Council debates resignation notice policy, event fees Hodag Park parking project approved

The Rhinelander Common Council’s July 27 meeting featured a spirited debate, but no action, on whether to formalize a policy on how the city notifies council members of high-level employee resignations. The panel also approved a $56,193.85 contract to add parking near Hodag Park.
Council discusses, but does not adopt, employee resignation notification policy
Alderman Steven Jopek asked that the council discuss possible changes to how the city notifies council members when a high-ranking city employee resigns, an issue prompted by criticism over how council members learned of City Administrator Patrick Reagan’s resignation. (Reagan has accepted a city manager position in St. Sault Marie, Mich.)
Jopek said he wanted to open the discussion even though he does not believe anything improper occurred.
“I don’t believe anything nefarious happened, and that’s not why I’m proposing this,” Jopek said. “I’m not opening the door to speculation about something bad happening. However, it is something that we could institute a little change that can fix it and plug the hole.”

Alderman Tom Barnett argued the full council — not just the council president — should be notified when someone in a position the council itself hires, such as the city administrator, resigns. Barnett noted that in the case of Reagan’s resignation, the resignation letter went to the council president and mayor.
“I think that there should be a proper protocol of someone in this high of a position to notify all of council,” Barnett said.
Mayor Kris Hanus said he did not call a special meeting to announce the resignation because Reagan told him there was no way to retain him, and Hanus said he did not believe the cost of a special meeting was justified solely to relay notice of a resignation that involved no immediate council action. Hanus noted the last of the interim/search proposals in the council’s packet had arrived by the prior Friday, meaning earlier notice would not have changed the council’s timeline.
City attorney Steve Sorenson told the council that Wisconsin’s open meetings law limits how city officials can communicate with the full council outside of a public meeting, which complicates any effort to notify all alderpersons simultaneously without triggering a “walking quorum” violation. He said the more workable solution, used by other municipalities, is for the mayor or council president to call a special meeting as soon as a high-level resignation is known, rather than creating a written notification policy.
“You live in Rhinelander, Wisconsin. It is really hard to keep anything quiet for two weeks,” Sorenson told the council, adding that he would recommend the council rely on special meetings rather than trying to draft a policy for direct notification.
Jopek said he learned during the process that he had been told not to forward a resignation-related email to the full council because doing so could constitute a walking quorum violation.
Not all aldermen agreed a policy change was necessary. Council president Carrie Mikalauski said she did not forward information she had received about the resignation because she was wary of being part of a potential walking quorum, and said she considers the council’s authority to exist only when aldermen are meeting formally. Alderman Gerald Anderson said he did not see a problem with the notice reaching all council members at the same time through official channels.
“I feel it’s a non-issue, and we should move on,” Mikalauski said.
No motion was made on the resignation notification issue, and the council took no formal action.
Council advances new special event fee policy
In other business, the council also reviewed a new policy governing fees and waivers for special events held on city property. The proposed policy is the product of a subcommittee made up of Alderman Tom Barnett and Alderman Steven Jopek, who worked with city department heads to draft the proposal.
Jopek said the policy grew out of recurring disputes over which organizations — particularly nonprofits — should have city fees waived for events, and how much city staff time and overtime those events require regardless of whether fees are charged. He said the subcommittee researched how the Wausau area handles similar fees before drafting a scaled-back version suited to Rhinelander’s size.
The new policy would create two tiers: Class One events, defined as drawing 500 or more people, which must be submitted for approval further in advance so department heads can plan adequately; and Class Two events, for gatherings under 500 people, with more streamlined pricing. Jopek said the policy also raises the $25 special event application fee, arguing the current fee does not come close to covering the staff time needed to review an event plan across the city’s roughly six department heads.
“What I want to be explicitly clear about is that these events are important, and I value them incredibly,” Jopek told the council. He said the goal was to find a middle ground that recoups some, but not all, of the city’s costs for hosting events, without discouraging community events from continuing.
Barnett said the subcommittee worked to balance supporting community events against the costs the city absorbs to host them. “I think we came up with a really good deal that everybody kind of makes out with,” he said.
Alderman Bob Lueder questioned whether the policy was intended to replace the city’s existing special event ordinance, noting the document did not address a question raised roughly eight months ago about the process being inconsistent for nonprofit fee waivers. He also asked whether nonprofit organizations would still be able to obtain temporary “picnic” liquor licenses to sell beer and wine at events, since the draft policy’s language did not explicitly mention nonprofits in that section.
City Clerk Austyn Zarda said the eligibility requirements for those licenses — limited to churches, foundations or bona fide clubs that have existed for at least six months — are drawn directly from state statute governing temporary Class B licenses, so any group currently eligible, including the Rhinelander Freemasons and similar organizations, would remain eligible regardless of the new policy.
Jopek said the new class system is meant to remove the case-by-case, for-profit-versus-nonprofit debate that previously determined which fees were waived, applying the same tiered structure to all event organizers based on event size.
Hanus noted the policy would not apply to existing lease agreements or memorandums of understanding the city has with groups such as the county fair, Lights of the Northwoods, Little League or the farmers market. Sorenson clarified that the vote approves a policy statement only; city staff must still draft and the council must still approve formal ordinance language before it takes legal effect, and existing multi-year contracts would be grandfathered in until renewal.
Hodag Park parking expansion Approved
The council also voted to approve Resolution 2026-72, awarding a $56,193.85 contract to Musson Brothers Inc. for asphalt paving to add parking near Hodag Park. Tom Roeser of the city’s Department of Public Works said the additional parking — roughly 400 feet of new spaces along the road near the park’s splash pad — is intended to accommodate growing crowds at the park, including for concerts and hot-weather days when visitors have been parking on the grass.
Roeser said the new parking will be added along the first road inside the park, across from a new bathroom facility under construction, with spaces on both sides of the road. He said additional handicap-accessible parking will be added closer to the new bathroom on the opposite side of the street so visitors using those spaces do not need to cross the road.