Tree Backlast at Neillsville City Council Meeting
Wednesday, August 17th, 2016 -- 10:32 AM
-The Neillsville City Council dealt with the backlash of some misinformation at their meeting last week.At the council’s previous meeting at the end of July, an item on the agenda approved by the council involved turning on the regular city Christmas decorations the Friday after Thanksgiving because the Christmas Tour of Historic Homes is being held that weekend. From there, discussion followed on the lighting of the Christmas Tree in Sniteman Square. During that discussion, it was mentioned by the Director of Public Works, Dave Flynn, the tree is getting big and unruly and may need to be taken down. It was stated that members of the Beautification Committee and Historic Preservation had talked about that and discussed other types of decoration that could replace the tree and other Christmas decorations to use in December.
Even though all of that discussion was in the planning phase and nothing had been decided, this caused a large uproar in the Neillsville Community as many people want the tree to stay. A large crowd of people attended last week’s council meeting to speak against cutting the tree down and they had collected numerous signatures on a petition to keep it. Once the council reached that item on the agenda, Dave Flynn began by stating that the city, council and committees love hearing input people have on different items. But, he also asked that people bring that input to them before they start criticizing other ideas. He stated that they had no plans to take the tree down it was just mentioned during the last meeting and in the earliest phases. Many people stated, and Dave agreed, that a news article in a local paper made it sound like the department was going to take the tree down any day now. In the end, the council took no action on the tree and reiterated that if people have input, please come to them and let them know without criticizing others.
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