Lake district: Shumaker keeps seat; $322,000 operating budget approved

By Kim McDarison

Electors of the Rock-Koshkonong Lake District (RKLD) approved a $322,000 operating budget for the 2021-2022 fiscal year and elected incumbent commissioner Mike Shumaker to another term Saturday during the district’s annual meeting. 

The meeting, held at Race Track Park, Edgerton, was attended by just over 100 people. 

The full meeting included several components, among them a budget hearing, at which time electors learned from RKLD commissioner and treasurer Mark Meyer about how the budget was calculated; an election to fill one open seat held by Shumaker who ran unopposed, and the annual meeting, at which time several members of the electorate came forward to speak, with some voicing approval of and others in opposition to leaving monies in the budget earmarked for a potential boat landing project. The budget ultimately was approved as it was initially proposed, with monies remaining available should a boat landing project come before the board. 

After the annual meeting, a regular board meeting was held, at which time the newly elected board installed officers. 

Budget hearing

Calculated at $322,000, Meyer said during the budget hearing, the RKLD operating budget proposed for 2021-2022 offered the same total as last year, but, he said, within line items, some changes were proposed. 

Meyer said his objectives as treasurer are to create “a clean operating budget, project tracking, and audit resolution.” 

In keeping with those objectives, Meyer said, commissioner expenses have gone down 90% annually, and the district’s legal expenses have decreased by at least 90% from previous years, and quarterly RKLD board meetings, which were held in the past, have been replaced with monthly meetings. 

This year, the district has increased its insurance expenditure, gaining $1 million in real property insurance at a cost of $1,225 per year.  

Further, he said, accounting costs decreased by $700 because a representative from an auditing firm was not required to attend the annual meeting. Instead, Meyer said, a transactional audit was performed (on Aug. 25), by a five-member committee whose members included representatives from several of the district’s taxing authorities, along with Meyer and RKLD Chairman Alan Sweeney. 

Expenses associated with buoys had gone up “considerably,” Meyer said, attributing a large portion of the increases to a buoy and light project undertaken this year at a railroad bridge spanning the Rock River. 

He described all other operating costs as “constant.” 

Turning to budget calculations, Meyer explained that prior to the 2020-2021 fiscal year, the budget was derived using an average number of 4,000 parcels within the district that were subject to a “special fee.” Last year, the district approved using a tax levy structure, disposing of the special fee. The levy structure, Meyer said, uses a number more representative of the actual number of parcels within the district, which, he noted, was between 4,400 and 4,500. Using the special fee structure, he said, not all the monies collected by the district were allocated as part of the operating budget because dollars were received from the 400 or 500 parcels that were not used as part of the calculation. When using the average of 4,000 parcels to calculate the budget, he continued, an amount representing approximately 10% of the full attainable budget was not allocated within the budget approved annually. Using the new taxing system, all of the monies collected would be allocated as part of the fiscal budget, he added.  

Meyer said that while his calculation would produce an average mill rate of .00049, or $49 per $100,000 of assessed property value, the amount owed by individual tax payers would not represent the average calculation. Tax bill rates would be adjusted to represent equalized value, a rate used by the state to disperse more fairly the full taxable amount levied by the lake district against each property within the district. Equalized value takes into consideration the different tax rates collected by each of the municipalities included within the district. The rate then apportions the amount owned by each property owner as a percentage against the mill rate they, as a property owner within their municipality, pay. 

Meyer said the district spans five municipalities (including the towns of Fulton, Milton, Koshkonong, Sumner and Albion) within three counties (Jefferson, Rock and Dane). (The RKLD board includes appointed representation from the town of Fulton and Rock County, which are the two taxing jurisdictions with the most property owners included within the lake district.) 

Looking at the district’s lake management plans and segregated funds, Meyer said the Indianford Dam Fund, which currently holds $711,542, will be drawn down to $11,542 after it is used to fund the district’s water control project, which includes new gates and renovations to the dam. To fund the full dam project, Meyer said, RKLD will be receiving a grant facilitated through the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (DNR) of $400,000 and will take out a loan which will be paid back at a rate of $30,000 over the next 10 years. 

He also recognized a donation made by the Lake Koshkonong Wetland Association of $2,500 to help offset the costs of a new cleaning boom included as part of the water control project. 

Meyer said the district holds $107,232 within its Lake Fund, with $100,000 of those dollars allocated to “boat landing projects.” Monies were approved for the allocation during last year’s annual meeting, he said. 

Also included as a line item within the general fund/operating budget is $23,950, earmarked for “landings, new initiatives, buoys.” 

As part of the district’s money management plans, Meyer said, internal borrowing from segregated funds “has stopped. Interest spending has stopped and remains with the fund.” 

Additionally, he said, “audit resolution will ensure direct access to the district’s financials annually.”

Annual meeting

Chairman’s report

Sweeney opened the annual meeting with his report, a portion of which focused on updating the electorate about the Indianford Dam water control project. 

He said updates would continue through the district’s website. 

“The 2020 approved water control project is now under contract with an effective date of August 24, 2021,” Sweeney said, noting that the district has selected De Pere-based  IEI General Contractors, Inc., to undertake the project. After a bidding process which completed earlier in August, the company brought the low bid, coming in at just under $1.9 million, which, Sweeney noted, is under the projected cost of the project of $2.25 million. 

In a separate interview, Sweeney told Fort Atkinson Online that other bidders for the project included Manitowoc-based Michael’s Construction, coming in at $2.06 million; Janesville-based JP Cullen, who bid just over $2.4 million, and Black River Falls-based Lunda Construction, with a bid of nearly $2.3 million.  

Within his report, Sweeney said the DNR has given its approval to the project’s design and is finalizing the $400,000 grant award for the lake district pending proof of contract insurance and bonding review. 

Trash racks on the dam’s powerhouse, which were previously included as part of the project, Sweeney said, “have been a money drain and maintenance nightmare for over a century.” 

He cited a “non-toxic relationship” with the state’s DNR as producing a benefit to the district, in the form of gaining DNR approval to eliminate trash racks and instead install a cleaning boom system, which, he noted, will use some of the components of a nonfunctioning boom already present at the site. 

He noted contributions from the district’s dam operator, whom, he said, has “worked diligently to keep water levels at the maximum of the operating order, expediting the recovery time for the wetlands’ recovery per the 2019 (DNR) order.” 

RKLD has requested of the DNR that a wetlands study, started in 2019, which has since been delayed due to high water above the operating order for an extended period of time, undergo completion, Sweeney said. The Lake Koshkonong Wetland Association has also requested completion of the study, he added. 

Said Sweeney: “The Indianford water control project will increase the discharge capacity by 49%. That increase, along with basic operating protocol, will facilitate the discussion of a different water level order, with an increase for the recreation seasons on Lake Koshkonong and water levels in non-recreation seasons for habitat maintenance and wetland recovery.” 

2020-2021 transactional audit report

RKLD Board of Supervisors Commissioner Susan Shearer read to electors the district’s transactional audit report as approved by the district’s audit committee, which met on Aug. 25. 

In attendance at the Fulton Town Hall and forming the RKLD Audit Committee, she said, were officials representing the towns of Milton, Fulton, Albion, Sumner and Koshkonong. Also in attendance from RKLD were Meyer and Sweeney. 

The committee reviewed bank records and invoices as provided by Meyer from between January and December of 2020. 

According to minutes from the meeting as submitted by RKLD elector Justin Shultz, the committee found the records to be “clear and satisfactory.” 

During the committee meeting, Meyer was noted as saying that new policies implemented by RKLD would require that every expense come before the RKLD board for approval on a monthly basis, which, he said, would make expenses easier to track by both board members and constituents. All new expenses, and not just those over $2,500 as was past practice, would require board approval. Further, Meyer said, RKLD was maintaining physical copies of invoices for record-keeping purposes, which, the minutes reported, “was not done in the past.” 

Responding to questions posed by the audit committee, the minutes state, Meyer said the resolution to form the committee was passed “as a measure of transparency.” 

The resolution gives each chairman of the five towns in the district the power to appoint a member to the district’s audit committee and the ability to review the district’s financial documents. 

The report further described how district revenues are received, with Meyer noting that the district collects revenues from the five towns and the three counties —Jefferson, Rock and Dane — that have property owners within the district. Revenues are deposited in “lump sums,” although, Meyer said, the district sometimes receives revenues at unspecified times because not all property taxes are paid on time. 

The district receives its tax apportion after the taxing jurisdiction receives payment from RKLD property owners within those jurisdictions. 

Approval of the budget

While the operating budget was approved by electors as submitted by the RKLD board, several electors came to the microphone with concerns, most of which revolved around monies earmarked for a boat launch project. 

The discussion yielded several motions, all of which did not pass. 

Elector Mike Gransey asked RKLD board members to explain the project for which use of the $23,950, under the line item of “landings, new initiatives, buoys” was being proposed. 

Meyer said there was not a specific project. 

“So we are putting 8% of our revenue budget toward something we don’t have a plan for?” Gransey asked. “As a taxpayer, I would like to see a plan,” he said. 

Meyer described the money as “a vehicle to get to a project.” 

Gransey asked for clarification about the money earmarked for the water control project.

Meyer said that $1.5 million was what the electors approved last year as an amount that the district could borrow. The full project, which was projected to cost $2.25 million, would be funding in several parts, including a borrowing, $700,000 from the district’s Dam Fund and a grant of $400,000. 

Gransey also wondered: Of the additional 10% developed in the operating budget when using the 4,500 parcel count as opposed to 4,000, would taxpayers see a corresponding reduction in the next fiscal budget? 

Meyer said the district would levy taxes against all of the district’s taxable property, which he estimated at $660 million. Those dollars would then be collected to form the district’s operating budget. 

Gransey made a motion to remove the line item of $23,950 earmarked for projects from the 2021-2022 operating budget. 

Pointing to a line item in the budget from 2021 of $27,000, labeled “Landings, new initiatives, buoys,” another constituent, Bill Boyd, comparing the number to the $23,950 proposed in the 2022 budget, asked if the 2022 number was earmarked specifically for boat landings. 

Meyer responded by saying, “yes.” He called the money “project starter funds,” noting that any project the district might explore would come with some exploration costs. The money allowed the district to make those explorations. 

Meyer noted that last year at the annual meeting, constituents were interested in exploring a new boat landing, which, he said, became known as the Bingham Road project. 

“The project went flat,” Meyer said, adding that some new initiatives were under discussion to continue with boat landing improvements. 

Said Gransey: “I don’t believe we should be in the business of developing or maintaining landings.” He also said he thought the board needed a more detailed understanding of the project.  

Speaking in opposition of the motion made by Gransey, constituent Jerry Cox said he was in favor of keeping the $23,950 in the budget as earmarked so that the board had flexibility to address unforeseen needs. 

A constituent said he trusted the board to make decisions, adding: “The reason we’re here to vote for you people is to watch out over our interests. With that money, you guys have the flexibility.” 

Another elector, George Wellenkotter, also spoke in opposition to the motion, saying: “leave the money alone.”

Electors were asked to show their support for the motion by holding up pink cards. The motion failed by a large margin. 

In a second motion, Gransey asked for the removal of $100,000 earmarked for boat launch projects, with those monies residing in the Lake Restoration Fund. The motion stipulated that those monies be used instead to offset the cost of the dam water control project. 

The motion included moving revenues from the Lake Restoration Fund and placing them into the Indianford Dam Fund. 

RKLD Commissioner Bill Burlingame noted that while the district currently did not have a boat landing project under consideration to present, he and other board members were in the discussion stages with potential partners such as county and municipal officials, to locate existing boat launches on the lake that might benefit from improvements, such as improved piers and parking. 

The motion to move monies from the Lake Restoration Fund to the Dam Fund failed by a vote of 52-20. 

Cox made a motion to take $12,000 of the $23,950 earmarked for boat launches and donate it to the owners of two public boat launches for the express purpose of extending piers at those locations. 

That motion also failed by a vote of 42-21. 

Election 

Shumaker, who was elected to the board in 2018, retained his seat and will begin serving a second term. 

Of the 103 ballots issued to electors Saturday, Sweeney said during the meeting, 90 were returned and marked in favor of Shumaker. Ballots with write-in candidates were not received. 

Monthly board meeting, officers selected 

Following the annual meeting, RKLD board members held a brief monthly meeting at which time officers were installed by members of the board. They are as follows: treasure, Meyer; secretary, Shearer, and chairman, Sweeney. 

A recap of the Indianford Dam water control project and steps taken toward the Bingham Road boat launch project is here: https://fortatkinsononline.com/rock-koshkonong-lake-district-annual-meeting-set-shumaker-to-run-for-reelection/. 

The RKLD website is here: https://rkld.org.