Oct 3

Written by: Steve Erbach
Friday, October 03, 2008 6:03 AM

The proposed ordinance to regulate newspaper vending machines (NVM) in Neenah was passed last night on a 6-3 vote.  The separate ordinance establishing a permit fee for NVM's also passed on a 6-3 vote.  On the way to those votes, however, there were five motions to amend or delay adoption of one or the other of the ordinances.  There was also some assistance in our glorious cause from an unexpected quarter on the Council.  The whole debate lasted for over half an hour. Combined with the 18 minutes for presentations during the  Public Forum, the NVM ordinances took up 50 of the 90 minutes of the Council meeting.

There were three Public Forum presentations.  The first was made by the owner of The Scene magazine, Jim Moran of Neenah (http://scenenewspaper.com/home.html).  I'd never met the man, but he sat a few seats away from my wife and me.  He was accompanied by a fellow about my age with a gray ponytail.  I figured that that was the editor of the Scene, Jim Lundstrom, whom I had corresponded with several times about this proposed -- now official -- ordinance.

Moran began his talk by looking at the imposing setup of the Council chambers.  While the whole hall holds only 100 people in the theatre seating, the Council members and city department heads sit on a dais that bends around about a quarter of the chamber.  Everyone up there sits behind one continuous desk, each with an LCD display in front of him.  The desk looks to be made of mahogany or some other nice-looking wood.  It's very impressive with the Mayor flanked by the City Attorney and Clerk and three other department heads and the nine elected Council members. So Moran started off by saying, "It's kind of intimidating; usually in this situation I have to see a judge."  This got a huge laugh.

He spoke of the distribution of his magazine and the costs they incur to do so with a free publication.  He mentioned that most of the businesses in downtown Neenah advertise in the Scene and they've come to expect a certain visibility there.  The one vending box that Moran has in the public right of way in downtown Neenah gets 200 copies of each press run of the magazine (total of 25,000 copies a month), the most he distributes to any single vending box in the whole Fox Valley area.  He also stressed that there were a lot of young workers in the businesses downtown, his prime market.  He talked about the ineffectiveness of a similar ordinance in neighboring Appleton.  Sure, the free publications were no longer in evidence in Appleton, only the Gannett paper, the Appleton Post-Crescent.  The P-C is the only publication that could afford the standardized black box.  But each and every one of those boxes is covered in grafitti...so the beautification aspect of the ordinance is nullified.

Then Business Improvement District (BID) Board Chairman, Steve Griese, went up to the podium to speak his piece.  He started by saying, "I feel comfortable here; I don't feel I'm in front of a judge."  Polite chuckles.

Griese's spiel was centered on the investment that had been made in the downtown by the BID and the businesses that were members.  He said that the ordinance provided "a little more control" over newspaper boxes.  I guess he didn't consider having to spend hundreds of dollars for the privilege of purchasing and mounting a box to be anything greater than a "little more control".  His address was, mercifully, brief.

Then I got up on my hind legs and passed out copies of the Green Bay ordinance to the Council members and dept. heads.  I began my address by saying, [pointing to the seat he used to occupy on the Council] "I used to sit right THERE, so I'm really comfortable." Perhaps a smile or two.  Just goes to show you how a joke can wear off quickly.

I'll post my final speech in another message so that this message doesn't go over the limit.

18 minutes after I finished my address, the Council took up the matter of proposed city ordinance 1374.  An amendment was proposed by Marge Bates, one of the people who supported passage of the ordinance, to amend the length of time that an NVM can stand empty.  She pointed out that most if not all of the free publications are monthlies and that if the box in the public right of way goes empty after just a couple of weeks, then that box could run the risk of being declared abandoned with the 7-day rule in the ordinance.  This amendment was passed 8-1.

Then an amendment was proposed by Nick Piergrossi, the Council member who originally voted against the original ordinance in committee two months ago, to remove the sections requiring purchase of a standardized box.  That amendment failed 3-6.

Alderman John Ahles brought up something I hadn't considered.  He said that if the city is going to require a standardized box for any publication to be distributed in the public right-of-way then the CITY should pay for it.  I gave a silent cheer upon hearing that.  He didn't propose an amendment; however he did say that he would vote against the ordinance as a whole, which he subsequently did.

Jim Hemes, the alderman that usually supports anything the city wants to do, spoke out forcefully against the ordinance.  I thought at the time that the points he raised were curiously parallel to the ones raised by Jim Moran, the owner of the Scene; but I let that go while I silently urged him onwards.  He also emphasized that the city's current ordinances should be able to handle any nuisance presented by the boxes.

Questions for the Community Development Director, who appeared quite annoyed, came from Piergrossi and Lee Hillstrom, the guy who beat me in my re-election campaign last year.  Hillstrom wondered why the Scene couldn't simply paint its existing box black.

Hemes came back to move that both of the ordinances be tabled until further discussion could be arranged between the city departments and the newspaper vendors since he felt that not enough had been done by the city to notify the vendors during this process.  Motion failed 4-5. Piergrossi, Hemes, and Ahles were joined this time by alderman Mark Lange, but the motion didn't quite squeak by.

Piergrossi moved to refer the ordinance back to the Public Services and Safety Committee since it appeared that sufficient notice had not been given to the newspapers involved.  Principal City Planner Chris Haese hopped up to the podium in some agitation to note that copies of the proposed ordinance had been sent via email to the majority of the papers with vending machines in downtown Neenah.  Hemes pointed out that the two representatives from the Scene magazine were shaking their heads No that they hadn't received any such emails.  Haese scooted back to the podium to offer copies of the emails.  He was clearly displeased with this discussion.  Hemes went on that sufficient opportunity had not been given the newspaper vendors to present their side in all of this.

Piergrossi wanted to retract his motion based on Haese's statements, but Hemes objected as the person who seconded the motion.  Hemes continued to hammer on the notion that the current ordinances pertaining to nuisances should be enough to deal with the NVM's.  The City Attorney piped up to elucidate the flaws and vagueness in the current nuisance ordinances that wouldn't give the city enough leverage to require, say, the NVM's to be fastened to the concrete. Hemes then came back with criticism of the city's vague  ordinances and overrode the City Attorney with "Don't I have the floor, here?" when the City Attorney attempted to interrupt him.  So the Community Development Director, the Principal City Planner, and the City Attorney were at various times quite put out by the disucussion surrounding this ordinance.

The motion, however, failed 3-6.

Finally the amended ordinance itself was put to the vote and it was accepted on a vote of 6-3, with Lange, usually a reliable contrarian, voting with the majority.

The resolution to adopt a yearly permit fee for NVM's was amended to require a one-time fee with yearly renewal of the permit on a vote of 6-3.  The three sourpusses being Bates, Judy Zaretzke (who didn't say a peep during all of this; she is also a member of the Public Services & Safety Committee and always supported the NVM ordinance), and Council President Todd Stevenson.  Stevenson asked how the city was going to compel the vendors to renew their permits without a fee being required.  The City Attorney replied that if the permit expires then the machine would be removed, and if the vendor didn't renew the permit in a timely fashion, the city could require a new permit to be issued along with the one-time fee.

The amended ordinance requiring a permit for NVMs was adopted 6-3. Whew!  Again, this debate lasted 32 minutes.

After the meeting I learned something interesting: one of Jim Hemes' best friends is Jim Moran, the owner of The Scene!  Hmmm, I wonder if that had anything to do with him being such a bulldog last night, contrary to his normal demeanor.

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