Stories from our March 10 edition
Drinking establishment rules take center stage at Little Chute meeting
By Tom Collins
For the Times-Villager
A common theme of the Wednesday, March 3, meeting of the Little Chute Village Board, beyond the previously reported Dutch Boyz development, was clear rules for village drinking establishments.
The meeting included consideration of the outdoor beverage service areas and increased adherence to existing regulations, especially those that have been lax about having licensed bartenders on duty.
Approval of the outdoor alcoholic beverage proposal was on the March 3 agenda after discussion at previous village board meetings.
Fox Valley Metro Police Chief Erik Misselt noted the proposal was approved March 1 by the Kimberly village board. He reviewed the parameters of the proposal for Little Chute establishments.
“We are allowing something that does not take place now,” explained Misselt. “We are going over and above to try to deal with the smoking ban — to allow a little more leeway.”
He added that places with smoking-only outdoor decks would not be impacted. And he said the ordinance allows owners to plan in advance for the July 1 smoking ban.
Misselt said the bar owners would police the outdoor beverage decks and those facilities could be opened for smoking only after designated outdoor hours have ended.
The original stricter 100-foot setbacks have been modified. Those places qualifying with 50-foot setbacks would have their beverage decks closed at 8 p.m. seven days a week.
Those falling into the 100-foot setback category would be allowed to have their beverage decks open until 10 p.m. on Friday and Saturday and until 9 p.m. on other nights.
“Living space goes with the territory,” he said, suggesting living near a bar or in an apartment over an establishment in a com-mercial area is inherently more noisy than living in a residential neighborhood.
“Many of the bar owners I talked to felt comfortable these concerns were addressed,” noted Misselt. He added that alcoholic beverage service still would have to take place inside, not on the qualifying outdoor beverage decks.
Trustees passed the beverage deck ordinance and then passed a separate ordinance allowing sidewalk cafés. The state still must confirm the village’s right to have the cafés on Main Street because it runs along a state highway.
Misselt surfaced discussion regarding drinking establishments again when trustees had to deny two operator’s license requests for varied reasons.
The police chief noted that 20 licenses were approved, an unusual number at this time. The police calls to a few bars revealed some flaws.
“Quite a few have been operating without operators licenses. We have found no agents or licensed bartenders on the scene,” he explained.
“I want to see them get up to snuff before the enforcement issues come up. And these are only places we’ve been called to,” he added, suggesting there might be others in the village.
Misselt added there is a point system for Little Chute establishments similar to one used in Appleton and elsewhere.
Each establishment begins with 200 points. He said at least two facilities now have lost 50 points through violations. Misselt said letters are sent out so the bars understand exactly where they stand on the point system.
Drinking establishments aren’t the only places that will have stricter rules. Library director Barbara Carpenter made her first official appearance as a reporting member of the village departments.
She said beginning March 15, there will be an age requirement applied to some library patrons. Anyone age 11 or younger must be accompanied by a responsible adult — someone 16 years or older.
Parents will be informed via the library Web site. Families sending young children without an adult will be called. In the extreme, the new rules will dissuade use of the library as an alternative to day care when parents are working or unable to be home.
Security also will be upgraded. Continued conduct violations would progress from a verbal warning to a temporary ban from the library. Further violations will be handled by Carpenter.
A realignment at the library for budgetary reasons will mean two teen workers will lose their positions by mid-March. Volunteers will take on their work.
The duties of retiring librarian Karen Vandenberg will be assigned to three current employees. A new youth librarian will be hired to work 30 hours per week.
The libraries in Little Chute and Kimberly will now open at 10 a.m. instead of 9 a.m. The later opening hour was chosen instead of other closing hour options.
Kell noted a meeting with the Wisconsin Department of Transportation was planned on Friday regarding the Mill Street bridge. Kell was scheduled to accompany Village President Chuck Fischer to Madison for the meeting.
Parks, Recreation and Forestry Director Tom Flick reported several upcoming matters will be placed before the village board in the coming weeks.
One will be a grant proposal for the proposed Heesakker to Island Park pedestrian bridge. Another will be a report on deer hunting in the village. A third will be a special events policy being considered simultaneously in Kimberly and Little Chute.
Flick was asked about the ongoing meetings with the park planning commission and aquatic design consultant Barry Rollins.
He explained three directions are being carefully considered for the Doyle Park pool including compliance with modern codes, pool renovation and consideration of a new facility.
“This board has to tell staff how you would like to spend money in the next 10 years,” said Flick. “A lot ties in to what you are doing with the deck.”
Flick offered the example of the removal of the deteriorating slide at the pool. He said that action would alter the grandfathered status of the current pool in light of newer, stricter codes.
In turn, that would mean a series of considerations would need to be considered just to comply with the current pool codes.
“I’m not comfortable making expenditures without this board approving it,” said Flick.
He also mentioned the unusual request of a local rugby club. They would like to use an open piece of village land at the corner of La Follette and Bluff streets for rugby practice until spring weather melts the snow pack and dries their usual field at Heesakker Park.
At least one trustee questioned possible village liability for such use. The staff opinion was the village would have “recreational immunity,” similar to what would happen if someone was injured while walking near land near a storm water retention pond. Flick said he would verify the matter with Village Attorney Charles Koehler.
Public Works Director Roy Van Gheem offered the possibility that Vinton Construction might be the low bidder on the upcoming, state-funded Washington Street project.
Vinton had troublesome concrete installation on village projects in 2008 and recently went through a series of remedial negotiations with the village on those concrete problems.
Van Gheem said the state will communicate with the village before an official award is made. That could offer Little Chute officials a chance to communicate any valid reasons why the low bid should not be awarded to Vinton for the street project.
Trustees voted to adjourn to closed session at 8:30 p.m. to discuss the conditional uses previously placed on the Dutch Boyz development project.
Kimberly ski enthusiast spending week at Junior Olympics in Maine
By Brian Roebke
Editor
If one of Kimberly’s athletic teams qualified for a national event, there would probably be a massive celebration but Paul Schommer, a senior who is skiing at the United States Ski Association Cross Country Junior Olympics in Presque Isle, Maine, is satisfied to participate in relative anonymity.
Schommer qualified for the Junior Olympics by participating in five races this winter in Wisconsin, Michigan, and Minnesota where the top nine ranked skiers in the midwest qualified for the Junior Olympic games in Maine, which is being held this week.
Skiers from all across the country are racing this week for the national championships.
This week, Schommer will be in four races, two each in classic and freestyle.
There are two different techniques in cross country skiing: classical, where the skis move parallel to each other through machine-groomed tracks in the snow, and free style where skiers push off with the edge of their skis, similar to speed skating.
The more modern free style method was pioneered by U.S. Ski Team member Bill Koch in the early ‘80s, and is almost 10 percent faster than classic.
“I never really raced at this high of a level before, so it will definitely be interesting to see where I stand,” Schommer said.
He has some goals for the week, since he can look at time and placing from other skiers and think where he might fit in.
“Time can be affected quite a bit by the conditions,” he said. “It’s more that I’d like to place in the top 20, the top 10.”
He’d also like to beat some people he hasn’t beaten before. He sees a lot of the same skiers at races and develops friendly rivalries with them.
Schommer participated in the Kortelopet 23K Race at the American Birkebeiner in Hayward for the third time on Feb. 27, which is half the distance of the Birke, because he’s still 17 years old and Birkie participants must be 18.
“It’s the biggest race event in the Americas,” he said.
Schommer took sixth overall in the skate race despite being in the middle of a crash about 50 yards into the race.
“We were just skiing and I don’t know what happened but I got tripped by a pole from another and I went down,” he said. “I guess there were about 20 skiers involved and they all kind of fell on top of me.”
People watching on the sideline told him he was knocked down several times and he was down on the ground for about a minute before he got back up and on his way.
“There were like a thousand people going off at once,” Schommer said. “It was a bad start but I skied well enough to have a decent finish at the end,” he said.
Schommer started skiing with his family when he was younger and his older brother, Phil, was the first person in the family to ski with the school’s ski club with Assistant Principal Steve Verboomen. “I came along one time and Mr. Verboomen put me on some better skis than what I used to have and it was a lot more fun on better stuff, and I just started going from there,” he said.
Verboomen designed the club to be a fun activity where 99 percent of the kids do it just for fun, but Schommer just took it upon himself to get into a ski program.
“He’s the perfect kid to do this because the guy is unbelievably driven,” Verboomen said. “I’ve never seen a kid before just driven to go after something, and that’s what he’s done with this skiing.”
As a sophomore, he was hooked, and began to travel to other places to ski competitively. Now, he’s a fanatic.
“Now it’s all I do, really,” he said. When the snow is gone, he skis on roller skis and runs as a member of the school’s cross country and track teams.
Schommer was fifth at the state meet on Feb. 13 in Wausau.
“I’ve really been working on my classic technique and I put out a pretty good race there,” he said. “I skated my way to fifth overall and I was pretty happy.”
Schommer said Wisconsin has a lot of good skiers, so he was happy with that race.
Verboomen has played an instrumental role in his ski career and helped him get to the next level.
“He’s helped me get into the sport and if it weren’t for him, I probably wouldn’t be skiing,” he said.
Schommer has a different relationship with Verboomen, who handles discipline issues at school, than most students.
“I usually get called down to the dean of students office not to get yelled at but to talk about skiing,” he said. “It’s not the normal relationship that a student with has the dean of students at their school.”
Schommer said it’s different to be part of a ski team at school that doesn’t get a lot of attention, but he doesn’t mind it at all.
“I have to do a lot more for myself,” he said. “It’s not like I get the bus to go everywhere. I have to drive myself places and get my own equipment.”
Verboomen noted how Schommer had to drive himself to his races to compete in races just so he could qualify.
“A lot of people in the ski community have helped Paul out a lot and Paul and I are extremely happy about that,” Verboomen said. “Skiers from around the Appleton area have helped him out both financially and with time and the mental part, it’s just unbelievable.”
Being in cross country and track at school helps with his training, but it doesn’t come anywhere to giving him the adrenaline rush he gets from skiing.
“Running is the best cross training for skiing there is,” he said. “The transition’s easy from running to cross country skiing.”
Schommer lifts weights, working on his core with other skiers in the weight room.
After he graduates, he wants to ski in college but is still undecided on where.
“One interest is UW-Green Bay, but I’m still keeping my options open,” he said. “But I definitely want to ski in college.”
That could take him far from here where there is more snow if the right opportunity came.
“The kid’s driven in the class-room, taking demanding classes,” Verboomen said. “I’m unbelievably proud of him because when we started this thing it was just an opportunity to get folks out skiing. Well, Paul not only took it out skiing, he took it a level way beyond we could have ever even thought of.”
Kaukauna Lighthouse team revisits climate for student achievement
Fresh goal focus, much better communication emerge as needs
By Jim Pinkham
For the Times-Villager
Deb Gurke tackled head on last week the frustration some Kaukauna educators felt last month about lackluster local responses to a survey of how well the school district is creating a climate where student achievement thrives.
Gurke, district consultant for the student-achievement focused Lighthouse Project, launched this week’s gathering of the district leadership team with a quote from management consultant, philanthropist, and professor Margaret Wheatley.
“Everything’s a failure in the middle,” Wheatley said. “It’s in those moments of darkness, when things are truly falling apart, that we can get together, think together, be together, and come up with solutions that will really work. … It’s not permanent failure. It’s just the learning curve that we’re experiencing.”
Gurke then touched briefly on a handout addressing types of change — observing that progress on complex challenges such as those the district now faces — are seldom immediately apparent.
“We won’t know exactly when we get there,” Gurke said. “We might not know until quite awhile after we get there.”
3 lingering questions analyzed
And with that bit of wisdom and emotional salve, a couple dozen board members, teachers, and administrators delved into the responses to three lingering questions from the survey:
• Describe how decisions are made in your school district.
• Discuss the role of leaders within the system.
• What are the improvement goals for this district?
About half the meeting was spent reviewing the hundreds of responses to these questions in small groups; the other half, debriefing with the entire assemblage.
The groups quickly realized responses to this round of questions were daunting, too — running the gamut from affirmation to condemnation to uncertainty.
Decision-making query highlights communication needs
One respondent to the first question, for instance, wrote:
“There does not appear to be a clear pattern for decision-making. I feel decisions are made in the following ways: They are made and communicated; input is requested but has no impact on the decision; more effort is being made to make collaborative decisions; decisions about rules are made, but enforcement and follow-through is lacking.”
At every table in the room, the need for better communication emerged from the analysis as a recurring theme.
Facilitating at her table, KHS social studies teacher Maggie Engman echoed back what she was hearing, “We have to tell them how decisions are made.”
“Right,” agreed school board member Jeff McCabe, “The communications regarding decisions and processes are inadequate. Moving forward, we have to review and retool our mission, vision, and guiding principles.”
Teachers need to ‘feel more invested’
At another table, Sarah Janssen, fifth grade teacher at the River View Intermediate School, said, “You have to explain why we are doing this — this is the plan; this is why we are doing the plan; this is how long it’s going to last.”
Janssen said information flow among her colleagues is often heavy, but not always clear or ideal. Key details can get buried amid mounds of e-mail, memos, and papers.
“Make them feel more invested,” she advised. “If you don’t tell them what your concerns are, how can they address them?”
Later, reporting out for her table on the decision-making question, Janssen elaborated further:
“People just want to be invested and engaged in what’s going on,” she said. “We need to be open and honest and transparent with people.”
That includes giving staff ample information — even if just periodic snippets — to grasp the process underlying decisions, rather than springing sudden announcements of change after all decisions have been made.
Board member Phil Kohne suggested short but frequent campus meetings, perhaps for 10 minutes every couple of weeks, “so we can be on the same page.”
Matrix might help explain actions
Randy Hughes, the special education director, said his table saw the gamut of responses, too, and the anger and distrust piercing some of them.
His table, as did several others, acknowledged that some decisions are, by their very nature, not collaborative and that different categories of decisions are made in different ways.
With that in mind, the Hughes table suggested developing a matrix that explains to staff how various types of decisions are made.
Also to improve collaboration, they advised encouraging their peers to join one of the many established committees that provide a vehicle to get involved — and to train staff in technological tools that could bolster input. Several of those on hand observed younger teachers are especially more apt to engage in this way than they are to carve out time for many meetings.
Leaders and roles lack clarity in district
The question about the role of leaders also captured a range of responses from admiration to disgust to ambiguity.
“The question seemed to be very vague in terms of how people were answering,” said Niki Herlache, a third grade teacher at Quinney Elementary. “We were not always sure if people were identifying what they wanted or what they saw.”
Among the responses reviewed at Mary Jo Kilgas’ table, several ideas emerged about who the leaders are — the superintendent, principals, or the entire staff.
“Considering everybody a leader — really, that is true,” Kilgas said. “We need to have everybody to have buy-in, everybody working together.”
“We saw more of a clear definition seems to be those that viewed leaders as the superintendent and principals,” said River View’s Stacy Knapp, reporting from another table.
But, she added, her group’s consensus, after weighing the responses, was that the district has not clearly defined who leaders are, what leadership is, and what it entails. Nor was the sentiment limited to staff and administration.
“We didn’t see them seeing the school board very often as leaders, either,” Knapp observed.
Goals question stirs desire to work harder
Responses to the goals question stirred not a little frustration among the district leadership team, which has been especially attuned to the goal-setting steps of the past two years.”
“Quite a few people didn’t know or were unaware of the goals,” Kilgas said, adding that this must change to be able to improve student achievement.
“Lack of mention of climate goals was something we felt was very significant,” said Kaukauna High Principal Mike Werbowsky.
“Too many people say they don’t know,” commented Herlache, smiling, but blunt. “How can you not know unless you’ve lived in a cave?”
But Gurke found the positive: “I think you celebrate that literacy came through loud and clear — and that did show through.”
Further, the prevailing sentiment of those present was to redouble efforts at both communicating the goals and pursuing them.
“We need to increase collaboration within the district,” Angel VerVoort said, calling for common literacy goals and common climate and culture goals, goals that would be consistent on every campus.
“We’ve been more accountable with the Lighthouse process for putting the goals at the fore and communicating them on out. … We should continue to share our goals and passion, focus on and review our goals.”
