It’s supposed to be a short meeting, but it’s still 2 hours and 15 minutes. The main event is Judge Doyle Square, with little else on the agenda.
GETTING STARTED
Bidar and Hall not present.
They suspend the rules – to take things out of order and introduce items not on the agenda.
HONORING RESOLUTIONS
They honor Margaret (aka Peg or Peggy) Stonestreet for 3 decades of service to the city, most recently as an admin assistant in the Community Development Division.
They have a moment of silence for Hank Lufler, a former alder, who passed away.
They honor Christine Beatty for her retirement as the Senior Center Director.
This all took about 35 minutes and was really sweet, if you want to take a look.
CONSENT AGENDA
It was as I reported yesterday. There were no additions to that at the meeting.
The Mayor and Samba explain that all items pass with with recommendations as noted in the agenda or the information in yesterday’s post. So now they move on to items 3 – 11 public hearings, and item 12 (E. Johnson St. reconstruction by First St.) and 68 (Judge Doyle Square).
PUBLIC HEARING
#3 – 222 N Charter St. – There is one registration in opposition to the zoning, supporting the Plan Commission rejection of the project. .
#4 Public Hearing on liquor license at DBs Service (902 Atlas Ave).
#5 Public Hearing on liquor license at Mr. Kimchi Korean Restaurant (225 King St.) One registration in support.
#6 Public Hearing on liquor license at Deja Brew (4915 Commerical Ave) One registration in support.
They pass all these items without discussion. 3 is placed on file (rejected), the other three are in support as recommended at ALRC.
#7 Plans and Specs for Haywood Drive
#8 Plans and Specs for Koster St and North Rusk Ave
#9 Ordinance considering the impact of terrace trees when there is a demolition or removal of a building
#10 1954 E Washington Ave rezoning – this is being re-referred and the public hearing is kept open.
#11. 2202 Tennyson Lane/3804 Packers Ave rezoning. One registrant in support.
They pass items 7, 8, 9 and 11. 10 is referred. No discussion.
BUDGET AMENDMENT FOR E JOHNSON ST. CONSTRUCTION
Alder Mike Verveer asks for the Engineering staff to explain why this is being adopted under suspension of the rules without going to Board of Estimates or Finance Committee. This won’t go to any committees and Verveer would like it explained, but the bids all came in over budget. Some other projects might be delayed to fund this project. Verveer wants to know if any projects might be delayed as a result of this coming in over estimate.
Rob Phillips, City Engineer explains the project is from Baldwin St. to First St. and includes a little bit of reconstruction at First St. at Johnson St. It’s a reconstruction project that includes a (cycle track?) adjacent to Tenny Park and they are going to raise up Johnson St. a little bit because it was closed this summer due to the flooding. The project needs $9,208,000 to proceed, the budget amendment is $1,630,000 GO Borrowing and $380,000 in Sewer Utility Bonds, the Sewer Utility has those funds. The project was designed by a consultant through a contract, it was bid by the Department of Transportation, there is some federal funds which is why they bid the project on our behalf. He says its hard to know what the bidders are thinking when they bid the project, but projects that are difficult or have additional risk, usually due to traffic or underground utility work – they are less desirable and they are seeing dramatically higher prices on the projects in this “prosperous” climate for building projects. The contractors tend to put their time into less risky projects because they have plenty of work and we see higher prices and projects that are more risky are more difficult. The projects that will not proceed because they are moving existing funds are Oak St. in district 6 which was delayed to work more with the neighbors. And Gregory St. – they were asked to delay that because they did Monroe St. last year and they had enough over there and they were happy to delay.
JUDGE DOYLE SQUARE
Reconsideration and Explanation of Process
The mayor asks Mike Verveer to make the motion to reconsider and then the Mayor will explain where they are “pursuant to the City Attorney” on this item.
Verveer moves reconsideration of the substitute resolution. Professor Paul explains that they are reconsidering the last action of the council. If the motion fails, then they do nothing and go home. If it passes there will be a 2nd substitute they will consider and if that carries, they will need to vote on the main motion.
There is one member of the public there to speak, John Jacobs. The mayor asks him if he wants to speak on reconsideration or the main motion. He says he’ll wait.
There is no discussion on reconsideration, and it passes on a voice vote seemingly unanimously.
The Mayor asks again if John Jacobs would like to speak or wait for the staff presentation, he says he’d like to wait.
Staff Presentation
The mayor asks Natalie Erdman, the Director of Planning, Community and Economic Developent says that the construction of the underground parking and podium are moving forward, they passed a resolution for that back in May for the design. They are proceeding on time and on budget and will be done in September with occupancy in October and they will have 700 parking spaces in the publicly owned garage. The motion that failed here was giving Beitler $600,000 to give up his right to the podium but he maintained his rights to develop above the podium, the hotel and apartments on block 105. It shortened his timeline to take up the next portion of the development from 24 months to 18 months and the next development to 30 months. They heard direction that there was an interest in him dramatically reducing the time to build on the podium. Hearing that direction the mayor went back to him and negotiated this second agreement. The new deal increases from $600,000 to $700,000 and he not only give up the rights to the podium, but also the air rights above the podium so he no longer has rights on block 88. It continues with the shorter time frame to start the hotel within 18 months of finishing the parking, the city does not have to demolish Government East until they get a building permit for block 105. In return for giving up block 88 rights, they are giving a land restriction to prohibit building a hotel on block 88 – he asked for that in perpetuity, but they are doing 20 years like they did for Monona Terrace.
The Mayor asks if George Austin has anything to add – and his highly paid response was (I’ve lost track, but we’ve paid him a a lot of money!) – that was complete.
The mayor says he asked Natalie to research obtaining a “flag” (what brand name will it have?) for the hotel. He says one of the criticisms was that at this point there was not a flag. What is the outcome of the work you did.
Erdman says she spoke directly with the representative for Hilton that manages franchise development in the midwest and he said that Beitler was in discussion for an Embassy Suites flag, but they have not talked with them for some time but they are still interested in that site. He said that until a developer has a signed commitment for purchase of sale or an executed ground lease, they wouldn’t accept and application for a flag so at this time there is no way to do the application.
There are a bunch of alders with questions, but the mayor asks again if John Jacobs would like to speak now and he says yes.
Public testimony on 2nd Substitute
John Jacobs says the podium was approved in May, you broke the development agreement and here we are. He says at first the idea of removing Beitler from block 88 is intriguing. But he does not think this is cost free because we will save $700,000 on not demolishing the garage until Beitler is ready. He says whether is it Beitler or another developer, it saves them money because they would not have to dig out the fill that we put in there. Another benefit of the deal is supposedly a reduced timeline to do the hotel, but will Beitler actually do it? He asked about a subsidy yesterday at the Finance Committee. He’s not aware of any project with underground parking that hasn’t needed a subsidy, how is it reasonable to think that this project won’t need a subsidy too? The mayor’s response was that Beitler didn’t ask for a subsidy, but so what, he didn’t ask for it here either, until we were backed into a corner and now we are paying $11M for a podium. I also asked about if the developer building on the podium will need a subsidy, what other developer will be able to build this, what will it take to remobilize the project, where will the cranes go, how much subsidy will be needed. I didn’t get an answer, maybe you guys can? Marsha Rummel asked about the restrictive covenants for the hotel, it prevented a hotel on block 88 since the Monona Terrace opened. I heard Ms. Erdman say that is a problem. Block 88 is the closest place to the Monona Terrace. Marsha also pointed out that the Monona Terrace also said that they wanted 400 rooms and Beitler will only do 250, what about the other rooms they need. The covenant was a mistake 20 years ago and it is now. The new deal costs $700,000 but it does little to increase the mess and the ever increasing costs of Judge Doyle Square. Regaining rights to Block 88 won’t mean much if Beitlers rights expire in a few years anyways. It’s likely a subsidy will be needed for block 88 in any case. A subsidy will also likely be needed for block 105 as well. He has a suggestion but his last statement is don’t give Beitler a gift of $700,000 unless we get something real from them.
Questions of staff
Marsha Rummel asks who negotiated the deal, or did staff participate. The mayor says that the direct communication was only him, but he took the discussions back to staff and they discussed it among the team.
Rummel says that he wanted the covenant in perpetuity, why did you decide on 20 years. Mayor Paul Soglin says that it is standard in the industry and Beitler when he retains block 88 has the protection since he owns and controls it, when he gave up block 88 he thought it was reasonable to provide that agreement.
Rummel asks if Monona Terrace will have the room blocks they need. The mayor says that in terms of increment from only having the Hilton and now getting the new hotel – the difference of a third hotel within walking distance is not as significant because it doesn’t incrementally bring in the larger conventions that require more rooms.
Allen Arntsen how do they enforce the block 88 agreement, what needs to happen to give up the rights to block 88. Natalie says that they need to produce the hotel and start within 18 months, have a closing on the financing, if that doesn’t happen, he loses the agreement to not put a hotel on the site in the next 20 years.
David Ahrens says this was the first time he had heard about the timeline of the podium project. Is it correct that it starts in October of this year and completed in 2020? Natalie says that the below grade parking will be open by August and the above grade should be ready for occupancy in October of this year, there will be a certificate of occupancy.
David says that this is when the clock starts ticking for the 18 months, when there is a certificate of occupancy and then Beitler has to file an application. Erdman says he has 18 months to close on financing and start construction.
Ahrens asks about between August of this year and March or April of 2021, then Government East would still be up? He asks if this would be detrimental to the parking at the underground parking while Government East. Erdman says they have not yet decided what they are doing. The mayor chimes in that one possibility is that they will close the ramp. Ahrens says it will be closed. The mayor says “it might be”. Ahrens says that if he had a choice of parking at Government East instead of 6 floors below ground, he says that seems to be detrimental to the new parking. The mayor says that the Parking Utility never anticipated revenue from both ramps. Ahrens says if Government East is open, his understanding is that it would be a revenue generator and we would get that money back. Erdman says the numbers they have given the council were only from the new structure, they did not anticipate revenues from the old structure.
Larry Palm asks if an apartment building is built on block 88 and we classify AirBnB as hotels, how does that impact the rights of people in that apartment if they are renting out their apartment as a hotel. City Attorney Michael May says that there are two possibilities, one is that they wouldn’t allow it, the other is that they would determine that a few AirBnBs does not constitute a hotel. He hadn’t thought of that until Larry just asked it. He hasn’t spent a lot of time figuring out their response but those are the two that come to mind.
Palm also asks about the potential expansion of Monona Terrace? Is that true? Gregg McManners, Monona Terrace Direct, says that there is discussion of expansion of the Monona Terrace in conjunction with Nolan waterfront project. Palm asks where that goes, physically where is the expansion. McManners says to the East towards Machinery Row.
Barbara McKinney asks about his answer at the finance committee about the need for additional hotel rooms in response to Marsha Rummel’s question. McManners says that it is not uncommon to ask for non-competition from properties around businesses. He worked in shopping centers for 20 years and it was a common clause that once you invest in the property you don’t want the competition to be around you. They have been working on the right that Monona Terrace has to build on block 88. If we were not building there they would have that right until the TID closes in another 4 years. It is expected that they would ask for a noncompete clause during absorption. It’s not optimal, but he thinks there are plenty of cites in the downtown area that they expect to build hotels in the next 5 years. There’s 870 on the books right now if you include Drury, JDS and the hotel on State St. and the one on E. Washington. The market it ripe, it remains ripe as other markets mature. It’s reasonable to expect it. Is it optimum in 20 years, not really, but it hasn’t impacted them in the 20 years they have been in business. They don’t expect this to be a major hurdle.
Rebecca Kemble asks about the requirement of 18 months to build the hotel and 30 months to build whatever they build on block 105. If they don’t start construction on the hotel in 18 months does that void the ability to build on block 105, does it void the entire agreement. Michael May says “I believe it does, I don’t have the agreement in front of me” (sigh . . . ) “The intention was that they had to do the 18 months one and if they didn’t do that, they would lose their rights.” Kemble says “all right”, May says “yup”. May says we want the hotel more than everything else. Kemble clarifies again, that they lose all rights if they don’t do the hotel, May says yes. Kemble asks how they can have rights on block 88 that we are voiding with this covenant. May says its a right of first refusal, they could step in.
Sheri Carter asks how the payout goes from $600,000 to $700,000. The mayor says it was because they were giving up the right to develop on block 88. He says that is what a significant amount of alders wanted.
Rummel asks if they have the development agreement now. May says its drafted, but they were waiting for the council to vote. Rummel asks if that will come back. May says that this authorizes them to make those changes in conformity with the resolution before them. This would be an amendment to the development agreement. Rummel asks if the agreement is boiler plate? May says it is 3 or 4 pages to make these changes.
Mo Cheeks asks May if this might open up more possibilities for ligation. May says it greatly reduces the chances because block 88 is where they have had all the disputes. He wants to build the hotel and that is more straightforward because the ownership is more clear. He can’t guarantee there will be no litigation, but this reduces the chances.
Discussion
Verveer . . . bump . . . bum . . .bum . . .thanks . . . 🙂 his colleagues for the referral of this reconsideration. He says that when they argued for referral it was for three reasons and the mayor and the staff team have been able to answer our questions from last November. He wanted referral to resolve the impasse, get more information from Beitler regarding the hotel flag and research concerns about Beitler’s ability to perform (are the overly litigious). He says that much information has been shared by the media and at the meeting yesterday, he encourages them to continue asking questions. This has been a long time coming, it wouldn’t be the Judge Doyle Square project if there weren’t bumps in the road. There have been lots of changes over the years with several mayors, it started as an Amtrak Station with a Public Market and here we are today. But throughout that whole time, what has remained the same is the need to replace the 1950s era parking structure and secure additional hotel rooms with more beds for Monona Terrace to ensure the long term success of Monona Terrace to reach its potential. We have done that. People keep asking why the construction cranes are moving if the project is stalled. Verveer says that the public portion of the project is still on time, that is why you see the cranes and traffic issues. He says the proposal will help us build a hotel as quickly as possible. They unanimously approved the room block agreement on the consent agenda in December. You heard answers about the research on “the flag” and we have assurances that the Embassy Suites flag will be pursued when there is an agreement. They have a hotel operator secured and the council approved the operator last year – we are on the way to reaching a hotel and he is asking for their support tonight for the long term support of Monona Terrace and so Beitler can focus on completing the hotel as soon as possible. Rejection of the proposal tonight will lead to further ligation if we don’t support this tonight. He is urging them to move forward. You have heard we are on track to complete the podium. The way to ensure that we get the parking open for occupancy by Halloween and avoid delay is to avoid a court injunction while things are settled. The bids are out and will be received and soon the council will be asked to award the bid. It’s important to keep this on schedule to get the parking garage done on schedule. The main part of the podium isn’t the two floors of parking, but its the transfer slab, so any future development won’t create a loss of parking during future construction. He says the downtown businesses were very concerned about the loss of parking during the Exact Sciences project, he doesn’t want that to happen again. He says this is a way to solve legal disputes. He says construction costs – labor and materials – are rising and he doesn’t want the parking utility to have to look at the future costs when they are trending in the wrong direction – he says that is their fiduciary responsibility. He says that there is much that is attractive about this. He he hears them say that it will cost millions to get them out of our lives but it is so much neater and cleaner to not have the uncertainty about who has the right to build on that podium, to not have the ground lease negotiations hold up the garage being open and the hotel rooms being built. The hotel construction could begin as soon next year. He knows it is not as much as people hoped for to not have Beitler involved, but we should let them build the hotel as soon as possible. He thinks this is the wise course and he urges them to support it, he knows it is not everything they want, he doesn’t think that a hotel built behind the Municipal Building is the best use, having the podium and subterranean garage open by Halloween would be a great thing and building the hotel next year would be a great thing. Lets move forward after all these years.
David Ahrens says that this is picking at a scab at this point, but he thinks its important to review the bidding, what we gave and what we receive. $11M for the podium, half million for development fees, half a project that they won’t develop but won’t be returned, $700,000 payment for use of a building they effective surrendered a year ago, $100,000s of dollars more in legal and consulting fees. And given the speed with which they have been wrong by 1/3, we should expect that the city will receive a request for a TIF grant to build hundreds of below ground parking spaces at a phenomenal rate. On the upside, hopefully we recover the costs of the podium with a new developer, a big upside is that we are not entangled with Beitler on the development on block 88, and at least for now we won’t be sued. It speaks volumes about the nature and quality of the relationship with this partner and it speaks volumes that at this point we are giving him money so we don’t get sued in the future. He says this is a much improved proposal and he would credit the members of the council for that improvement. If clear majorities did not vote against past proposals and we didn’t succumb to statements that nothing could be done to improve the proposal, or the threats of law suits, this wouldn’t have happened – we waited a few months and we have a far better proposal and that a credit to the council. He can’t vote for it because of the millions spent with nothing to show for it and because this is just a downpayment for what is to come. But he would like to vote for it because it takes Beitler out of the proposal. So he is very conflicted on this measure, he decided for the first time since he’s been on the council, he is going to abstain.
Allen Arntsen asks about block 105, if he builds the hotel but doesn’t build 105, what happens. May says he would still have the ground lease, but he would lose the right to build. He can’t remember how the ground lease works, he hasn’t looked at the terms of the ground lease and isn’t sure what would happen. Arntsen asks if he builds the hotel and doesn’t build the other part, he can still prevent building a hotel. He says that this sounds like trouble. May says that is something they would have to cover in the ground lease, they will start immediately if this is approved. If he fails to do the 30 month timeline, we may recapture the air rights. Mayor asks George Austin to answer. Austin reads from the 2017 agreement . . . eventually he says that each element has its own ground lease. Arntsen, says right now this is an unresolved part of the deal? May says it has not been a topic of discussion in resolving block 88. Arntsen says that they have been so difficult to deal with and this makes him uncomfortable. He can see the merits of some of the agreement, but it seems we are buying ourselves more trouble. Mayor says that from his discussions they intend to develop the back half of the block. Arntsen says that is not comforting. May says that was not discussed, they didn’t discuss 105 except changing the timeline. That will have to be dealt with in the ground lease about what happens if he doesn’t build.
Palm says there is not clear plan that delivers us redemption and fulfills all our promises. He thinks that the back half of MMB should be city use. He thinks that city services should be kept in these blocks. He thinks there should be civic purposes. He has been generally unsupportive of these deals, and he always felt there is more to be accomplished in the negotiations. He says that they are at the end of the negotiations and all we can offer them is money and we only have so much money and so, this is as much as we can give, given the savings on the podium. He has a tendency to support this, he doesn’t think it is perfect, but the number one thing he does is it provides certainty on what we will do next, we will secure the parking for residents, business and people in the area, and we continue to be at the table with someone we don’t dance well with. This should be a warning to new members of the council and mayoral candidates to be more careful with this deals. When they come forward they paint a rosy picture, but some choices made by both parties have made this a challenging situation. If they can’t make a project go on block 88, who else can? It’s probably good to get out of the deal with them and gives us back control, but he is concerned about the future of the block and he thinks there should be a city, public, civic use of the site.
Steve King says that Verveer started out by clearing listing out goals and one is the hotel and he’s on the Monona Terrace Booking committee and one of the things they talk about is the conventions that want to come to Madison. She has a friend that is a professional event planner. If you don’t have the capacity to host those bigger events, you’re not on their radar, we need to be back on the radar. He agrees there has been a lot of ill will, but we need a hotel near Monona Terrace as quickly as we can do that, to bring money into the city. In case you haven’t noticed, all the places you eat downtown are more expensive. He doesn’t want more city service downtown. He wants to drop off his leaves and get a building permit in the same spot and he shouldn’t have to drive downtown, he wants to park on a flat parking lot. He wants to decentralize and build something really fun on the back half of that block.
Michael May follows up and says it calls for three separate ground leases in the agreement and those leases will define the terms of default. It’s not otherwise in the development agreement. Arntsen asks if the sound lease comes back, May says yes but doesn’t seem real certain.
Rummel says that the turning part for her was when Beitler decided they couldn’t do block 105, I think we made a big mistake, we moved forward on the podium and you could argue that maybe we had legal standing if they defaulted, and we didn’t do that. She doesn’t think she knew that they had development rights that they were abridging, she thought they defaulted, we tried to fix it and then we got sued. When we did what they said they sued us. When we saw the earlier substitute where we paid them $700,000 she got offended and stuck on that and maybe she should let that go, but we are paying them for for development rights that they abrogated or the cost of development that they are responsible for in the agreement. They are solely responsible for those costs, so I don’t feel any obligation to pay them $700,000 and I understand some of you want to get rid of them. The good things are moving forward on the hotel but not as optimal as we would like, but it is something. We wanted 400 rooms and we have 252 rooms. She’s been thinking about Monona Terrace for a long time, the room thing was important to earlier councils to grow capacity – they are trying to be self sufficient and we need to take care of our assets. That is the sticky think for her. We passed the deal with Marcus which was really a bad deal and it seems really dumb to do it again by saying we lived with it for 20 years. She would have been more comfortable with 5 years. The parking ramp will be completed and we have to protect the parking utility, we took their money to pay for this and the last thing that came up tonight is that block 88 is so complicated. What will happen to that, how do we figure out the next step, is it another Rip, do we just build affordable housing, she likes that idea? She sees the mayor putting his hand on his forehead so she knows she is doing really well, but really this is the best deal we will come up with but we need to make sure we are doing our due diligence. We need to talk about what block 88 looks like, what if Beitler only builds half or builds another hotel. She is struggling, voting against is just throwing rocks in the air that will come down on her head.
Keith Furman asks about Beitler coming back for more money. What are their opportunities to do that and hold us hostage. Is that the ground lease. May says they can always ask, but that’s up to you. If they miss either deadline to build the existing agreement says they can terminate, “I just found this out”. The mayor says that maybe he wasn’t paying attention, but the first time he hear anything about Beitler asking for TIF was raised by Mr. Jacobs yesterday and today him and Alder Ahrens, its just pulled out of the air, its fiction, its possible he may ask us to provide him with a Tesla rocket back to Chicago. Furman says that the point is clear, but there is not opportunity for them to hold us hostage for money in the future, they have to fulfill their obligation regardless.
Kemble says that as this has gone on, it has become so important to protect the parking utility. If they don’t get the new parking they would have to put more money into the old parking garage. She doesn’t want to be in an abusive relationship with a developer in a jointly owned piece of property. In November she said if they gave up their development rights I would be in, the mayor got that deal. Should Government East still be available for use. This is the one garage we don’t offer monthly parking passes, maybe we do that with it. Staff says the demand is high and the fees are higher, Kemble says that they might be able to temporarily utilize the space, staff say they could explore that. Kemble says that they will have more parking and we can explore our options. That is actually a good problem to have. She says that McManners says the 400 rooms number was set 10 years ago and there are more hotels downtown and there are other places people can go with the new hotels. We need to move ahead in a straight forward manner on block 88. We will be in a stronger position moving forward for negotiation and that is why she’s supporting this.
Cheeks says that years ago we discussed that Judge Doyle Square was going to be a series of decisions, and hopefully we are at the end, and its unsatisfying to have this partner and we are saying at least we probably won’t get screwed. This is better than we had, but its not the inspirational project we once hoped for. He wishes they could have a true collaboration but this seems like a path to cut the level of exposure we found ourselves in.
Matt Phair says that he thinks this is the best of a series of bad options. He doesn’t think we should have been negotiating this on the council floor and they should work through the executive branch but its hard never seen or talked to Beitler to make decisions. There is a feeling of being in the dark and that wasn’t a great process for us. He’s not blaming anyone, but for future councils, leadership and mayors, there needs to be a way for the council to have more of a role without over stepping. We would feel more informed and we can hold our partners more accountable in the public. That is thoughts for future projects with private partners.
Carter says its been a long and weary road. She’s shocked they are not in some kind of ward at the hospital with padded walls. She wants to thank the colleagues that pushed us to get to this agreement, this is a good agreement and the light at the end of the tunnel. The parking is the priority and she is going to support this, but she would like to see future agreements not become so complicated and not so weary.
Mayor asks to speak from the chair. He says that it was difficult to communicate with the council because of the open meetings laws. He discussed with Baldeh and Carter and certain stages other members of the council but always trying not to create a negative quorum in Finance or the Council. This latest proposal was not discussed with him and Verveer. A lot has been said about the relationship with Beitler, when they spoke last week he did offer to come up here today, the mayor recommended they don’t do that until there was resolution on this matter. He says that goes to when and how we got into this predicament. There were certain things that happened that we failed to anticipate what would happen if we didn’t go ahead with the podium on block 88. They didn’t tell us to fix it, we went ahead with our solution, we could have negotiated more at that point but we saw only one reasonable solution. If we just put a cap on it, we would then be in a difficult discussion and we would have had to close down the ramp during future development. Yes, Beitler will save costs, but we shouldn’t resent that. The project is within budget, in describing what we got for our money, their organization put in a lot of time in effort on the parking ramp and that contributed to the execellent bids we got at this time. He says parking ramp and hotel were our objectives and we may still get more. He can only say that Monona Terrace has been mentioned many times – this was a cake walk – Monona Terrace took 60 years, so we have a big window in front of us to finish this project.
(omfg . . . my brain hurts)
Roll Call
To make it the main motion:
16 ayes
Abstain: Ahrens, Skidmore
Absent: Bidar, Hall
Final vote:
15 ayes
Abstain: Ahrens, Skidmore, Rummel
Absent: Bidar, Hall
HANK LUFLER
The mayor says they stared the meeting with a moment of silence, but Hank Lufler raised the standards for the city council and did so much for the city and played a critical role as a co-chair of the committee that led to the construction of the Monona Terrace. He list others who played a role.
Alder King moves adjournment.
