Economic Growth Committee: Highlights and Red Flags from Nov 13

I watched the latest Economic Growth Committee meeting (Nov 13, 2025) and made these notes. While the CAO paints a picture of "plentiful" public engagement and success, the reality in the video tells a very different story.

Here are the key takeaways that every resident needs to know:

1. Is Less Than 1% Really a Success?

The CAO described the Strategic Plan progress as a triumph of public engagement. He failed to mention that "plentiful" feedback actually meant only 43 people attended the town halls. That is less than 1% of our population. The online survey? It boiled down to a single, arguably biased question. Decisions affecting our entire budget are being justified by the feedback of a tiny fraction of residents.

2. Did Anyone read the Draft?

Twice, the CAO asked committee members for feedback on the draft strategic plan. It became clear no one had actually read it. As a compromise, he asked for feedback by the following day. How much scrutiny is being applied to documents that is shaping our future?

3. The "No Plan" Plan for Hartz Point

Remember when the CAO stated clearly in a previous meeting that there were "no specific plans" for Hartz Point?

Fast forward to this meeting: We are suddenly hearing about access roads, easement negotiations with the DNR, endangered species evaluations, and GIS work. If there is "no plan," why is so much work being done to prepare the site?

4. The Mystery Documents and  a Broken Promise

Throughout the meeting, references were made to a document listing various economic projects. The problem? It wasn't in the public package.

The Warden previously promised in writing that all anonymized public input would be made available. To date, none of it has been released. If the feedback was so positive, why hide the data?

5. Water Security or Industry Security?

There was an interesting discussion on desalination and water security involving "Anika Water." We need to ask: Is this focus on water really for the residents, or is it to secure the massive water amounts needed for Green Hydrogen production using wind turbines? I don’t know the answer, but I am skeptical.  We must be vigilant about this.

6. Privacy Concerns

A plan was discussed to use cell phone data to track attendees of the Pumpkin Regatta. Legal? Maybe. Ethical? That’s debatable. Do we really want the Municipality (or a private third party) tracking our movements just to gather event stats? Does the Municipality want to take the risk of the negative publicity?  Cost/benefit - someone should consider this.

The Bottom Line:

We are hearing a lot of consultant buzzwords like "priority spectrums" and "governance pillars," but we aren't seeing the transparency we were promised. A "mammoth meeting" is coming up to set the budget based on this "strategic plan." We need to be paying attention.

Watch the video yourself here