By Patricia Bogumil
Editor
Turns out no news actually is good news for a few dozen Town of Waterford residents whose properties have been excluded from the Norway Dover Drainage District – especially its charges and assessments.
Checking on whether or not his efforts to save those residents the expense of inclusion in the NDDD was one of those final “tying up loose ends” projects for former Town Chairman Robert Langmesser, who retired last month after serving for 22 years.
Last summer, he and Town Supervisor Dale Gauerke walked the area in question with NDDD engineers who originally targeted the Tichigan properties for annexation into the NDDD.
But that made no sense, Langmesser and Gauerke argued, pointing out that flow from those Tichigan area properties drains into Tichigan Lake and not the lakes served by NDDD.
Engineers apparently agreed, Langmesser said, although they never notified him or the township of their new findings. Instead, the township property owners apparently are supposed to figure that out, he speculated, by not ever receiving a bill from the NDDD for assessment money owed.
Langmesser noted that for years he has been a critic of the NDDD board and how it conducts its business, which he said should be more transparent and open to the public.
“There are other farm drainage districts in this area, and I hope when they decide to do projects they will be open to the public from the get-go so people understand why the projects need to be done, and these have to be properly managed from the beginning.”
Earlier this year, NDDD formally completed its annexation proposal, successfully increasing its boundaries from 1,868 parcels of land totaling about 18,880 acres to 4,467 parcels of about 32,000 acres.
In 2009, a similar annexation attempt by NDDD was halted in Racine County Circuit Court by legal challenges that erupted after insufficient notice was given to affected property owners.
To confirm the new boundaries, Langmesser pulled the latest map of the drainage district before he left office. It shows the Tichigan properties are no longer included.
He explained that several years ago, the town spent $1 million of Line of Credit money paid for by the developer of Fox Water Bay subdivision. The developer’s funds were used to install two huge culverts and underground sewers with a swale on top to fix persistent water issues in that area of Tichigan.
“Now the water just shoots through and on out to Tichigan Lake,” Langmesser said.
NDDD engineers agreed.
“Basically, I fought this for the people in the Town of Waterford,” said Langmesser. “I could not speak for the people in the Town of Norway or Dover. I could only represent my people in the Town of Waterford.”
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