 Welcome to Sheboygan County government working for you. I'm Dan Lemieux, chairman of the Sheboygan County Board and I co-host this program with Adam Payne, our administrative coordinator. And today our focus is going to be on our land and water conservation department. We have with us Pat Miles, the director of that department today. And we are going to focus on that department and some of the services you provide Pat through your department. But just to start off, we are the 12th largest county in population I believe, we have somewhat over 300,000 acres of land in the county, approximately two-thirds of that in agricultural use, 200,000 acres. And some of the relationship you have with that portion of our county is what we're going to be talking about today. So maybe we could start Pat by just telling us a little bit about yourself and your background and especially in regards to this department. Sure, thanks Dan. I grew up on a dairy farm in Southwest Wisconsin. After I graduated from high school, I spent some time out in Montana. After that I attended Fox Valley Technical College in Appleton. Graduated in 77, spent part of the summer as an intern in Fond du Lac County in a similar type job and began employment with Sheboygan County in October of 77. So maybe you could tell us a little bit about the department now on what the mission and responsibilities are of the department? The mission of the Land and Water Conservation Department, Dan, is to provide technical and educational assistance in the management of soil and water resources, the use of two Sheboygan County land users. Some of the responsibilities and the big one is to administer policies and programs that are set forth by the Sheboygan County Board. And the staff in your department to take care of these functions at you? We have a, currently we have a staff of eight. We have a combined total of just a little over 108 years of combined service, presently in the department. Some of the staff, the focus is on some of the program areas which include the Farm and the Preservation Program which is conservation, compliance and dealing with erosion control. The state provides tax credits to those land users that meet those standards. We have the Wildlife Damage Program where we provide assistance in abatement and claims. As you know, we have a large deer herd and geese in the county. We have our priority watershed projects. We have three we currently administer through those projects. We provide technical and financial assistance provided to the state, to land users in those watersheds. And those land users generally install water quality improvement practices in the watersheds on their respective farms. We have a buffer strip program, car share program which we are in our third year. We have a variety of other programs tree and shrub program that we provide. And there's other miscellaneous type activities and services we provide, surveying, design, a lot of technical assistance type request. You mentioned the deer herd. This isn't one of the questions that we talked about earlier, but this isn't the deer herd that we are raising deer for. I mean, this is the deer population in Sheboyin County. Yes, yes. I don't want any of our viewers to think that we are raising a bunch of deer somewhere in Sheboyin County. You mentioned water quality as one of your focuses. Maybe you could just tell us a little bit about the importance of water quality to the residents of the county, not just in these rural areas, but throughout all of Sheboyin County. Sure. I think the first and foremost reason people should probably be concerned with water quality is that we all drink the water. Whether you get your water source from Lake Michigan or from a private well, we all have an impact somewhat on what that water quality becomes through our, just our existence. So, important fact was the drinking part of it. The second part is the recreation use of our waters, whether it be fishing, swimming, boating, as you know, in Sheboyin County, we were blessed with water resources with Lake Michigan right in our doorstep, and of course we have in the lakes and a river system. So I would say those are the important reasons that we should be concerned. We're probably all concerned about our water and what we're drinking and not just that it smells good and looks good, but that it's not harmful to our bodies, but what programs do you have or what can we do as a population in Sheboyin County to improve that quality of water? We talk about it and we're concerned about it, but what can we do? We have basically a two-sided problem. One is the urban part of the problem, one is the rural, and I'll just go into the urban a little bit. If you're an urban resident, there are simple things you can do to improve the water quality of your surroundings or the water that runs off your property. One is the proper use of fertilizers on your lawn. If you over-apply fertilizers or herbicides, you get a heavy rainfall. Of course, that's going to end up in the storm sewer, which ultimately ends up in Lake Michigan. A second part and it's more extensive is stormwater management, which as you know, City of Sheboyin is quite involved with right now where the excess rainfall is contained in some of those sediments and such settle out before the water's released. In the rural sector, there are a number of things that can be done and that are being done. Farming practices, whether it be rotational farming where you grow a series of crops in different years, there's conservation tillage, there's proper application of animal waste so that we're not over-applying and then again the runoff gets into our streams and lakes. There's buffer strips that can be put along the streams and rivers and such to filter out some of those, some of that runoff that will occur, especially this time of year when you have the heavy rainfall and we don't have the crop cover established yet. So you will get some, those types of activities. You didn't mention industrial contamination in the water systems. Does your department get involved with that at all or I mean, we've heard over the last 20, 30 years and especially in the Sheboyin River, some of the problems, does your department get involved with that at all? No, not to a big degree. Those types of problems are more handled by the Department of Natural Resources and the EPA, the Environmental Protection Agency, the national level. Okay, so you're more involved with residential and the local, the agricultural uses and things like that. In the area of agriculture, I think we've seen a lot of the farms in not just in Sheboyin County, but in Wisconsin in general, where a lot of the smaller farms have been consolidated into larger operations in Wisconsin. Being the dairy state, we see that in the dairy industry quite a bit where the larger operations and larger operations bring larger problems. What is your involvement in that area where these farms are being consolidated and what help can you give to these individuals? As you know, that trend is occurring in Sheboyin County as we speak. As an example, we have a situation where we have three landowners that recently formed a partnership and we've been working with individuals since day one as far as just citing the operation and making sure that the animal waste system, storage system is placed properly so that we're not too close to a drilled well or we're too close to surface runoff. We'll provide design assistance for the waste management system itself. We issue a waste storage permit once they get to that point if they wanna build the system and operate it. We'll work with the landowners on a nutrient management plan where we will provide information and areas where those landowners can safely apply that animal waste so that it does not end up on our streams and lakes. And a trick there is to balance the crop needs with the amount of waste that's applied. So those are the areas that we work with pretty much. And it's one-on-one and with the operations getting to three, four, or 500 animals it sometimes becomes a challenge, but it can be done. And you have staff people that are, that is their prime responsibility to work in with that group of farmers and individuals. Yeah, we provide some of the engineering services as far as the animal waste system. We'll provide some of the surveying, the actual surveying, some of the design work and some of it's pretty intensive. We use AutoCAD in our office for some of the designs. You're looking at some of these systems that might be two and three million gallons in capacity. So it does take a bit of engineering behind them. And your feeling is that in the last, since you've had some of these programs in place that we've been able to improve the quality of our rivers and streams in Sheboyne County? I think we've had an impact. There's, of course, there's much more to be done, but I think we're having an impact, yes. Going in the right direction. We're going in the right direction. Earlier, Pat, you mentioned some of the main programs that the department administers and I think you said the non-point pollution program and farmland preservation. And there are a number of state and federal programs that our county staff are administering here. And we all know that locally led conservation is key to success and it's what the landowners are doing that make a real difference on water quality and nutrient management and many of the items you described. Two years ago, I understand you led efforts to develop a local land and water resource management plan. What did that entail? What did that involve? What that basically entailed was assembling a group of individuals from around the county that wanted to serve on an advisory committee to somewhat drive the formulation of the land water plan. We had 37 members that became involved and through a series of meetings, we established some important resource priorities or concerns in the county. We ranked those and then we established some goals and objectives to carry out some of the main priority ones. So you had 37 people from across the community sit down around a table. I imagine a number of meetings discuss priorities, key concerns to the people living here. What were some of those priorities established? Some of those priorities that were established was water quality improvement was the number one priority. Everybody had a concern of water quality and where we were at with that. The second one was nutrient management. I think the fact that Dan just mentioned with the bigger farms coming into play in the county that nutrient management play a bigger role in that we can address the animal waste problem. And the third priority that we ranked was the subdivision and construction site erosion. Whereas we have quite a bit of development going on and people were concerned that we were losing a lot of sediment off these construction sites, subdivision sites. And to date, we've been talking a lot about the work in the agricultural community and how that's two thirds of the land represented in Sheboygan County. But isn't your breakout about 60, 40, 60% in the rural areas and 40% in more of the urban areas? I would say that's fairly accurate. So with the water quality as being the number one objective, I know you were real pleased when Sheboygan County established its first local cost year program, the buffer program. Tell us a little bit more about that. And I want to thank the county board for establishing that. And I think we're providing some leadership in the state in that area. We're in our second year of the buffer strip program. We have the county board appropriated $50,000 as you know for this year. What that actually entails is we will go out and we'll contact various landowners where there's a need for a buffer. If it is cropland, we'll work with a landowner, sometime just negotiation, where we will negotiate a certain width along that stream or river and have the landowner establish that in either grasses or maybe even tree planting. And the width will vary, of course, anywhere from 30 to 100 feet. And what happens is when you establish that buffer, that will tend to filter the runoff from the surrounding fields before it reaches the body of water. And in turn, the landowner then has provided some incentive or some financial assistance to establish that buffer because we are taking some of that land out of production, but the landowner still must pay taxes. So by providing a incentive or a cost sharing incentive to the landowner that land not only stays on the tax rolls, but the landowner also benefits by having the land in buffer in the public as well. Now just before the program started, we were talking a little bit with the rains that we're receiving, how chocolate brown that river or rivers or streams can become. If buffers are more prevalent throughout the county, will that make a difference in our water quality? That will make a big difference. At this time of year, as I mentioned before, there isn't a whole lot of crop cover out there. The fields are quite exposed. So when you do get a rainfall event and it doesn't take much amount of rainfall, a buffer will have a big effect on the runoff that does get to that stream. Now with $50,000 that the county board has allocated, which again, it's our first local cost share program. So it's a step in the right direction. I imagine you have to do some prioritizing in terms of what you're gonna target in the county. Yes, this year we have three townships that we've prioritized, town of Herman, town of Suborgan Falls and the town of Linden. And we have, through our GIS mapping, have identified areas that would benefit from buffers. Of course, there are a lot of areas that are naturally buffered, we don't work with those. But those areas of those three townships where a buffer is, we think is needed, we'll contact a landowner and work with them and give them some proposals as far as what we could offer them as far as a buffer strip program. That's standing. What streams or rivers would that include in those townships? The streams and rivers, any of the large named rivers, the Lake of Sheboygan River, the Onion River, the Pigeon River and some of the smaller streams. Fisher Creek comes to mind around Howard's Grove and there are some unnamed as well. But it's been quite successful. The landowners have taken to it, they like it. Like I said, it's a win-win for the landowners and the county and the public. And I know you have a newsletter that you people can sign up for and you send out and give up updates. You said that you contacted the landowner if you felt that it was beneficial and in a targeted area. But landowners can also contact you. Oh, sure. And we have that too and usually a first come, first serve basis. And a landowner when they do approach, they probably have a problem or they perceive a problem on their property and that's why they're contacting us. And it probably would benefit from the program. Now you said that generally it's grasses, but you said it can be trees. And I know that you have a very successful tree shrub program. Tell us a little bit about that. Every fall we announce our tree program. This is our third year that we've provided that program. We've sold over 70,000 trees and shrubs this year. Matter of fact, as we're speaking, the trees are being loaded on a truck. They'll be delivered tonight or tomorrow. And we'll have to sort those trees, those and shrubs. We had a little over 400 landowners in Sheboygan County and outside the county order these trees. Very minimal cost, the minimum order size is 25. And the cost is very reasonable, starting at $12, $14 per 25. They are on the small side. They're one to two years old, however, for the price. We think it's a good bargain. And we have some landowners that are participating in the buffer program have ordered trees from us. So we can provide that service to these individuals as well. And they can get a quite a large area planted to trees at minimal cost. Very good. So how do people learn more about the tree program, the buffer program, some of the other services you provide? They can subscribe to our newsletter or they can go to our website, which will probably be up and running around May 1st, I believe, and we'll have a lot of that information on there next fall when we announce our program. We'll actually have the tree order form on there. And they'll be able to order right off of there. Okay. Now you've talked about the non-point pollution program, the farmland preservation program, a local costier buffer program, a tree shrub program. I know you work with subdivisions and providing services there on natural resource protection. I assume there's gotta be a lot of coordination with the Department of Natural Resource, the Department of Agriculture, the Natural Resource Conservation Service extension. Are you working with those agencies? Is there coordination? We work with those agencies, Adam, basically on a day-to-day basis. As far as water quality, which I've talked at length about, as you know, DNR is the state agency basically in charge of water quality for the state. So when we deal with our watershed projects or any project dealing with water quality, we tend to work with DNR hand-in-hand. We do have to coordinate programs and such. The Department of Ag, we also work with, just by its name, it deals with agriculture. We deal with agriculture. The UW extension, of course, is our educational arm. Many times we have questions from landowners or just from the public dealing with certain agricultural activities. And we can't be a specialist in every field, but we do have access to the UW extension and their wealth of knowledge. We work with Wisconsin Conservation Corps. We have a crew housed in our location in 650 Forest Avenue in Sheboygan Falls. And this program gives young adults an opportunity to pursue some education and to do some meaningful work around the county, whether it be for Sheboygan County or it might be for a park or a state forest or something of that nature. So we house them as well, and they provide a lot of benefit and services to the county residents also. Very good. Well, the final question I have before turning it back to Dan is, we have discussed a lot of programs, but I know an up and coming program that you're gonna be administering and that the county board is soon gonna be acting on is non-metallic mining reclamation. What's happening with that? The state recently mandated that all counties participate or become involved in the non-metallic mining reclamation program. Sheboygan County has developed a draft ordinance that has been sent to Department of Natural Resources for review and as you know, it was introduced to the county board last Tuesday. I believe it was referred to the Highway Committee for further review. That will be coming back to the county board in May, the May county board meeting that ordinance will become effective as of June one. And what it basically does is mine operators will need to submit for an automatic permit to continue mining. They have a two month window. What that permit basically does is establish a timeframe so that these operations can submit a reclamation plan for that operation so that when the activity ceases, the mining ceases that there was a plan in place to reclaim that site. As the chairman and I both know, we had the opportunity to fly over the county about a year or so ago with our airport director. And there are a lot of non-metallic mines in Sheboygan County. So in short, what does this mean? These are new ones are gonna be reclaimed, old ones will be reclaimed. What does this ordinance mean in short? The ordinance basically deals with the new operations and the existing. Those operations where there is no activity but the scar is still there, those will not be addressed. But any current mine and any new mine that would come into existence will be addressed to the ordinance where a reclamation plan will be required and there will be requirements to be met to carry out that plan. Thank you. Pat, land use and those issues continue to be a topic in Sheboygan County, protection of our natural resources, those that whole area. And last fall in November, Sheboygan County passed a referendum concerning stewardship. And since then, the county board has appointed a ad hoc planning committee to deal with the stewardship and to try to develop a structure for dealing with stewardship down the road year to year in annual basis. And you were one of the people appointed to that committee. I'm on that committee. And it's a large committee, 14 people in that committee. One of our larger committees to deal with but we've been meeting for a month or two and trying to develop a structure for this. Maybe you could just fill our viewers in a little bit about some of the goals of that committee and where we are in that process. Sure. As you recall, the stewardship question itself is kind of the umbrella that we're operating under. Some of these specific goals that the committee is dealing with is identifying some of the existing programs that are operating in the county that could be related to stewardship, identifying some funding sources, some potential funding sources. Other items would be suggesting a governance structure so that when the program comes to fruit, there's a body there to deal with it and identifying potential categories for funding, different type projects for funding, identifying any state or national type of funding sources. And once these meetings are finished and we're looking at probably May or June, these suggestions or recommendations will be compiled and then put in a preliminary report. After that point, there'll be a public hearing held for the public to comment and have input on the process. And after that, the final report is due to the Resource Committee, I believe, of the County Board by July 1st. And we're on track pretty much? Yes, I would say we've been meeting, I believe, since the end of January. We talked a little bit about funding issues at our last meeting. We have another meeting coming up next Wednesday and I believe we're gonna finish the funding issues and be getting into the next part of the structure. We have identified topics for each meeting that we do have so that they're listed so that if there's anybody in the public that would want to attend these meetings, they're welcome to do so. Can you imagine a public hearing down the road but all these meetings that we're having, I believe, every other week on Wednesday evening, these are all public hearings and they're all open to the public and we give a few minutes at the end of the meeting for some public input at all those meetings also. So it's not like they're limited to see what our final result is at the public hearing but they're welcome to give their input as we go. Right now, Lil Mirstein from the Conservation Association is chairing the committee and it is a diverse committee and one of the things that I've enjoyed observing is they're discussing how a stewardship program could be developed or governed and again, they're simply gonna be making recommendations to the resources committee and then on to the full county board. But I think one of the real eye-openers where you've got a 40 plus million dollar state stewardship program, you have all these other opportunities out there but the key thing is you have to have a local match. So some people who are observing this as well as sitting on the committee may and after our discussion, well, we're doing a lot of good things in Sheboygan County. What do we need this for? And that's what the policy makers are ultimately gonna be determining but one of the key issues is if you're going to tap into these state dollars or these federal dollars or be able to leverage local dollars, you have to have a local match and that's gonna be one of the key areas that the committee's discussing. And as you said, the final decision will come some time between now and budget time in October when the county board has to decide what level we're going to fund this and what we'll put in the budget as far as funding for this. And the county board just heard earlier this week that it's gonna be another tight budget. It's gonna be a tight budget. So the challenge is there again. The challenge is there. So we get paid a big box for making those decisions. Thanks, Pat. This was good. Thank you. It's nice to see what is being done for the different areas of the county, the rural areas, the urban areas as far as water quality and some of the programs you have. And I think our viewers maybe have a better understanding of what the county provides in this area. Next month, we're going to have our Veterans Service Officer Jim Riesenberg with us. It'll be the month of May where we approach Memorial Day and we thought it'd be appropriate to get Jim in and hear with some of the services that the Veterans Service Office provides to our veterans. And I'd just like to suggest to the viewers that one of the things I like to do with our program is we're not live. This is Taibt and it's gonna be shown throughout the month. But if you have any questions that you'd like us to ask to answer and you can call in because we're not live, give a call to our office 459-3103 or write to our office and ask us questions. And if we do get some questions every month, we'll try to answer one or two questions at the beginning of our show. And if it's something we're not sharing with you, we'll be happy to answer your questions. So next month, Jim Riesenberg, Veterans Service Officer, thank you, Pat. Thank you. And thank you for watching.