Congratulations Belleville!!

Editor,

As a former Belleville resident, I was excited to learn that Belleville was going to, at long last, have a dedicated senior center to serve its older residents. On August 9, I was lucky enough to get a tour of the building. It is beautiful beyond my expectations. My late parents, Lincoln and Maxine Marty, would have been so grateful for the building and amazed as I was, I’m sure.

I worked for a number of years with Wisconsin’s aging network and heard, over and over again, that a society is judged on how it treats its elderly population. Belleville will surely be judged as being supportive of its older residents and the center will be a wonderful reason for people to move to or stay in Belleville. Congratulations to all of you and thank you so much to the hard working Senior Center staff (and all who made donations) who made it all possible.

Now on to a new library, something else on which a community builds its character.

Linda Marty Schmitz,

Waunakee, WI

Blood Drive a Success

Dear New Glarus Folks,

First, to pass along the remarks from Julie, the Charge Nurse last Friday: “It was an awesome day! Thank you all so very much. It was a privilege to work with you all and thanks for having us!! We look forward to next time!” (A great group from Dubuque.) Our numbers were 85 in the door but with some deferrals and short pints, there were 61 full pints plus the eight that donated doubles, so we made goal of 76 + 1, 77 productive pints in all!

We had wonderful help from Swiss Church members and friends: Terry and Peggy Roth, Guy Nelson, Diane Holcomb, Christine Craven, Phil Hanna, Ruth Wyttenbach, Diana Truttmann, Marlene Kowalski, Katie Elmer, Shirley Lueschow, Louann Bodenmann, Eloise Kuenzi and Stephanie Ganshert. The wonderful cookie bakers were: Eloise Kuenzi, Dorene Disch, Betty Henning, Lorraine Blumer, Mary Usher, Tom and Linda Coughlin, Naomi Meland, Diane Holcomb, Phil Hanna and Peg Roth. A Shout Out goes to Culver’s Sponsorship: A Pint for a Pint is very appreciated, as are the donations from our New Glarus Dairy, New Glarus Bakery, New Glarus Hotel, Maple Leaf Chocolate & Cheese, Hoesly’s Meats, Ruef’s Meats, Glarner Stube, and Piece of Cake. We have the absolute best canteen food around for our Blood Drive.

A special recognition to the Post Messenger Recorder for passing along the advertising and informative articles.

Our next New Glarus drive is on December 18, 2015. That is one week before Christmas. Mark your calendars.

Thank you so much one and all from your Coordinator Team,

Bill Kuenzi, Linda Coughlin, Ruth Anderegg, Sara Siegenthaler

New Glarus Dog Park Wanted

Dear Editor, 

My husband Nate and I moved to the Village of New Glarus in June. We would like to address a noticeable issue in the New Glarus community: dogs are not welcome in any of our parks! There are no places in the Village that we can take our dog to let him run freely and interact with other dogs, and in fact, there are no parks in the Village where we are able to take our dog even on leash (with the exception of the New Glarus State Woods).

When we moved here we began brainstorming ways we may be able to help facilitate the formation of a dog park and noticed the topic of a dog park was on the agenda for the July meeting of the Joint Boards Parks and Rec. Committee. We attended that meeting, along with +/- 10 other supporters, learned of the history of this project, and learned about why previous efforts have been somewhat unsuccessful (mostly due to location and funding issues). We were very pleased to hear from the committee that they thought a dog park was a good idea though, and they suggested we move forward with garnering support. The Village provided a great petition form, which we have placed at a few businesses in the Village as well as Belleville, and we took the initiative to start an online version of the petition through Change.org. We have been collecting ink-based and online signatures for about two months now, and we even created a Facebook group to keep online supporters informed of our efforts. One thing the committee stressed to us is that in addition to seeing support from residents of the Village, they need to see support from residents of the Town too!

We are hopeful that anyone who resides in either the Village or the Town and supports the idea of establishing a dog park will join us at the next committee meeting currently scheduled for September 9th, at 7:00 p.m. The meeting is scheduled to be held at The Town of New Glarus Town Hall, located in the Swiss Miss Center at 1101 Hwy 69. The entrance is on the rear side of the building where the Sugar River Bank is located. We understand that the subject is on the working draft of the agenda, and I am happy to speak to anyone who may have questions, want to sign a petition, join our Facebook group, or learn more in general. My email address is dow.shaun@gmail.com.

Thank you! 

Shaun Dow and Nathaniel Basting

New Glarus