WAUPUN — The City of Waupun voted to purchase several properties for long term development goals at the Common Council meeting May 13, 2025.
These properties included a garage behind the 300 E Main St block, the empty land on Libby St and Watertown St, and several lots in the Town of Chester.
Mayor Rohn Bishop wrote about these purchases in his Mayor’s Column last week.
The property in downtown Waupun located at 18A N Madison St is in the back alleyway behind The Clothing Pallet. The City Council passed a purchase agreement for the property from JC Improvements LLC for the amount of $67,500. The purchase was made utilizing TID 3 funds.
18A N Madison is a small white block garage that was previously used as Towne Woodworking. In their downtown development plans, the City noted that the building blocks parking and traffic flow in that alley. Once the purchase is complete, the City will tear down the garage and add more parking.
The purchase was passed with no further discussion.
The other three properties are owned by Phoenix Industrial Investors, who purchased the Silgan plant after it closed several years ago.
The Libby St lot across from the former Silgan facility was part of the larger Silgan Parcel 292-1315-0544-004, but will be separated for the purchase. It is currently farmland but the City plans to develop it for new housing in the near future.
The other two lots are long and narrow strips of land near Highway 151. Parcel 010-1315-0433-003 is located at the end of Shaler Drive near the Mayfair Apartments, and stretches from Highway 151 to Watertown St. Parcel 010-1315-0911-00 is to the east of Highway 151, and stretches until County Road I.
Purchasing the first lot is necessary for the City for their plans to connect Shaler Dr from Main St near the new Kwik Trip to Hwy 26 by the Truck Stop, and the length may be used for new roads for housing development in the Mayfair Apartment area.
City Administrator Kathy Schlieve noted that the funds to purchase these properties were coming from funds previously held in reserve for the new Community Center project, which were no longer needed since fundraising was successful and the project stayed under budget.
The purchase for all three lots was made for the amount of $325,000 from Pheonix Industrial Investors.
The City Council covered a number of other items at the meeting.
A motion to purchase generator equipment for the new Waupun Community Center to be used as backup generators for a city command center should power be lost throughout the city. The Council voted to purchase a Generac Mobile diesel generator from Wolter Inc. for $44,025.
A bid was accepted for the replacement of ventilation equipment at Waupun Ice Arena by Bassett Mechanical for $158,050.
The Council discussed a proposed Professional Service Agreement with Cottingham & Butler to Complete a “Salary Market Update” study.
A similar study was done in 2019, with this study building a new dataset to measure changes over the last several years. Alderman Matoushek asked if there was any way for the City to do it without a consultant, but Schlieve said that there’s a lot more work that goes into it that without a consultant would be difficult. Alderman Meilke asked about the timeline for results, Schlieve said fall of this year.
Schlieve recommended to do the study now, after holding off previously. Mayor asked how much more it would cost the city to operate if Act 10 was overturned. Schlieve said she had no idea, but that the city “could not afford for that to happen.” Kaczmarski asked if the Act 10 changes will be resolved by the time the City does this, but Schlieve said she did not think so.
The motion was passed unanimously after some input from the Department heads on how the study may improve or protect current staffing conditions.
The City Council discussed and denied a lawsuit against the City for an individual who fell on the stairs at a hockey game at Waupun Ice Arena, causing injury to her face and teeth. The City’s insurance company recommended to deny the claim based on a lack of “known danger” by the City. Passed unan.
Passed a motion for the proposed locations for the 2025 Waupun Sculpture Tour and financially support a new permanent sculpture proposed by Create Waupun.
Ordinance to amend Ch.6.05(3) (e) entitled Traffic Code-No Parking on Industrial Drive and S. Watertown Street. This was previously discussed at the Department of Public Works meeting of the same night. The proposed ordinance changes primarily relate to the addition of permanent “no parking” zones to some streets in the industrial park. Some businesses notified the City that cars parked near driveways have made it difficult for trucks to safely come and go. This prompted the City to issue temporary no parking signs, which have reduced the issue for a few months. Public Works Director Jeff Daane noted that it worked well so far and that he thinks it’s good to move forward for a permanent addition.
The Council passed the proposed ordinance changes with no further discussion.
The DPW also discussed studies done on all intersections in the City. Finance Director Casey Langenfeld did a study on which intersections in Waupun are controlled vs uncontrolled, while the Police Department did a study on crash history throughout the City.
Mayor Bishop noted that he thinks that the Police Department and insurance companies would probably prefer we didn’t have any uncontrolled intersections. He said it would be better to budget for fixing the uncontrolled intersections and be proactive compared to fixing them as they come in.
Waupun has a lot of yield signs, and people don’t take them as seriously as stop signs. For the city, the cost of a yield sign and a stop sign are the same so it doesn’t make sense to install yield signs. Stop signs are about $90 each.
The DPW also passed a new Stop Sign Policy to recommend to the City Council. Alderman Siebers requested the policy be changed from “stop sign policy” to just “sign policy” as to include yield signs, which Mayor Bishop also added to include speed limit signs. This will likely be brought at next month’s meeting.
