In recent months the Crookston Forum, an allotment of time up to 15 minutes for citizens to address the council at the beginning of each meeting, has been utilized often and Monday was no different as to residents addressed the council. But before that, the council held the Truth in Taxation hearing, with the 2019 levy, capital improvement plan and how the City will use the tax dollars presented by Angel Weasner, finance director. The total levy is for $2,167,662 with a five percent increase ($103,222) from the 2018 levy. No one attending the meeting had any questions or comments after Weasner’s presentation.
During the Crookston Forum, the council was first addressed by Dennis Larson, who first stated the council didn’t give him an opportunity to speak at the last council meeting about a water bill, stating he thought they didn’t know what they were approving. There was an opportunity given to address the council during that public hearing regarding water charges and it was taken advantage of by one resident, Harvey Myerchin, who had $64 removed from his bill.
The rest of Larson’s address concerned litigation regarding several code violations. Larson had been through the court process and found in violation by the courts. City Administrator Shannon Stassen explained the process that would’ve preceded the City taking someone to court over code violations. “We have a property maintenance code we put in place a few years ago with progressive fines,” explained Stassen. “We always try to do everything we can to mitigate that, when it escalates to the point where things out taken care of it goes to court and at that point is out of our hands.” Eventually, Mayor Wayne Melbye thanked him for coming but told Larson there wasn’t anything the council could do at this point as the court had already ruled.
The second citizen to address the council was Roman Adams who stated he received a letter from his attorney that the City Attorney would be recommending that council approve legal action against both Adams and his father Dean, who ran for mayor in the last election. Adams stated twice that “we’ve been close to closing twice but the City has changed the terms.” Melbye informed Adams that the Ways and Means Committee would be addressing his topic during the “Other” portion of their meeting and asked if he’d be willing to readdress his concern then, which he was.
All items on both the consent agenda and regular agenda sent to KROX on Friday passed unanimously. The consent agenda included approval of the proposed minutes for the November 26 meeting and the following resolutions: to approve City of Crookston bills and disbursements in the amount of $337,365.59, to approve execution of grant agreement for the funding of the Drug Task Force 2019, to approve 2019 Calendar of Council Meetings, to adopt the Water Supply Plan for public water restrictions, to designate Election Precinct Polling Location, for UMC Ag-Arama Dance Permit – “Jacked Up” – for January 26, to amend designated depositories for public funds for the year 2018, transferring all investments from Morgan Stanley to RBC Capital Markets, LLC.
The regular agenda as previously announced included the second reading and final passage of City Ordinance No. 76 and No. 77 for electric franchise fees with Ottertail Power Company and Red Lake Electric Cooperative, INC; second reading and final passage of Ordinance No. 78 for gas franchise fee with Great Plains Natural Gas Company; and resolutions adopting the 2019 budget, adopting property tax levy for taxes payable in 2019 and adopting five-year capital improvement plan for years 2019-2023.
Not included in the agenda sent to the KROX and a part of the amended minutes to open the meeting were public hearings for 117 Washington Avenue regarding a hazardous building, a sidewalk improvement fee, and Ordinance 116.01-116.03 which establish licensing requirements for plumbers. After no one was present for the public hearings, the topics moved to the regular agenda where both assessments were adopted, and the ordinances amended.
KROX News Director Rob Silvers asked the Council “why the media had not been notified of the changes in the agenda” as members of the council, often Mayor Melbye has stated the media is their tool for getting information to the public. Weasner said the public hearings had originally been omitted in error but had been on previous agendas, which is true, on the November 26 consent agenda, which passed unanimously (which means the hearings were listed on the agenda but never actually mentioned). Silvers said, “if you’re making us responsible for getting the information out to the public, we should probably be given the updated information the public needs to know even if it’s a late change.”
Melbye did admit, “this is another area we [the City] have got to get better in.”
