CRAWFORD COUNTY - The Crawford County Board of Supervisors has a variety of things of note on their agenda for their Tuesday, Dec. 15 meeting, which starts at 10 a.m. Perhaps most notable is the agenda item called ‘Report from LCC/action on extending CAFO moratorium.’

Although Crawford County remains in ‘Phase One,’ which means public health guidelines recommend limiting indoor gatherings to 10 people or less, along with social distancing, there is a virtual option available to participate in the meeting via Zoom.

To access the link, go to:

https://crawford.extension.wisc.edu/cd/

Crawford County Conservationist David Troester reported at the Tuesday, Dec. 8, meeting of the Land Conservation Committee Soil and Water Concerns that he had had no role in the item being placed on the agenda. It was essentially “news to the committee” as well.

Chairman Dave Olson expressed some surprise that after the committee had voted not to recommend extension of the moratorium to the Board of Supervisors, that it could still be placed on the agenda.

“My understanding is that members of the board have been receiving a lot of phone calls about this topic,” Troester said. “It is the Finance Committee that decides what will be on the County Board agenda, and so they are able to make that decision.”

DAWS testing results

The results of the first of two planned rounds of community well water testing for the Driftless Area Water Study (DAWS), conducted in Crawford, Vernon and Richland counties, will be reported on at a virtual meeting to be held the evening of Monday, Dec. 14.

According to Kevin Masarik of the UW-Stevens Point Center for Watershed Science and Education, the presentation will be general and initial, and aimed at helping citizens understand their well testing results or well testing in general.

“We basically just got the results back, so we haven’t had the time yet to do any in-depth analysis,” Masarik said. “The goal for this meeting is really for those that had water tested to understand what tests we performed, make sure they are comfortable interpreting test results, and provide next steps if problems were identified in their wells.”

Interested citizens can register their e-mail to participate in the informational meeting at

 https://tinyurl.com/wellwaterDAWS

Priority to participate will be given to citizens who had their well tested.

“Participants should already have received their well test results or be receiving them any day,” Troester said. “So the meeting on December 14 will be the first public announcement of the results.”

This announcement occurs on the eve of the Crawford County Board of Supervisors taking a vote on whether or not to extend the Crawford County CAFO Moratorium. It was one of the items of information that some supervisors who voted for the moratorium in December of 2019 were specifically interested to see. These results will presumably be part of the Land Conservation Committee’s report to the Board of Supervisors the next day.

Other agenda items

Other agenda items of note for the meeting include:

• Appointing a redistricting committee. According to Crawford County Clerk Janet Geisler, “every 10 years after the census, the county may need to make adjustments so that there is equal representation. The committee, to be appointed by the county board chairman, will be responsible for this.”

• Consideration of a resolution regarding ‘County Board Proceedings.’ There is no explanation given about what this resolution proposes.

• Consideration of an ordinance amending, repealing, and re-creating portions of Chapter 2.01 Rules of Procedure. This ordinance governs how meetings are run, when they are held, how supervisors are elected, powers and duties of the chair and vice-chair, voting procedures, order of business, how the agenda is made, who is allowed to speak at meetings and for how long, and more.

According to Geisler, when asked to furnish a copy of the proposed changes, “it needs to be cleaned up since it hasn’t been revised in years. Corporation Counsel made me aware of this.”

• Announcement of Crawford County Community Fund 2020 grant recipients.

• Appearance of Crawford County Emergency Management Director Jim Hackett with a COVID-19 update.