The Polk County Commissioners held their first meeting of the new year on Tuesday morning, where three commissioners took their Oaths of Office, including new commissioner Mark Holy (Fifth District). The Commissioners also allocated funding for Business Relief Grants approved by the Minnesota Legislature and signed by Governor Tim Walz in December.
According to the legislation, a business must demonstrate a significant revenue loss since March 15, 2020, and have been impacted by an executive order from Governor Walz related to the COVID-19 pandemic. Polk County Administrator Chuck Whiting said the application process will work similarly to the CARES Act applications, with the county’s three largest cities collecting applications. “We received $622,000 of state money to process, similar to how we did the CARES money,” said Whiting. “It’s not exactly the same, but that’s state funds to get out to local businesses affected by the pandemic. Like we did with CARES, we divided the monies between the Cities of East Grand Forks, Crookston, and Fosston with a pool left over for the businesses in the rural county areas.”
Whiting said the application should be finalized and published in the coming days. “People interested should watch the county’s website or one of the three cities’ (websites), depending on which one they are closes to,” said Whiting. “You’ll be able to download an application. Put in the appropriate information and contact information. And submit it to one of the three cities. The application will tell you which one to apply to. You’ll have to state how the pandemic has adversely affected your business. The deadline will be sometime towards the end of the month or the first week of February.”
Just as with the previous CARES Act funding, each city will recommend the grant allocations to the County Board, who will then hold a vote to approve those grants. “The staff will review it with their governing bodies (in the three cities) and get it back to me,” said Whiting. “Then, the hope is the County Board will act on grants to be awarded in February. The applications are still being worked on, but we’ll post it just like we did with the CARES money once we’ve got it. The easiest place to go is to start with the County’s website, but if you’re familiar with the East Grand Forks, Crookston, or Fosston websites, it will be posted there as well.”
The $622,143.05 was approved to be distributed with $200,000 each to businesses in the Cities of Crookston and East Grand Forks, $120,000 for businesses in the City of Fosston, and $100,000 for businesses in rural Polk County. An additional $2,143.05 remains to be determined as needed.
OATH OF OFFICE/NEW OFFICERS
The Oath of Office was administered by Ninth Judicial District Court Judge Corey Harbott to new Commissioner Mark Holy and returning Commissioners Gerald Jacobson (First District) and Gary Willhite (Third District), who won reelection in November.
Holy won the Fifth District race over former State Representative Tim Finseth, replacing Don Diedrich, who retired after serving four terms (16 years) as the Fifth District Commissioner. Holy said he’s thankful to be elected and interested in dealing with water issues in the county. “I’m thankful to be involved,” said Holy. “It will be interesting, and a lot of education needs to happen here, but I’m willing to take on the task and go forward. Water is an issue for me on both sides. We’ll work through that process. I farm, so drainage is a concern, and also DNR type stuff – wetlands and safety of our public waters – is also very important to me.”
The board also elected Gerald Jacobson as the Board Chair for 2021 and Joan Lee (Fourth District) as the Vice-Chair. Jacobson said it has been a while since he’s been the chair, but the board will get back in a groove with the new year. “It’s kind of a new challenge for me now,” said Jacobson. “I haven’t been the chair now for probably seven years. We have our agendas and things that come up that are very interesting – talking about the COVID and possible money coming out. We’re back in the groove, and we’ll be setting our plan forward as we go forward, I guess.”
The Commissioners also reviewed their committee assignments, explained Jacobson. “Don retired, of course, and Mark Holy took most of his assignments,” said Jacobson. “For the most part, that went very smooth.”
It was also noted that the long-awaited replacement of the outdated and sometimes out-of-commission elevator at the Polk County Government Center was completed Tuesday morning and now operational for those needing to conduct business at the facility.
