Last week Monday’s City of Prescott Ordinance Committee went swimmingly.

The first focus of the meeting was centered around some members of the public that feel Prescott’s swimming pool ordinance is due to be updated. After the meeting was called to order and past minutes were approved, the Committee started discussing how they can make Prescott a safer community.

City Administrator Jayne Brand informed the Committee that she looked into how neighboring communities have handled requiring fencing around in-ground and aboveground pools. Brand stated that Rice Lake, Osceola, Hudson and River Falls require a fence in some capacity if the pool is a certain depth or height.

“I spent a couple of evenings going through ordinances from all over the country,” Councilmember Thomas Oss said. “After reading all of them, I came to the conclusion that for myself, inground pools are all to be fenced. I do not have any problem with aboveground pools also requiring a fence. But I do have a problem with trying to make the aboveground pool retroactive on the fencing requirements.”

“Going forward, I do not have an issue with requiring fencing for above ground pools, too. If you recall, the complainant was wanting a retroactive requirement for all aboveground pools,” Oss continued after explaining that he did not think that was legal by Wisconsin law.

The Committee decided that they were only discussing the matter, and not taking a vote on it just yet.

Oss pointed out that if it is the decision of this Committee to move forward requiring that all pools be surrounded by a fence, that moving forward the fence fee would be waived by the City of Prescott if the fence was being built to surround a pool.

“I just want to remind everybody, that there is nobody in town with an inground pool that does not have a fence already by ordinance,” Oss informed the Committee. “So, the only ones we are worried about are future aboveground pools and present aboveground pools.”

Councilmember Maureen Otwell summarized the difficulty faced by the Ordinance Committee in designing the Ordinance.

“It’s all grey areas surrounding it because there are different types of pools, different shapes of the pools, then you’ve got the ladders, stairs, gates to the fences. And I get frustrated because I feel we need to have something. But this is why we get stuck each time,” Otwell expressed.

The Committee stated they want to get this done yet this summer and will set a special meeting date to address just the pool ordinance.

The Committee moved onto the next agenda item, discussion on outside storage on commercial and industrial zoned properties.

“I think it is important that businesses have the opportunity to do some outside storage in an industrial setting,” Oss said.

The Committee discussed hazardous material storage and the different measures that must be taken to make sure nothing is leaking into the local water table.

The Committee also agreed to move forward with an ordinance related to the removal of rubbish and dirt from sidewalks/sweeping litter into gutters or streets.