The Polk County Commissioners have approved fee increases to the licensing fees for childcare and corporate foster care. The changes were precipitated by the Minnesota Department of Human Services (DHS) taking over the responsibility of conducting background checks as the county’s will no longer be able to collect fees on background checks explains Polk County Social Services Director Peter Sedgeman. “What really raised the issue was the state changed its direction how who provides background studies for childcare providers,” said Sedgeman. “Anybody who is a childcare worker and any permanent resident of their house has to have a background study. That used to be the responsibility of the county, now the state has taken on that responsibility and those fees.”
Additionally, DHS has changed the background checks from every two years to every five years, so the decreased cost of background checks and the increased licensing fees to providers should result in a negligible change in cost to the provider over five years. “The change led us to look at our fee structure and what we’ve found is that our fee structure hadn’t been changed since 2004 and that is was not covering the cost of the program,” said Sedgeman. “Certainly, we want to have as many childcare providers in the county as we can get. But what we looked at was we needed to have a little more income then we were currently at and that’s how we came up with the numbers that were accepted today.”
Potential childcare providers applying for a new application licensing fee will have a rate of $50 for a one-year license. The renewal license, which is good for two years, will be $100. The Corporate Foster Care rate will increase to $500 for the first-year license and will have the same two-year renewal structure at $500 each renewal. There are no fees associated with family foster cares.
Also approved by resolution were the 2019 tax abatements for 20 residences in Crookston and East Grand Forks following a public hearing on Tuesday explains Director of Property Records Michell Cote. “We had our public hearing for our new construction housing abatements,” said Cote. “The County Board has an agreement with each city regarding new construction tax abatements. So, if a home is built, upon completion the owner is eligible to abate their taxes for up to two years. All the players need to participate, meaning the city involved, the appropriate school district and the county have to agree to participate for it to come to the board.”
No one was present at the public hearing, which Cote said was typical as it’s used as a piece of economic development within the communities. The abated taxes between the 20 properties total $38,464.34.
The final item approved by the board was the tax levy on 18 county ditches totaling $169,000. Depending on the ditch the levy averages from $.07 an acre to $4.94 an acre on the high end.
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