The talks between the Town of Cottage Grove and the Village of Cottage Grove have been continually advancing (as has the cost to the taxpayers of the Village of Cottage Grove). I wrote about it here . Since that time, the merger study committee has brought in some people from Verona, (who tried and failed at a merger) to tell us “what went wrong and why it failed”.
The Cottage Grove Joint Merger Study Committee heard another perspective on consolidation at their Monday, August 22, meeting.
Verona Town Chair David Combs presented his thoughts on what went wrong and what he would do differently after a proposed merger between the town and city of Verona failed at referendum.
Combs stressed the hard work required to complete a merger between two municipalities.
“I worked my tail off,” he said. “If you aren’t committed to this to start out with, it is brutal. You have to be committed to have it go forward.”
The merger committee previously heard from city of Verona attorney Richard Nordeng.
Like Nordeng, Combs said the merger failed primarily because the town of Verona felt the tax rate of a consolidated community was unacceptable
So now we have a “merger committee” that was originally supposed to study if this was a good idea or not, but has turned into a committee spending thousands of (Village Taxpayer)dollars to figure out the best way for us pass the merger. It also appears that they are working for the best way to have relief for the taxpayers of the Town of Cottage Grove. Our Village tax dollars are being spent fairly heavily to figure out the best way to keep the towns tax dollars down and push through a merger.
Personally, I have not made up my mind if I will support a merger or not yet. However, no one has made a case(in my mind) as to why we would merge. Now that the “merger committee” has shown to be pushing the merger through, I would like to see someone come and speak who opposed the Verona merger and give us their information why and if Verona has survived after the merger failed.
If anyone would like to let it be known why they opposed the Verona merger and how things have shaken out since (either on record or anonymously) please email me here.
Also much more on the merger, and the different meetings , right here.
