The Crookston Public School District held a public Community meeting on Wednesday night in the Crookston High School Auditorium to hold its final public meeting about its multiuse complex stadium that is planned to begin construction during the 2022-23 School Year.
Interim Superintendent Dave Kuehn began the meeting by sharing some history of the district’s decision to build the complex, saying that the school never had its own home field, and even back in the school’s beginnings, the school had students and parents walk up a dirt path to a field called Lincoln Field. It wasn’t until 1996 that the high school partnered with the University of Minnesota to use their stadiums and fields instead for football games and track meets. But it never quite felt like a home stadium with it never utilizing the school’s colors or any Pirate’s logos and signs, and over time, the college stopped using and maintaining their football field and track, which caused issues for the school teams, but they are unable to fix the problems themselves with the school’s money due to it not being their property.
Kuehn then showed the proposal for the project, saying the complex would be on the property northeast of the high school, next to the tennis courts, which will have an artificial turf field, an 8-land Track, a press box, concessions, and bathrooms. He explained that the artificial turf is much easier to maintain and has extended usability during wet/snowy seasons, and if it needs to be replaced, they can use the school’s Long-term Facility Maintenance or general funds to complete it.
Superintendent Kuehn then went into the budget summary of the complex, saying the proposal for the project would be $3,915,000 and said that if the prices of construction materials would go up due to inflation, the school would find ways to cover those rather than raising the amount the public would vote on. He noted that the school would save over $400,000 in the construction of the concessions and bathrooms building by having the school’s CTE class assist in its construction as part of its curriculum. He explained that the funding sources would have 36% of the referendum funded by the state thanks to the Ag2School Credit State Aid. Other funding sources were for Ag Land & Farmers to pay 15%, commercial and industrial businesses would cover about 18%, and the final 31% being covered by resident taxes and other sources. Kuehn then revealed the Preliminary Tax Estimate Information with the differing tax impacts of how much each person will have to pay in differing living conditions. He brought forward one of the school’s financial advisors, Ehlers Senior Municipal Advisor Jeff Seeley, to explain the impact of the Ag2School Credit State Aid on the farmers’ taxes. “For school building bonds, farmers on the Ag property will be seeing the Ag2School Credit. It was implemented in Pay 2018 at 40%, and it’s been increased going into Pay 2023, the upcoming tax year, to 70%. From last year’s taxes to this year’s, it’s going from 60% to 70%,” Seeley explained. “Farmers are going to see a reduction for that particular tax on school district debt service of an extra 10% over last year. So even with the passage of the proposed bond referendum, their overall tax will decrease on the school debt portion.” Seeley noted that there could still be changes in evaluations with the city or levees, but aside from them, farmers would see a reduction on the Ag Land regardless of whether the referendum passed. Saying it would drop from $1.25 to $.90 if it does not and to $1.08 if it does.
The table for that and the estimated Change in Taxes from 2022-23 can be seen below.
Keuhn then invited Activities Director Nate Lubarski to give more information about the referendum, who mentioned that it could hold associated softball games on the turf and baseball practices on it, and even for other teams around the area looking for a field to play on. He then gave a comparison to Moorhead Public School’s Turf, which is used for about 67 games and 90 practices a year with PE Classes out on it for nearly seven hours a day, then used it for football practices and a JV and Varsity game later that day for a total of 14 hours. Along with those, they used it for marching band practices, youth football games, and other varsity and JV sports games and practices. He also noted that for the past five years, the school has held its track meets at East Grand Forks High School, which has started to charge the school a $500 rent for using it for meets. He also noted that due to a lack of a proper home track, the school has had to pass up hosting section track competitions that would bring in a lot of business for the town. And the football field at UMC, the weather made it very difficult to play and would require major maintenance and repair in the near future. He also explained that the field could also be used to hold youth flag football programs during the summer and fall. Retired Crookston farmer Allen Dragseth voiced his thoughts about the referendum in how it could be used to encourage people to stay in the city with more events happening in it rather than having to go out to other fields and schools to hold their home games. “I think it’s really important to the whole city because the school district has been shrinking for years. There are a lot of teachers at UMC, but very few of them live in Crookston. Some of the teachers in the Crookston School District don’t live in Crookston, and other people that take jobs in town here,” said Dragseth. “If their kids have got a full-rounded athletic complex to have their kids to go to, I think that’ll enthuse people to stay in Crookston, which will help the whole city.” When an audience member asked about how much the college charged the school to use their turf and about repairing the track, Kuehn explained that the base of the track was destroyed, and they would have to repair the entire track and not just the two damaged lanes, and they can’t use their Long-Term Facilities funds to do that.
Kuehn then went into a conversation about the artificial turf vs. natural grass that was discussed at the meeting on July 27. He noted that the artificial turf would be much easier to maintain over a natural grass field, and the turf would only have to be replaced every ten years, which they could use their Long-Term Funds for. One audience member mentioned that this spring’s weather caused the sports teams’ practices and games to be delayed until May 3 rather than March due to the wet fields.
Keuhn then opened the presentation to the public for any questions they had. When asked about why the Concessions and bathroom building cost over $600,000 to create (if they didn’t include the CTE class’s help), John Holten of Zerr Berg Architects answered that they had looked at other referendums and took a rough square footage estimate of one and multiplied it to the estimates that they had to make it the price they proposed. When asked about the timeline for the complex, Holten explained that if it is voted on next week, they would begin designing the complex with the school district, install turf by next summer, and complete the construction by the fall of 2023.
This is the last public meeting the school district held about the facility for the public. The vote on its construction will be included on the primary election on Tuesday, August 9, from 7:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. at the St. Paul’s Lutheran Church for Crookston wards 1, 2, and 6, and the First Presbyterian Church for wards 3, 4, and 5. “I think people need to be informed and go out and do their due diligence of voting with what they believe in. I think we’ve provided a lot of good information about what we see as a benefit to the school and the community. There are two voting sites that people can go to vote in Crookston on August 9, and we’re trying to provide some information if you still need to get an Absentee ballot, but you’re running short on time for that,” said Dave Kuehn. “We’ve provided information, and it’s time to go to the polls on Tuesday and have our community give us an answer. The next steps will depend on the answer, and we feel good about what we’ve done to inform people that wanted to be informed about what this project is about and what the benefits are.” Absentee ballots can be mailed to your house by going to www.mnvotes.org and entering your address to have them mailed to your home if you cannot make it to either voting area. If you have any questions about the facility’s construction and planning, you can contact Interim Superintendent Dave Keuhn at 218-281-5313. Rendered pictures of the complex and a table of the Preliminary Tax Estimate Information can be seen below. If you would like to see the proposed plan for the referendum and use the Tax Impact Calculator to learn exactly how much you’ll be paying for the project. You can go to www.crookston.k12.mn.us/district-proposedreferendum.
