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HomeMy WebLinkAboutnewsletter TO: Honorable Mayor and Members of the Common Council FROM: Mark Rohloff, City Manager DATE: November 19, 2021 RE: Weekly Newsletter 1. STUDENT RIDERSHIP UPDATE: As a result of the revenue agreement between the Oshkosh Area School District and the City of Oshkosh, student ridership has been and remains strong this school year. GO Transit gave 12,314 no cost rides to students in October and has given 63,794 year to date. As expected, the highest ridership is middle and high school students. However; these rides unfortunately have not gone without incident as there have been an increasing number of behavior issues with the student riders. GO Transit has been working with the Oshkosh Police Department and School District in an effort to reduce these incidents. The strong ridership has also caused bus capacity issues. For example, one of the buses that services Oshkosh North has been at capacity on several occasions therefore; some students had to wait 30 minutes for the next bus and the bus was not able to make any stops to pick-up riders between the school and the downtown transit center. GO Transit has been working on the costs to add additional service during school release. The current revenue agreement is based on the established and regularly publicized bus service. The agreement states that “additional bus service may be added if both the city and OASD mutually agree based upon ridership need at an agreed upon rate. The city shall invoice OASD for additional service/routes at an agreed upon rate”. GO Transit will continue to evaluate the service need and costs. If you have any questions about this, please contact Transportation Director, Jim Collins. 2. A COMMUNITY WORKING TOGETHER: Early this summer, citizens were contacting OPD expressing their concerns about homeless individuals sleeping under the bridges and camping near the River. Officers made contact with several people who were residing under the bridges. One gentlemen we spoke with pointed to some bags of property and said that he was watching the property while two of his friends were at work and then pointed to a male who was sleeping and said that he just got done working 3rd shift. This person also told us that he works, but that he works the 2nd shift so when he is gone, the others will watch his property. This discussion led officers to ask some follow up questions- like, what are some of the barriers that are preventing individuals with jobs from finding a place to rent and what can we do to help. After working in conjunction with staff from the Day-by-Day Warming shelter, we discovered that in some cases citizens are working temporarily and in other cases the large amount of money that is due (security deposit and first month's rent) when first signing a rental agreement is a challenge. Officers from the Oshkosh Police Department spoke with employees at the Day-by-Day Warming Shelter as well as the organizer of the Police Lights of Christmas program about possibly using some of the donated funds to help get two homeless gentlemen an apartment. Both organizations were on board with this and the Day-by-Day Warming Shelter staff worked diligently with these individuals to make sure that they were still employed full time and had the necessary wages to continue to pay rent. Day-by-Day Warming Shelter staff also assisted in locating an apartment that would fit their needs. The Police Lights of Christmas (Q 90 Radio) is a program that provides donated funds to Police Officers to help citizens in need. Officers receive these donated funds in the month of December to give out to members in our community. It was a great day when we watched the keys to the apartment being handed over to the two gentlemen who are now no longer homeless. It truly does take a community working together to achieve amazing goals and to create long lasting positive impact on others' lives. 3. SCHOOL SAFETY: On Tuesday, November 16, 2021, Chief Dean Smith, Assistant Chief Kurt Schoeni, Sergeant Jeff Nelson, and School Resource Officers met with the School Superintendent, Dr. Bryan Davis, and school staff to discuss issues of school safety in the Oshkosh Area School District. As a result of this meeting, both short-term and long-term plans are being developed to address these issues. 4. ADVANCED LAW ENFORCEMENT ACCREDITATION: On Thursday, November 18, 2021, Chief Dean Smith met virtually with the Commission on Accreditation for Law Enforcement Agencies (CALEA) Commissioners for final review of our National re- accreditation. The Oshkosh Police Department earned its initial accreditation status in November 1994. This will be our ninth CALEA re-accreditation. Through this process, we will attain Advanced Law Enforcement Accreditation. 5. REMINDER-2021 FOOD AND TOY DRIVE DATES SET: OFD is accepting non- perishable food items, new/unwrapped gifts, wrapping paper/tape, and cash donations. All donations will be given to the Salvation Army and distributed through their distribution program. Monetary donations (and checks) will be given to the Oshkosh Firefighters Charitable Trust and be used to fund the Gary Kassube scholarship, given to two graduating Oshkosh seniors enrolled in a police or fire science program. Additionally, cash donations can be made through the PayPal link below: https://www.paypal.com/donate/?cmd=_s-click&hosted_button_id=QTK97FZHLAHT6 All routes (maps attached) begin between 5 and 5:30pm. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram @OshkoshFoodToy for further updates throughout the drive. We look forward to seeing you on the routes for what promises to be another great year of helping our community!  Tuesday, November 30th - Station 14  Wednesday, December 1st - Station 15  Thursday, December 9th - Station 16  Monday, December 13th - Station 18  Tuesday, December 14th - Station 17/19 6. REPORTS ATTACHMENTS UPDATES AND LINKS: Attached is the weekly Museum Board memo. 7. MINUTES FOR BOARDS AND COMMISSIONS: All meeting minutes are uploaded to the website upon approval. Please follow the link below for the most updated information & meeting minutes: https://onboard.ci.oshkosh.wi.us/. 8. COVID-19 RESOURCE LINKS AND INFORMATION: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention: https://www.cdc.gov/ Wisconsin Department of Health Services: https://www.dhs.wisconsin.gov/ Winnebago County Public Health Department: https://www.co.winnebago.wi.us/health/divisions-program-areas/communicable- disease/covid-19-coronavirus/wchd-covid-19-situation 9. UPCOMING MEETINGS: The only meeting of note that I have scheduled for the week of November 22 will be at 7:30 AM on Monday when I will be meeting with Mayor Palmeri to discuss Tuesday’s agenda. As a reminder, City Offices will be closed for Thanksgiving and I will be out of the office beginning Wednesday through the remainder of the week. Due to the short work week, there will be no newsletter, Friday November 26. If you have any questions about my schedule, please contact me.