Lennox council moves forward on noise rules, tree rebates

The Lennox City Council met Tuesday, May 27 at Lennox City Hall. With all members present, the council heard agenda items including noise ordinances, habitat conservation and a last minute addition of a pay application for the bandstand.

Ordinance 658 was first discussed at the April 28 meeting and since that time has been amended as discussions have taken place between the impacted parties. With no changes since the first reading on May 12, a motion to approve the second reading was requested. Police Chief, Will Ericksen, was present for any additional questions. 

Mayor Danny Fergen asked if the department has heard any feedback on the proposed ordinance. 

“At this point we’re just waiting for everything to go into effect and kind of see how it’s going to run down. We’re going to handle this like any other change that we make in the town. Education’s got to be our primary goal. Once education has been done then we will have more enforcement rules at that point,” Ericksen said. Motion to approve the second reading by Bill Daugherty, seconded by Billy Welch, motion carried.

A long-vacant property at 509 S. Poplar has been acquired by sale from Lincoln County under a new owner and the owner is requesting a waiver of all past-due taxes and fees. 

“The property was vacant for a long time with unpaid taxes. Lincoln County acquired it as a result of those unpaid taxes, then sold the property at auction. In doing so, they agreed to waive all past due taxes. We were asked about that at the time and didn’t object. Unfortunately, the special assessments were not included in that tax forgiveness. Because they’re assessments, the county can’t forgive them is basically the argument we’re getting,” City Administrator, Nate Vander Plaats said. 

Motion to approve the waiver of past-due taxes by Lauren Van Ariel, seconded by Rob Peterson, motion carried. 

The Council was asked to consider Ordinance 659 – Habitat Conservation, which gives the City of Lennox an opportunity to engage in positive practices benefiting the community. 

“This ordinance is the result of two discussions ongoing over the past several years. The first is some of the challenges with removing mature trees along the Central Basin 4 project, Boynton Avenue project, and others before that. Removing those trees definitely has an impact on the character of those neighborhoods and has an impact on energy uses for those properties.” Vander Plaats said. 

Ordinance 659 would require the city to develop a rebate that is available to each property owner to replace any removed trees. The Ordinance also covers Petal Pals Park where pollinator plots have already been established to help with the preservation of monarch butterflies. 

“This section of the ordinance would require any drainage or open areas that are otherwise undesignated for recreational use to be planted in a native mix and maintained as such. We won’t be mowing them frequently, only every five or six years probably. It would require some reseeding of some areas, and future costs once seeded are estimated at about $14,000,” Vander Plaats said. 

Alderman Laura Thiesse asked if the trees being removed also included ones that needed to be removed for safety as well or if the ordinance needed to be clarified more on specific tree removal language. Vander Plaats agreed the language should include a dead or diseased tree, or an ash tree. Motion by Welch to approve the first reading, seconded by Van Driel, motion carried.

The City of Lennox is spending significant funds on pursuing legal action in code enforcement cases. Vander Plaats introduced Ordinance 661 would permit the City of Lennox to request the court order for the property owner to reimburse the City for any legal fees incurred in each case. 

“As you probably see in the monthly finance report, we’re spending significant funds on legal action and code enforcement cases. I don’t want to go too deep into that process, but it’s not uncommon for our case to make it to court. We’ve had two court hearings in the past month, and these tend to rack up significant legal bills and without this ordinance we really don’t have a case to request it,” Vander Plaats said. Motion by Daugherty, seconded by Welch to approve the first reading of Ordinance 661, motion carried.

Council members Thiesse and Van Driel requested a discussion item be added regarding the prison project reset. 

“Mayor Fergen received the letter in your packet from the Lieutenant Governor’s office. The letter notifies community leaders of the potential locations of the new men’s prison based on the RFI responses received prior to the last meeting. Potential sites are discussed by the task force at their June 3 and July 8 meeting and ask that local governments provide any comments prior to May 30. I’ve included in your packets the locations nearest to Lennox,” Vander Plaats said. 

“We just felt it was important to be transparent with the city. Much of this information is already publicly available, but given our recent agreement in the fall, we just wanted to ensure that this information was again, put in front of our citizens for their intake,” Van Driel said. No action was needed.

Vander Plaats added a museum and bandshell pay application to the agenda at the beginning of the meeting. 

“This came to me late Friday morning, so my apologies for not including it on the agenda,” Vander Plaats told the council as he referenced the first page stating the application certificate for payment was a really important piece of information. “The pay application totaled $142,833.10. The original contract price of $230,000 was increased by about $7,300 for those first few change orders, and there have been a few more RFI’s I’ve requested since then to change the door of the bandshell and to update the lights to new LED’s,” Vander Plaats said. Vander Plaats noted the project is behind schedule, but does not feel it is a concerning amount at this time. The retainage on the pay application has changed from 10 percent to five percent as well according to the documents Vander Plaats provided to the council. Motion to approve the last minute pay application made by Van Driel, seconded by Chad Swier, motion carried.