The Crookston Ways & Means Committee met Monday and unanimously approved a request from the new owners of North Acres and Carmen Terrace mobile home parks. Andrew Keel and John Squartino, asked to have city garbage collection service in the parks. The parks had previously been contracted out as a commercial property. Mayor Dale Stainbrook noted that Carmen Terrace had been cleaned up and was looking nice since the change in ownership and Keel said they’d spent around $10,000 for dumpsters and cleanup of the property. “I think this is a big step for us getting the council’s approval of such a request,” said Squartino. “The tenants themselves, at the onset might not see the value in it but I know from experience it is something that will be a huge value add not just for the residents as well as the property owners.”
Public Works Director Pat Kelly said collection could begin in the mobile home parks the week of July 6 with Carmen Terrace being added to the Monday route and North Acres to the city’s Thursday garbage route. Each mobile home lot is charged individually for their water bill by the city and a garbage collection fee of $5 will be added to those bills. There is also a small RV park used primarily for seasonal workers that will be charged separately to the owners.
Next, the committee approved the renewal of a cash farm lease for 111 acres at $90 per acre for three years with the University of Minnesota Northwest Research and Outreach Center (NWROC) with an automatic renewal in 2023 with both party’s consent.
The committee reviewed and made no changes to the budget calendar for the 2021 budget process, although Councilman Jake Fee requested that a meeting be set up with the Minnesota Department of Transportation to discuss cost-sharing on a downtown sidewalk project. Weasner said the budget cycle has a long timeline before the preliminary levy can be set. “I always put out the budget calendar, so the council sees it is a very long timeline start to finish,” said Weasner. “We are currently in the process where department heads are putting together their budget. I always ask the council for their input in case they want any projects or anything added to the budget. That way it is upfront, and we know about it ahead of time because once we set our preliminary levy in September, we can’t increase the budget, it can only go down.”
And a working group of Councilmen Jake Fee, Clayton Briggs, and Don Cavalier was created to provide guidance with the final steps before bringing a new liquor ordinance regarding brew pubs, and other establishments before the City Council. “It is just to give us some guidance,” said Weasner. “We only have three council members on there, so it’s not open to the public. The information will be put out later, once we get the final determination ready to go. Each liquor establishment will get a copy of the proposed changes, so they can make any comments they want along with the council.”
The City of Crookston also received a quote for $36,983 for resurfacing tennis courts at Highland Park with an alternate option to add armor crack repair for an additional $25,677. Parks and Recreation Director Scott Riopelle was asked how long the basic resurfacing would hold up compared to adding the armor crack repair. He told the committee cracks would begin to show up again next year if just resurfaced but the information he’d been given on the armor repair had a life expectancy of 10 years.
Councilman Dylane Klatt said he’d like to see a second bid but Riopelle explained he’d attempted contacting several places and this was the only bid the city had received this year and although past bids hadn’t included the armor option, the resurfacing was comparable. Councilman Jake Fee said he thought the repair needed to be done but he wouldn’t approve a $37,000 expense if it was going to crack again next year. Councilman Bobby Baird also asked about doing a mill and overlay on the court and Interim City Administrator said past estimates put that at approximately $188,000.
Citing the fact that last year Crookston wasn’t able to get the courts redone because nobody had time later in the year, the committee unanimously approved resurfacing the courts with the armor crack repair for a total of $62,660. Fee said he thought it was a good decision to spend a little extra to do the job right. “Highland Courts have looked pretty tough for a while,” said Fee. “One option was to resurface it and within a year we’d see the cracks back again. For another $25,000, we felt it was the right thing to do fill the cracks have it last where we won’t see the cracks for many years to come. We’re hearing 10+ years before we’ll see those cracks show up again. This was one of those situations where the council said let’s spend the money, another $25,000, and do it right. It was a good action by the council tonight to get that completed yet this summer.”
Last year the city was unable to get the resurfacing scheduled so they used resurfacing funds to purchase park equipment originally scheduled for this year. Weasner said that they’ll now use the park equipment funds for this year to complete the resurfacing. “We did reserve some money from last year because we’d originally tried to complete this project last year,” said Weasner. “We utilized $30,000 of it to get some additional park equipment (a year early), so we’ll be utilizing the additional $30,000 we reserved (for park equipment this year) for this project.”
The Committee then voted to place the lot 110 Lincoln Ave, which they’d previously received from the former owner, who was unable to demolish and rebuild following a fire, up for public bid. The city demolished the home for $7,500 and the committee added a $5,000 minimum on bids. “We will be doing an advertisement with a sealed bid process with the clerk’s office to purchase the land that is 110 Lincoln,” said Weasner. “We will have a minimum bid price of $5,000. It will be open to anyone in or out of the city that wishes to put in an offer.”
