The Crookston Housing and Economic Development Authority (CHEDA) Board met on Tuesday morning. The board authorized Executive Director Craig Hoiseth to apply for a grant from the USDA for rural business development using $100,000 of the funds allocated to CHEDA last year by the Crookston City Council.
Hoiseth said the application, due by the end of March, would likely be to establish a low-interest loan program for businesses, which could be significant given the current dynamics of the evolving coronavirus situation. “The USDA has a program for rural business development,” said Hoiseth. “There is a grant we’re going to go for, and the board has authorized me to make the application. Essentially, what we’re doing there is trying to leverage some of the dollars the city gave us for community investment, seeing if we can’t match those, dollar for dollar, and get a program where these grant dollars could help our businesses in Crookston probably with a very low-interest loan program. We see a lot of dynamics right now with the coronavirus, and we think there are going to be some businesses in need of some monies this summer, and that would be a fantastic opportunity if we can see that materialize.”
Hoiseth said the key to being successful with these types of grant applications is to score as many points as possible during the application grading process and explained how he thinks CHEDA could do that successfully. “Likely, our application will include a request from USDA of about $99,000 because you score more points if you’re under a $100,000 ask,” said Hoiseth. “Our leverage would probably be more than that because that gives us more points if we’re incurring more than a 50 percent match. It’s all about points and trying to get a successful grant application put in.”
The CHEDA Board also discussed the land options for the Colborn Property and the need to have legal descriptions of the parcels for land option agreements. While CHEDA owns two-thirds of the property, the City of Crookston, which owns the other third, is the controlling entity. Hoiseth told the board that the estimates to survey the property were anywhere between $8,000 to $10,000 and that a decision needed to made who was going to initiate the process. “We’ve been talking about the parcel of land known as the Colborn Property for quite a while, and everybody seems to agree that we are going to go with the 60-acre option for Epitome Energy, 10-acres for the Ag Innovation Center, and about six acres for Vertical Malt,” said Hoiseth. “What that means is we need to parcel out that property, have a land survey, and get the legal descriptions done so that we can get land options and purchase agreements in place. My thrust today was simply to accelerate that process because our customers need that and get that work for legal descriptions wrapped up.”
The board put the onus to move forward on the City Council before moving on to discuss the infrastructure needs. Hoiseth explained that the request had been scaled back to just the land for Vertical Malt and the Soy Innovation Campus. The two businesses ready to break ground shortly. With that, the Capital Investment Committee had suggested the City of Crookston apply for a Business Development Public Infrastructure (BDPI) grant that is more for projects of that size. “As you know, we were talking with our Representative Deb Kiel and Senator Mark Johnson about carrying a bonding bill forward for some infrastructure,” said Hoiseth. “The Capital Investment Committee said our request was pretty small and there was probably a program in place that could probably suffice those needs called the BDPI grant. We’re going to put forth an application from the City of Crookston, taking the lead on that, to get the grant-funded. That will require some city matching dollars as well, but it seems to be a program that will get us road, water, and sewer into that Colborn Property this year.”
FOOD SHELF DISCUSSION
The board also discussed looking at a more permanent, larger location for the food shelf in Crookston. After a discussion about the need for a food shelf in Crookston, the board unanimously authorized Hoiseth to use up to $6,000 to pay for a year of rent for a larger location if a suitable one can be found working with the food shelf. Councilman Tom Vedbraaten, who did vote in favor of the expenditure, voiced he didn’t want to get into a situation where it was an annual payment for the location. He also expressed that if they get this going and then in a year, the food shelf closes down that is going to go over well in the community either. The funds used would be through the incubation funds available through the program CHEDA uses from the rent from the Valley Technology Park.
The board discussed that a more prominent location might be needed to meet the needs of the community and could garner more volunteers, said Hoiseth. “Since the food bank left Crookston last year that left a void for a food shelf,” said Hoiseth. “The Care and Share as you know have stepped up to the plate hosting a food shelf to embark, but we’ve been looking at is that the best spot for it on a full-time, long-term basis. Our discussions have said that if we’re able to find a better spot to serve the community better and allow volunteers and different things to go there that we would move forward. The CHEDA Board did approve staff to expend some resources if needed to get a new food shelf location secured.”
The board also discussed the sale of inventory from Cofé, which the CHEDA Board now controls after the business closed. The board expressed a desire to sell it all to one buyer but elected to put the search for a buyer on hold due to the uncertainty around COVID-19. A rehab loan was approved to Dean Adams for 416 Central Ave. The loan is for $50,000 with a one-year term at two percent and is the fourth time Adams has used the Rehab Loan Program. Finally, the board discussed a request from the Red River Valley Shows for help with repairs to their building to be able to continue holding events. However, the board determined it didn’t operate any applicable programs. CHEDA has also had its annual audit scheduled for May 4-7.
