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Marathon County committee agrees to continue talks with WPS on regulator station near county park
Summary
Representatives from Wisconsin Public Service outlined a preliminary request to site a gas regulator station on county property along 72nd Avenue; the committee signaled no objection to continuing site discussions and asked staff to seek buffering and design protections for the park/neighborhood.
The Marathon County Human Resources, Finance and Property Committee on Wednesday agreed to continue discussions with Wisconsin Public Service (WPS) about siting a natural-gas regulator station on county-owned land along the 72nd Avenue corridor.
Chris (county staff) framed WPS’s inquiry as an exploratory request to place a new regulator station on county property, and WPS engineer Evelyn Weicker told the committee the utility can work with reasonable local design specifications, including landscaping and screening to reduce visual impacts. "We certainly would work with whatever within reason…we've worked with neighbors before as far as landscaping," Weicker said.
Why it matters: the proposed locations were shown in packet photos and include two county-owned blue-square parcels near park property and a juvenile facility. Committee members focused on whether an easement, lease or sale would best protect county interests, whether the county could impose design criteria, and how a sale would change tax treatment. WPS clarified that if the parcel were sold, utilities do not pay traditional property taxes but participate in shared-revenue arrangements.
Committee direction: members signaled no objection to moving forward with conversations. Staff was asked to investigate design-buffer options, consider minimizing footprint, protect trees where feasible, and return comparative transaction options (easement vs. lease vs. sale) to the committee and board.
Next steps: staff and WPS will continue site discussions and return options addressing buffering, driveway access, and potential shared-driveway arrangements for committee review.
Closing: committee consensus allowed preliminary work to proceed; no formal easement, lease or sale decision was made at this meeting.
