June 18, 2026
By Tim Hundt
VERNON COUNTY, Wis. – Vernon County’s Finance Committee signaled support for up to $3 million in heating, cooling and controls work at the sheriff’s office as part of an ongoing investment grade assessment of county facilities, telling Schneider Electric to design a first phase that prioritizes critical jail infrastructure and building automation across multiple buildings.
Even though the county Sheriff’s office and jail is the one of the newest county buildings (2005), the committee members said the complex has failing mechanical systems that leave the building one boiler or chiller failure away from an emergency that could threaten state compliance and force difficult decisions about where to house inmates.
“The sheriff’s department has got to be our priority.” said Supervisor Frank Easterday. “It’s a lot of money that we probably do not have, but we cannot afford to just kick the can down the road on the sheriff’s department. We have too many people involved over there, prisoners, and what do you do with them if we had no heat.”
Why the county pursued an investment grade assessment
County leaders turned to Schneider Electric after years of piecemeal fixes and growing concern that major systems at the jail, courthouse and other facilities were reaching the end of their useful life without a clear, countywide plan or solid cost estimates.
Schneider representative Conner Trepton told the committee the company was brought in to perform a detailed facilities review that goes beyond a basic audit and is intended to support long term capital planning with defensible pricing and projected savings.
Trepton said the first walkthroughs confirmed what staff had been warning for months. Boilers and chillers at the sheriff’s office are beyond their expected life, one courthouse boiler has already failed, and some older buildings still lack modern building automation, outside air controls or code compliant ventilation.
“We have found a lot of different areas for improvement.” said Trepton. “A lot of the things that we found are capital intensive items where there is probably going to be limited savings, but they are probably the most immediate pressing needs for the county.”
He said the goal of the investment grade assessment is not to design a wish list, but to match realistic project scopes to a budget number set by the county, then return with firm pricing, estimated savings and possible utility rebates.
“The best thing that we can do to eliminate cost on our side is to cut anything that we do not think is going to make it into an actual project as early as possible.” said Trepton. “Designing a $6 million project makes a $1 million project less effective, because you are going to have more tied up in that design fee.”
How Schneider was selected
While the selection process was not rehashed in detail at this meeting, Trepton reminded supervisors that Schneider was chosen after a competitive process that focused on energy and mechanical expertise rather than general construction work such as roofing.
The county heard presentations from three firms with the expertise and track record to assess county facilities, plan and implement needed repairs and improvements. Part of that asessment is meant to help the county make decisions on aging buildings they may be better off replacing rather than pouring more money into fixes.
“As part of the competitive selection process, we talked about some of the areas where we thought we presented the most value, and the roofing piece was not a part of that conversation.” said Trepton. “We provide better value on the HVAC side of things. If the county has a roofing partner you have worked with and had success with, it does not make a whole lot of sense to have us add a layer of general contract fee and design expense.”
Jail mechanical systems at center of first phase
The clearest consensus of the discussion was that the sheriff’s office should anchor the first phase of work.
Trepton said the jail has three boilers that are oversized and well past their expected life, one of which has already failed, along with two air cooled chillers from 2004 that are at or beyond their 20 year life expectancy.
“Our scope that we are proposing right now would be replacing those chillers before they reach a point of failure where you would be replacing them under some sort of emergency condition.” said Trepton. “Typically, it is better to do a planned replacement as opposed to waiting for something like that to fail.”
County Facilities Director Ryan Marx, who joined the county earlier this year, backed that assessment and warned that lead times for replacement equipment could leave the county exposed if it waits for failures.
“If we lose the one boiler, now we are in an emergency situation.” said Marx. “If you lose one of the chillers on top, you are in an emergency situation. You have three months probably before you can get a chiller to go back up there, so if you preplan and enroll in some of these energy savings programs and the VFDs (variable frequency drives) and stuff like that, it will pay for itself over time.”
Supervisors also heard that the jail’s boilers were originally installed with far more capacity than the building truly needs, in part because outside air dampers were kept nearly closed to help the system limp along.
“We had determined that if we brought in the proper amount of outside air, you would still be a little oversized, but not dramatically.” said Trepton. “You would need slightly more than one of what you have. You have three, but slightly more than one is what would be required to operate the facility.”
Building automation and one common control system
Beyond the mechanical equipment itself, Schneider is recommending that Vernon County move toward a single, modern building automation system across its major facilities, replacing the current patchwork of control platforms.
Trepton told the committee that the sheriff’s office uses an older Automated Logic system with failing boards, the courthouse runs on a dated Trane system, and other buildings such as Erlandson and the Banta building have little or no automation at all.
“The main reason why we would recommend pursuing an upgrade at the sheriff’s office would be that you could bring in the latest, most efficient tech across all four of your facilities.” said Trepton. “We would recommend that whatever the county chooses to do, you eventually move towards having one consistent building automation system through all of your facilities.”
He said the courthouse in particular suffers from dueling systems and equipment that are not fully tied into any automation, which can leave staff trying to manage rooms that swing from cold to hot during a single meeting.
“In this room I have been here a number of times now, and there are times where in one three hour meeting it might be cold in here and hot in here.” said Trepton. “Things like that, you would see immediate improvement with the building automation upgrade.”
Marx said the age and condition of the courthouse controls are already forcing staff into constant manual resets.
“I spend two to three times a week resetting stuff to get it so it talks back and forth and operates valves,” said Marx.
Schneider’s preliminary estimate for boilers, chillers and pumps at the sheriff’s office is in the range of $1.6 million to $2 million, with building automation upgrades at all four reviewed sites adding roughly $1.1 million to $1.2 million, for a combined mechanical and controls package of about $2.7 million to $3.2 million.
Trepton said the current request is not for a funding commitment, but for a target budget so his team can refine the design and bring back a project in that range with firmer costs and savings estimates.
“My ask today is that the committee starts to think about what is a reasonable budget for a first phase of work.” said Trepton. “Is this something that is too much to bite off and chew, is this size adequate for a first phase, would you want to do more than this. This is when we need to get some feedback in terms of where the county sits from a budgeting perspective.”
Roof questions and timing
The sheriff’s office roof, which Marx described as an older, specialty system now at the end of its life, also entered the discussion, but supervisors and the sheriff indicated it could likely be delayed a year to avoid tearing up a new roof while mechanical work is underway.
Marx told the committee a contractor who inspected the roof estimated replacement at roughly $450,000 and confirmed that the system is at the end of its life, despite repairs the county has already made.
“That style roof is probably at its life from the contractor I had come out there and take a look at it.” said Marx. “We have done some fixes on it. I cannot tell you how long it is going to last before we have to do more fixes on it.”
Sheriff Roy Torgerson, participating online, urged the county to focus first on the boilers and chillers but agreed the roof cannot be ignored for long.
“I do agree that the roof could wait.” said Torgerson. “But the boiler is, from what I have seen, more of a priority.”
Supervisor Bruce Kilmer said it makes the most sense to tackle the full mechanical package at the sheriff’s office before committing to a new roof.
“If you are going to do the sheriff’s office and focus on the whole thing, it makes sense to me.” said Kilmer. “You have the potential to damage a new roof if you are up there moving stuff around. With me, I would do all the chillers and stuff on the roof and everything, and then have somebody come in and do your roof work after that.”
Funding options and budget uncertainty
Finance Committee members wrestled openly with how to pay for the work and how big a number they could responsibly put in front of Schneider before they see the rest of the 2027 budget picture.
“Where is the money coming from.” said Pedretti. “I am trying to get roads taken care of right now. Are we going to give up on roads and do bonds for first phase.”
County Finance Director Anne Lockyer reminded the committee the county has just paid off the jail construction debt and used to make annual payments of about $250,000. Supervisors and the sheriff suggested that retiring that jail bond opens some room in the long-term debt load for new borrowing focused on keeping the jail functional.
“We could bond out for about five million or less and have about 250 (thousand) per year payments.” said Pedretti.
“I do not have $3 million lying around either.” said Lockyer. “We would be bonding, maybe over two years, maybe just over one year. We are likely to do a two year bond if we have to do one this year, so we are not doing this every year.”
Decision to give Schneider a $3 million target
“If we are going to do it, I think we should just try to do all of it.” said Pedretti. “I would not feel too bad if we set it at $3 million, and then it would be done. Now, we do not have to spend all that money either. They might get a real sharp pencil and surprise us.”
“We could give him a number, and we are in no way committed to it, because it has to jump through all the rest of the hoops.” said Supervisor Kevin Walleser. “But it does give you somewhere to start.”
“We would like to get the budget and design to that by the end of July, early August, so that you can incorporate this into the budget for next year.” said Trepton. “The plan is for us to be ready to present a fixed firm price contract by the end of October or early November for tentative summer construction next year.”
The Finance Committee’s final action was to give Schneider a three million dollar planning target for upgrades at the Vernon County Sheriff’s Office and its building automation systems, without yet committing to actually spend that amount.
Supervisor John Pedretti made the motion to set a three million dollar figure for sheriff’s office mechanical work and building automation, essentially telling Schneider to design within that ceiling for the first phase.
“Alright. I’ll make the motion,” said Pedretti. “Figure of $3 million for the sheriff’s building and automation.”
After discussion about whether that number would or would not include the roof, committee members clarified that the three million dollars was meant to cover the boiler, chiller and automation package laid out on Schneider’s scope sheet, not the roof at this stage. They noted that any eventual bonding package could still add roof work on top of that project amount.
“It’s just a number right now,” said Supervisor Kevin Walleser as the committee agreed the figure would guide design work but did not bind the county to spend the full amount.
Walleser then seconded Pedretti’s motion after the group confirmed the intent was a three million dollar planning figure for sheriff’s office mechanical and automation work only, with the roof to be addressed separately through future bonding and bid work.
With no further discussion, Finance Chair Kay Stanek called for the vote. The committee voted in favor on a voice vote with no one speaking in opposition and Stanek declared the motion carried.
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