2014: A year of tremendous gain, historic loss

By Jennifer Eisenbart

Editor

2014 certainly didn’t lack for action – at least not in Burlington and the immediate area.

Some of the more spectacular headlines of the past year included the loss to fire of Schuette-Daniels Furniture – a mainstay of the city’s downtown – and a break in a decades-old mystery when a database turned up a fingerprint that led to murder charges.

In the end, however, it was Aurora Health Care’s announcement that it would build a $75 million ambulatory care center in the city – preserving local jobs and maintaining a robust medical presence in the area – that emerged as the top story of the year.

Here’s a look back at the top 20 stories of the year as determined by the Standard Press editorial staff:

 

1. Aurora makes long-term commitment to Burlington

After more than a year of uncertainty about the future of Aurora Health Care in Burlington, the state’s largest health care provider made a commitment to the area in a big way in January.

Aurora announced its intention to invest $100 million in Burlington and the surrounding area, with the majority going to build a new ambulatory surgery/care center along Spring Valley Road at the edge of the city.

The car center project, estimated at about $75 million, will include a cancer center, an accredited breast care program, outpatient surgery, endoscopy, physical rehabilitation, imaging – including a woman’s imaging department for procedures such as mammograms – orthopedics and sports medicine, a pharmacy and lab services.

Aurora also said it would invest the rest of the money into improvements in facilities served by both Aurora Memorial Hospital of Burlington and Aurora Lakeland Medical Center in Elkhorn.

The announcement was viewed as a victory for city officials who lobbied vigorously to keep a hospital in the area. At one point officials entered into preliminary discussions with a competing health care provider who expressed an interest in building a hospital in Burlington.

While the Aurora investment in Burlington is significant, residents on Spring Valley Road raised objections in recent months, saying the new center would adversely affect their quality of life in a rural setting. Residents attended most City of Burlington Plan Commission and Common Council meetings to voice their dissent, but a miscommunication at one meeting resulted in residents missing a public hearing on the matter.

Construction is expected to begin this spring.

 

2. Schuette-Daniels Furniture burns; store won’t re-open

One of Burlington’s mainstay downtown businesses is now gone.

Schuette-Daniels Furniture burned in a multiple-alarm fire April 6, and the resulting damage was enough for the Daniels family to decide the business was no longer viable.

After close to a century in business (the store opened in 1929), the family wrote a letter to the community announcing its intentions in September.

“After securing estimates to return the business to its ‘pre-fire condition’ and factoring in the insurance coverage to this rebuilding process, we have decided that in today’s business climate it is not financially possible to re-open the store. Rest assured this was a very difficult decision to make,” wrote owner Matt Daniels.

While the Daniels family may not be re-opening the store, another area businessman will be repurposing the building. Shad Branen, the owner of Plaza Theater in Burlington, announced in November that he was purchasing the building at 425 Pine Street.

“There’s a lot of potential for a building that’s truly in the heart of Burlington,” Branen said.

The building, with the exception of a small portion where the fire originated, is structurally sound, Branen said. The only portion that will be demolished is half of an adjacent building that was part of the furniture store.

That area will be converted to a green space, and Branen said the rest of the space will be repaired and reworked.

“Obviously, it will require extensive remodeling,” said Branen, who expects that the demolition of the back half of the smaller building would happen quickly.

Branen said the insides will be gutted. He envisions a multiple-use building, with offices, retail, services and apartments.

 

3. City Administrator Kevin Lahner leaves

In a surprise move, City of Burlington Administrator Kevin Lahner announced in November he would be leaving to take the same job in Waukesha.

Lahner announced his departure via Twitter, saying, “Mixed emotions today. Excited for my new gig, but sad to say goodbye to the great folks at Burlington City Hall.”

Lahner’s leaving quickly became mired in controversy, however, as his contract – renegotiated in 2011 to award him a raise and keep him in the city – required a $51,000 payback to the city for leaving before it expired.

Originally, Lahner said he didn’t anticipate issues with the payback, but later declined a no-interest, five-year payback for the $51,000, saying he would stay and work the rest of the contract first.

The council, in an emergency session the night before Thanksgiving, decided to cut the payback to $25,000. The City Council split 5-3 on the decision, with council members Bob Prailes, Ruth Dawidziak and Jon Schultz voting against letting him out for less.

However, Mayor Bob Miller defended the decision, saying that Lahner had forgone a raise he was due – and also had re-opened and re-negotiated the contract in the past to save the city money.

Miller added that in hiring a new city administrator, the city would also be saving money.

“If the numbers here were reversed, if it was going to cost the taxpayers money to let Kevin go, I wouldn’t have agreed to it,” Miller said.

 

4. City rescue, fire strained relations

After a study was finished in 2013 about cooperative efforts between the city and town of Burlington fire departments and the Burlington Area Rescue Squad, making strides toward those goals turned out to be a touchy process.

The city fire department, led by the city’s first full-time chief in Perry Howard, began clashing with the rescue squad, led by EMS Capt. Brian Zwiebel. Both agencies are housed in the city firehouse on Washington Street.

Rescue Squad members said Howard was encroaching on their territory, while the city and Howard maintain the changes being made were simply to put best practices into effect.

The situation seemed to come to a head in October, when representatives from the city and the Rescue Squad sat down to renegotiate the squad’s contract. After a two-hour closed session meeting, both sides seemed to have reached a compromise – though neither would reveal details.

Both sides agreed to appoint a committee to meet with the Rescue Squad members in an attempt to “bring a resolution to our issues,” City Administrator Kevin Lahner said.

On the committee from the city’s side was to be Lahner, Howard, and Aldermen Bob Prailes, Ruth Dawidziak and Jon Schultz.

 

5. Future of city’s community pool in doubt

A request for city dollars to handle cosmetic repairs at the Burlington Community Pool in May highlighted the dire need for a long-term plan for the pool.

With Mayor Bob Miller saying the very existence of the pool was in doubt past 2014, the council approved the money and began a process to determine what would need to be done to keep the pool viable in the future.

In late November, The city received six proposals – five of which actually addressed the pool work. The sixth came from a company offering to operate the pool – everything from scheduling to paychecks to maintenance – once the renovated pool was up and operational.

The other five were to be reviewed by city staff and three finalists will then be presented to the City Council.

The one-time $25,000 expenditure addressed much-needed cosmetic work at the pool – including new paint, bathroom fixtures and floors and a new counter.

New lockers for staff and patrons, as well as benches, were also purchased thanks to an additional $9,400 Burlington Community Fund grant.

 

6. BASD eyes a long-term facilities plan

The Burlington Area School District, facing declining enrollment but aging facilities, determined it needed to work with a consultant to develop a long-term facilities plan.

Originally approached by Scherrer-Nexus to work on improvements to district buildings that would create energy savings (to fund the improvements), the district balked at the possibility of spending what could be millions of dollars without a definite beginning or end to the project.

In looking at other options, district officials decided to first do a demographics study – through the Applied Population Laboratory at the University of Wisconsin‑Madison – and then work with a group at the Wisconsin Association of School Boards to determine what to do moving forward.

Those meetings, called stakeholder-driven strategic planning, are scheduled to begin in January and last for several months.

 

7. District approves 4-year-old kindergarten

While the majority of the Burlington Area School District School Board agreed that 4-year-old kindergarten was right for the district, there was still a battle to get the program approved.

School Board members Roger Koldeway and Phil Ketterhagen were the only two of the seven on the board to vote for an amendment to the 4K proposal, and also the only two to vote against the proposal in February. Both raised concerns ranging from the cost of the program to no proven results.

The 4K program was approved by a 5-2 vote, and registration exceeded expectations.

According to those in support of the program, 4K gives students an important head start in learning, and adding the program to BASD would keep the district competitive with the more than 90 percent of Wisconsin school districts that have the program.

Waterford also added the program this year.

 

8. A break in the Amber Creek murder case

After more than 17 years, charges were filed in April against a 36-year-old Palatine, Ill., man in the murder of Amber Creek, a 14-year-old runaway whose body was found in a Town of Burlington marsh in 1997.

James P. Eaton was accused in Racine County Circuit Court of first-degree intentional homicide and hiding a corpse.

Racine County Sheriff’s Department investigators announced details of the arrest and charges in a press briefing in April.

“This is a day that we have been waiting more than 17 years to arrive,” Sheriff Christopher Schmaling said at the briefing.

According to the information provided at the briefing, fingerprints and DNA from the case were entered into state and national databases at the time of the crime. However, it was not until February of this year that a hit came up on either.

Eaton, who would’ve been 19 at the time of the murder, had not previously been a suspect in the case.

 

9. Winter weather creates scores of problems

With numerous snow and cold events over the course of last winter, the season created issues for just about everyone.

The frost level got so deep that city staff advised everyone to leave a faucet running to prevent frozen pipes. Thawing occurs from the top down, which meant it was well into spring before the ground completely thawed.

In addition, because of so many small snow and ice events, the city went through its entire supply of road salt and struggled to get more. The city budget also suffered, with additional overtime needed to clear the streets.

Burlington Area School District, meanwhile, ended up cancelling so many days of classes it was forced to use make-up days. In fact, so many cancellations took place that the inevitability of make-up days was confirmed in February – before winter even ended.

 

10. Local woman fights to get seizure treatment approved

For Burlington resident Sally Schaeffer, the fight to get the state to approve cannabadiol – or CBD oil – as an alternative treatment for seizures was personal, as her daughter suffered numerous seizures each day and evening.

Sally Schaeffer, along with other parents, pushed hard in the spring to get both the state Assembly and Senate to approve the measure and, in April, Gov. Scott Walker signed a bill allowing for the treatment. However, a late addition to the bill required parents to get a special license for experimental treatment, which has stymied efforts to use the oil here.

Schaeffer’s daughter, Lydia, suffered from Kleefstra syndrome. In addition to slowing Lydia’s development, she developed epilepsy. Medications for the disease eventually become ineffective, and the CBD oil treatment had shown positive results in Colorado.

Lydia died on Mother’s Day in May, before she could benefit from the treatment. Her mother continues to fight to get CBD oil approved on a national scale.

 

11. Echo Lake Foods gets ready to re-open

After a devastating fire in 2013 drastically cut production at Echo Lake Foods – one of the city’s largest employers – a new building plan was submitted for the facility in May.

Using various incentive programs, the city drafted a 10-year tax reinvestment program, under the terms of which Echo Lake would receive 70 percent of its city taxes back on an annual basis during that time.

In return, Echo Lake agreed to rebuild to a level of 250 full-time positions, at an average wage of $13 an hour.

Reductions in the employment level would result in reduction in the incentive payment.

The item came up for a vote at a June City Council meeting, with Alderman Tom Preusker raising concerns that the $13 an hour wage and 250 full-time jobs would limit how the company could hire.

However, after a short debate, Preusker was the lone dissenting vote in approving the measure.

Meanwhile, local residents continued their battle against the facility, in spite of building changes to facilitate quiet and a change to baking goods rather than cracking eggs.

 

12. Proposed women’s shelter comes – then goes

After opposition grew quickly against a proposed western Racine County shelter/program center for the Women’s Resource Center, the group abandoned its hopes of purchasing a building on Amanda Street in Burlington.

The owner of property on Amanda Street that the Women’s Resource Center of Racine had targeted for a new western Racine County shelter confirmed in late November that the deal appeared to be dead.

The WRC had announced plans late in the summer involving a new shelter and program center in Burlington.

However, when the proposed site became public about a month ago, furor began to grow. The proposed building, was directly across the street from Cooper Elementary School.

Considerable opposition from parents of children at the school – as well as misgivings from the Transitional Learning Center board – grew quickly to a boiling point.

The TLC operates a homeless shelter, but has housed victims of domestic violence when needed. However, WRC workers had said that domestic violence victims need a chance to find safety and reassurance to rebuild on their own terms – not those that the TLC requires of its shelter occupants.

 

13. BASD teacher dies suddenly at conference

The community mourned the passing of kindergarten teacher Jennifer Libbey in August.

Libbey was in Wisconsin Rapids for a teachers conference on 4-year-old kindergarten – where she would have been teaching this fall – and collapsed shortly after the conference started.

CPR was begun immediately and emergency medical responders were able to revive Libbey, but she died later in the day at a Rapids hospital.

BASD Superintendent Peter Smet called Libbey an asset to the district.

“She was a wonderful teacher,” said Smet, who called her death a “very sad time” for the district. Smet notified staff on Friday, and counseling was available for anyone who needed it.

“Our thoughts and prayers go out to the Libbey family at this time,” he added.

 

14. A Capella choir travels to national tree lighting

The Burlington High School A Capella choir got a surprise of a lifetime in November, being invited to perform at the pre-show to the national tree-lighting ceremony.

With just two weeks’ notice, the choir managed to raise $12,000 for the trip, thanks to private donations on a GoFundMe page, and financial help from the Rotary Club and the Burlington Community Foundation.

Taking coach buses for a whirlwind trip – the group left on a Wednesday and was back by Friday evening – the performed at President’s Park for those waiting to get into the tree-lighting ceremony.

Members of the choir were Rachel Briggs, Landen Brown, Jacob Burton, Zachary Chernouski, Lydia Crabtree, Moses Crist, Logan Dailey, Kylie Dawley, Cain Gann, Sawyer Gilding, Peyton Hepner, Matt Koenen, Ally Konz, Alexandria Knight, Graeme Langley, Brandon Lindemann, Karley Nadolski, Jenny Panackal, Sammi Robers and Sarah Waltz.

 

15. BHS football team has banner year

The football season for Burlington High School started with the renaming of the stadium to “Don Dalton Stadium” – after the school’s legendary coach and athletic director – and ended with the Demons in the second round of the WIAA Division 2 playoffs.

After advocates went to bat to get the field named for Dalton – it involved working around nebulous language in Burlington Area School District Policy – the Demons started the season 0-2.

But after coming together under first-year head coach Steve Tenhagen, the Demons secured a share of the Southern Lakes Conference title – the team’s first conference title since 1996 – with a four-overtime victory over Wilmot.

The Demons then rallied past Wilmot in the opening round of the playoffs, winning 21-20, before falling to top-ranked Greendale.

 

16. Local National Guard Armory to close

Burlington’s Wisconsin National Guard armory will no longer house a detachment starting in 2015, officials announced in July.

The Burlington unit 457th CBR Company (Chemical, Biological, Radiological) will consolidate with the rest of the company in Hartford, according to Wisconsin National Guard spokesman Capt. Joe Trovato.

Trovato said the Wisconsin National Guard created a re-stationing committee, and made decisions on “what made sense on a day-to-day basis.”

The closure is expected for late 2015.

Trovato said there are 112 members in the 457th, of which there are currently 75 stationed in the Burlington detachment.

Trovato said that the National Guard will maintain ownership of the building, as well as its commitment to keep up the building and its grounds.

 

17. Local humanitarians Duplessis, McKusker die

The community felt several losses keenly in 2014, including the deaths of former St. Vincent de Paul Burlington manager Toni Duplessis and veterans’ organization leader Jim McKusker.

Duplessis, the long-time driving force behind Burlington’s St. Vincent de Paul agency before it closed, died Dec. 6 at Aurora St. Luke’s Medical Center in Milwaukee.

She was 84.

Over the years, Duplessis was recognized by many for her work within the community – most recently in 2010 as “Humanitarian of the year” for the Rotary Club of Burlington.

McKusker, 65, who moved to Burlington with his wife, Donna, in 1992, had been beyond active in the community. He was the commander of Burlington’s American Legion post, and a past commander of the Veterans of Foreign Wars.

In fact, he had held just about every leadership role possible in the Ross Wilcox American Legion Post 79 and the Anderson/Murphy VFW Post 2823.

 

18. Western Racine County Health closes

The public health agency that had been serving the western end of the county made the decision in early 2014 to close at year’s end, leaving both the city and town of Burlington without an organization to provide such services as immunizations, community health education programs and a resource to deal with disease outbreaks.

While several options were originally on the table – including the idea of a county-run program – the city and the town ended up going with the Central Racine County Health Department for at least two years.

A county-run program just didn’t have enough time to develop, which forced the hand of communities such as Burlington, Waterford and Rochester.

The switch to Central Racine was set for Jan. 1. The telephone number is (262) 898-4460, and the website address is www.crchd.com.

 

19. Downtown retail development still in flux

The planned downtown retail development – one that was supposed to go hand-in-hand with the parking structure and Hampton Inn – remains undeveloped.

Burlington Core Upgrades II, LLC – headed by Bill Stone and Tom Stelling – made an offer to purchase the empty land from the city for $1 in the spring, but the Community Development Authority balked at the sale.

A soft market – and planned medical-related tenants who have now pulled out because of the Affordable Care Act, according to the men – resulted in several different plans for the land being scrapped over the last few years.

As of May, Stone and Stelling were looking at the possibility of trying to develop a small, multi-family residential unit, and gained an extension of their option until May 30.

However, residents and council members balked at the sale.

 

20. Yik Yak is a big yuck

The Burlington Area School District had a brief but furious run-in with the newest of social media menaces – an anonymous posting site called “Yik Yak.”

While the app was meant to be used on college campuses, it quickly got out of hand in area schools, including Burlington, as students began to anonymously bully others and staff.

BASD administration moved quickly to get the app blocked in and around school grounds, but BHS high school students took another step – posting affirming messages on student lockers and spreading positive messages in reaction to the bullying.