RIVER FALLS — The River Falls City Council unanimously approved an annexation and rezoning that would allow for residential development on a site off of County Road M on June 9.

Senior Planner Harley Mehlhorn presented the item for the annexation of property at the southeast corner of County Road M and 1060th Street from the Town of Clifton to the City of River Falls. The approval also came with a rezoning to R-2 Multiple Family (Medium Density) Residential and B-3 Highway Commercial. It applied a future land use classification to mixed use and medium density residential.

“The City Council is not reviewing any specific development proposals for the area at this time, but rather the annexation itself,” Mehlhorn said. “If the annexation is approved, those applications would be forthcoming.”

The annexation proposal is for 55 acres from Delbert and Elaine Johnson, collaborating with BW Homes. The site is currently zoned for agricultural uses, adjacent to both agriculture and residential zoning districts.

“The future land use plan guides development within the City of River Falls and its urban area boundary where infrastructure may expand. Land use designations consider surrounding uses and infrastructure efficiency,” Mehlhorn said. “Medium density residential allows for a variety of housing types at densities that support efficient infrastructure. Although part of the area is designated for earth preservation, the area to be annexed is flat, agricultural and can be efficiently served by city infrastructure.”

Adjacent resident Christine Witt asked council where the responsibilities of upkeeping the roads would fall.

“I’m concerned with the multiplication of the numbers of people that will be using those [township] roads, and wondering who will take care of, and who is going to pay for any upkeep, any renovation of those roads, because they’re not built for that kind of traffic now,” Witt said.

John Witt said council members should drive on 880th and 1060th streets to decide if the change is truly compatible with the surrounding area.

Community member Krista Cleary said the city has done this in the past, and it is a damaging pattern to the surrounding small towns.

“I’ve watched this city do what it’s doing right now. Pick some land adjacent to the city, folks who live in the local towns show up and say, ‘This isn’t what we want, this isn’t how we want our community developed,’ and the city ignores it. So, I expect the same to happen again,” Cleary said. “A lot of us want to be involved in how this community grows and develops. We want a say in what happens.”

The proposal was unanimously approved. Any future development proposals would go through council for each step of the process, per policy.