John Tuthill

I’ve got a fortune cookie saying taped to the wall above my desk that I got years ago that says: “You get not what you deserve, but what you negotiate.” Wendling Quarries recently competed the acquisition and zoning of stone reserves for our Moscow Quarry.

Next Generation Reserves! Those fortune cookie words ring so true as I reflect back on the process of acquiring the properties, exploring them and then zoning. The negotiations for the acquisition of the land that was ultimately permitted by the Muscatine County Board of Adjustment on March 12th, began three or four years ago.

The Wendling team (Tony Manatt, J.C. Miller, Marc Whitman and myself) negotiated with the land owners for many a session over almost three years, before we actually lead this horse, which had as many as four heads, across the finish line. It was a hard fought negotiation that included things like future farm lease options all the way down to who got to keep the fireplace mantle.

Brain Billick and Dustin Stumma

Then came the exploration drilling, surveying, mapping and calculating. Marc Whitman’s Quarry Development team invested much time and effort in defining what the reserves were and whether or not the option that we had negotiated with the owners was worthy of executing. A thanks goes to Brian Billick and Dustin Stumma (pictured right) for all their drilling and surveying efforts on this project. In September of 2002, we decided to retain a local lawyer to help us with the zoning of the properties. No quarry has ever been zoned in Muscatine County. Our existing quarry was grandfathered by virtue of its existence since the mid-1800’s. The Special-Use permitting of a property for quarrying is a unique process of educating and negotiating with County governmental officials, neighbors, various departments within the DNR, Federal government and occasionally, the press.

I’d like to recognize a new member of the Wendling Quarry Development team, Pete Gansen (pictured below), for his talents and time in preparing many visual aids that were used in our zoning hearings.

It doesn’t seem like there is a day that goes by when you can’t pick up the paper and read about someone that is protesting something - “Nimby’s”, landfills, hog lots, new highway construction projects, and yes, quarries and sandpits. What a lot of us call progress is not always accepted by those people that have to live near it. Almost everything, that everyone of us does, everyday here at Wendling is seen by someone in the public. Those actions generate an image - our company’s image to the public. That image is important, because it can be the basis for some tough decisions.

It was our image and the substance behind it that led the Muscatine County Board of Adjustment to a unanimous vote in favor of our Special-Use request. Yes, a lot of hard work, preparation and education, but ultimately, I believe, a lot of the decision process comes down to our company’s culture and image. A good company, doing good things that is in it for the long-term. So, thanks goes to all of the people at Wendling that care, they make our job of negotiating our future a whole lot easier.