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City will use same procedure for future hires for all departments |
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By Charlie Warner
Argus News Editor
“Although I’ve been happy with what has been brought forward in the past, I feel we need to handle all hires within the city in the same manner. All departments need to be treated the same,” Caledonia City Councilman Paul Fisch stated during the Feb. 25 council meeting.
Councilmembers had been discussing what the most reasonable approach to conducting interviews for the opening on the police department.
In the past, all of the applications had been reviewed initially by the city police chief and his officers, who would determine which applicants didn’t qualify and which ones did. The chief and his staff would then conduct the first interviews, and pare the field down. A committee made up of two city council members, the chief, and the city administrator would conduct the second interviews and recommend which candidates should have background checks done on them.
“We don’t do it that way with our other departments do we?” Fisch asked. “Don’t we have all the applications sent to City Hall and review them here?” he asked City Administrator Bob Nelson.
Nelson replied that Fisch was correct.
“Then I feel all applications for all hires should come to City Hall and a committee of two councilmembers, the department head, and city administrator should review them and conduct the interviews,” Fisch said.
The other councilmembers agreed with Fisch and approved a motion to handle all hires in the future, including the new police officer hiring, as Fisch indicated. The council then named Fisch and councilmember Randi Vick as the two persons from the council on the committee dealing with the police officer hire.
In other council action:
Energy audit completed
Administrative Coordinator Mike Gerardy summarized the report of an energy audit that was recently conducted by two representatives from Dairyland Power and one from Tri County Electric on all the city buildings.
Concerns with the municipal building included:
•older style windows in City Hall,
•the rubber roof with very little ceiling insulation,
•the 10 window air conditioning units that are not very efficient,
•the remaining wooden overhead doors in the fire station,
•the remaining incandescent light fixtures in the building, and older fluorescent lamps in the city council meeting room,
•the old style EXIT signs that use incandescent bulbs.
The report indicated the police and ambulance building already incorporates a number of energy saving measures. Incremental upgrades for this facility will make sense only as the existing equipment fails.
The only real issue with the municipal liquor store is the large compressor for the walk-in cooler is located inside the building. An exhaust fan used to remove the heat generated by the condenser is located next to the compressor, which is operated with a thermostat. Those conducting the audit felt the compressor should be located outside the building.
“There are some things we can do to make our city buildings more energy efficient,” Gerardy said. “When I told them we were planning on replacing the rubber roof, and would be adding quite a bit of insulation, they felt that was a good step forward. They liked the new boilers we recently installed in City Hall and the new mini-split air conditioning unit in the council room. We could realize quite of bit of energy savings if we continue to replace the existing air conditioning units with the mini-split models, which are much more energy efficient.”
“No” to living in industrial zone
Stating that they did not want to open up another can of worms, the council went on record as being opposed to allowing property owners to take up residence in buildings located in industrial zoning districts.
Last month an un-named property owner asked Nelson if it would be allowable to take up residence in a portion of his business located in an industrial zoned district.
“The only place our zoning ordinances address persons living in a commercial structure is in our downtown commercial district,” Gerardy said. “And then, they can only reside above the ground floor.”
It was pointed out that persons have taken up residence in buildings in industrial districts before, but did so on the sly. As soon as the city found out about it, they were notified they were out of compliance.
“If we would allow something like this, and the owner would sell the property, would that apartment become rental property if the new owners didn’t want to live there?” Fisch asked. “I can see many issues cropping up if we allow this.”
“I’d rather see people buying homes in Caledonia, but I guess I really don’t see a real problem with this,” Councilman Gary Klug said.
“But if you let one do this, would if affect other businesses down the road?” Fisch countered. “It probably wouldn’t, but we would be setting a precedent.”
No action was required on the issue, but the general consensus was the council was against granting approval of the request.
Ambulance subsidy increase
Following a request by the Caledonia Area Ambulance Service, the city is asking townships in the priority service area to increase their subsidy from $5 per capita to $7.50 per capita. Ambulance Director Mike Tornstrom and Nelson have attended Mayville and Wilmington township meetings and made a presentation on operational costs, and other financial issues. Both township boards agree with the increase.
The ambulance service has not had an increase per capita from the townships it serves since 1992. Tornstrom and Nelson will be making similar presentations before the other township boards in the ambulance service area.
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The city council screwed up the last hiring process so now they must do what they do best; find a way to put the blame on someone else. Here they have decided the hiring process itself is to blame and they must step in and change it so they look like they know what they are doing. Do they know the difference between what a qualified and unqualified candidate’s application will look like? Do they have some sort of set criteria they will use to sift through the applications? What training do they have to make the determination as to what qualified even means in this situation? Police officers who are trusted with the safety of the community should be trusted with hiring a qualified applicant. Now in the event there is a dispute about the best candidate, the Chief is out voted 3-1 by people who don’t know the first thing about law enforcement. I sincerely hope for a change they listen to Chief Shefelbine and go with his recommendation on who to hire. Chief Shefelbine has the knowledge and experience so use it.