HomeMy WebLinkAboutWeekly Newsletter
Date: June 4, 2010
To: Mayor & City Council
From: Mark A. Rohloff, City Manager
WEEKLY NEWSLETTER
Subject:
JACKSON/MURDOCK ROUNDABOUT:
1.Afteryears ofdiscussion, planning and design,
Oshkosh's first roundabout will open later this month at the intersection of Jackson Street and
Murdock Avenue. We understand that public education is the key to early success with
roundabouts, so we have been pursuing various educational and public information efforts through
several city departments over the last several months. This week, as part of our latest effort, we
have launched a roundabout web page on the city's web site at
www.ci.oshkosh.wi.us/Transportation/traffic/roundabouts.asp. This page is designed to help
community members understand how roundabouts work, and where and when they are being
constructed in Oshkosh. There are excellent resources, from the Wisconsin Department of
Transportation and others, to help drivers, bicyclists, and pedestrians understand how to navigate
the roundabouts to get where they want to go. We trust this information will be helpful in
shortening the learning curve that often happens with roundabouts. If you have any questions
concerning this issue, please contact Transportation Director Chris Strong.
NIXLE COMMUNITY INFORMATION SERVICE
2.: Council Members have already received
a press release prepared by the city regarding the Nixle Community Information Service that the
city launched yesterday. Nixle is a web-based service that allows the city to send messages
directly to cell phones and e-mails with urgent and/or emergency notifications from the city.
Nixle is a nation-wide service that was originally funded by a grant from the Federal Department
of Justice. This service is now made available to qualifying public and community entities such as
the city. I'm sure you've seen many different businesses and media outlets that have offered a
service of instant text messaging. The Nixle service is similar to this, but it is geared specifically
for local governments. Our goal will be to use the Nixle service for urgent and emergency
communications with the public. We do not want to use this often and diminish the value of this
informational tool. The key to making any urgent notification system work is to encourage people
to subscribe to the service. The city will be taking many different initiatives in order to publicize
this to residents. I will also mention this at Tuesday's meeting to further encourage people to
subscribe to the service. As we want to encourage and inspire interest in the Nixle service, I
would encourage Council Members to ask me relevant questions at Tuesday's Council Meeting so
that we may continue to promote this service.
Weekly Newsletter
June 4, 2010
Page 2
UPDATE ON LONG GRASS IN STATE HIGHWAY MEDIANS
3.: As you are aware, in last
week's Newsletter I mentioned that I was going to be contacting our local state representatives
regarding the lack of funding to county highway departments from the state to maintain medians
on state highways at the entranceways to the city. As the enclosed articles indicate, we are not
alone with this concern. My former community of Grand Chute appears to be wrestling with this
same issue. As I mentioned last week, these state highways are not within the city limits, but are
on state highways in the towns leading into the city. The state would certainly love to pass along
these responsibilities to other governmental entities, but the fact remains that for state highways
that are not in cities, the county is responsible for maintaining these, but they are not sufficiently
funding counties to get this work done. I have heard back from our state representatives and each
of them is planning to contact the State DOT. However, I believe most of this will be a futile
effort, as the State DOT does not receive the same level of transportation funding that they have in
the past. I will report back to Council as our state representatives make additional inquiries with
the DOT.
DEPARTMENTAL REPORTS & UPDATES
4.: Other items I'm enclosing with today's
Newsletter include the latest report on the 2010 hotel/motel room tax. Insofar as minutes are
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concerned, I'm enclosing the minutes of the April 14 Board of Appeals meeting; the minutes of
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the May 3 Sustainability Advisory Board meeting; the minutes of the May 19 Transit Advisory
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Board meeting; the minutes of the February 2 Police & Fire Commission meeting; and the
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minutes of the May 12 Landmarks Commission meeting. The last item I'm enclosing is the June
newsletter from the Oshkosh Auxiliary Police, which lists the events they have scheduled for the
months of June, July and August.
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UPCOMING MEETINGS
5.: Meetings I have scheduled for the week of June 7 include the
following: On Monday, at 8:15 a.m., I will be joining Mayor Esslinger for our monthly interview
program on WOSH Radio. At 9:30 a.m., staff and I will be meeting with representatives from the
Town of Nekimi to introduce them to Community Development Director Allen Davis and discuss
items of mutual concern, most recently the potential annexation by the city for the FVTC welding
center. On Wednesday morning, at 9:00 a.m., department heads and I will be meeting to discuss
final preparations for presenting the strategic plan document to Council for your consideration.
On Thursday, at 1:00 p.m., I will be meeting with Jeff Kierlieber, owner of the Pioneer Inn
property, to introduce him to Mr. Davis and to discuss the city's interest in Mr. Kierlieber and his
development group doing something with the former Pioneer Inn property. I also wanted to note
that this week's meeting scheduled to take a boat tour of lakefront and riverfront properties was
cancelled due to weather conditions. We will be rescheduling that meeting at some time in the
future. If you have any questions regarding any of these meetings, please do not hesitate to
contact me.
MAR/jdc