Testy topics at Hermosa meeting

The Hermosa Board of Trustees met for a regular meeting May 20, chaired by Trustee Kel Koontz in President Linda Kramer’s absence, though she attended via phone.
Engineer Anthony Theodorou is pursuing a Federal Railway Association grant for the railroad pedestrian bridge on Vilas Street, through the Railroad Crossing Elimination Grant Program. These projects are high on the priority list and he is optimistic that a grant would be given to the town of Hermosa.
“What they’re trying to do,” Theodorou said, “throughout the country is to eliminate at-grade crossings.”
He said they would be going after $100,000 to $250,000 and, “A lot of that money gets paid to the railroad consultant,” he said, for the studies and planning. This is a matching grant, with an estimated 80/20 federal/local cost share. The town is looking at an initial cost of $29,000 to be paid to Benesch, which Theodorou suggested could come out of the Bed Booze and Boarding (BBB) fund, the economic development fund, but would count toward the 20 percent cost share.
“It is accessing commercial zone property; all that is commercial east of the tracks,” Theodorou said.
Leo Van Sambeek, from the audience, commented that the new library is supposed to be built on the east side of the tracks, and Linda Kramer over the phone agreed that this planning cost would be a great use of the BBB funds.
“The library alone makes it a huge benefit,” she said, “and the growth of the town...the fair board is accessing the fairgrounds a lot more than they ever used to, which is wonderful.”
The board voted to move forward with this project.
Theodorou also requested an expansion of the budget for the on-call building official and asked that $2,176, which was reimbursed to the town from Ferguson Construction for the Whitney Street project, be allocated to this budget expansion and used to review Whitney Street water and sewer extension and to complete state Department of Agriclutre and Environmental Resources (DANR) approval. The request to earmark money reimbursed to the town from Ferguson Construction for review of the Whitney Street project had to do with the need to allocate the money for something, and the Whitney Street water and sewer extension is a project that is on the horizon and needs attention.
This request sparked a long discussion on the fine points of the subdivision ordinance, as Dan Holsworth from the audience once again took serious issue with Ferguson’s development project, and the needed water main extension, going so far as to say that he was “very disappointed that we’re not following our ordinance.”
It was  pointed out that Ferguson’s project had already been discussed at length at a previous meeting, and it was at that time acknowledged that there were some irregularities in how Ferguson went about getting permits and having work done, but that the goal now was simply to get everything to be in compliance with DANR’s standards. Theodorou also pointed out that anything that is done development-wise gets reimbursed to the town by the developer.
Holsworth again spoke up, saying, “As what Anthony said, this is all completely backwards. If (town attorney) Mr. (Kent) Hagg would please be allowed to review this ordinance, I would ask this board to please table this. There should be no more development even allowed or permits allowed into this, and in a normal developers’ world, the developer, not the town, would put this line in, and the extension of it sugarcoats this, where the developer doesn’t have to pay for the line but the town has to pay for it.
“I would ask that you rely on your professional with your attorney and get a ruling on this. I would say that we need to table this until we have a ruling from the attorney, so the taxpayers aren’t paying for the extension of a main that has no benefit to any of us, but only to one person, and that’s the developer.”
Trustee Aaron Serviss eventually reined in the discussion and brought it back to the original issue, which was Theodorou’s request to expand the on-call building official’s budget and to authorize him to move forward in answering comments from DANR regarding Ferguson’s development, tabling the discussion on the $2,176 since the current budget is sufficient for Theorodou’s immediate project needs.
Theodorou gave planning and zoning updates, presenting a residential building permit application for a lot in Ferguson’s subdivision, submitted by Todd Stainbrook, the owner of the lot, and Theodorou went over the different inspections that would be needed for this permit and described the process.
Holsworth again took issue with this project, saying, “I’m always for development in our community, but once again we have no subdivision followings here. There’s no drainage plans, no roads, no infrastructure. So how can we approve a building permit in a subdivision when we have no infrastructure to serve this individual?” He requested tabling this as well.
The board talked about having a one-item work session the following night, but Hagg pointed out that they really didn’t have time to post 24-hour notice of a quorum, open meetings violations being something this board has struggled with. Serviss suggested tabling this permit application to a special meeting, since no actionable decision can come out of a work session.
Todd Stainbrook, who submitted the building permit application, was present at the meeting and said, “It concerns me, because when I went to look at these lots and came up to the town, I was told that yes, these lots were all platted. Standing in my lot, I could see the lift station right there, and they told me there was sewer and power there…I didn’t have any concern about not being able to have utilities on these lots…I already have a considerable amount of money invested in this project. I don’t want this to be tabled again and again, because I’m eating a ton of costs here…I’d like to see this resolved as quickly as possible.”
There will be a special meeting May 29 to address this permit.
Serviss has been working on getting quotes for chip sealing in town, which will give some improvements to the roads.
Regular drinking water sampling is required by DANR, but sampling was not submitted for the month of April, which Ferguson said was due to the hustle and bustle of change in office staff. All water users will be notified of this failure to submit samples in their next water bill.
The board showed concern about this oversight, and discussed how to make sure that samples were submitted every month, though trustee Donna Ferguson said, “It was just a slip up,” and May’s sample came back clear.
Koontz disagreed, and said, “At one point we were kind of in hot water with DANR, and we’re coming back into their good graces.”
He said he wanted to make sure that this didn’t happen again and that they stayed in good standing with DANR.
“We need to make sure that we do everything that we’re required to do on time. I understand that it was an oversight, but if we work together we can make sure this doesn’t happen again,” he said.
A Hermosa resident was denied reimbursement of a utility bill for a water leak that occurred in October and November of 2023. This request for reimbursement came after the controversial recent meetings in which Trustee Linda Kramer’s recorded water leak of 97,000 gallons was reduced to a bill for 9,700 gallons (citing a suspected misplaced decimal), and at which meeting Koontz also pointed out that nowhere in the town’s ordinances is the homeowner said to be responsible for water lost to a water leak. After discussion, during which it was said that Kramer’s leak was a totally different circumstance, and also that the customer had not been the one to pay the bill, but Western Community Action paid the bill for her, the board denied reimbursement.
The next regular meeting of the Hermosa Board of Trustees will be on Wednesday, June 4, at 6 p.m.