Lake Holcombe Town Board; Take care with where you put your snow
By Julia Wolf
With the white stuff’s arrival, the Town of Lake Holcombe voted during a meeting Nov. 17, to send a reminder to the community, about how to safely handle snow.
Chairman Brian Guthman read a letter he and town roadman Ben Jordan put together to include with the tax bill, as snowplowing has become an issue in the town.
“No plowing of snow into, or across, the road,” said Guthman, adding pushing snow from driveways can cause accidents, death or municipal snowplow damage.
Residents should also remove fiberglass rods and metal stakes from town right-of-ways, and remove garbage and recycling containers from right-of-ways within 24 hours of pickup. People also should not push snow off culverts or into ditches.
“That will cause the culverts to be frozen and ditches to accumulate water in the spring,” said Guthman.
“I know drivers...in other townships, that have actually gotten injured when they hit that with the wing plow,” said Doug Olson, supervisor, “or when it’s rained on and it’s frozen to ice.”
Guthman also asked if recycle round-up should decrease in frequency.
“There are some residents that really use it,” said Guthman, but added it is not a lot of people.
Supervisor Dave Staudacher suggested they have it once a year, the weekend before Labor Day, which was approved with a vote.
In the chairman’s report, Guthman reported that the sheriff’s department and all the townships are going to get together to rewrite the ATV/UTV ordinances, so they are the same county-wide.
“Hopefully, ours will be the one that they look at to be exactly mirrored to the county,” said Guthman.
Guthman also reported he looked into the short-term rental ordinance from the Town of Lafayette, but found it is basically the same thing the county is doing right now, so it would be a duplication of what is already there.
A public budget hearing and special town meeting were also held earlier in the evening.
“From last year to this year, our intergovernmental revenue went down, because we don’t have that federal grant anymore,” said clerk Tracey Larson.
Larson said everything else looks similar to last year’s budget.
Town electors approved a town tax levy of $307,169. The 2023 budget was approved in the regular meeting, later in the evening.
Also on the topic of finances, Olson asked if the excess cash in CDs could be invested in treasury bills instead. Treasurer Jim Mataczynski agreed that sounded like a good idea and said he saw it at both credit unions.
“We don’t have to tie up all of our money in it, but what we have in the savings account, we could sure grab some of that and make a couple of bucks,” said Mataczynski.
Mataczynski questioned if there are any statutes against investing in treasury bills. Guthman asked Mataczynski to look into it and report back.
