I think would be very slim much more probability for a medical emergency. In this case you'll always with annexation you're going to lose the first responders. 70% or to 80% of the time first responders are on scene before the ambulance sometimes as much as 10 minutes. Town of Wilson first responders average response time is approximately four minutes. This is extremely critical because in a full code situation CPR must be stated or started within five minutes to reduce permanent brain damage. The Town of Wilson fire department and first responders twice also reviewed emergency procedures with Kohler and both times Kohler approved these plans. So I failed to understand the argument that the city can provide better emergency services versus the Town of Wilson when there's a dramatically understaffed station five the station that would be responding to this proposed property and also the loss of the first responders. You know with all the information that was presented and with everything I've read about this project I would ask you the same question that I'd ask my children. Is this something you need or something that you want? Because to me it's not something you need. And at that point your need becomes greed and the last thing any resident of Sheboygan County needs is a greedy city of Sheboygan. Thank you. Thank you for your comments. Dave you have the floor please give us your residence information. Thank you my name is David Sanderson. I live at 806 Settlers Lane in Sheboygan Falls. I'm here today. I'm also the general manager of Blue Harbor Resort. So indirectly to a degree a competitor of Color Company. I asked the commission to consider this application a once in a generation opportunity to grow a tax base, to continue to grow a tourism industry. I'm very proud on behalf of all the employees at Blue Harbor that our revenue since 2011 have doubled. We've only scratched the surface. Our tourism economy has boomed since 2011. It remains one-tenth the size of Door County. And almost those people that go to Door County have to pass us to get there. How much sense does that make? While we're a competitor with Color I subscribe to a theory that a rising tide lifts all boats. In terms of the golf course I'm also president of a 2,500 acre four golf course resort in Northern Michigan. We've talked about wildlife being disrupted. We've talked about stormwater runoff, well damaged, well poisoning at that resort which has been there for 40 years built with technology far inferior to what is available today. We've had none of it. We've had a nesting pair of bald eagles on the site for better than 10 years. Have produced eagles in each of the last two years. It is a plethora of wildlife. So because they put a golf course there the wildlife isn't gonna go away. Nothing's gonna happen to the wildlife and this becomes something that is better for the whole which is the entire community and also answers a fundamental right. That if you own property in the United States of America if you play by the rules and you go to these hearings and you get your permits you should be able to do with what you want. Thanks very much. Thank you for those comments. Don Wyman is up next and Rose Phillips is on deck. My name is Don Wyman, 3228 North Nines Street Cheboygan. I don't have any prepared remarks. All I have to say is I heard a lot about the pollution of Lake Michigan and the Black River and I wanna ask how many people in the town of Wilson fertilized their lawns or how many farmers actually don't use pesticides to use under crops. I think that this would be a boom for tourism. They say why do we need another golf course? There's studies made, there's market studies made. They must know what they're doing, it's their money that they're putting into it and they own the property and if they play by all the rules like the gentleman said and get all the required permits he owns the property, he has a right to do with it what he wants. He's not telling the people in the town of Wilson what to do with their houses or what to do with their land but the town of Wilson is trying, some people are trying to tell the Kohler company what to do with his land. If I'm not mistaken part of Kohler, Coley-Andre Park was donated by the Kohler Foundation or the Kohler family and you wouldn't have that today if it wouldn't be for the Kohler company. Kohler company owned a land, it was called John Michael Kohler. In the 1960s I believe I read in the paper that they donated quite a piece of property to the Terry-Andre Park. It was owned by John Michael Kohler. I had like I said, I have no prepared remarks but if I was the people in the town of Wilson if they're so concerned about polluting the Black River or the Lake Michigan, then don't use fertilizer or pesticides on your land and the farmers out there don't use pesticides on their land. Thank you. Thank you for those comments, Don. Next is Rose Phillips if you can give us your address information and Angela Holland is on deck. Hi there, thank you for listening to me. My name is Rose Phillips and my address is 1628 Spruce Court and that is in the city of Sheboygan. I have a degree in biology with a focus on natural science and I have done extensive research on the effects of non-native invasive shrubs on the understory flora in a mixed woodland community. My research was done at Woodland Dunes into Rivers, Wisconsin which is a nature preserve and the ecology there is very similar to the ecology of the proposed golf course and I would like to say that I think the proposed invasive management plan is highly lacking in my opinion. To read a quote here from the Environmental Impact Study, it was said that most of the species in the wetlands are conservative and in general these rare wetlands have exceptional floristic diversity and are relatively free of invasive species. To simply say that you're going to remove invasive species and even plant native species in my research and my professional opinion is not enough. Invasive species have a preference for disturbed sites and that is exactly what we would be creating. I would also like to point out that many of the people who are speaking here, the majority of them are in opposition of the annexation as well as the golf course proposal and from what I'm noticing most of those who are very confident about moving forward with this are financial stakeholders and they think that that's worth noting. The only reason to annex would be to benefit Kohler and the proposed golf course and I do not believe that the benefits outweigh the negative impacts that would occur. Kohler claims that he is using minimal, will minimize environmental impacts. I think that a complete reconstruction of an ecosystem is far from minimal. He speaks of having reduced the plan from 25 acres of impacted wetland down to 3.69. I am appalled that anyone would even for one second consider destroying 25 acres of wetland. I think the impacts of the wetland have been underestimated, under-researched and are highly misleading. Not taken into consideration are the temporal, the unintended and the indirect impacts of the wetland. In reality, 247 acres would be impacted and beyond. When you change the topography, you change the hydrology. We already know that the nature of this soil is that it is highly permeable. 15 seconds. Wetlands are connected. Warnoff and water contamination will occur. These rivers and waterways are already impaired. The mitigation has not been approved and the mitigation plan is not equal. Time is up. Please vote no. Rose, thank you for those comments. Angela, you can step forward and give us your address information and Jerry Gundlach is on deck. My name is Angela Holland, 6709 Lake Air Court in the town of Wilson. You probably noticed that there haven't been many people my age speaking here today because we're all home taking care of people this age. I sent this email earlier today to the council members, but I'm gonna read it again. When the noble thing to do is at ads with the smart thing to do, you're faced with a difficult choice. In the case of the town of Wilson annexation proposal, the noble thing is to be a good neighbor and not go through with an annexation based on the desires of a few property owners and tenants. The smart thing according to the economic impact statement provided by the cooler company is to look only at short-term economic impacts, the full-time equivalent jobs created, the revenue generated by golfers and tournament traffic, and the tax-based increase. Unfortunately, as I'm sure you are aware, the short-term impact is only part of the much larger picture. There will also be costs. Developing the infrastructure to become a tournament venue will be monumental and will necessarily strip more land from the town of Wilson and the residents of Wisconsin who rely on our state parks. Consider the path to bring buses in for tournament traffic, which cooler company will not admit at this time. I tried talking to them about it at the event at Three Sheeps. They won't admit it, but the plan is evident upon inspection of the orientation of the greens, just how they plan to circumvent buses around a roundabout that is not designed for bus traffic. It will be straight through the Black River trails. This will come at the cost of an additional annexation battle, ill feelings between neighbors, infrastructure costs, and stripping of more public land that the Sheboygan community already relies on for tourism dollars. I heard back from a few of you on this email regarding the annexation. One of you making the point that annexation is the only way for the city to grow. I understand that point. However, a hasty and hostile and controversial annexation is not the only way to grow. Additionally, we are well aware that the coach buses that are bringing in terrific, they are not going to embark from downtown Sheboygan or anywhere else that would be an economic boon for the city's business owners. We know only to look to cooler company's past actions to be sure of this. And while we are considering past actions, let's not forget the company's willingness to sue their eponymous village for a tax break. To think that they won't do the same thing to the city of Sheboygan is naive. In this case, the noble thing and the smart thing are actually not at odds. It's just that seeing what's smart takes considerable sifting through the propaganda. 15 seconds. Please do your due diligence for the sake of your city and your neighbors to the south. Thank you all. Thank you for those comments. Jerry Gundlach is up next. Jerry, and let's see. We're going back to Stacey Barr. Could you check and see if she's in the other room? Stacey Barr. I'm Jerry Gundlach and I live on the south end of Sheboygan in the city. And it was nice to listen to all the speakers. It was, it gave me heart because I heard people from all different areas and areas of expertise and opinions coming out together on not wanting this golf course. I have lived in Sheboygan, Wisconsin most of my adult life. Lived in Sheboygan since 94. We raised our kids in West Bend. We've always been campers, hikers, nature people, out-of-doors, both of us are retired teachers, my husband and I. And we like to birdwatch and just enjoy that whole area. In fact, when our children were younger, we camped at Coler Andre and even doing dishes at 11 o'clock at night by moonlight did not stop us. I just want to say that those things are precious. They are worth money too in the sense of bringing people to this area, but it's not just about money. I really love Black River. Before I knew that part of it was private when we first moved here, I hiked around back there where they're gonna build the golf course. And it was wonderful. Last Saturday, we went on a wildflower hike along the Black River trails with one of the naturalists from Coler Andre. Let me tell you, if you had gone along with that, you would see why we need to protect this kind of environment. It's irreplaceable. I also tried to teach my own children and my junior high students about certain values that they should have. Among those are fairness, being straightforward with each other, being truthful with each other and open and not hiding things for their own benefit. Not manipulating others and giving all the facts and then deciding, not deciding before they have even heard from constituents. That is really important. It is not about power or growth. 15 seconds. It is about doing the right thing. I have voted in every election since I was able to vote. And I guess you'd call me more conservative than liberal. But hey, I've got friends on both sides and I would like to see the council do the right thing. Thank you. Thank you for your comments. We also now would like to open it up to anyone else who didn't sign up and was motivated and they wanna speak right now that hasn't spoken previously. If anybody in the audience would like to do that, just raise your hand. You wanna come forward? And if there is somebody else that's motivated, they can take the on-deck seat. Your name and residence information. I'm Zachary Marcott of 1540 North 9th Street in the city of Sheboygan. Don't really have anything prepared because quite honestly public speaking terrifies me. And I'm glad people have talked about the economic, ecological impact on the water table. But one of the things brought up in the slideshow that I haven't heard discussed is the discovery of native artifacts and burial mounds on the site. And to be blunt, proposing building a golf course near that site, specifically the burial mounds, is akin to somebody proposing we build a golf course by Calvary Cemetery or Wildwood Cemetery. It is disrespectful. It is not for the public. It is the site of the dead. And to be blunt, it is heartless to believe that any amount of tax money justifies the desecration of the site of the dead. So I want the council to consider that if they propose that this should happen, what they are saying, they are saying that they don't care about the dead. They don't care about the people of this land. So I would like that to be considered that that is a decision you will all have to consider. It is not for the public. It is for the respect of the descendants of those people. Thank you for sharing those comments. Anyone else wishing to be heard, please come forward. If anybody else would like to come, they can come and sit on deck. Your name and residence information. My name is Mike Mayer, not Mike Fourmayer. I'm not a great public speaker, but this is annexation without represent- Excuse me, Mike, your residence information. Oh, 5107 Evergreen Drive. And that's in what city, your town? Town of Wilson. Thank you, sir. This is annexation without representation. It's just pulling the rug out from the town. It's a hostile takeover. You aren't gonna like the results when your whales train our whales. Who would we end up referring to? The city or Kohler when we have these problems. That's about all I have to say. Okay, Mike, thanks very much for your comments. Thank you. Is there anyone else wishing to be heard? Is there anyone else wishing to be heard? Is there anyone else wishing to be heard? Two seconds to make sure she... We're gonna check with the other room where we're streaming the show. Nope. Okay, I'd entertain a motion to close the hearing. So moved. Thank you for that motion and support. All those in favor, please signify it by saying aye. Aye. Motion passes. Okay, next item on the agenda is arrow number 32 of 1718 by the city clerk submitting a communication from Reinhardt Attorneys at Law at the request of their client, the Kohler Company at Wisconsin Corporation in closing the annexation petition for Lance in the vicinity of Stahl Road, County Trunk KK and South 12th Street, County Trunk V in the town of Wilson. Steve? I guess at this point in time, I'm not sure if the planning commission has any additional questions. If there's anything specifically that they would ask of staff, if there's any information that's part of the staff report that you would like to go over. Other than that, mayor, I would just answer any questions. And representatives of the Kohler Company are also here to answer any questions that you might have. So under discussion, seeing no discussion. I'd accept a motion. The motion to approve. Second. Thank you for that motion and support. One last call for any discussion on the motion to approve. Seeing none, all those in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion passes. Item 2.5 is general ordinance number four of 1718 by Alburton-Boren and Sorenson amending the city zoning map of the Sheboygan Zoning Ordinance to change the use district classification of property being the entire area included in the annexation petition as shown on the attached map and received and dated on May 15th of 2017 from the town of Wilson, P1, A2, A3 and R1 to class suburban residential SR5 classification. Entertain a motion to that effect. Make a motion to approve. Second. Thank you for that motion and support. The motion on the zoning is before us for discussion. Yes, sir. I just want to state that in the documents that came from the city clerk, it referenced this being a rezone. I think it's safe to say this is an establishment of zoning, we don't have any properties are currently in the town. So even though the agenda states that it's P1, A2, A3 and R1, those are zoning classifications of the town property. So we're actually establishing SR5 in the city. Thank you very much for that information. Is there any other discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion passes. Item 2.6 is a conditional use and variance application by anchor Hope Pregnancy Center of Sheboygan to install a new signage at 703 North Ninth Street that was held over from a previous meeting. Mayor, this particular item, the applicant hasn't updated their application. So they asked us once again to table this matter. Okay. Second. Thank you for that motion to hold over again. All those in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? We'll hold that over then. Item 2.7 is a conditional use and variance application by Depot Auto Service and Toeing to install a new freestanding sign at 1131 Pennsylvania Avenue. Steve? All right, I believe Jim Marshall is here. Hey, Jim, for this of Marshall sign and he's representing Depot Auto Services. So what we're taking a look at here is Depot Auto Service is proposing to install a new freestanding sign with an electronic message center at 1131 Pennsylvania Avenue. The existing, they plan on removing the existing dated weathered oversight and pylon sign with a new site that includes an electronic reader board. The existing sign is 35 feet tall and the new sign is proposed to be 12 feet tall. So it's 23 feet shorter. The existing cabinet is 156 square feet per side and the new sign is proposed to be 48 square feet. The new design does better match the color scheme of the existing building. The proposed sign meets the city's requirements to be a bit more aesthetic as well as balances it with the neighboring properties while at the same time fitting into the owner's budget. So the applicant is requesting a variance to have the sign 12 feet high and is requesting to have the sign located in the existing location instead of meeting the 12 foot setback. The reason for that is if they tried to move this 12 feet, it's into their parking lot. So they want to stay in the same location and just bring it down. So staff is recommending approval of the sign subject to the conditions you have before you. I can answer any questions in the applicants here. Thank you very much. Motion to approve subject to staff recommendations. Thank you for that motion and support under discussion. Mr. Marshall, did you have anything to add? It's all I need. Okay, very good. Any other discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion passes. Thank you. Item 2.9 is the conditional use and variance application by the Sheboygan area school district to construct new building additions to reconstruct the parking lot and add new access drive along Pershing Avenue at Pitch and River Elementary School for the Arts and Academics. ESSA at 3508 North 21st Street. Steve. All right, so we're going to do the school one before the Becker one, the transport mini storage. Oh, I'm sorry, I missed that one. Okay, item 2.8 is the conditional use and variance application by Ron Becker to construct and operate transport mini storage facility from 1331 Wisconsin Avenue, the former Northwoods Chemical Building. Please proceed. All right, I'm not sure. I know Ron Becker is here. Steve Schmidt is here on this one. I think Roger Miller may have been here. So anyways, the property we are taking a look at for this part too, and I'm not sure, Mayor, if there's neighbors here for this matter. The property is located at 1331 Wisconsin Avenue. It's the former Northwoods Chemical Building. The previous use was used as a warehouse and distribution center for Northwoods chemicals and they have subsequently moved out to the industrial park. The proposed use is to be indoor mini storage facility. The applicant's proposing to remodel the interior of the existing 14,500 square foot facility into 76 storage units, those ranging in size from 75 square feet to 200 square feet. In addition, the applicant's proposing to construct a new building to the east side of the existing facility. That's 6,600 square feet. This is also indoor mini storage, and that's located on the east side. We'll have 34 storage units ranging in size from 100 square feet to 200 square feet. The hours of operation will be 6 a.m. to 9 p.m. and they're anticipating that three to six vehicles would likely be accessing the property daily. They've allowed for some security fencing along the front area, a six foot tall decorative fence that would be placed along the north side of the site as you would enter, and then eight foot tall chain link fence on the south end of the site. There's a number of residents that join this particular property, and so you can see from the plan that there's a decent amount of setback both on the east and south sides to minimize impacts. There are no garage doors. This is all mini storage from the interior of the development, so there's no garage doors facing any of that. There's additional landscaping that is to be installed in those areas to try to buffer yard those areas. There's a couple old driveway approaches along Wisconsin Avenue that are no longer needed, so we're gonna be looking to improve those to city specifications. There's some stormwater issues on the site that the app can all be required to work with our engineering department on to satisfy those again, and then the properties directly to the south and east are residences, so we've tried to take a look at in terms of buffer yard landscaping and setbacks to try to minimize the proposed uses impacts on those adjoining residences. One person that's not included in information in the staff report was the property owner at 1303 Wisconsin Avenue. Her name was Holly Gertison. I don't know if Holly's here today or a representative of that property. Anyways, they just wanted to make note that they do have a easement agreement with the property owner that allows them to utilize a portion of their driveway on this particular property, so it's something just to be aware of, Mr. Becker, that that is out there and I can share that with you. But it was not, as you can see from the development, that area's proposed as a setback area anyways, but it was just something that was brought to our attention and wasn't, I hadn't heard of it before, so I just wanted to make everyone aware of that. The applicant is requesting a couple of variances and those include requesting an eight and a half foot front yard setback and these variances are all with regards to the new building addition, which is the east side of the site, asking for an eight foot five front yard setback and requesting a 21.5 foot rear yard setback and the reason being for those two variance requests are to match the building in terms of footprint with the existing building along 14th street, so they're not going any closer to the street, not going any closer to the rear property line than what's already there. Applicant has also requested a variance for some locational landscape in requirements, so staff is not objecting to the proposal and recommending approval and I can answer any questions. The applicant's here and again, Mayor, I'm not sure if any neighbors are here on this one. Thank you very much, Steve. Mr. Schmidt, would you like to add anything to Steve's? Steve Schmidt, President Joe Schmidt and Sons representing Ron Becker. If there's any other questions, I'd be happy to answer them. We pretty much have met several times with staff to go over things. I know that we still have to go over some details with the stormwater drainage and that too, so we're gonna be working with Ryan and the other staff members with that. Yeah, are there any neighbors here for this project? Okay, commissioners, any discussion? Make a motion to approve subject to staff recommendations. Second. Thank you for that motion and support under discussion. Ryan. Can you talk about the easement just a little bit more? Sure, at the southeast corner of the property, so that would be along the 13th street side. There is an existing, there's a couple of homes between the alley 13th and this property, so this property is at the southeast corner, actually it would be the southwest corner of 13th and Wisconsin Avenue. So it's right at that site and if you take a look at that site plan, the site plan might even show the home in that area with the driveway. I don't know if you can see that or not, but that driveway right there crosses the property line into this, into Mr. Becker's property and so they have an old easement that was worked out with the shallers that allowed them to use 3.5 feet of that particular property for driveway purposes and they provided that documentation that shows that and their interest was just to make sure that they maintained that drive, that that access was maintained for their home. Okay, Mr. Miller. And if I could pick up on that same issue that Steve has identified, I move this. Now I haven't had a chance to talk to Ron about this, but if you'll notice on the big site plan, in addition to that driveway at the northeast corner, there's even a little bit of encroachment of a garage at the southeast corner. And Ron, we've planned the site with the 25 foot setback from the building that would still allow five to seven feet of the east edge of your property that if you chose could actually get conveyed to those abutting neighbors, which would actually help conform those properties and uses rather than have them reside remain as easements or even prescriptive easements by use that I think would be to no disadvantage to your property that you might consider. Would you care to speak to that, Ron? We will take it into consideration. I was not made aware of that until right now, so. Sure. I don't know, Ron, if there's any information you just wanted to show on many transport and many storage just in terms of you as a general business person and what you have and what you've done in the city previously. Sure, be glad to. Our company was founded in 1995 as a self storage facility on Union Avenue, 2515 Union. We filled out the property there started facility at 3515 Superior Avenue and then now also at 1209 South 11th Street. We have a total of 677 units. And to the best of my knowledge, we've been a pretty good neighbor to all the people in those, in those vicinity. We'll do the same here. Thank you very much for those comments. Are there any other questions by the commissioners or discussion? And if I may, this is a preliminary site plan. What would upon approval of this, we'd proceed to prepare the detailed plan specifications working with staff for all the conformities. So it'll be a complete site plan once approved. Thank you very much. Steve, are we gonna need to do anything in our motion to amend it based on those easements? With the easement, the only thing I would recommend is a condition, something to the effect that the applicant will work with the owner of 1303 Wisconsin Avenue to maintain the driveway per the easement agreement. It's already written, it's already there, but if we want, we could put that in there and just confirm that as well. I'll amend my motion. I'll approve with that language. Second. Thank you for that amendment. We'll just consider that a friendly amendment and add that to the motion if there's no objection. So that motion is before us for any other further discussion. Seeing none, all those in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion passes. Good luck with the project, gentlemen. Thank you very much. Now move on to 2.9, a conditional use and variance application by the Sheboygan area school district to construct a new building additions and to reconstruct the parking lot and add new access drive along Pershing Avenue at Pigeon River Elementary School for the Arts and Academics at 3508 North 21st Street. Steve. All right, school district is here represented by Dave Albright. And then there's Mark Shukard of Bray and then Ryan Byrne. Kevin. Kevin Byrne with Kapoor. Sorry about that, I'm sorry about that, Kevin. So what we're taking a look at is we're taking a look at Pigeon River School and the elementary school for the Arts and Academics ESAA that are both located at the same facility at 3508 North 21st Street. Appkins indicated that this elementary school for kindergarten through fifth grade, proximate enrollment is 439 students, 278 at Pigeon River, 161 at the ESAA. The project includes additions to the east and west ends of the school. The proposed one-story east addition is with a mechanical penthouse is approximately 5,000 square feet. And this addition includes a cafeteria kitchen and support spaces. The proposed one-story west addition is approximately 2,900 square feet. And this addition includes an office for the ESAA school art music room and support spaces. The additions will provide additional support space for both Pigeon River and elementary school for the arts. They will eliminate scheduling conflicts with the shared spaces that include the gymnasium, cafeteria, art and music. They share the cafeteria and the gym so they've had a lot of scheduling issues as far as different uses of those facilities. The east hard surface playground will be replaced and moved to the north side of the school. The west hard surface playground will be expanded. The existing parking lot and access drives will be completely removed and replaced. The new parking lot will have a separate bus loop. The loop serves to separate parent vehicle traffic from the bus traffic to help create a safer environment and ease congestion off of North 21st Street. The applicant indicates there's gonna be four regular, one special education and one city bus that serves the school in the morning and the afternoon. The proposed bus loop is to be accessed off of Persian Avenue. So this is a new access. Presently right now the school all accesses off of North 21st Street. So they are indicating that this route will serve as a new access point. And I'll go through some of the people who are allowed to use that. The access point will have automatic gates to prevent unauthorized vehicles from entering this location and these gates will otherwise be closed at all times. The applicants can speak to this when they have an opportunity but they indicate that the authorized users of Persian Avenue are gonna be the school buses, school maintenance personnel for snow plowing, site maintenance specific to the side of the property and contractors who would be working at that property on that particular end of the site. They indicate that no school staff parking or access, no deliveries would go through. Staff parking and deliveries will occur off of the 21st Street access point. So that's probably one of the biggest concerns with the development itself is this new access drive. I think provided that the driveway can be used by other staff members and parents and can only be accessed by the buses and the Sheboygan area school district authorized personnel. Staff doesn't have an issue with that. I think the big thing there is just that we don't want it to be used as a cut through for traffic getting to Calumet Drive and the applicants can speak to how they plan on continuing to North 21st Street. Other than that, the additions were acceptable and we're looking for approval. There is a variance to some landscaping requirements but staff was recommending approval of the proposal subject to the conditions you have before you. So the applicants are here and they're our neighbors here for this one, Mayor. Gentlemen, did you have anything else you'd like to add to the presentation? I think Steve covered that really well in regard to how we're approaching the design. Any questions? We're more than happy to answer those right now. Do they have neighbors for this one? Yes, do you have any comments or questions? As far as the proposed access, it comes between the clearing where the existing pedestrian path comes. So it will be coming where that curve in the road is. It is for buses only, it is gated so it will only be buses two times a day in the morning and in the evening five, six buses total. All other access, all other traffic goes off of 21st Street. The point is to actually help separate the bus and pedestrian or excuse me, the bus versus the parent traffic to create a safer solution for the children and also help solve some of the parent drop-off problems that are going on currently. We create, we maintain the same number of parking stalls but create a 25 stall drop-off lane. Right now currently parents are not allowed to use the drop-off lane, that is for the buses, that creates some of the problem that we currently have. By moving the buses to a separate area, we will create the 25 car drop-off loop and hope to solve some of the staging issues with the parents. Yes, with a new drop-off lane for the student pick-off, we think those parents are gonna come into that area. We can't stop them from dropping off over there but most are gonna find the new drop-off lanes with the safety raised concrete in the middle will be much safer for all kids and actually shorter for them to school. Once they finally get in and out faster, they're gonna go that way because they don't have to walk as far. Okay, any other questions? Yes ma'am. They are completely separate. They are separated by a six inch high sidewalk which is part of the drop-off pick-off area. That is also the new pedestrian walk to connect to the pedestrian path that is over on the west edge, the kind of the middle, western middle area of the property. What we've done is redirected that pedestrian path so that we no longer need dual crossing guards so that the children can leave the school, walk down that center island that separates both sides via a six inch raised curb and get the children out and away. Yes ma'am. Yes, and again, we're hoping the safety of the students is one of the primary concerns during the design. That's one of the primary reasons we are looking to separate the bus and the parent drop-off. And also by moving the buses, we're able to create a staging lane. What we've also done is currently, the current design has the opportunity for parents to basically drag race down the two lanes to get out. The new parking lot design is all inbound with a single outbound lane with angled parking. So you no longer have two lanes of outbound traffic where parents can come and one can try and loop around that southern loop and then one can loop around that middle loop to try and race their way out. There's a single exit lane now to try and minimize that kind of drag racing effect that occurs right now as parents try to race to that stop sign and get out. Hopefully by creating an efficient drop-off pickup lane, we will make it that the parents will want to not have to have their children walk all the way out to Pershing. The point is to hopefully create this new system where there isn't a backlog. However, your point is valid and it's something that can be watched. We've looked at, we've basically analyzed the site. We've actually were out there during drop-off pickup. So we did observe these situations and with the land available to us and looking at what's there, it may take a little bit of time. But again, what we're looking at is if we can get everyone in the mindset that this is no longer a stop and goal, the situation right now is the parents actually have to park in a parking stall and then back out and go, which is very inefficient. With the new design, the parents will be able to pull up and basically stage parallel style along the curb. The children will be able to come right out of the school, get in a car, and then one car can pull out and then the whole line can continue to slowly move up versus having to have a parent come in and actually park and then back out and then drive around. And so the intent is by creating an efficient drop-off pickup situation, which we have done on other schools, we will hopefully make it that the parents will look at this and say, yes, this is now efficient. I don't want my child to have to walk all that way, all the way out to Pershing where they have to cross, not only for the buses. In our mind, the six buses that come out and when they leave at the end of the day, the buses will all leave at one time. So you have six buses leaving the site at one time. In our mind, that is less of a safety concern than the two dozen cars that you're talking about that are not paying attention. The bus drivers are trained to watch for the students and watch for the cars. That is their job and all of those students will be in the buses. The bigger concern would be those parents that stage out there. Their kids are probably more at risk from getting hit from other parents that are parked there than the six buses that are egressing the site. And you had one more question, ma'am. The chief of police would like to respond to that, chief. Okay, does that answer the question? Okay, and then, leading the back, can you respond to that? None of the buffer that currently exists is going away. The parking lot pretty much falls in line with the pavement as it exists now. If we push it further south, correct, yeah. It's within feet of the existing layout because we've maintained those because the school does use those for activities. Are you gonna be signing the new driving lane for the buses as buses only and giving it that designation? Okay. Commissioners, do we have a motion? Make a motion to approve subject to staff recommendations. I'll second it. Thank you for that motion. Is there any discussion on the motion? Seeing none, all those in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion passes. Thank you, gentlemen. The next item is 2.10, RC number 16 of 1718 by the Public Safety Committee to whom is referred, RO number two of 1718 by the city clerk submitting a communication from Angela Smith who resides at 1410 Illinois Avenue raising concerns regarding Thomas Industries noise and lighting. You have anything on that? Yeah, I'll take this. There's a representative from Gardner Denver here and what I just wanna state as relates to this document came into council and was referred to the Public Safety Committee, but it's really a zoning issue and it's really not a planning commission issue. It's really an issue that staff typically takes care of. So the police department, the neighborhood officer and Gardner Denver has made some recommendations to alleviate these concerns. I don't know if they're gonna completely take care of the concerns of the neighbor, but what I would ask is after we hear from the representative from Gardner over what they've done, because they have been in that neighborhood for 30 some years, I believe, then I would ask that this body would maybe file the request and staff then will follow up on a staff level and take care of it as we do with all of their zoning code issues. So, sir. Sure, would you like to make any statement? Sure, sure, my name's Ray Culchin. I've been with, well, Thomas Industries, now it's Gardner Denver, Thomas for approximately 30 years. We've been manufacturing at this site in Sheboygan probably since the 1950s and I think actually beyond that into the 1940s for World War II efforts at that time, but by and large the noise or the consideration to the noise that we have has been part of our foundry operation, which has been a foundry again since the 50s. So what we've done in the past is an off shift, second shift, third shift hours, we run a three shift operation. We close our overhead doors to minimize the sound output that leaves from the building. That's always been our policy and we'll continue to do that. I have not run into this in the past. I think it maybe came out once in the last 20 to 30 years that I've heard of it, but it hasn't been a recent situation. As you know, back in 2008, 2009, Thomas went through a restructuring. We were purchased by Gardner Denver and they did some synergy projects, which involved a lot of our manufacturing operation in Sheboygan, our assembly plant, which is now the A.O. Smith building on the south side to move down to Louisiana. So in those efforts, really, things are growing again for us in Sheboygan. We have two operations now. We have 80 people at the Illinois Avenue facility. We have another operation on North 18th Street with another 30 people over there. I'm sure you maybe are aware, we worked with the city police department to cordon off our street recently for an investment of another machine tool into our foundry operation. We've invested approximately a million dollars into our operation for a manufacturing and that location is really key to our assembly operations in North America and we'd like to continue that and add more headcount to the Sheboygan operation overall, but we're trying to be a good neighbor. We work with the police whenever we can with our surveillance cameras in the area whenever anything that does come up that we can assist with, but we're certainly gonna put our best efforts forward to work with any noise issues in the area and continue to do so as we have. Like I say, we've been in operation as you see today for probably almost into the 40s, so I'd appreciate your consideration of that. Very good, thank you for those comments. Second. We have a motion and a second to file under discussion, Scott. I just wanna say that Angela Smith sent me the message after I talked to her on the phone, she called me out. I do wanna say that my grandma used to live at 1521 Illinois Avenue, so I was very familiar with the noise from the Thomas Industries and I think most of it is because the overhead doors are open during the summer. I would think that if the doors would be shut more, that would solve most of the problem. Okay, thank you for that comment. Mr. Chairman. Any other discussions, do you? I think the only other item, Ray, is just I think there might have been some changes maybe to the parking lot lighting. That's right. And whether or not there's the ability to do some shielding. Sometimes those LED lights are fairly bright and I think that was one of the concerns too was maybe that element and that it's pretty light. So if that can be looked at in terms of maybe some downshading or something, that would be appreciated. Yeah, I'm glad you brought that up. Yes, in the past three years, we replaced probably 99% of the windows within our facility and we also did all exterior lighting, new exterior lighting around the building for security purposes. And the lights, I believe, I know which ones you're speaking of are for our front parking lot. And I think how we'll address that is we'll try to change the angle of that lighting to bring it more downward. Anything to keep that would be appreciated. Facilitate less light reaching across the street. Sure. So that was our intention to deal with that. I'm glad you brought that up. Sounds good. Okay, any other discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor, please signify by seeing aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion passes. Thanks for coming and waiting for our speaker. Thank you. You're done. Jerry? Second. Thanks for that motion and support. All those in favor of adjournment, please signify by seeing aye. Aye. Opposed? We stand adjourned. Thank you for your time tonight. Thanks, everybody.