By Kim McDarison
Plans concerning a 75-acre, city-owned parcel of vacant land along Banker Road are moving forward according to Fort Atkinson City Manager Rebecca Houseman LeMire.
As part of the city manager’s report, presented during the Fort Atkinson City Council meeting, held Tuesday, March 16, LeMire said she and members of city staff had been “working diligently pursuing the Banker Road properties.”
“We have met with actually a couple developers about the property and we also met with Vandewalle and Associates and they are looking into a request for a proposal for a master plan for the area,” LeMire said.
“We also met with the school district, the school board finance committee, last week, relating to a potential easement on the … high school property to get utilities to the Banker Road parcels that the city owns.
“And, we’ve been working with others on possibilities to increase, amend our tax increment district in that area to pursue development options, and then we also just today met with Michael Marr relating to the possibility of adding sustainable elements to that development,” LeMire said.
Marr is a Fort Atkinson resident with a background working in the fields of energy supply, utilization and efficiency, according to his online LinkedIn resume. He has retired from the field.
Additionally, LeMire said, she and City Engineer Andy Selle recently met with the Town of Koshkonong Board of Supervisors Chairman Bill Burlingame and the town clerk, “relating to an intergovernmental agreement, relating to our Banker Road parcels as well as the overall boundary agreement. We’ve seen a lot of progress … it was a very positive, productive meeting.”
The intergovernmental agreement is currently being drafted by City Attorney David Westrick, LeMire noted.
An intergovernmental agreement is any agreement that involves or is made between two or more governments to cooperate in a specific way. Most are made to upgrade services, consolidate resources or save money through economies of scale, an online definition of intergovernmental agreement states.
The city-owned, 75-acre parcel for which plans are being made is located within the Town of Koshkonong and east of the Fort Atkinson High School at the corner of Banker and Hoard roads.
The city purchased the land in 2019 for $750,000. Included within that number, then-City Manager Matt Trebatoski wrote in a memo to council, was $50,000 earmarked for “subdivision plans,” and the city would need to pay an additional $65,000 “to receive the 85-90 percent completed plans.” Additionally, Trebatoski wrote, there would likely be some other costs associated with the annexation, taxes, a certified survey map and final engineering plans.
The land comprising the 75-acre parcel was purchased by the city as three vacant lots.
In December of 2019, the city approved a resolution authorizing a borrowing of $950,000 from PremierBank to finance the project which is today referred to as “Banker Road.” The loan is for a 10-year period and comes with an interest rate of 2.358%.
Utility easement approved by school board March 18
During its monthly meeting held Thursday, March 18, the School District of Fort Atkinson Board of Education approved a resolution granting the creation of a utility easement for use by the City of Fort Atkinson Public Wastewater, Water and Stormwater utilities.
According to district documents, the 70-foot wide easement will begin on Campus Drive, extending north by approximately 1,320 feet, onto school district property along the east side of the high school complex, and will be used by the city to bring utilities to the 75-acre parcel.
Some history
In August of 2019, the Fort Atkinson City Council approved the purchase of 75 acres of land east of the high school. At the time, then-City Manager Matt Trebatoski wrote in a memo to council that the owner of the land “has been planning to annex the land into the city and develop it into a residential subdivision.”
That owner later expressed an interest in selling the land to the city would the city have interest, Trebatoski wrote.
After meeting in closed session, the city determined that acquiring the land was in the city’s best interest and noted its use for “current and future residential growth.”
“The land is immediately adjacent to the city and is designated as a Planned Neighborhood on the Future Land Use map of the Comprehensive Plan,” Trebatoski stated.
At the time, Trebatoski reported, a multifamily housing study conducted by Baker-Tilly showed vacancy rates in the city were as low as 0 to 0.5%, and there was a demand for an additional 200 housing units.
In addition, he wrote, the assessment identified the location of the Banker Road property, on the city’s northwest side, as an “ideal spot for housing due to its proximity to the high school, MATC, a grocery store, convenience store, healthcare, restaurants, and other service-oriented businesses,”
Trebatoski further cited a study produced by the Fiscal and Economic Research Center (FERC), a research branch housed at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater, which indicated a need for new single-family residential lots over a 5-10 year period in order to keep up with demand and population projections.
“The city was actually in the process of planning for additional multifamily housing on the former Kmart site and had developed some concept plans that were well-received by the public, however that unfortunately fell through with U-Haul purchasing the site, compelling the city to look elsewhere for opportunities for residential growth,” Trebatoski wrote.
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