Posted on July 23, 2018
With the public’s vote to allow dredging at Lake Redstone off the table, Lake Redstone Protection District Secretary Ken Keegstra said the order of the agenda at its annual meeting will be more of a traditional format.
At its July 10 monthly meeting at La Valle Town Hall, the board finalized the agenda for its Aug. 4 annual meeting. Sauk County Representative John Deitz was absent. The agenda for the annual meeting include the election of a commissioner, a secretary’s report to provide information on other improvements to Lake Redstone and the 2019 operating budget. In addition, the board discussed the format and plan for mailing notices out to the public about the annual meeting.
The topic of dredging will be addressed in a presentation from Commissioner and Dredging Committee Member Tom Walters providing an overview and update of the project. The board approved to allow a total of 30 minutes (two minutes for each person) for questions/answer session on the topic. The annual meeting starts at 9 a.m. Aug. 4 at Mauston High School. Doors open at 8:30 a.m.
The board planned to present a project to dredge 26 of its bays along Lake Redstone to voters at the annual meeting. But with the rejection of bids submitted from three separate companies at a July 5 special meeting the board decided to leave the topic off the agenda because of the unknown cost associated with the project and put it back out to bid. Chairman Chuck Ecklund said they would start the process of rebidding the estimated $3 to $6 million project as soon as possible.
In his dredging committee report, Walters shared the committee is meeting every two weeks to “move the process along.” He said he and Ecklund have been in contact with adviser Ayres Associates on how to move forward with the project including addressing the timeline of the project; possibly changing some aspects of the project to incorporate additional disposal sites, reducing the number bays and depth for dredging to make the project more cost effective.
“I think we’ve got momentum,” he said. “We’ve learned a lot from the process and by rebidding we expect we can save quite a bit of money.”
Source: Reedsburg Times-Press
