2026 Town of Mercer Annual Meeting

Town of Mercer Reorganizational and Annual Meeting Tuesday April 21, 2026 at 6pm Mercer Community Center Reorganizational Meeting 1. Call the meeting to order: Mike called the meeting to order at 6pm 2. Pledge of allegiance 3. Roll call: Present were Supervisors Lundquist, Towne, Lutgen and Boes, Chairman Lambert, Road Foreman Saarnio, Clerk Hohner and 32 electors. Absent was Attorney Schellgell and Treasurer Bettin. 4. Acknowledge that the meeting was properly posted: The clerk acknowledged that it was properly posted 5. Swearing in of Supervisor’s: Supervisor Towne had previously been sworn in, Supervisor Lutgen was sworn in 6. Reorganization of the Board: Mike read aloud the new liaisons (attached in meeting packet) 7. Adjournment: The meeting adjourned at 6:04 Annual Meeting 1. Call the meeting to order: Mike called the meeting to order at 6:04pm. Chairman Lambert apologized to Tim Lutgen for not appointing him onto the Park Board, as he hadn’t realized that Tim was previously on the Board. 2. Roll call: Present were Supervisors Lundquist, Towne, Lutgen and Boes, Chairman Lambert, Road Foreman Saarnio, Clerk Hohner and 34 electors. Absent was Attorney Schellgell and Treasurer Bettin. 3. Acknowledge that the meeting was properly posted: The Clerk acknowledged that it was properly posted. 4. Read and consider minutes from the previous Annual Town Meeting held on April 14th, 2025: Pam Davies made a motion to approve the minutes with addition of last name and typos fixed, seconded by Dave McNutt. Carried 5. 2025 financial report: Mike read the financial report (attached in meeting packet) After reading the report questions were: Did the town cut funding to the library, Senior Center and the Depot. The library fund’s were held stable, cut the Senior Center and does not provide funds to the Depot. Question about the legal fees: questioned if the fees were for the Wake Boat Ordinance. Larger fees were for the Wake Board Ordinance but also for the EMS service. Questions were about what is happening with the legal proceedings with the previous ambulance service. Information was shared with the Sheriff’s Dept, after a period of time charges were filed but the judge dismissed the action with leave to re-file. The town has been in contact with Deputy Randall and the Sheriff. After Iron County asked for additional information, at this point it seems as though Iron County Sheriff is not proceeding and Deputy Randall does not call Supervisor Boes back. There was a question as to whether the electors would like the town to proceed with charges with the State of Wisconsin. Julia Pusatari made a motion to accept the report as read, seconded by Dave McNutt. Carried 6. Chairman’s report: The year started with putting together a new ambulance service. He thanked Rick Leisecki, Jim Bianga and Debbie Hohner and especially Eric Snow for all their work getting it going. Thanked the FD for getting the boys trained. Acknowledged the road crew for all their long hours with the trees and snow with the Thanksgiving storm. Thanked Jerry and Sharon for their work for the town and the recycling guys. Appreciated the past Board and is looking forward to working with the new one. Stated that Deb is the backbone of the town and Becky has her numbers going. Mike spoke about how things are running well in all the departments and believes that they should be left alone to do their job. 7. Department head’s reports Rick Leisecki- Service Director Mercer EMS: On January 1, 2025 took over the ambulance service when MAAR terminated its contract. When he and Chairman Snow went into the EMS hall on January 1st the building was completely empty except for two ambulances which had no equipment in them. To date none of the items have been returned to the Town of Mercer. The sheriff’s department filed charges, but the judge dismissed the action with leave to re-file. Prior to March 3rd, when the EMS license was approved, Oneida County EMS and Beacon Ambulance Service along with Mercer Fire covered EMS Calls. On March 11th, the service had it’s first call, with a total of 157 documented calls in 2025. With budgeted town funds, donations from local EMS departments and grant funds Mercer EMS is fully up and running. In the Spring/Summer the town sponsored EMR/EMT classes. Currently there are roughly 15 responders of different levels but are always open to others to join and or gain training. Late December Mercer EMS was approved for Flex Paramedic service. Todd Engler-Assistant Chief Mercer Fire: Mercer Fire has a roster of 22 active members, 8 of which are dual certified in Fire and EMS (1 paramedic, 1EMT and 6 EMR’s) and three members joined the department in 2025. Total continuing education and training hours for the department was 1.147 hours. There were a total of 41 calls that Mercer FD responded to including: 11- Snowmobile accidents 9- Motor vehicle accidents 3- False alarm/crash detection and tree on power line 2- Vehicle and wetland fire 1-Search and rescue call, hazmat call, chimney fire, structure fire, equipment fire and mutual aid fire. The Annual Steak Feed returned in 2025 with the combined efforts of Mercer FD and EMS and held their most successful gun raffle. These fundraising monies were used to lessen the taxpayer burden. The Board approved a fire truck purchase in the amount of $610,000, which build out time is three years. It will replace a fire truck that will be 25 years old. Jerry Huffmaster- Director of Building Maintenance and Recycle: Updated to LED lighting in the FD and EMS halls, switched from Republic to WM for solid waste removal, set up 2 free electronic recycling pickups and had tire recycling. Jake Saarnio- Road Foreman: Spring 2025 prepped portions of West Fisher and Beaver Lodge circle prior to a deadline, which reduced the price of paving. Worked on gravel roads, garage maintenance and assisted the park, sanitary and library with their projects. Received a record snowfall and trees down over Thanksgiving weekend. Was the hardest hit area in the state, which opened us up to $27,000 in state reimbursement. Gave a big shout out to the guys for working so many hours and being away from their families over the holiday. Has been under $246,645 in his budget since 2024. There were questions related to how much it costs to grade roads- grader is $172/hr plus wage and the gravel itself. Question was asked how does Jake come up with the 5-year road plan- Jake looks at the lowest number on WISLR then looks at how many people drive the road to evaluate placement. Question about the tube on Fisher Lake- engineer gave it 10 years until needs replacement. Question about how many miles or roads we have: 160 miles total with 90 miles being paved. Tanner Hiller- President Mercer Park Board: replaced benches with dedicated benches at not cost to the town. In the process of fundraising for updated playground equipment- so far $20,000 has been raised. Successfully had three “music in the park” activities. Replaced and upgraded all the bike trail signage and co-hosted “Bike Day” activity with ICORE. Added a commercial grade refrigerator and freezers in the pavilion. Goals for 2026 include: dog park completion (no cost to the town), hosting 4th of July activities at the park, new furnishings for the pavilion and a new Tiki bar. Additional music in the park, new activities and new swim area markings. Brenda Nelson stated that they completed a Bike Trail Feasibility study and submitted a DOT grant for Phase 1. 80% of the funds for phase 1 would come from the DOT and 20% from donated funds from ICORE. The first BikeFest held had 300 riders and ICORE has raised $50,000. Julia Pusateri- Mercer Public Library: Had 10,300 visitors, borrowed 6,251 books and 6,557 ebook/audio book downloads, 8088 hours of computer use, and 1,681 people attend their adult and children’s programming. The library works with other organizations within the community and has organizations that use the facilities for meetings. Eighty-four people helped pack and unpack the library for improvements made for the grant. 84 people put in 750 of volunteer hours within two weeks’ time. The final renovation should be completed at the end of June 2026. Roxanne Lutgen- President Mercer Planning Commission: Was a big transition of members of the commission with over 60 plus years of service stepping down. The 20 Year Comprehensive Plan 2025- 2045 was completed and approved in April 2025. Ordinance development included: Dwelling Ordinance, Municipal Wellhead Protection Overlay District, Sign/Billboard Ordinance, Business Park Polices and Covenants and TRH Ordinance and procedures. The commission reviewed: 17 TRH permits, 8 CU permits, 7 sign/billboard permits, 4 business park sales and one condominium conversion, rezone request, temporary occupancy permit. There was discussion about TRH and how to limit them in the town- increasing fees for permits etc. Reassessment of properties that become a TRH is an option for the town- the attorney is working on that. There also was question about all the fiber optic material just south of town on Highway 51. 8. Any town business the electors chose to discuss over which the town has statutory authority Tom Hanrahan made a motion, seconded by Dave McNutt, to say that the electors support the EMS service and thank the members for their service. Carried Scot Lundquist made a motion, seconded by Tyler Bianga, to have the clerk and treasurer appointed positions. Carried Debbie Hohner made a motion to sell business park lot 4 to Premier Docks, lot 9 to Tim Tyler lot 10 to Restored Electric and lease lot 11 to the Mercer Dusty Loons, seconded by Julia Pusatari. Carried There was much discussion about options for how to pay for upcoming major purchases and paving of roads. Discussion included raising of levy and discussion about the PRAT tax that was approved by the electors a few years ago. Julia Pusatari made a motion, seconded by Dave McNutt to table this for two months, giving the Department heads 30 days to come up with a list for future capital needs. Carried 9. Set date and time for 2027 Annual Town Meeting: Tyler Bianga made a motion, seconded by Dave McNutt, to set the next meeting on April 20th 2027 at 6pm at the Mercer Community Center. 10. The meeting adjourned at 8:19. Respectfully submitted, Debbie Hohner, Clerk Town of Mercer Unapproved