Oneida County zoning approves contested Cassian sawmill project

Following a March 4 public hearing, the Oneida County Planning and Development Committee has approved a conditional use permit for a proposed sawmill operation in the town of Cassian, overriding objections from nearby residents but attaching conditions to address concerns about noise, water use, and closeness to neighboring homes.

John Lawrence, owner of Stettin Properties LLC, plans to operate a sawmill on a 40-acre parcel south of Rocky Run Road and west of U.S. Highway 51. The site was rezoned in 2025 from residential farming to Forestry 1B, a district that allows full-time forestry operations with a conditional use permit (CUP). 

Committee members approved the permit on a unanimous vote after addressing two central conditions. Supervisors increased a proposed buffer between the mill and neighboring properties from 25 feet to 200 feet along the south and west property lines, and also required that water used to spray logs come from an on-site retention pond rather than a well. 

The decision came after neighbors raised concerns ranging from traffic safety and industrial noise to potential impacts on groundwater and respiratory health.

Lawrence’s plan envisions a multi-phase forestry product manufacturing operation that would process timber into wholesale lumber products. In a staff report, Oneida County land use specialist Scott Ridderbusch said the initial phase would prioritize log storage, with sawmill construction planned for 2027 and possible kiln-drying operations later.

Landscape bark and sawdust will also be offered for sale, Ridderbusch said. The facility would employ 25 to 30 employees, the report estimates, with hours of operation from Monday through Friday, 6 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Minimal customer traffic is expected, about two customers a day, but the proposal would entail significant log-hauling, and, for neighboring residents, that was one point of contention.

“John [Lawrence] anticipates up to a hundred deliveries a week taking place Monday through Saturday at any given point within a 24-hour period, meaning his proposed operation for deliveries is 24 hours a day on Monday through Saturday,” Ridderbusch told the committee.

The site plan provided to the county showed development concentrated in the northeastern portion of the parcel, with the remainder of the property left largely forested, Ridderbusch said. He added that the parcel is currently enrolled in Wisconsin’s Managed Forest Law program, and portions of the land would need to be withdrawn before development could proceed.

Rocky Run Road would provide the site access, not Highway 51.

According to Ridderbusch, Lawrence has been coordinating with the town of Cassian on road improvements to accommodate tractor-trailer traffic, and he said the DOT had no concerns with the proposed access, so long as no direct access to Highway 51 would be permitted. 

Lawrence clarified during the hearing that the road upgrades had already been completed.

“The Rocky Run is new this past summer, and it was built to standards to hold heavy trucks and stuff,” he said. “What we’re going to be doing with the township — and we’ve already submitted a contract with them — is to bond the road. So that’ll be covered during the spring thaw period so that if there is any damage, we’re still going to be responsible.” 

Neighbors voice concerns

While the town of Cassian submitted no objections, that wasn’t the case with constituents who live near or by the site. Several residents raised concerns at the hearing about the project’s potential impacts.

Noise from trucks and equipment, water, lights — all were major concerns. One neighboring property owner, who said his home lies directly west of the proposed sawmill, pointed in particular to the proposed allowance for 24-hour deliveries and the noise associated with them: “I don’t know how you deliver a load of logs quietly,” the resident said. “I don’t think anybody else does, either.”

Molly Petts worried about her family’s potential exposure to health hazards.

“My husband and I chose to accept a job promotion on his part and moved to the Northwoods three years ago,” Petts said. “We fell in love with this area on summer vacations, and his family is originally from here, and we always planned on retiring here. So we jumped at the chance to make this our home sooner rather than later, with the inventory of houses on the low side, which we all know.”

Petts said she and her husband felt lucky to purchase their home with over two acres and to be able to live surrounded by trees and nature. But she wondered how long that would last.

“I don’t know that I would be at this meeting if it weren’t for the fact that this proposed sawmill will be built just hundreds of feet from my home, but out of all the vacant land in that area, this parcel was chosen and now not only directly affects my home, but also the homes of my neighbors,” she said.

Petts said she had multiple concerns.

“I have read several articles, and they speak to the health hazards of respiratory exposure when living near a wood industry facility, which can lead to a higher risk of respiratory illnesses, especially in children, of which I have two,” she said. 

Highway safety was another issue, Petts said.

“The proposal also states a five-day a week operation with a six-day a week delivery possibilities, including 24-hour delivery,” she said. “That will increase the already prevalent number of lumber trucks on 51, which is already a dangerous and often congested stretch of highway, as we are all aware, having lived here. There are multiple traffic accidents every year on that stretch of road, and some of those collisions and accidents have been fatal, and that’s me only living here for three years.”

The size and depth of any well that would be drilled and the water usage at the site concerned Petts, too.

“If a deeper well is drilled, how will that draw off of our surrounding well?” she asked. “What will happen if all of a sudden my well doesn’t have water? That makes my property unlivable.”

Even with the proposed conditions, Petts said her and her neighbors’ properties would be affected by noise, dust, traffic, disturbance of wildlife, decreased property values, and the uncertainty of the effects of a well drawing off their water tables.

Maggie Frost, who lives on Rocky Run Road, said she was worried about increased truck traffic and safety along Highway 51, among other concerns, and called for an environmental impact assessment.

“I’m against this for the water reason, for the noise reason, the traffic reason,” Frost said. “My husband himself was almost killed once, turning left onto Rocky Run Road, and our friends a little farther north did get killed last summer, turning left. So, traffic there is going to be a problem.”

Frost worried about a dry well, too. 

“I want to know what would be the environmental impact if our well goes dry,” she said. “Also, are you going to reimburse us if we get sick? Nothing was said about chemicals. Are they ever going to be restricted from treating the wood? Is it going to be treated? I heard kiln, but I don’t know enough about that industry being a nurse.”

What she did know is that there would be health risks, Frost said.

“There are the respiratory, potential chemicals, the noise, constant noise,” she said. “And we hear the beeping from the forklifts from Peterson’s, which is a quarter mile away. We hear that. We hear it sometimes since we’ve lived here 30 years, even at four in the morning. So the noise travels. Having it be 25 feet from our lot line, … it’s going to be very loud. For us at night, this quality of life issue is terrible.”

This is where she and her husband want to live, Frost said.

“I mean, we’re retired now,” she said. “Our kids want to live here because they grew up here. We have 20 acres, and it seems like our town board doesn’t care about the people, just about business, and sometimes the people matter. So I’d like an environmental impact assessment.”

If not, Frost said she had contacted lawyers and promised Lawrence that, if the project were realized, she would be vocal about every issue that came up.

Lawrence defends project

For his part, Lawrence responded to many of the concerns raised during the hearing. For one thing, he said nighttime log deliveries are sometimes necessary due to seasonal conditions in the logging industry.

“Things are thawing out during the day,” Lawrence said. “So right now it’s warming up. We pile wood in the woods. We do logging. So the top gets slimy, gets muddy. So right now our trucks are parked. And so we have six log trucks. They’ll leave home at midnight. They’ll go to the woods, they’ll get a load, and they’ll be at the mill at two in the morning. This is what we currently do now at our mill that we have.”

If you see directly to the east of his current facility in Marathon, Lawrence said, there’s actually a house about 300 feet from his sawmill, and the neighbors have no concerns.

“We have a really good relationship with them,” he said. “We’ve been doing this since 2009, but the short story is that’s why we have to haul at night when things get warm during the day. We have to haul while it’s frozen.”

Lawrence also addressed concerns about water use. He said the facility would rely primarily on a recirculating system using water from a retention pond to keep logs moist.

“[At the current sawmill] we get the water from the retention pond that’s on the south end, and then we recirculate it,” he said. “So there’s a pump there by the pond. It sprinkles the logs, and then the water runs back to the retention pond.”

If the company ever needed a bigger well, Lawrence said it would have to be state-approved. It would be a normal residential well, not a high-capacity one, and he also said the operation would not involve chemical treatment of lumber.

Committee debates buffer, noise

After public testimony concluded, the committee turned its attention to the proposed 25-foot buffer separating the facility from neighboring property lines. Several supervisors said the distance seemed inadequate, and the discussion quickly turned to expanding the buffer substantially.

Supervisor Dan Hess asked Lawrence how much he could expand the buffer.

“Could you do a 100- or 200-foot buffer zone and that’s part of the restrictions unless you came back and asked for more?” Hess asked.

Zoning committee chairman Scott Holewinski intervened, saying Lawrence could come back and ask for an amended CUP, and the neighbors would also be able to weigh in.

“If it was 200 feet — and it sounds like it’s going to take quite a few years to develop — and if he wants to get more of that 200 feet, he has to come back and amend the CUP, and we see how the neighbors feel about that,” Holewinski said.

Supervisor Bob Almekinder thought a 100-foot buffer sounded reasonable, and, at first, Holewinski leaned in that direction, too.

“Let’s just say we’ve got a hundred-foot buffer only, and if he wants to go closer, he has to come and amend a CUP, which could be years down the road,” Holewinski said. “And also, if there’s complaints from the neighbors about the 100-foot, then we could amend it. We could bring it back and do something about the noise if it’s bothering the neighbors and he’s getting complaints. But I think if we set a 100-foot for campgrounds, the residential property line at 100 feet would be more realistic in this case, knowing that he’s only going to start [at another point] and he’s not going up to that 100-foot mark.”

Lawrence said he could work with a larger buffer if necessary, noting that initial operations would occupy only about 10 acres of the 40-acre parcel. 

Holewinski began to think a buffer zone of 200 feet might be more appropriate.

“Well, I’m going to a 200-foot myself at this point because either way he’s going to have to come back and it’s a better buffer zone than what it is,” he said. “And the idea of a CUP is, it’s an allowable use for the public hearing. We’re supposed to listen to what the comments are and try to resolve them, and I think a bigger buffer zone is addressing that. And the realization is, if it is a problem, it comes back, and we can amend or suspend or whatever if it’s too much.”

Holewinski said a 200-foot buffer gave Lawrence 1,000 feet both ways.

“That’s quite an area to start out with,” he said. “And as your business grows, and if you want to shorten that 200 feet someday, you just have to come back to amend it and then we look at it, but if there’s problems with noise, [zoning] will get the calls and then we’ll decide if we have to call another public hearing to amend, suspend, or remove.”

Supervisor Mitch Ives made a point about the noise.

“I don’t know if you guys realize his log pile is in between the sawmill and the people,” Ives said. “That is a huge sound barrier. There’s going to be a big pile of logs there, and the sound doesn’t go through that.”

Ultimately, supervisors agreed on a compromise that significantly increased the buffer zone to 200 feet.

During the discussion on traffic and appropriate placement of the operation, including access from a town road, Holewinski pointed to the town’s comprehensive plan.

“This is where Cassian wants the businesses to be, and off these roads,” he said. “You heard that the town of Cassian had no objections to it. So I think if it was an issue, the town would have brought up the town road entering on it. I don’t know if we can sit here and figure out that part of it.”

But supervisor Billy Fried said that, while the town board expressed no concerns, some residents at the public hearing raised specific concerns.

“I’ve heard public comment, and I don’t know if these comments were made at the town level or not, because we were presented a report that said there were no concerns, which is fine, but you have a property that was rezoned a year ago and now it’s being proposed for this type of use and you have some residents that live in the area,” Fried said. “And it would have been nice if some of these arguments were brought up at the town level because it gets here, and we hear that this is all good and this is what the town wants, but I just want to make sure we address concerns.”

Holewinski said the committee couldn’t tell the towns what to do. 

“If it was in my town, I would bring that up as an agenda item and make sure the neighbors would have been informed about it like we’ve done for years,” he said. “But if a town is not required to hold a public hearing, just the town board can act on it. But if people in the town want their input, they should talk to their town boards and say this is stuff that should be at the town level prior to going to the county.”

Fried also wanted to know whether a condition could seasonally limit the hours when trucks could be on the road 24 hours a day, but Lawrence said that would be difficult to implement.

“Our trucks leave early in the morning, even in summer,” he said. “They’re on the road at four in the morning. It’s just the nature of the logging industry, I guess, because you get rainy days and so you kind of got to make hay while the sun shines, so to speak.”

Committee members also discussed whether the county should require a more detailed site plan before approving the permit, with some supervisors observing that the proposal was less a finalized site design than a conceptual layout.

“I’m just not familiar if we OK CUPs without definitive site plans [showing] where everything is going to be,” Fried said. 

County staff said the project would still need approval from the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources for stormwater management, meaning details would be reviewed during later permitting stages.

Following the discussion, the committee voted unanimously to approve the conditional use permit with the amended conditions.

Those conditions include the expanded 200-foot buffer, restrictions on water use for log watering, and a range of standard zoning requirements such as parking, lighting, stormwater compliance, and screening of outdoor storage areas. 

Lawrence told the committee he intends to maintain a cooperative relationship with neighbors as the project develops.

“We’re very courteous,” he said. “We don't want a disturbance next to our own houses, so we try to do our best not to be that disturbance.”

Richard Moore is the author of “Dark State” and may be reached at richardd3d.substack.com.