The Town of Three Lakes received good news regarding health insurance costs and also looked at budget amendments during its Oct. 6 meeting.

In the last few years, the town has seen Security Health plans rise at about 10 to 15%, which was expected again for 2027. Clerk Sue Harris shared the estimates indicated only a 2.71% increase which was welcome news.

“I highly encourage the board to accept this,” she said, which garnered laughs from those in attendance at the meeting.

Harris also talked about a series of unexpected expenses that came up recently during her work on the 2027 budget, including a cut to state road aid by about $40,000 and $32,000 in IT expenses. In order to cover the deficit, she expects she’ll be able to make some slight cuts to the road work allotment and will have final numbers soon. While she has preliminary assessed property values from the Department of Revenue (DOR), she is still awaiting finalized figures. She plans to have firm numbers for the Oct. 20 meeting.

Roads are the only place she can find currently to make up for those expenses, but clarified, “We want to keep doing our road maintenance.”

The board also approved a resolution to secure a $1.14 million loan through Nicolet National Bank. The funds will finance 2027 capital equipment, including new police squad cars, a loader, a town brush truck, a new town truck, and various smaller tools and equipment. The loan carries a three-year term at a 4.79% fixed interest rate.

Highway X bridge opens

Josh Paetow, the town’s public works superintendent, gave an update on the Highway X bridge project which was very close to completion and expected to be open within days of the meeting.

Paetow said there were two linear cracks running on both sides of the bridge and requested the Wisconsin Department of Transportation do an epoxy injection on the cracks as part of the current project, and was surprised when the department agreed. Due to the project coming in about $60,000 under budget and DOT agreeing to the epoxy injections which cost about $60,000, he said the town was essentially paying the same amount that the project was bid out for, but with the addition of a whole second project.

He and his crews have also been working on repairing nine street lights east of the Shell station that have been out of operation since June. Public works looked at breakers over the summer and swapped in a new one, but that did not fix the problem.

A contractor is coming Thursday to look at it and Paetow is hopeful that will go well. The contractor suspects some sidewalk work construction crushed some of the conduit for the lights, eventually causing them to fail.
If the contractor’s attempts are unsuccessful, two to three lights will remain out through the winter. In that case, a permanent fix would require removing sidewalk panels and boring a new conduit next summer.

Fire updates

John Fink of Three Lakes Fire Department gave an update that the department had gone on 12 calls which seemed like a lot, but noted four calls were to the same residence. Fink said it was a newer house that was having some issues with the security and alarm system resulting in multiple calls.

Supervisor Matt Olkowski respectfully questioned what types of rules are in place for when it’s appropriate to charge for additional trips to locations if calls are not necessarily a safety call.

“More technology, more alarms, where do our services end? Olkowski wondered. “I’m being very polite when I say that, but somewhere it’s gotta cut off.”

In other business

The board voted to deny a request from Brian Fritz of Forward Bank to eliminate a parking spot in front of the bank. Town leaders determined there was no need to eliminate the parking stall, but will have public works repaint the stall to force vehicles closer to the intersection.

An amendment was made to town building codes to protect local homeowners from elevated commercial costs due to a new state electrical code for standalone structures. The board also reappointed RC Inspection Agency LLC as the town building inspector, and okayed a three-year assessor contract and two-year auditor contract.

It was announced at the meeting that Three Lakes will host the Wisconsin Towns Association Oneida County Unit meeting on Wednesday, OCt. 21, at 6 p.m. This is the first time they’ve hosted the traveling meeting in about four years.

The board waived the Nov. 3 regular meeting due to the General Election, and announced that special meetings including the annual budget public hearing, special town budget meeting and special town board budget meeting will all be held Tuesday, Nov. 17, followed by a regular town board meeting.