The Appleton Common Council met on Wednesday, November 5, 2025, at 7:00 PM in the Council Chambers. The meeting was called to order by Mayor Jake Woodford, with 14 alderpersons present and 2 excused. The meeting adjourned at 7:41 PM. Key actions included approval of a special use permit for a homeless shelter, a sustainability master planning contract, updates to the park naming policy, and approval of the Veterans Park renaming process.
The next meeting was noted for budget adoption on November 12, 2025.
Good evening. I now call to order the Wednesday, November 5th, 2025 meeting of the Apple and Common Council. Please rise for the invocation, which will be delivered by Alder Lambricht. So this year is the 35th anniversary of a photo that I distributed to the Alders and some of the uh department heads. I can make sure that the audience gets a chance to see it as well. Um and this photo is known as the pale blue dot. And so I'm gonna read a little bit of um some comments. Carl Sagan uh wrote in his book from 1994 titled The Pale Blue Dot, talking about the greater significance of the photograph. From this distant vantage point, the earth might not seem of any particular interest, but for us, it's different. Consider again that dot. That's here, that's home, that's us. On it, everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you've heard of, every human being whoever was lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor, and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every superstar, every supreme leader, every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there on a moat of dust suspended in a sunbeam. The earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on these scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds. Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the universe are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there's no hint that help will come from somewhere else to save us from ourselves. The earth is the only world known so far to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment, the earth is where we make our stand. It's been said that astronomy is a humbling and character building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known. Please join me in the Pledge of Allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the United States of America. Under God. Okay, and roll call of officers and department notes. All are represented. Need a motion to approve the minutes of the previous meeting. We have a motion and a second to approve. Is there any discussion of the minutes? Hearing none, please cast your votes. That motion passes 13 to zero. The minutes have been approved. Text of these proclamations is included in your materials. Next is uh 25-1346, bicycle and pedestrian advisory committee appointments. Uh, need a motion to approve. We have a motion and a second to approve. Is there any discussion? Hearing none, please cast your votes. That motion passes 13 to zero. Thank you for approving these appointments, and we look forward to welcoming Lori and Karen to serve volunteer service on the bicycle and pedestrian advisory committee. And we thank them for being willing to be a part of it. Next, we have 25-1343, Appleton Redevelopment Authority Reappointment. For a motion, we have a motion and a second to approve. Any discussion.