The Polk County Commissioners met on Tuesday morning and approved a large gathering permit for another Johnny Holmes Dance at the Maple Lake Pavilion on May 24. They also approved establishing new funds to streamline the financial department.
PLANNING AND ZONING –
Jacob Snyder of Polk County Planning and Zoning came before the board to request approval of a large gathering permit from River Bottom LLC to host the Johnny Holmes Band on May 24th at the Maple Lake Pavilion, again this year. Erickson’s Smokehouse will provide food and beverages this year with a crowd of up to 1,2000 allowed.
Snyder said River Bottom LLC has done a great job since taking over the Pavilion and has even installed permanent lighting in a grassy parking lot on the property. “I think this will be the fifth annual concert for Red River LLC to host the event. They do a great job,” said Snyder. “ We commend them for getting their application in, they got a certificate, insurance, and all the safety precautions to host an event like that. So that was approved today.”
The commissioners unanimously approved the permit.
The board also approved a conditional use permit for Jana Pederson for an accessory structure greater than 800 square feet. A permit for something like this isn’t the norm, as the structure is an 18-by-28-foot shed. “We usually don’t issue conditional uses for 504 square foot sheds. But when you couple that with a shed that’s already there, they can go up to a little bit different threshold if they go through the conditional use process,” said Snyder. “Once we do that, we kind of look at visibility from the lake, and is there a way that we can kind of lessen that burden if it’s sitting out in front of the cabin like this one is. And they’re kind of trying to lessen that with building it kind of in the hillside and hide that with little rock walls and things and some other vegetation they already have along the shoreline.”
The commissioners unanimously approved the permit with several conditions, including no guest house use.
JUSTICE CENTER WATER HEATER
Richard Langlois, Polk County Facilities Director, appeared before the board to request approval of a change order for a water heater at the Polk County Justice Center. The project has been shut down since late March because a larger water heater pump is needed than what was going to be installed. Brent Dammann of Widseth said they need a larger circulation pump that they were going to install because of pressure loss. Dammann said the county will pay for the new pump, but Widseth will cover the additional costs incurred outside the pump. “The pumps that were sized for this project, it’s been determined after the contractors got into it a little bit that they were going to be undersized,” said Langlois. “The proposals came back to upgrade these pumps in order to run the system properly and without glitches, that’s where we’re sitting right now.”
Langlois said that once the pumps are in place, the project should go smoothly. “After we get moving again here, it should go very well. Everything is set in place. It’s just a matter of hooking everything up and getting things going,” said Langlois. “All in all, it’s a good project. What they started on turned out really nice. It’ll be efficient, and it’ll just be a good savings on utilities and whatnot.”
The cost for the pumps will be $8670, and the commissioners unanimously approved the purchase.
FINANCE DEPARTMENT
Polk County Finance Director Stacy Grover asked the board to approve adopting a Capital Asset policy. “The capital asset policy just really directs how we depreciate capital assets, and we’re just upping the limits so we’re not capitalizing, having to depreciate things that are not worth the value and the time anymore,” said Grover. “So it’s just bringing it up to more current standards.”
Grover asked for approval of the Polk County Capital Improvement and Acquisition fund. The fund will support the capital improvement plan process. “We are going to develop a capital improvement plan, a five-year plan for the board so that we can kind of prioritize projects and also determine how we’re going to fund those projects, whether it’s a public works building, infrastructure changes, computers, servers, large purchases, example, would be over 100,000,” said. “But then we can plan for how we’re going to fund it. We can have a dialogue on priorities. And where we’re going, and then, so it’ll be good.”
Grover also asked for approval to establish the Polk County Insurance Fund. The fund would move the current committed insurance fund balance from the general fund to a new insurance fund to help streamline everything. “The insurance fund currently exists. It’s just been set up as a committed fund balance on the books,” said Grover. “We’re just moving it to a new fund and just changing kind of how we track it, and that’s for property liability auto, simplifying the process a little bit. Just kind of streamlining and centralizing some of the processes that we’ve got that can be made simpler, cleaner.”
The commissioners unanimously approved all three of Grover’s requests.
