Council to discuss West Madison, sewer rates

The Washington City Council will debate a number of hot button issues at its meeting tonight at 6 p.m. One of those is the reconfiguration of West Madison Street. The Iowa Department of Transportation has proposed changing the lane configuration of West Madison from a four-lane to a three-lane road. The middle lane would be for left-turning traffic only.

Representatives of the DOT visited Washington in February and March to talk about the proposal. DOT representative Troy Jerman showed evidence that reconfiguring a road from four to three lanes has reduced collisions every time the DOT has tried it, often reducing the number of crashes by 50 percent.

The decision to change West Madison to a three-lane road is the council?s. Jerman told the council he wanted an answer in the month of April. If the council approves the three-lane configuration, the new lines will be painted when the DOT resurfaces West Madison in 2012.

The council will talk about utility rate increases. At the April 13 special session of the council, City Administrator Dave Plyman informed the council that sewer rates would probably have to double to pay for the new sewer plant. He said the wastewater plant generates $1 million in fees per year, but would need to generate at least $1 million more just to pay back the loan for the sewer plant.

In late March, Plyman announced he would leave his position to accept a job as the city administrator of Rochelle, Ill. Since that time, the council has discussed how it will replace him. It will continue that discussion tonight. At its April 13 meeting, the council agreed that it should hire an executive search firm to find a replacement for Plyman. Plyman said he will leave Washington around Memorial Day.

There will also be a public hearing on the demolition of the buildings on South Marion, southwest of the square. The buildings to be demolished are 207, 209 and 211 South Marion. Two of them were at one time the site of the grocery store ?La Cruz.? In the fall of 2006, those buildings collapsed during renovation. The city later bought the buildings from Alfonso and Julia Raymundo.

The city attempted to sell the buildings to a developer, promising the developer $50,000 in TIF funds to remodel the buildings and preserve their historic façades. That effort failed, so the city has now elected to demolish the buildings.