Damakant Jayshi
Wausau could eliminate its humane officer and shift those responsibilities to multiple part-time police employees, under a proposed animal control model under consideration.
The Human Resources Department and Committee will examine the hiring portion of the proposal, after a recommendation earlier this week from the Public Health and Safety Committee. One alder on Public Health said he would like Ashlee Bishop, the city’s existing humane officer, retained under the new model. Bishop received a termination letter Monday, the same day as the committee meeting, with an effective date in October.
Bishop, whose role is part of the Wausau Police Department hierarchy, previously worked with the Humane Society of Marathon County. She spoke out against the proposal. A former director of the HSMC, Jody Lombard, called it wrong-headed, and said the change would undo years of good work since 2013 when the position was created.
City officials point to a significant loss in revenue after the Everest Metro Police Department withdrew from an intergovernmental agreement with Wausau on animal control. The loss of revenue is just under $17K per year, or about 18 percent of the budget. EMPD withdrew from the agreement after merging with Rothschild to create Mountain Bay Metro Police Department, which will now handle the animal control in the municipalities it serves.
Public Health and Safety Committee Chair Lisa Rasmussen said that after the withdrawal, the Finance Committee directed Police Chief Matt Barnes to take a holistic analysis of the animal control program and the assess the services provided before the city infused any more money into the program to fill that void. Rasmussen said officials want to identify potential efficiencies that would help fill the income void.
Police officials have been working for months to come up with an alternative plan.
The joint presentation lists City Clerk Kaitlyn Bernarde, WPD Capt. Nathan Cihlar, and Assistant City Attorney Tegan Troutner as authors. It proposes hiring part-time civil service officers – all non-sworn officers – under the police department umbrella, who could put in more hours than the Monday-Friday regular day hours Bishop now holds to better serve residents.
These CSOs have full authority to respond to violations of municipal code and issue citations, Cihlar told this newspaper. “Any of our CSOs and sworn Police Officers that we chose may attend and become certified by the 40-hour Humane Officer course offered via the state.” At the committee, Cihlar said their proposal is based on similar models in other municipalities.
Wausau Pilot reached out to officials in several municipalities to learn more about the models they use and their effectiveness. La Crosse Deputy Clerk Sondra Craig said their animal control officer is similar to a humane officer. In Eau Claire, Public Affairs Officer Benjamin Hundt said their department recently transitioned to more full-time community service officers and fewer part-time staff. As a result, Eau Claire’s animal control officer could seek humane officer training.
Fond du Lac City Attorney Deborah Hoffman said they do not have their own humane officer but have engaged four animal rescue organizations and the FDL Humane Society for animal control services.
City Clerk Bernarde, who gave a joint presentation with Cihlar, said the new model could make the animal control program more efficient, given the loss of funding.
When the animal control program was launched in 2013, city officials thought that the revenue from the pet licensing would help cover the cost of the program, but that has not proved to be the case. The figures shared with the committee show that while the total cost of the animal control work was a little over $183,000 in 2023, the revenue collected through licensing and enforcement-related fees was around $120,000. The humane officer’s annual pay including benefits is a little over $91,000, according to the presentation.
Cihlar said the proposal could make the program budget-neutral while adding another 20 hours of duty while spreading the cost among multiple staff, each of whom would put in between 15 and 20 hours per week.
Under the new model, the police department can focus on day-to-day initial first response, or animal bite response, quarantine process, while doing the licensing piece with the clerk’s office, Cihlar said.
Opening up the discussion, Rasmussen said she was surprised by the number of the animal-related complaints still being handled by police patrol. The whole goal of the program was to relieve the pressure on the patrol but that did not happen.
“So the fact that they are involved still so much of the time, especially with everything, it’s no wonder that the contract didn’t continue,” she said, referring to the agreement between EMPD and WPD.
Pushback from HO, others
The proposal did see some resistance. Former HSMC Director Lombard and Alder Lou Larson joined Bishop pushing back against the proposal.
Lombard said that city has been doing the right thing so far in having a humane officer – a person trained by the state and licensed to do all sorts of functions, not just collect licensing fees, and play dogcatcher. Lombard said police officers lack training to deal with animals.
“I heard many complaints from officers who had a cat pee in their car…weren’t trained, weren’t interested. Some of them didn’t like cats, some of them were afraid of dogs and yet here they are doing those processes,” she said.
Lombard, who lives in Rib Mountains but attended the meeting to emphasize the importance of a humane officer’s position, said she understood the financial part needed to be addressed. But she said the citation level in the city – one of the reasons behind the new model – has gone down simply because the program might be working. “I mean, I don’t know how to prove a negative but it’s possible,” she said.
Lombard said she hopes the city can find a way to implement this new program, but retain the trained humane officer.
Bishop said she spoke with officials in Racine and Marshfield, which the WPD police officer said have community service officers. “They do have CSOs doing their animal control things; however, those CSOs are certified humane officers.”
Marshfield, with a population less than half of Wausau, has had two trained ordinance control/humane officers. Since 2023, these positions were merged with zoning administration. Now the officers split their time between zoning administration and ordinance/animal duties.
Bishop said she has been working hard in coordination with patrol officers on whom she has to depend for some reports. She is the only humane officer and cannot not be everywhere. As for Everest Metro taking primary calls related to animals, she said she was not told about those calls. She cannot access those unless she is allowed access to them.
“I work with a great group and I say this with all due respect: They don’t know or understand the animal laws the way that somebody can be trained to do that because they have that specific training,” Bishop said, adding that police officers should not be expected to take training to deal with animals “because they have more important things, by the way, with the people.”
Alder Larson said he was not convinced the proposed model before them was the right approach on animal control. He voted no on sending the matter to the HR Committee. However, he requested that Bishop have a place in the new model. When asked whether she would accept the humane officer position at a reduced salary, Bishop did not directly answer the question but told this newspaper: “I am dedicated to animal welfare and making sure that the animals in the community are safe and the community is safe from animals.”
After alders Bishop, Lombard and the alders had spoken, Captain Cihlar again rose to address some of the questions. He said the drawbacks of having one person is that the knowledge base goes away if that person leaves and, as such, all the institutional knowledge ends up being with one person. He reiterated his earlier position that a team of multiple part-timers could do a more effective job – under the supervision of senior officers – on animal control.
This newspaper asked him if that logic applied to Community Outreach Specialist Tracy Rieger’s employment that might suggest her job was at risk in the future. Rieger, who like Bishop is a city employee but works at the Wausau Police Department, has received high accolades for working on homelessness in Wausau and trying to get permanent house to the unhoused population in the city. Like, Bishop, Rieger is the only employee of the kind in the city but often has to work together with sworn police officers.
Cihlar said the proposal to dissolve the humane officer’s position was connected to the “new reduced budget reality” and rejected the comparison between the positions.
“The position discussed is a licensing and enforcement position,” he told Wausau Pilot & Review. “Tracy Rieger’s position is more akin to a professional social worker role (and paid as such). It’s not a law enforcement role and not a suitable comparable for the Humane Officer role.”
Rieger’s position has been supported through the American Rescue Plan Act funds. Last month, the Wausau City Council renewed her contract through Dec. 31, 2026. Rasmussen told this newspaper that COS position was timed – along with 12 news firefighters’ position funded through ARPA – such that when the ARPA funding runs out, “they will be funded from the gain in the levy from the closure of TID #6 that will be returning the full growth increment to the general fund at that time.”
