Administrators Update: This past week, Alderperson Mixon and myself attended the Electric Utility introduction half-day seminar at WPPI. They covered many topics on how we get our power and future challenges we will be facing.
Budget season has officially begun. We have sent the YTD sheets to staff and they will fill return in July starting with CIP.
Hartford Housing Survey: The Housing survey that we put together and sent to local employers is now closed. You should have received our results from Julie on Thursday.
Pool Update: Due to some construction delays, we have decided to push off the ribbon cutting and grand opening until July 16 from 10 am – Noon. We hope you can all make this. However, the actual pool will be open as soon as we can for training and soft openings to make sure the facility and its staff are prepared to safely accommodate our patrons.
We may have the pool ready by July 2 but if there are any weather delays, it will push that date back. Formal invites for the ribbon cutting/grand opening will be going out in the next few weeks.
Airport Repairs Update: I wanted to give you a status update on the Hartford Municipal Airport project. The response to the Environmental Protection Agency’s comment letter was approved by the FAA (with some very minor changes), and that letter went out to the EPA on Thursday, June 2. I set a deadline of June 17 for the EPA to send any further questions/comments on the EA. Assuming that no response is received, we can start finalizing the environmental assessment that next week.
The next step in the environmental process will be for Mead & Hunt to draft the Finding of No Significant Impact statement (FONSI), and once completed, it would get routed to the FAA and DOT for signature. Once the BOA, the DOT, and the FAA sign the FONSI, the environmental document is considered complete.
It is our hope that we can wrap up the environmental assessment document later in June or very early July with the issuance of the FONSI. The land acquisition process and design efforts could then start in July. Again, this is assuming the EPA has no further comments or questions.
Regarding the runway rehabilitation for this year, Mike Gabor (our pavement expert) has executed a change order with Fahrner Asphalt Sealers for the flex patching and crack sealing of the runway pavement. As of right now, I have not heard an update on the schedule.
Thanks,
Matt Malicki, P.E. Wisconsin Bureau of Aeronautics
Electric Outing: An owl knocked out power in the Industrial Park for two hours last week.
Fire Dept Responses: The Fire Department responded to a garage fire on Arthur Rd. on Friday the 3. Later that same day, the department responded to a house fire on Cascade Circle. Our hazmat team joined the Washington County team to address the chemical spill at Gehl Foods in Germantown on Tuesday and our Fire Department assisted in the gas leak at the former Mole Hole building in downtown on Tuesday afternoon which resulted in much of the downtown businesses including City Hall to be evacuated.
Moody’s Rating Call keeps Hartford Consistent: The City just completed our Moody’s rating call for our 2016 bond issuant and our ratings remain the same at Aa2 for G.O. bonds and A2 for Utility revenue bonds. As this was our first bond rating call for Utility’s with Moody’s, we were happy that they kept our rating level at the similar level as S&P. However, by switching to Moody’s, we saved $5,000 annual fees. Overall, we are looking at getting a very favorable bond sale next week