PRESCOTT - As the Sept. 11 City of Prescott City Council meeting began, Alderperson Dar Hintz took the opportunity to thank Prescott Daze volunteers for the success of the event.

“I think that it was a success.” Hintz said. “I went to the Fairy Wonderland on Friday night. I had never been there before to look at the new playground. It was amazing. Really good for the really little ones and it was just a really nice night. Everybody was just hanging out with the kids and there was a couple food trucks and it was lovely, so I enjoyed it.”

Alderperson Maureen Otwell agreed.

“I was downtown on Saturday from noon until about two o’clock and that was fun too,” she said.

Mayor Rob Daugherty switched gears and shared his thoughts on the end of the paid parking proposal. He informed those in attendance that they spoke to River Falls concerning their meters.

 “A lot of people used River Falls as an example,” he said. “They don’t have parking, yada, yada, yada. Well, their meters had gone to their expiration date. They were penny and nickel ones they had to go around with bags to collect all their money and stuff. They chose not to do their public parking, that is why they don’t have it. It wasn’t because their downtown was dead.

“City of Hudson is paid parking. They’re having one of their best summers ever.”

He said Hudson received negative feedback from its citizens and businesses, but paid parking has hindered nothing and businesses are thriving.

“Same with Stillwater. And Stillwater did mention, ‘Don’t ever build a parking ramp if you don’t have to,’” Daugherty said. “A couple other things, we were told that we were reactive and not proactive but everything that we do here is very well thought through.”

He further stated that some things take years to complete.

“We are very proactive. We have a very good council. Everybody sitting here are citizens and we pay taxes like everybody else. So, I just wanted to point out a couple of things,” he said. “All in all, it was a good meeting, we had a good turnout. Maybe paid parking isn’t a good thing for us now, maybe in the future. I don’t know but for now it is off the table.”

Junked vehicles

With Alderpersons Bailey Ruona and John Peterson absent, the remaining council discussed junked vehicles and appliances.

“This is a second reading, and this ordinance is going to basically treat junk vehicles and any kind of junk appliances for commercial properties the same as residential properties,” Hintz said. 

City Administrator Matt Wolf explained that discussions surrounding this ordinance arose at the last meeting and led to the question, “Do we want to have neighbors putting up a fence and then storing junked vehicles and appliances?”

Council members recommended to move the ordinance for junked vehicles back to the Health and Safety Committee to discuss the repercussions of installing a fence and putting junk vehicles behind it and how to address that.

Tobacco products

The council moved on to Ordinance 07-23 concerning cigarettes, vaping and tobacco products.  “We don’t have any ordinances for smoke shops in the City of Prescott and we could see more coming to our city,” Hintz said.

Together with the City Attorney, a smoke shop ordinance was drafted to limit smoke shops in the city to one per every 2,000 people.

“At the last meeting we discussed making sure to add C1 Central Commercial District, which this second reading does have that C1 Central Commercial District entered in,” Wolf said. “As a result of the restrictions that were in place, one of the things we did change is previously we had 750 feet of a public park and they couldn’t be allowed within, but now it states 750 feet of a public park. This shall not apply to the C1 Central Commercial District because essentially the way the restrictions were put before were basically not allowing any tobacco shops to be in that C1, so that’s why it was removed. But now with this statement here, it basically allows for that restriction to not apply for the C1 Commercial Districts, and they can be in there with the changes that were requested at the last council meeting.”

The council unanimously approved the ordinance; smoke shops shall be allowed in the C-1 Central Commercial, C-2 Highway Commercial District and I-3 Mixed Industrial Commercial Districts only.

Cedar Corporation

Discussion then turned to the contract for design and specifications by Cedar Corporation for Elm Street and Washington Street from Kinnickinic Street to Wacota Street.

Greg Adams, municipal engineering team leader from Cedar Corporation, inform council of the project plan.  

“In anticipation of these two projects, we did do the preliminary surveying for both, so it represents a similar strategy to how we designed Locust Street,” he said.

It’s a 40% larger project in length than Locust Street, but will have an earlier start which is beneficial in communicating with the public. Adams also said this project has a few more challenges that they will try to incorporate into the design. Preliminary meetings will be scheduled with the public to get input for the design.

The estimated cost of the project comes to $3,770,200 with a goal of finishing the preliminary design by late November and bid documents completed by late February to the beginning of March.

“I know we were looking at a grant for the sidewalk.” Daugherty said. “Are we anywhere with that on this project?”

Adams said the grants he applied for last year weren’t awarded, but he plans to try for others now that he has a start date, cost estimate and concept plan.

In other news

Former Prescott Fire Chief Bill Dravis has been nominated for the Fire Association and will be voted on at the next meeting.