I had some great conversations about the Town of Medary fire service agreement and how the City of Onalaska submitted a bid that was rejected. Here are the questions and answers I received:

First, taxpayers want to know who drafted the bid for Onalaska?

The bid was drafted by the City Administrator, Mr. Rindfleisch, with the direction and following guidelines put forward from the City Council.

Second, who reviewed that bid?

The City Council worked closely with the City Administrator through a series of closed session discussions.

Third, who provided the appropriate oversite for the bid and approved it for submission to the Town of Medary?

The City Council.

Finally, what types of follow up actions were taken on that bid to answer any of Medary’s questions or offer clarifications?

The City Council worked with the Town of Medary to recommend at least one modification once the original bid was deemed unacceptable. The City of Onalaska proposed a separate bid that would have covered the portions of Medary near the Home Depot that are surrounded by Onalaska. I believe this was referred to as 'Medary North'. That bid was also rejected.

In my conversations about this issue there is one theme that kept coming up: the Town of Medary did not want to pay the true costs for the fire service being negotiated. They expected the taxpayers in the City of Onalaska to subsidize the Town of Medary’s expenses and our City Council did not budge from their fair pricing based on the realities of the true costs for our fire services and equipment. I respect the decision they made to protect our taxpayers. It is unfortunate that the Town of Medary feels entitled to our services without paying a fair price for them.

Please contact me if you have any additional questions regarding this.