The Rhinelander District Library Board of Trustees met Tuesday, Nov. 3 to review the results of an arbitration meeting on Oct. 27 that ended with a vote that library officials have said does not comply with the district’s funding agreement. At that session, Newbold Town Chairman Dan Hess moved to maintain “the 2026 budget share levels for 2027,” according to the board’s recording of the meeting. The motion passed 4-0-1, with the City of Rhinelander’s representative abstaining.
In their Nov. 3 discussion, trustees stressed that the dispute comes down to one word.
“The word share. That’s the problem,” trustee Gerald Anderson said.
Ultimately, the trustees agreed to Hess’s request to bring the towns back together to sort out the matter. The board voted unanimously to reconvene budget arbitration with its member municipalities at 5:15 p.m. Nov. 10, immediately following the board’s regular meeting.
As the meeting is scheduled to take place after this edition went to press, the outcome will be reported on our website (www.starjournal.com) and in our next print edition.
What the contract says
Under the district agreement, the municipalities fund the library’s operating budget through a two-part formula. Half of each municipality’s share is based on its equalized property value as a portion of the district total. The other half is based on its population as a portion of the district’s total population, as estimated by the state for the previous year. The district members are Newbold, Pine Lake, Pelican, Crescent and the City of Rhinelander.
The arbitration committee may accept or reject the total budget the library board proposes, or set a lower one, trustees said. But the formula then determines what each municipality pays.
“They’re allowed to cut our bottom line,” noted trustee Ruth Jaeger. “But they’re not allowed to backtrack and say they want to pay the shares that they had in 2026.”
Why shares shift
Even if the total budget stays flat, each municipality’s bill will change because equalized values changed. An email from the Pine Lake town clerk read aloud at the meeting made the same point. Trustee Ryan Ourada said most, if not all, of the towns saw property values rise this year, while the city saw a slight drop after a significant increase last year. Last year, trustees said, the towns’ shares fell while the city’s and county’s rose. This year the trend reversed.
“Sometimes they go up, sometimes they go down, and the formula stays the same,” another trustee said.
‘Bottom line’ or shares?
Several trustees said they had understood Hess’s motion as a 0% increase — holding the total budget at the 2026 level — with the formula still applied. Asked why the issue wasn’t corrected at the time, library director Virginia Roberts said, “When you’re working with a contract, you expect people to behave within the contract.”
Trustees noted the district also went to arbitration two years ago. That motion approved a bottom-line figure, and no follow-up session was needed.
Numbers in advance
The board directed that each municipality receive a copy of the contract before Nov. 10, along with a spreadsheet showing the 2026 total budget with the contract formula applied to current values. Roberts, who was called into the meeting partway through, said she has prepared multiple budget scenarios in past years, but neither the towns nor the board asked for this version at the Oct. 27 session.
Ourada urged the board to give town representatives side-by-side figures — the proposed budget, last year’s budget and each town’s resulting share — so they can see the direct impact on their municipality. He also noted the library’s proposed increase is well below increases in general operating costs.
Concern over cuts
Trustees worried the towns could respond by cutting the library’s total budget until their own shares land where they want them. Roberts said a town official told her on the way out of the Oct. 27 meeting that the towns would cut the library’s budget by 5%.
“Just keep in mind, in the municipal arbitrations, they hold all the cards,” she said.
Whether the board could accept town contributions that don’t follow the contract formula remains an open question. One speaker asked whether doing so would be allowable and said the board may need guidance.
City representation
Trustees also raised the city’s lack of a clear voice at the Oct. 27 session. The mayor did not attend, and the city’s stand-in, interim administrator Adam Gitter, abstained because he was unsure whether he had been officially appointed. Trustees said they want a city representative at the Nov. 10 session.
Contract up for review
The trustees also discussed the district agreement itself. One trustee said the copy she received is dated 2005 and is reviewed every 10 years; it was last reviewed in 2016 and is due again in 2026. Any change requires the agreement of all member municipalities, along with state review and a county vote, trustees said. Hess said Oct. 27 he wants to discuss a new funding formula with the library board after the holidays.
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