The Crookston Ways & Means Committee decided Monday night to continue offering trash and recycling service through the city. The committee had been considering a proposal from Countrywide Sanitation that would’ve taken the cost of trash and recycling from $5 a month plus bags to $16.85 a month plus taxes with optional charges for seasonal yard waste and fall/spring cleanup weeks.
Each of the council members expressed they heard more about this topic than any other with a majority saying they wanted the city to continue operating the current service. Councilman Jake Fee said younger people seemed to be more in favor of the contracted service, but that probably 80 percent of those who contacted him wanted the city’s service to continue. Councilman Steve Erickson said he also heard from a lot of people that don’t want to pay for bags and again, asked for an explanation of why there is a charge. Public Works Director Pat Kelly explained that the state passed a law in 1992/1993 for that garbage collectors are required to charge customers by either weight or volume. The city has to charge for bags at least until such a time as there is a decision to upgrade the trucks purchased to accommodate bins.
However, the council did hear from Marsha Odom, who said she preferred the bags because the bins would be too hard to move in the winter. Odom also said the best part of the service was the branch and twig collection during the summer. Councilman Bobby Baird said he didn’t hear from anyone who wanted to change the service. “Everyone I talked to wanted to keep it,” said Baird. “We’re going to put an employee on in Crookston here, there are many things to look at. I don’t believe in signing a five-year contract, there is no guaranteed prices, and the biggest thing is fall cleanup. Who is going to do it? Who is going to get the mess if there is a mess left? There’s many scenarios. The city is doing a good job now. It’s sad that we were running in the red but now we’re going to bring that up. We’re not here to make money but not we’re going to break even. But the biggest thing is it stays in Crookston. We’re adding another job and a lot of good things come out of this deal.”
The committee also discussed appointments for Mayor, and possibly for Ward 5. To begin the discussion, Acting Mayor Dale Stainbrook addressed some rumors of what he called dirty politics regarding the openings. “There was some rumors floating around that if I didn’t appoint so and so to Ward 5 they couldn’t support me as mayor,” said Stainbrook. “I said I think it’s dirty politics and I won’t play by that game. I expect that at the national level, you see it. But this is Crookston. It’s local government. We all are in the same sandbox. We need to move our city forward, our community forward and that’s where I’m going with it.”
The committee discussed opening up the mayor process with interviews but ultimately Stainbrook was nominated by Don Cavalier. Stainbrook also said that if the committee chose to do the interview process for the mayoral opening he wouldn’t apply for mayor and would return to the Ward 5 council seat. “I guess I have ran for mayor twice so that shows that I am interested in the mayor’s chair,” said Stainbrook. “I know the politics of the council. I think I run down the center of the road as far as politics as far as issues. I weigh all the facts and I just feel I’m comfortable going back to my ward seat if I have to interview for the mayor’s chair. I wasn’t going to do it, it’s not for me then.”
Councilman Tom Vedbraaten had questioned whether the council should divert from the process they’ve used previously but said after the meeting that he believes Stainbrook will do a good job. “I’m okay with that too,” said Vedbraaten. “Dale does do a good job. I heard Steve saying there too, it is a big commitment. A lot of people say this one should be mayor or that one should be mayor. You have to have the time and want to commit to it because it is a big commitment. You have to go to a lot of things. Dale’s done very good about doing that. I like to stay consistent with things if we can and we’ve done it the other way in the past by opening it up, so this is a little different. But I’m fine with this too.”
Councilman Steve Erickson said he believes the general public wants the council to move forward, have a good 2020, and get something done for the city. “I think we did the right thing,” said Erickson. “That’s a big-time job and it’s busy. He’s at meetings almost every day, a couple times a day. And he is very good at what he does. I think for somebody to walk in there for the next two years and deal with that it would take a special person. I think we did the right job by putting Dale in there. He’s highly qualified. He’s good at what he’s doing, and we need to move on as a city. We filled Ward 6 tonight and going right after Ward 5 now that we appointed him. I think that’s what the general public wants, is us to move forward, get going, have a good 2020, and get something done for the city.”
The committee voted to open the Ward 5 council seat to interested parties and have an interview committee of Ward 5 residents as they did with the Ward 6 opening. They also approved a lighting project for $48,495 for the Crookston Sports Center to upgrade to LED lights with an estimated annual savings of $10,620. The committee also tabled a discussion on sidewalk projects around Radisson Road and on 5th Avenue South so that council members could get some feedback from residents on whether they want sidewalks or not.
The meeting ended with a closed-door meeting for negotiations that wasn’t on the published agenda. However, Interim City Administrator Angel Weasner told KROX the city can do that because they say the possibility for a closed session may exist on the media notices. “We have to have a closed session we can at any time which is why we have it on every notice now,” said Weasner. “That we may have a closed session at any time. We did notice, when we went into the meeting, before we shut the door that we were closing the meeting due to the state statute.”
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