Union Grove approves November fire station ballot question
By Dave Fidlin
Correspondent
The years-long discussion involving facility needs for the Union Grove-Yorkville Fire and Rescue Department will reach a new dimension this fall as voters have an opportunity to weigh in on the matter at the ballot box.
Union Grove officials this week adopted a resolution in support of having the advisory referendum question included on the upcoming Nov. 5 ballot.
Village residents will be asked whether Union Grove should take out $5.307 million in promissory notes “for the purpose of paying the cost of acquiring, constructing, furnishing, equipping and financing a new facility” for the department.
The Village Board was slated to act on the referendum question at its regular Aug. 26 meeting, but deferred it by a day, ultimately adopting it at a special emergency meeting on Aug. 27.
Village President Steve Wicklund said the vote was delayed because some of the numbers in the initial resolution draft had to be revised.
The state had a hard-and-fast Aug. 27 deadline for placing referendum questions on this fall’s upcoming busy ballot. Union Grove’s fire station question will appear alongside high-profile federal and state elections – including the presidential race.
In recent weeks, village officials have been navigating state laws about the permissiveness of having a referendum question on the November ballot.
The Wisconsin Legislative Reference Bureau in Madison was one such organization tapped for insight.
WLRB representatives Michael Gallagher, assistant chief counsel, and Sarah Walkenhorst Barber, senior legislative attorney, indicated the village did have the legal standing to have the question placed on the ballot.
In the memo, Gallagher and Walkenhorst cite a state statute that “generally bars cities, villages and towns from holding advisory referenda.”
But, in the memo they add, “That statute explicitly provides an exception ‘for an advisory referendum regarding capital expenditures proposed to be funded by the property tax levy of the city, village or town.’”
“Because the village’s construction of a new fire station involves capital expenditures, financed by debt issuance, presumably funded by the property tax levy, that exception applies here, allowing such an advisory referendum to be held in the village,” Gallagher and Walkenhorst wrote.
The village also consulted with Attorney Eric Larson of the Municipal Law and Litigation Group on the matter. Larson gave a different take.
“Since the proposed advisory referendum involves expenditures funded by borrowing, not expenditures, ‘funded by the property tax levy,’ there is concern that the statute may not provide a relevant exception,” Larson wrote in his analysis.
He added, “When we have faced this in other communities, bond counsel (Quarles) and financial consultants (Baird) have advised that they believe municipal governments are prohibited from holding referenda on advisory borrowing questions.”
Larson said his input was based on new state law around referendum questions.
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