Common Council

Updates April 14, 2021

Updates:

• Neighborhood 
• Meeting highlights for this week
• Parks
• Transportation
• Community
• COVID-19

Neighborhood

New Park Shelter

The City of Madison Parks Division will hold a community meeting for a new multi-season park shelter at Door Creek Park. The design team will introduce the project and review existing conditions, site opportunities and constraints, and the current building program. This is the first of a series of meetings for the project. More information and meeting registration are available on the project website.

Door Creek Park Shelter
Public Input Meeting #1
Tuesday, April 27, 2021 @ 6:00 pm
Virtual via Zoom
Meeting Registration

This year's Ride the Drive includes a route around Kennedy Park

This year's Ride the Drive is slated for Sunday, June 6, 2021 and the event will look different than the traditional downtown Ride the Drive.

As a COVID safety precaution, the city has made several significant adjustments. This year's Ride the Drive will offer four simultaneous neighborhood events. As in previous years, the focal point remains a park with surrounding vehicle street closures allowing participants to stroll, roll, pedal or glide along the less than 3-mile route in a free event.

One of the routes is around Kennedy Park (5202 Retana Drive).

The other parks included are Marlborough Park (2222 Whenona Drive), Warner Park (2930 N. Sherman Avenue) and Wingra Park, 824 Knickerbocker Street.

Updates in the coming weeks can be found on RideTheDrive.com.

Informational meeting for alcohol license at Takarajima Sushi tomorrow

A new restaurant at the Rolling Meadows Shopping Center, Takarajima Sushi, has applied for an alcohol license to serve both beer and liquor. They will be holding a public information session tomorrow, Thursday, April 15, between 8-11 am at their location at 4674 Cottage Grove Road.

Rolling Meadows Neighborhood Association Board Special Election - Virtual meeting

Seats up for election: President, Vice President, Secretary, Treasurer and four at-large members.
When: Thursday May 13, 7 pm
Where: Zoom tinyurl.com/RMNAElect21

The Rolling Meadows Neighborhood Association is holding a special meeting where they will be electing new officers. They are seeking a diverse group to more accurately represent the neighborhood as a whole. Let's work together to make this the best place to live for all who reside within it.

Questions? Email rolling.meadows.na@gmail.com

Discussion of Advisory Referenda Results

The Task Force on Government Structure Final Report Recommendations Implementation Work Group will be discussing the results of the advisory referenda on Common Council size and composition at its meeting on Wednesday.

Meeting details

Meeting agenda

Register for public comment

For additional information about meetings scheduled for this week, please consult the City Meeting Schedule online here.

Parks

Earth Day Challenge 

Celebrate Earth Day with your neighbors and friends by volunteering to clean up your local park. Join this community-wide volunteer effort to help make a difference on Saturday, April 24.

Transportation

Bus Survey

Metro Transit is working on a complete network redesign to create a new system of bus routes that better serves the needs of Madison area residents and businesses and they need your input.

Please fill out the Transit Choices Survey to help them better understand your goals and priorities for the future redesigned transit network. 

For additional information on the Metro Transit Network Redesign project, visit mymetrobus.com/redesign. 

Questions and comments can also be emailed to MetroRedesign@cityofmadison.com. 

Parking division outages on Sunday mornings in April

The Parking Division is making upgrades to their payment systems that will result in some outages while the work is occurring. To mitigate as much impact to the public as possible, the work will occur on Sunday mornings in April, when garage use is at its lowest. This upgrade will affect the use of credit and debit cards at City-owned parking garages and lots. Cash payments will be required while monthly pass cards should see no disruption. 

Community

Save the date

Make Music Madison - June 24 (Deadline for New Registrations – Midnight on Tuesday, May 25th) Info can be found at https://www.makemusicmadison.org/

Online directory of Black-owned businesses

ConnectBlack directory, a free, online directory of 100 Black-owned businesses in Madison has been launched.

Renter assistance

Are you a Dane County renter in danger of eviction due to COVID-19?  You may be eligible for rental assistance from Dane CORE Emergency Rental Assistance Program. See if you're eligible.

If you need in-person assistance to complete the Dane CORE rental assistance online application, Tenant Resource Center (TRC) staff is available to help. Check the online scheduler to schedule an appointment or call the TRC main line at (608) 257-0006. 

COVID-19 updates

Vaccine appointments at the Alliant Energy Center, transportation available

Dane County residents age 16 and older can sign up for COVID vaccine appointments at the Alliant Energy Center and other locations. Transportation is available for those who need it. More information in English and Spanish.

Public Health Madison & Dane County Pausing Johnson & Johnson Vaccine Administration

The CDC and FDA recommended pausing use of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, after six reported cases of a rare and severe type of blood clot in individuals who received the Johnson & Johnson vaccine.

Public Health Madison & Dane County will follow this recommendation until further information is provided.

These adverse events appear to be extremely rare and are currently only documented in six cases out of about 7 million vaccines given, but the pause shows how seriously vaccine safety is taken.

COVID resources

• Data Dashboard

• Financial Navigators hotline

• Close Contacts Now have Quarantine Options

• UW-Madison's rapid testing

• WI Dept. of Health Services Cases by Neighborhood (Census Tract)

• Madison COVID-related news and service updates, Español: COVID-19 and Hmoob: COVID-19

• COVID-19 recovery dashboard, a tool to track local indicators in order to better understand how our residents and community are doing throughout the pandemic.

• Public Health Madison and Dane County COVID data and orders

• Dealing with job loss

• Childcare, food, jobs, housing and low-cost internet access 

• Community-aggregated COVID resources

• From the City's Economic Development Division: Business & Non-profit Information Covid-19

City meetings schedule

City weekly meeting schedule

The Mayor's meeting schedule

The County weekly meeting schedule