WAUPUN — Mayor Rohn Bishop announced Thursday afternoon that he vetoed the City Council regarding the approval of a $15,000 study that would create a strategy for new housing development in Waupun.
The City Council unanimously approved the Madison-based consultancy Vandewalle to develop an Affordable Housing Strategy for the City of Waupun, at the Committee of the Whole meeting held Tuesday, March 25, 2025.
At the meeting, City Administrator Kathy Schlieve introduced the topic by saying the City was trying to find ways to meet the increasing demand for housing in the United States, especially with the rising cost of quality housing nationwide.
“We need to make sure we have solutions,” Schlieve said. “Sections of the state are being very smart and thoughtful about this issue and coming up with very creative programs. There are things we can do as a community and we need to start to take action. It also will help us to qualify for new funding sources that are open out there for Wisconsin housing, and we need to help our developers qualify for those too as they are very low interest loans that are in most cases much better than what bank loans would be.”
The agenda item included a chart with the median house prices for the last few years, with the median price from 2024-2025 being over $240,400. The chart also outlined the average wages for many critical local jobs, including teachers, technicians, healthcare workers, law enforcement, and other communtiy services. These salaries alone can’t be used to purchase a house in the current market.
However, the framing of the study around “affordable housing” made some readers nervous, with some residents bringing concerns that this may be used to develop Section 8 housing—a type of federally subsidized housing program that provides vouchers for low income individuals and families to move out of impoverished neighborhoods—which Schlieve said this plan was absolutely not for.
Schlieve explained that the plan is to update the zoning and subdivision codes to allow for the development of new market rate housing on “smaller” lot sizes. The development priorities of the last several years favored the construction of duplexes and “McMansions” built on lots several times larger than the historical lot sizes in Waupun, both of which do not adequately solve the housing shortage at the current rate of construction.
Schlieve also said the state legislature is looking to pass programs which may improve housing developments.
According to Schlieve, Waupun has only about five houses on the market at any given time not under contract, which is not healthy for the housing market. A year and a half ago, Jodi Mallas from My Property Shoppe presented to the City Council some troubling figures in the community regarding houses for sale—a falling number of listed houses, and those that do get listed often sell for cash within the week sight-unseen.
Schlieve also said that rent is up significantly for multi-family housing for similar reasons.
Vandewalle asked for $15,000 to do the study and develop a strategy for Waupun.
The Council unanimously approved the study without further discussion. Alderwoman Kambria Ledesma made the motion, with Alderman Pete Kaczmarski seconding.
However, on Thursday Mayor of Waupun Rohn Bishop announced that he would veto the item, citing the lack of need for a new study. According to the Mayor, they already knew the City needed more housing and already developed plans to increase the housing supply, and did not need a consultant to tell the City what they already knew for $15,000.
“I’m sick of spending money on consultants,” Mayor Bishop said in a statement to WPN. “On top of that, this consultant fee, for this one study, is more than the mayor gets paid in an entire calendar year! For one study! And, this was passed by the Council with no discussion, on the same night that aldermen lectured me that the public needs more time to digest spending plans.”
Later in the meeting, the Council discussed the Mayor’s proposal to increase the elected officials salaries, particularly the mayoral salary from $12,000 to $18,000. One of the primary points of contention during that discussion was a perceived lack of time for the Council and members of the public to consider the proposal before it would be approved.
Editor’s note: this will be covered in a future article.
“This housing study landed on my desk on Friday afternoon, which gave city residents less than four days to look at it,” he said. “Also, Jason Whitford posted on social media about it being Section 8 subsidized housing—which it’s not—but when you’ve only got four days to clarify, it’s not enough time. All this veto does is give the community an extra two weeks to learn what’s really in the study. What’s the rush to approve it?”
Mayor Bishop sent a copy of the veto to WPN, which included his reasoning for putting a hold on the item.
“I am a strong supporter of new housing opportunities due to housing shortages and lack of affordability, however, I believe this decision needs community review and input,” Mayor Bishop wrote in the veto document signed Thurday. “I believe this timeframe does not allow ample time for community review and this meeting did not allow community involvement. There have been comments and concerns on social media which has caused confusion with our residents. I believe, before taxpayer dollars are spent on another study, we need to do our due diligence and be assured all constituents understand the purpose and reasoning behind this expenditure.”
This is the first mayoral veto used in at least thirty years.
The item will be brought back for further discussion at the next Council meeting on April 8, where residents can provide public input or ask questions for clarification.
Also passed at the Council meeting Tuesday night was a waiver of Restrictive Covenants for the Heritage Ridge subdivision related to the Carver Flats Development Agreement.
According to the agenda packet item, the Heritage Ridge Restrictive Covenants were drafted in 2017 for orderly development in the area according to the City’s plans. However, with the new zoning changes to allow for multi-family housing, the covenants would need to be waived for the development to allow the construction to begin, as some of the original covenants contradict the developers agreement for Carver Flats.
City Attorney Vande Zande noted that when they signed the contract with Carver Flats they added a contingency to waive the restrictive covenants in the Heritage Ridge subdivision. He went on to say that the waiver of restrictive covenants only apply explicitly to the items that are in conflict with the developers agreement.
The site plan for the lot was passed at the Plan Commission meeting on January 15, 2025.
Carver Flats is set to begin construction by this summer, and could see the first available apartments in Spring 2026. A total of 56 apartments are planned across four buildings, all of which must be completed by December 2026.
The waiver was passed unanimously by the Council with no further discussion.
