Okay, we are officially live.
Right, hello everyone. This is the Land Conservation Committee meeting. It's Monday, July 20, 2026 at 1 p.m.
We get a roll call. The committee, please.
Chair, Brian Holtz.
Here.
Vice Chair, Rick Stacey.
Supervisor, Sheila Reeve.
Here.
Citizen member, Richard Kunky Jr.
Here.
And I have received word that citizen representative Michael Bergman will not be present and let
the record show that Rick Stacey is not present at the moment.
We have a quorum.
Thank you.
Next would be approval of the agenda.
So moved.
Motion by Comkey.
Second.
Second by Reef.
All those in favor say aye.
Aye.
Any opposed?
All right.
Our agenda is approved.
Next is the approval of the minutes from May 18th five of your packet. So moved
Second. Motion by Reeve second by Conkey all those in favor say aye. Aye. Any
opposed? Okay our minutes are approved. Next is the time period allotted for
public comment is there anyone from the public wishing to speak or anyone on
the phone?
Okay we'll move on to item six this is the Potter's Lake Protection
and Rehabilitation District. This is the county representative in interview. Pages six through
seven. And at this point, I'll invite Christopher Ozele.
No, it's not. I'll get it right. Come on
up. We'll do our interview here. Yep. And then just make sure that the microphone is turned on.
Just a single press will cross the red. You're good. Yep. You're on. Okay. Welcome. Thanks
for coming in. Thank you for having me. Are you a resident of Walworth County? I am. And are you residing
in the district where that you are going to be representing? Yes. Okay. Do you own property
within the boundaries of Potters Lake? You've said yes. Do you have experience with Potters Lake
Protection and Rehabilitation District? Mostly just by attending local meetings so far.
I've never served in any capacity yet but try to make as many meetings as I can
and familiar with Kathy and the board over there.
Okay.
What are the most important responsibilities
for serving as Walworth County's upon?
That's a good question.
I read through, excuse me, the job description
and it seems to me that the primary task
is to serve as liaison between the county
and the Potter Lake rehabilitation district.
Seems like that can be anywhere from
voting regulations all the way through waste management or anything that comes
up that would affect the district. Then just acting simply as liaison between
the two parties and making sure that everyone's on the same page. Great. I'll
expand on that a little. There's several of us here that service those
representatives and just from our experience there are it will be
important to be tapped into what the land conservation is doing or what this committee
is doing are just county-wide issues because when you're going to do your report monthly,
quarterly, whenever you guys are meeting, there'll be a question, what's happening at the county?
Sometimes that's nothing, but sometimes if there is a key initiative happening around lakes,
it's kind of your job to make sure that that information is passed on to the district
so that they can act on it if they choose to, including programs that are coming down from
the DNR, etc. What I'll say in this too is that pending approval, just keep my number and Mandy's
number around. You have any questions. Sometimes one of the main things you do is save the district
money if they're considering doing aerial photo, talking to the Regional Planning Commission,
those type of things there's always it's always easy enough to ask us a question
so that we're not duplicating efforts or it's something that could fall into
something that we're doing sure next one would be it's a little bit unique with
you also being a member of the district to just keep in mind that you can vote
on anything you'll be a voting member but in this case you're voting as a
representative of the county not necessarily in your personal interests as
So like district, I'm sure.
Understood.
Thanks for that.
Yeah.
What are the most, okay, we got that one.
What qualifications make you a good candidate?
That's fair.
I think on my resume over there,
I mentioned that for the last 10 years,
I served as a secretary treasurer for my pilot union.
I'm a pilot right now for American.
I was formerly with spirit,
but I was the secretary treasurer.
So I oversaw 32 committees
and $7 million of dues income a year and allocated funds back and forth. How
that's relevant is to your point that you just mentioned, I was responsible for
making sure that that the vote or the will of a bigger body was represented,
not just my own. Sometimes that came with an education piece and sometimes
that that just was simply a straight vote. So I come with a parliamentarian
background with Roberts Rules of Order and kind of more of a we'll call it like
a servant style leadership background where it's not necessarily me doing
something directly with a large body but more in a listening capacity and
education capacity. Well great when you're done being a pilot you can run
for local office.
Are you currently receiving any salary compensation or fees for services
that could be considered a conflict of interest with your appointment?
No.
Okay. Do you have any other perceived conflicts of interest with the Lake District?
No.
Do you have any restrictions that represent times or days that you could not attend
district meetings?
My schedule is fairly random, but that being said, if I know about something the further
out I know about it the easier it is to maneuver around it but there will be times I don't know if
you've traveled recently but I'll get stuck somewhere so does the district offer a virtual
option yes I'm pretty sure that they do I don't think I've actually witnessed it but I think
that they do I know that this body does correct yeah okay that's all the questions I have any
any other questions from the committee?
No, thank you for coming in.
Very good, thanks.
Do you want us to entertain approval or denial now?
Yes, you certainly can if you're ready to move forward
with that.
Great, a motion from the committee.
I'll do a motion to approve.
A second.
Reef and then Konke, any other discussion?
All those in favor say aye.
Aye.
Any opposed?
All right, congrats Chris.
Yep, it'll move on to the County Board meeting Monday August 10th for approval
and then would be finalized at that meeting.
Information from your office will go out to the Lake District about your
appointment. Correct. If there's a meeting between now and then I would just
attend in a non-official capacity. Yeah and then if you have any I guess detailed
questions on like yeah communication back and forth and stuff like that we
can certainly
yes sure
yeah I I imagine she'll let you know everything and and
it yeah I'm sure it'll be accurate but yeah if you have any questions let me
know. All right, thank you. Okay, we'll move on to Mid-Year Item 7 Mid-Year
Progress Report for the Water Quality Specialist Intern.
Good to see
everyone again today. So this is just a mid-summer update kind of what I've
been up to so far this summer. So first I just wanted to highlight both our June
and July newsletter. So our newsletters are posted to our Facebook as the
county website. So they all include just kind of the general first slide. So this
one on the left is the exit from June and then an informational one as well. So
the one for July highlighted those cleaning stations around Wallworth
County that have done a great job and so we have a variety of different ones.
There's homemade ones, there's the DNR removal ones and then there's also
the CD3 stations that are at Geneva Lake as well. And then additionally in those
newsletters we have a species spotlight so that's different for each month. For
June that was Purple Loose Drive and then also just a page going over the
upcoming events as well. Can I ask a question on? Yeah go ahead. Is there
still signups available and then what's the finest go to the county website and
click yes so there is still signup available signup closes noon August 7th
so that's the day before and the county website there's a link on there and then
also there's a direct link and then where is where it's the meet up
happening that is we're starting here outside and then we're going to
different locations across the county. So we have White River, we're going to White
River County Park to do some there, Comis Lake, and then maybe if we have enough
people and enough time, then what is it Baymen Lake? Bayman Park? Bayman Park, and
then as well as a station off of Geneva Lake, there's like a creek that runs
that way as well. So how many people is too many people? Because I could get
at the Elkhorn Rotary Club, most likely to show up
to bateman to manage that park stand,
or I should at least invite them.
Yeah, yeah, it all depends on the size sometimes.
And, you know, we have about three hours or so
to complete it.
So if we get a large enough group,
it will be Hannah and I,
participants will split up and each take a group
and kind of do a divide and conquer situation.
situation. Let me see if I can get some interest from the club on Wednesday and I'll let you know.
Yeah, that'd be great. Sure.
All right. And then also something new that I decided to do this year
was also make a kids newsletter. So these are just three examples of what the pages are looking
like. I also had a couple of other pages with more activities, but these were handed out to
some of our local libraries. So Elkhorn, Williams Bay, Fontana, East Troy, Tuxam, and so those
were offered and they're also going to be on the website as well. And so first our first
page here just kind of highlighting what aquatic invasive species are. And then I made a variety
of activities. So we have an I spy page as well as a coloring page. And then there's
also. A maze, a quiz as well. So yeah.
And then I figured since I was going around to the local
libraries anyways, that I'd make an informational bookmark for them as well. So this is just kind
of highlighting some invaders.
And then we had our clean boats, clean waters training. So we had
one here at the county as well as with Lake Biola. So in total we had 29 volunteers between
the two events so trained a whole bunch of people a lot of people were engaged
and came with a lot of questions which and
then lastly here if it changes to the
next slide there we go so I've also been doing some early detection monitoring
trainings I assisted Amanda from Waukesha County as well as Scott who
works for WC grant he does Kenosha County's aquatic invasive species so
So this trained me on the protocols for early detection monitoring and how to do them myself.
So now I'll be doing some around our county in the upcoming weeks, which I'm super excited
about.
So yeah, those were just some of the things that I had so far.
And yeah, so let me know if any of you guys have any questions.
Well, Lake Beulah is finally doing it.
Yes.
I know they're they're running just kind of like a whoever volunteers for it this
year and then seeing how it goes next year. They want to actually hire people to
go and do it. It also seems pretty glad I got you to connect with him. Yes, yeah. Yeah,
he attended our event when we did it here upstairs early in the season. I'm really
glad to see you took the initiative to move forward on it. See one of the pictures
was that this year?
Yes, that was this year.
When was that?
That was, I think it was in like June, mid-June, I want to say.
Okay.
Thank you.
Yeah.
Any other questions?
All right.
Thank you for the report.
Yeah, thank you.
Our next item is 2027 budget ideas or considerations.
This is, again, it's our open-ended discussion about stuff that the
committee would like to see on the budget or questions.
Correct. Yes. So I don't have anything specifically to talk about, just an open dialogue if there
was anything. I guess the one thing I will mention, the annual SWARM grant the county
receives for staffing costs with the governor's biannual budget in 2026. Each county did
see an increase in allocations so that
We'll carry forward into 2027 as well. It may be slightly more than we saw in 2026,
but yeah, we'll get that again in 2027, and then I guess we'll see what happens with the next budget.
Thank you for that. Our next meeting date is going to be Monday, September 14th, 2026.
That meeting will be here in this room at 1 p.m. I'll entertain a motion to Jane.
So move.
We got a motion by Reef, second by Stacey. All those in favor say aye.
Any opposed? All right. We're adjourned. Thank you everybody. Thanks for coming and Chris.