September 2015 Fitchburg Star
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Sell your home eaSier! Local, Experienced & Trusted Get the riGhT real estate advice... Get Geiger JaSon GeiGer It’s your paper! (608) 277-2167 Friday, September 11, 2015 • Vol. 2, No. 7 • Fitchburg, WI • ConnectFitchburg.com • $1 Office Next to Great Dane - Fitchburg GeigerRealtors.com adno=427860-01 Inside Lacy Road plans D D draw criticism City’s burgeoning compost program primed for the big time Page 2 JACOB BIELANSKI Community Unified Newspaper Group Even up close, the piles behind the maintenance facility on South Fish Hatchery look just what they mostly are: dirt. But members of the city’s waste facility team see a lot going on in these piles. A biological process breaks citizens’ yard waste into a nutrient-rich plant food that not only means better azaleas, but real money Book recounts for the city. And the program is about to get husband’s battle bigger. with ALS For roughly the last year, the city has stopped shipping yard waste Page 9 away and has instead began keeping it in the large piles. The program is built, in part from successes seen in Schools pilot programs. The city intends to expand its Renovations begin capacity as soon as next year so it can bring in more material. around Oregon While cost and participation chal- School District lenges could remain if a program is instituted on a larger scale, such as Page 12 with curbside pickup, initial results indicate Fitchburg could have a future in compost. Sports “Sustainability, equity and quality of life – that’s what people want, and discover, when they get here,” May- or Steve Arnold said. Photo by Samantha Christian Mark Hodel, Fitchburg streets supervisor, checks the temperature of one of the compost piles behind the public works mainte- From sticks to dirt nance facility off of Fish Hatchery Road on Wednesday. The raw pile of yard waste, shown in the background, gets ground up to The City of Fitchburg’s current become reusable compost, shown in the foreground. compost program doesn’t look like much. It begins with a small area a wood chipping expert. The broken- This ecosystem, however, is a near the dumpsters on the south side down waste begins its transforma- delicate one. As the microorgan- Inside of the maintenance and recycling tion. isms feed on the waste, heat is gen- facility, where residents can dump On a recent Wednesday after- erated. If it gets too hot at the core • Fitchburg gets yard waste and sticks “no larger than noon, Hodel stuck what looked like of the pile, those bacteria die – too recycling award a thumb” in diameter, said Fitchburg an oversized meat thermometer cool, and they stop feeding. To man- streets supervisor Mark Hodel. into one of the piles of deteriorating age this, crews use front-end load- • Engineer honored for From there, piles of the yard waste yard waste. Beneath the surface of ers to periodically mix the piles up, environmental efforts the brown mounds is a microscopic right around the time the internal West boys cross are taken to a pile on the opposite end of the facility. When the pile gets feeding frenzy of bacteria that breaks Page 24 country takes third large enough, the city contracts with down the wood. Turn to Compost/Page 24 at Verona invite Page 13 Badger Prairie Needs Network Business Revamped food pantry grows its presence the corner: Helping people nonprofit has changed Nonprofit gets in a … it feels good. its name, moved loca- new groove to meet No doubt this commit- tions, reorganized leader- ment of “neighbors helping ship, served more people, needs of community neighbors” for nearly 30 expanded hours and added years has fueled the vol- community-based services SAMANTHA CHRISTIAN unteer effort to transform in its mission to end hunger Pegex matches Unified Newspaper Group what was formerly known and address the root causes as Verona Area Needs Net- of generational poverty. hazmat needs, Thank-you notes were work (and the Verona Food BPNN outgrew the base- vendors big and written all over a white- Pantry before that) into ment of the city’s old board during Badger Prai- BPNN’s comprehensive library and moved into small rie Needs Network’s grand support system for those the single-story former opening Aug. 23. One had a who can use a helping hand. administration building at Photo by Samantha Christian Page 23 simple message scrawled in Over the past year, the Turn to BPNN/Page 20 Badger Prairie Needs Network is located at 1200 E. Verona Ave. PRSRT STANDARD ECRWSS US POSTAGE PAID Summer Closeout!! UNIFIED NEWSPAPER GROUP Irish Lane Our Best Sale of the Year! Store Closing • 1,000s of Perennials – Priced to Move! for Season • 40% Off All Shrubs! 9/20/15 • 40% Off All Pots, Statues & Fountains! • Huge Savings on All Remaining Inventory! Huge Selection of Mums & Fall Perennials! K&A GREENHOUSE kandagreenhouse.com • Hours: Mon-Sat 9-6; Sun 9-5 5555 Irish Lane, Fitchburg (608) 271-3230 | 7595 W. Mineral Point Rd., Verona (608) 833-5244 adno=428785-01 2 September 11, 2015 The Fitchburg Star ConnectFitchburg.com Search for fire chief restarts Timeline to a new chief Tentative start date Human resources man- age Lisa Sigurslid told the Sept. 20: last day for after New Year’s Star the city will accept applications applications until Sept. 20. According to a timetable Sept. 21-25: JACOB BIELANSKI Applications to be Unified Newspaper Group provided to the Star, vari- ous panel interviews and reviewed by HR, with top candidates forwarded Fitchburg will need to background checks will be conducted throughout to the Police and Fire wait at until at least after Commission (PFC). October, with top candi- New Year’s before it will Oct. 9: Interviews of have a permanent, full- date voted on at the com- mission’s Nov. 11 meet- top candidates before time fire chief on the pay- 5-person panel consist- roll. ing. In that scenario, the new candidate would then ing of: City administrator Previous frontrunner Pat Marsh, interim chief John Harris was original- tentatively start on Jan. 4, 2016. Chad Grossen (or Lisa ly selected from a final- Sigurslid, if Grossen is a ist pool that included the The fire department is currently led by inter- candidate), the Common head of De Forest fire Council President or a and EMS district, and an im chief Chad Grossen. He took over in January designee, the chair of the assistant fire chief from a public safety committee Detroit suburb. Harris is after longtime volunteer fire chief Randy Picker- and a fire chief from a the assistant fire chief in neighboring community. Murray, Utah, a suburb of ing had to resign in order to move into a new home Oct. 21: Closed-session Salt Lake City comparable interview with the PFC, in size to Fitchburg. outside of Fitchburg. In Photo by Scott Girard April, the city began the as well as meet with the Harris rejected the city’s mayor, take a tour of the offer in August after pass- previous search for a new, full-time chief. Whomever city, application test and a Pigging out ing the city’s background public meet and greet. check. The Police and Fire is hired during this next The Fitchburg Farmers Market hosted its Summer Fest Thursday, Aug. 20, which featured a pig Commission voted at its search would be the fourth Oct. 22-Nov. 11: roast and live music from Mud Music. The market will host its Fall Fest Sept. 13. Above, Alejandro meeting Aug. 12 to open full-time fire chief for the Background check. Bermudez, 1, of Fitchburg, enjoys a piece of corn on the cob. a new, nationwide recruit- Fitchburg department. Nov. 11: PFC votes to ment, instead of interview- extend employment offer. ing the other finalists. Jan. 4: First day. City of Fitchburg Get a Lacy residents: No $100 Visa Gift Card6 demand for sidewalk to get started SCOTT GIRARD On the web Unified Newspaper Group Opinions Information and a survey on the Some Lacy Road resi- Letters to the editor Lacy Road reconstruction project: dents are questioning poten- AKE A SELF-REMODELIN and a column fitchburgwi.gov/2267/Lacy- THEY M G KITC tial designs for reconstruc- UNTIL HEN, tion of the road between from Mayor Steve Road-Reconstruction the community center and South Syene Road. Arnold on the topic Feedback is still being Another goal of the proj- collected about the proj- Page 5 ect is to lower the speed on IT’S UP TO YOU ect details, but plans for a the road. Despite a 35 mph potential sidewalk or multi- Arnold said the city’s speed limit, Bizjak said the use path drew complaints at attorney does not think the department found 47 mph is recent meetings. resolution “applies” to Lacy the 85th percentile of speed Mayor Steve Arnold Road. for cars on the road. The AND MONEY included the project in his The public works depart- 85th percentile is the level proposed capital improve- ment conducted a pedestrian typically used for setting Your ment plan released in June. study on a recent weekday speed limits. to make it happen The proposal called for con- and found six pedestri- To lower that, the city struction to start next year, ans and bicyclists during a could narrow the road or but it was delayed after 12-hour period passing the install a curb and gutter sys- HOME EQUITY LINE OF CREDIT some residents complained intersection of Lacy and tem, either of which could 1 1 at public hearings about a Micah roads.