MONROE - Salary hikes for elected officials and an economic study of the Cheese Country Trail topped the agenda at the Green County Board of Supervisors monthly meeting Tuesday.
Supervisors voted unanimously to raise salaries for the county clerk, treasurer and register of deeds. The raises goes into effect in 2013. Through 2016, salaries will be based on the previous year's amount plus the percentage increase awarded to all county department heads.
Starting next January, the base annual salary for the county clerk is rising 2.7 percent to $62,000. Salaries for the treasurer and register of deeds will increase 10.6 percent to $57,800.
County clerk Mike Doyle said the raises are in keeping with averages at counties around the state and take into consideration differences in benefit packages. Lafayette County employees, for example, don't pay into their retirement plans. Green County employees do.
"It's hard to compare counties," he said.
Art Carter, board chair, said the increased salaries are fair compensation for the responsibility and will encourage good people to run for office.
"We're asking quite a bit of these folks," Carter said.
The Cheese Country Trail pulled $12 million tourist dollars into a tri-county area from November 2010 to October 2011, according to a study presented at the board meeting by Cara Carper of Green County's University of Wisconsin-Extension. She presented the 12-month study of the trail as part of UW-Extension's 2011 Annual Report.
The trail covers ground from Monroe in Green County northwesterly across Lafayette County and Iowa County. It's open to ATVs, snowmobiles, bicycles and horses.
UW-Extension couldn't afford to spend money on the study, she said, so it enlisted the help of volunteers to observe, track and interview trail users in two-hour shifts. In all, volunteers logged 1,400 hours on the project - in all weather, through snow and rain, from bitter cold winter days to 100-degree summer scorchers.
Weekends and holidays saw the highest usage, with 200 people observed on the trail in a two-hour period during the year's peak.
"At some times the trail is very, very heavily used," Carper said.
Two-thirds of trail users traveled from outside Green, Lafayette and Iowa counties, but mostly from the Midwest. The typical non-local user spent $175 to $220 per trip. In total, the study showed the trail infused the counties with $15 million, with $12 million of that from out-of-area users.
Carper says she plans to release the full details of the study to the public within two weeks.
More on Tuesday's Green County Board meeting will be published Thursday.
Supervisors voted unanimously to raise salaries for the county clerk, treasurer and register of deeds. The raises goes into effect in 2013. Through 2016, salaries will be based on the previous year's amount plus the percentage increase awarded to all county department heads.
Starting next January, the base annual salary for the county clerk is rising 2.7 percent to $62,000. Salaries for the treasurer and register of deeds will increase 10.6 percent to $57,800.
County clerk Mike Doyle said the raises are in keeping with averages at counties around the state and take into consideration differences in benefit packages. Lafayette County employees, for example, don't pay into their retirement plans. Green County employees do.
"It's hard to compare counties," he said.
Art Carter, board chair, said the increased salaries are fair compensation for the responsibility and will encourage good people to run for office.
"We're asking quite a bit of these folks," Carter said.
The Cheese Country Trail pulled $12 million tourist dollars into a tri-county area from November 2010 to October 2011, according to a study presented at the board meeting by Cara Carper of Green County's University of Wisconsin-Extension. She presented the 12-month study of the trail as part of UW-Extension's 2011 Annual Report.
The trail covers ground from Monroe in Green County northwesterly across Lafayette County and Iowa County. It's open to ATVs, snowmobiles, bicycles and horses.
UW-Extension couldn't afford to spend money on the study, she said, so it enlisted the help of volunteers to observe, track and interview trail users in two-hour shifts. In all, volunteers logged 1,400 hours on the project - in all weather, through snow and rain, from bitter cold winter days to 100-degree summer scorchers.
Weekends and holidays saw the highest usage, with 200 people observed on the trail in a two-hour period during the year's peak.
"At some times the trail is very, very heavily used," Carper said.
Two-thirds of trail users traveled from outside Green, Lafayette and Iowa counties, but mostly from the Midwest. The typical non-local user spent $175 to $220 per trip. In total, the study showed the trail infused the counties with $15 million, with $12 million of that from out-of-area users.
Carper says she plans to release the full details of the study to the public within two weeks.
More on Tuesday's Green County Board meeting will be published Thursday.