Addendum to the Annual Meeting of the Town of Cary 2023

TOWN OF CARY5688 ACCOLA ROADPITTSVILLE, WI 54466Addendum to the Annual Meeting of the Town of Cary 2023The Town of Cary was met with a few unusual challenges this year. There have always been financial hurdles to address, but this year particularly the problems were due to increasing inflation and unexpected budget pay items.The town voted in favor of having the board appoint the clerk and treasurer. This was important because the board has seen other townships struggle with having no candidates for these positions. Once the ordinance was accepted the board considered the future possibilities of vacancies in these position by increasing the salaries. It was evident that in recent years these positions have required increased knowledge and training. The board felt the need to see that the town is run more efficient business wise to combine the duties of the clerk and treasurer in an effort to coordinate a team of accounting, bookkeeping, financial reports, and clerical work so that if one of those would go down with for instance a health issue the other two will be somewhat familiar with the other’s duties. These positions now require knowledge in QuickBooks and other computer related programs to be prepared for the monthly business-related duties. Much consideration was given to the increase in salary, and I think we kept in line with what other towns are paying for these positions. Another consideration was to have an enticement for possible future candidates for those positions if a person thought they had the skills and requirements to take on one of these positions for a part-time employment opportunity. Whether or not I am chairman of the town, I do not want to see our town in the terrible position of having to scramble for finding a qualified individual.That being said, we also increased the hourly wage of our road patrolman. He is not only great running the equipment, but also does maintenance that saves the town a great deal of money on repairs.The board ha spent a generous amount of time discussing and planning for the best possible use of the road budget. As you may know Cary has 33 miles of roads. With the exception of two asphalt roads the rest are gravel. There was much effort in making a future plan for the best road surfaces we can provide. Asphalt roads and the preparation for asphalt is very expensive. An idea was tossed around that if we could consider the farthest outlying low usage roads to put a hard surface on in an effort to save money by reducing the road grading, wear and tear on equipment, and labor hours in travel to these areas it might be a future savings. Asphalt was out of the question because of the high cost of material and labor. The board contacted the Wood County Highway Commission to inquire about the viability of laying down and maintaining a road covering that was a hard surface using “millings” which are ground up asphalt, then laid down and rolled, which creates a hard surface. This would also eliminate the use of dust control and constant grading. Three roads were considered. Johnson Lane, from Steffek to the North end, Dabrowski Lane County B to the West end and Cary Rock Drive County B to the East end. The result of that study was that to just do Johnson Lane the cost would be approximately $158,000.00. Millings are $19/ton and much of the cost was hauling it from the east end of the county. As of this time hard surface roads are tabled. One might ask, “What about a road grant?” In my study of the current grants available, Cary would have a difficult time meeting the grant requirements. Even if we did get an 80-20 grant, 20% of $160.000.00 is $32.000.00m which is half of our gravel budget for one year, in the effort to maintain 4 miles of gravel roads per year. TOWN OF CARY5688 ACCOLA ROADPITTSVILLE, WI 54466In talking with other towns about these same problems, with attempting to better our roads some towns have taken loans, increased taxes, and now have the start of hard surface roads, (double chip seal).There are all kinds of arguments whether to improve our road surfaces. One of course is that an asphalt road does not need constant maintenance. It can be plowed after a spring snow storm because if it were gravel, all the gravel ends up in the ditch. The plowed asphalt road melts fast and the school buses have easy and safe access to where they have to pick-up and drop-off school children.Sometimes the town surfaces the road with crushed or decomposed granite. This is a nice surface for a time. However, it disintegrates because there is a lot of clay in it. The clay dries out and blows away. A lot of the granite ends up in the ditch after snow plowing.The board has been advised to use more road base to resurface the gravel roads. In thinking about this situation in and near our township we have good road base material mines. For instance, the Milestone quarry of Bluff Road east of B was suggested.In an effort to reduce our truck hauling cost we can purchase more product from these local quarries. In Cary we have trucking and equipment businesses that would give the town a reduced hauling rate.The cost of material and transportation is increasing every year. Our town has little revenue sources. We have good road work equipment. The board thinks that maintain our roads with local road base material, and using the established town businesses for transportation would allow us to maintain more road miles. The board does not want to request permission to take out more loans. We are currently paying over $2,000.00 a month for our grader loan. This will be paid off in October of 2025.If anyone has any suggestions or input to add to this report, please contact the board with input.Thank you,Chairman Mark Gosh