Looking at the Water situation in Trimont and what is next for the city

Transcript

Trimont School Demolition Controversy

Speaker 1 0:00

Here we are . This is Martin County Star's Newsmakers Podcast . I couldn't remember the name Newsmakers Podcast and I've got in with me Kelly Harter . And Kelly is a city clerk here in Trimont and welcome . Well , thank you for having me oh it's always fun to have you here with me .

Speaker 2 0:19

Great to be back .

Speaker 1 0:20

I was in radio , you know , for years and way back this was golly . I'm trying to think it's been at least 20 years ago I had a partner , okay , and her name was Desiree , and Desiree and I this was in Natchez , mississippi , okay , and she would come in and every time she came into the studio she would come in at 830 in the morning because she didn't want to get up early , so she would come in about 8.30 and whenever she came in I would hit the button and I'd play Wild Thing .

Speaker 1 0:49

You make my right and she would always fall for it . She would always fall for it and go , oh , that's a great song . Then it'd stop , of course , and she'd go oh , what happened ? That's your intro , that was her intro , but we had a ball , anyway , talking . That was her intro , but we had a ball , anyway , talking with her is like talking with you , oh fun we had so much fun .

Speaker 1 1:07

Oh good , we had a lot of fun together , and so it's fun to have you here with me . Well , thank you . We're going to talk about some Trimont stuff in a couple of minutes , but first a couple of things in the paper I want to look at . Yes , Before we went on , we were talking about the controversy with the school and welcome .

Speaker 1 1:24

Yes , Okay so I noticed last week they put up a for sale sign Mm-hmm , you know . So I went out and got the picture of the school with the for sale sign and I wrote the caption is it neat a school ? Yeah , you know . So I talked to Dan Schmidke , the mayor , and I called Dan and I said , okay , so what's the ?

Speaker 2 1:42

deal .

Speaker 1 1:43

Mm-hmm , Now they actually have an interested buyer and he wants to demolish the building but keep the gym .

Speaker 2 1:51

And he wants to make it cold storage .

Speaker 1 1:52

Yep , you know , and the neighbors around are not happy about this . They want it gone . You know it's an eyesore . They just want the whole thing out . And Dan said if you knew him , though , he wouldn't give his name or anything and he goes . If you knew him , you know he takes really good care of his properties and so he goes . It'll be an asset . And he said I'll do what the citizens want as far as because it'll have to be rezoned . He says I'll do what the citizens want , but I think we need to hear him out . Sure , but here's the deal he has to make an offer and buy it first before you can apply for rezoning . I said well , that's kind of I mean , that's doing things a little bit backwards in it . You know well , I'll buy it and then I'll have to go ask for permission , otherwise I'll have to resell it , mm-hmm , but he said it won't be that bad .

Speaker 1 2:38

You know it'll be a good deal . The school district may help with the demolition . You know they have funds for that already . Yes , and so they may help with the demolition . Oh , that would be great . You know they have funds for that already .

Speaker 2 2:47

Yes .

Speaker 1 2:47

And so they may help with that . Anyway , I did call Corey . She was in meetings , you know , and so it's hard to get a hold of her , but I talked to her once before about this , about a week earlier . Well , I was at the council meeting when she answered questions , yes , and she says if there's not an agreement by March 1st , they don't have a buyer they're ready to go .

Speaker 1 3:06

By March 31st they're going to start the demolition process . Oh , okay , so it's coming down . Yep , now will they keep the gym , will they not ? I mean , it goes either way . But here's my question to you , because you're the girl who's in the know we have a similar situation here . Yes , in two , three years , whatever it is , we have a new high school . We will no longer need TriMont's school , correct ? Are we going to be in the same situation where we have a building that's useless ?

Speaker 2 3:36

Very well could be . I mean , at this point we have to figure out what the options are , or the school has to figure out what the options are with it , you know , is it something that the city can buy , that we could develop ? Is it something that somebody wants the school to put something in , like this person wants to do some cold storage ? I mean , what are our options ? Options are good .

Speaker 1 4:00

Yes , okay , you may not know , so don't get too embarrassed . How much land is there ? Any amount of acreage ? It's probably about 15 to 20 acres .

Speaker 2 4:12

I honestly don't know . Okay , yeah , I don't either , I just decided to throw it out there . My guess would be 15 , but I really don't know . Yeah , it's a good amount of property though it was , though it was .

Speaker 1 4:22

Maybe it's an area that could be developed , right , but it's just I don't know . I hate seeing a school that's a decent school with a great gym , go away . It's a great building yeah , but I'm not in charge of that .

Speaker 2 4:35

Yeah .

Speaker 1 4:35

I can only be in charge of what I can be in charge of , and that's not it .

Speaker 2 4:38

Yep .

Speaker 1 4:39

So we have some new mayors in town . Well , in the community , I should say in the towns .

Speaker 2 4:45

Yes , sherwin got a new mayor , and so did we .

Speaker 1 4:48

Truman got a new old mayor .

Speaker 2 4:50

A new , old mayor , yes , yeah , yeah , us too . I know we did too .

Speaker 1 4:53

Yeah , I called Truman . I think it was Monday . I said , hey , who's your mayor ? Because I knew they didn't have anybody even to write in to you as well at the last minute . The mayor , what's his name ? Truman , jake Ebert . Jake went ahead and relented and said , yeah , put my name on the write-in ballot . He won so anyway . So congratulations to him . We have a new old mayor . Yes , you know Kevin's back . Yeah , you told me he . His lastint was in 2000 ?

Speaker 2 5:25

2004, . I believe was when he ended his , so it's been 21 years since he's been mayor .

Speaker 1 5:31

Things change .

Speaker 2 5:33

Yes , and he has said that already too . I'll bet yeah so yeah , this position that I have . Even it changes so much Like every year there's new laws , there's new the law convention yeah , everything it changes all much Like every year there's new laws , there's new . Oh , I can imagine . Yeah , everything it changes all the time . It's a forever revolving door and learning all of that .

Speaker 1 5:51

I worked for the post office for a few years and that was the thing there . It was always . They would give you a . You'd have to go to attend a meeting , right , and they would tell you the new rules and stuff . We tell you the new rules and stuff . We'd always look at each other and say , yeah , okay , tomorrow's going to change .

Speaker 2 6:05

Yes , you know , a lot of times my best friend works for the post office down in Iowa and they have reports to remind them to do reports . I mean they have a ton of reports that they do every day .

Speaker 1 6:19

I have been trying to move the paper from Sherbourne to Trimont and Deb , of course is amazing . Yes , I love her dearly .

Speaker 1 6:27

She is such a great helper , but you know , they don't work in this very often , and so finding somebody who could tell me what to do has been like you know . Finally we got it worked out , though , I think so . Anyway , now the paper is dropped off in Trimont , okay , and then we've been canvassing zip codes . We started in November . We started with Trimont first , and everybody in Trimont got a newspaper for four weeks .

Speaker 1 6:56

Oh , okay , and then the last week , of course , we put in a subscription card , if you'd like to continue , and it's our way of building up subscribers , and we did well . Good , yeah , it's , and it's our way of building up subscribers , and we did well , good , yeah , yeah , it's fun , it's nice . So I started in Ceylon and Donnell and Ormsby First week . I did it . I get a call from somebody at the post office . I hire up because you can't do this and I said I don't understand . What am I doing wrong ? You know , and he , he goes . Well , your masthead , and the masthead is over here on page two . That shows us that we're a class B . You know this thing right here . Oh , okay , that we're a class B , he goes . But on your front we had the EDDM sticker , which is class C , it's bulk , he goes .

Speaker 1 7:36

So when the postmaster got it and some came back to him , he goes . We don't know what to do with it . I said , oh , so the guy on the phone . He said so , stop doing it . I said , okay , I go . But what do I do ? Because I still wanted to do it and I go . I know there's a way , come on . And he goes . Yeah , I'll get back to you . Well , that went on for like three weeks . I never heard back . Finally I talked to this guy in the cities and he goes . I said can't I just take out that blurb about being a second class ? He goes , yeah , I said , well , okay , done , done , easy as that , we pulled that out and I put in just a little blurb about you know you're getting a free paper for some weeks . Yeah , and it flew right through Nice .

Speaker 2 8:18

So there's always a way yeah .

Speaker 1 8:19

It's just sometimes one guy doesn't know what the next guy is talking about . Yeah , so anyway , yeah . So anyway we've got new council members . We have another new old council member . Bush is back on .

Speaker 2 8:32

Yes , yes , good to see him yeah .

Speaker 1 8:37

And then , looking at Sherbourne , they've got a couple of two new council members , two , yes , truman also got two new council members .

Speaker 2 8:44

Plus Sherbourne's new mayor .

Speaker 1 8:46

Yeah , yeah , yeah , new mayor . I think Donnell got a new mayor .

Speaker 2 8:49

Okay , I don't remember , I'm going to have to look .

Speaker 1 8:54

I'm so sorry . It's okay . Anyway , we have lots of new administrations , yes , so I'm sure it's a learning process , not only for you as the city clerk . Now you can learn new personalities . Yes , you know what you can or what you can't say .

Speaker 2 9:05

Learning how to deal with different personalities Exactly . What their preferences are for , how they even want their papers laid out , I'm sure yeah , and one good thing is the League of Minnesota Cities actually has an elected official training class . Oh , okay , so we signed up four of our council members that are going to actually go to that .

Speaker 1 9:31

Well , you've got several new ones .

Speaker 2 9:32

We do .

Speaker 1 9:33

Ron and Justin and Bush is not new , but those two are .

Speaker 2 9:37

Right , but Bush had never received the training .

Speaker 1 9:41

So he's going . Oh , that's a good idea .

Speaker 2 9:43

Yeah , so everybody , I think , but Brad from Tremont is going because Brad's got a couple of years under his belt .

Speaker 1 9:49

Yeah , right , okay , that's a really good idea though .

Speaker 2 9:51

It is . It's a great idea . Brad did attend that when he was new too . Okay , so it's great training , because I don't possibly have the time to sit down and tell them all the rules , right , I just don't .

Speaker 1 10:03

Yeah , and then I saw this Pond hockey returns to Fairmont Mm-hmm , if you drive by the Marina Lodge , that you know I'm talking about . Right , yes , the bicycle shop , yep , I saw that on Sunday . Yeah , and I started doing a little research and I , son of a gun , pond hockey's back , yeah . So so I called the girl in charge and she couldn't get with me , but so I went out there and I wrote my own story , yeah , figured out what's going on . And anyway , this Saturday and Sunday , yeah , if you're into watching adults and I've got a little bit of a cold , folks , I'm getting over it Kelly is safe . I have a big screen over my face and so she's safe here . Don't anybody worry about her , and anyway . So , dennis , don't worry about Kelly , she's fine .

Speaker 2 10:45

Right , yes .

Speaker 1 10:46

Don't come down here and punch me yeah . Anyway they have a total of 19 adult teams . Wow , that's a lot .

Speaker 2 10:55

Yeah , that's what they said too . It's a ton , and anyway they're going to have some fun . Yeah , I , you know .

Speaker 1 11:06

I have all kinds of problems with pond hockey . First of all , it's outdoors . I'm a southern boy , this cold , this it just I get up . This is why this job is perfect for me . Now I'm in here , I walk to the house which is about 40 steps away , and I never have to go outside . I'm always teasing with Candy , I'll leave early , I'll leave first a lot of times and I'll say , okay , drive careful on your way home . She'll say , I'll be careful , but anyway , we never have to go outside , if we're lucky during the day . Folks , I pulled up to Tuesday night yes , tuesday night , city council meeting . I pull up . I saw Kelly . I could see you from outside right and also .

Speaker 1 11:45

I saw you see me and she's scurrying around and I thought what is she doing ? She kept running outside without a coat on and I was sitting there . She goes . I want a picture of the van . I said , oh . Then she came up and got her selfie with the van , which will be in next week's paper . Yay , I put last week's in . I was at the Jackson Post Office , emily came out and got her picture Anyway so I've been putting in pictures of people when they send them in .

Speaker 1 12:13

Get your picture of the van and then send it to me and tell me where you are and we're going to put it into the little jar and pull one out February 1st and we're going to get you a couple of tickets to Steak and Shrimp Night at the Legion .

Speaker 2 12:25

Absolutely , if you've never been there , it's really good .

Speaker 1 12:28

Yeah , we personally . Okay , I'm going to give them a free plug because I like the Legion

Community Conversations

Speaker 1 12:34

. First of all , we love the Hamburger Night .

Speaker 2 12:36

Okay .

Speaker 1 12:36

Oh , we love hamburger night , but we also go to breakfast once or twice a week . Okay , they have it Mondays , no , tuesday , wednesday , thursday , friday . And then the lady there is such a sweetheart . We like her a lot and we go in , though , and we have breakfast , and Fridays is sausage and gravy day .

Speaker 2 12:54

I don't like gravy , you don't no .

Speaker 1 12:56

Okay , you don't . No , okay , you must obviously be from a communist or something . No , but okay , yeah , no . Anyway , they have sausage and gravy on Fridays , that's their special . They have their regular menu too , but that's their special . Anyway we love that . So that's what's going on in the paper , yep .

Speaker 2 13:14

The pond hockey sounds interesting . We actually had a citizen approach our new mayor and talk about maybe a hockey rink here in Tremont next winter .

Speaker 1 13:24

Now , you guys talked about that , yeah , at the meeting . As a matter of fact , when do they put that ? Over at the basketball court .

Speaker 2 13:30

We used to have it where the basketball court is down at Anderson Park .

Speaker 1 13:33

Okay , yeah , I heard that and I thought that was a fascinating idea .

Speaker 2 13:37

Yeah , so there's a few things we've got to check into , you know , making sure insurance is good and all that kind of stuff .

Speaker 1 13:43

Yeah , that lady in the audience made a good point . She said it should cover the same as your basketball insurance .

Speaker 2 13:48

We'll be checking into it . I think it's a great idea .

Speaker 1 13:50

Yeah , I think the kids would love it around here In Fairmont , in our house in Fairmont , the neighbors behind us had a huge yard , okay , and they had a portable hockey rink , oh , wow . They put up and the kids went out there and played . We would sit there and watch them every once in a while . It was kind of we had a lot of trees so it was kind of hard to see , but it was fun just to sit and watch a little bit Again .

Speaker 1 14:14

I'm from the South . I don't understand the rules very well . I tried I go and enjoy watching . I went with a friend to watch their son . You know little league hockey , what was called peewee hockey , and I didn't understand how they could be off sides . That made no sense to me and what the blue line , the whole bit . But it was fun to watch though . Yeah , you know , like I said , I don't know a lot about hockey , but it's a lot of fun . It's a lot of fun .

Speaker 2 14:36

It is fun , yeah , to watch them . We watch it , and you know it's an aggressive sport .

Speaker 1 14:40

It is , and you know you get to take out some aggressions .

Speaker 2 14:44

That's my favorite part of the whole hockey , when I see it , I'm always like fight , fight , fight . Yeah , everybody goes to see a fight , they do .

Speaker 1 14:52

Yeah , yeah . So anyway , I've got a couple of questions for you .

Speaker 2 14:56

Number one yes .

Speaker 1 14:57

Buckenberg yes , dr Buckenberg , he's coming to town . He is , and when are ?

Speaker 2 15:02

we closing on the building . We close next week on the 16th .

Speaker 1 15:05

Already , mm-hmm , already , yep , okay .

Speaker 2 15:08

Yep , he's super excited because the clinic is already set up for office , so there shouldn't be a lot of remodel or or anything . I have no idea when he's going to open .

Speaker 1 15:17

Bring in a few chairs and he's ready to go .

Speaker 2 15:19

Pretty much . I mean that was part of the deal that he really liked about our building .

Speaker 1 15:24

So we're super excited

Potential Restaurant Opportunities in Trimont

Speaker 1 15:26

. We had a call from one of our tenants who asked if the clinic was open yet . She needed an appointment .

Speaker 2 15:33

I had a citizen call me the other day . When is he opening ?

Speaker 1 15:37

Yeah , Dr Buckenberg , we've already got two appointments for you . Yep , maybe we should get a cut somehow .

Speaker 2 15:43

We need to work this we're going to have to work on that .

Speaker 1 15:46

Alright , so he'll be here . Well , he's closing next week and then of course , it's his timeline , but I'm going to guess it's going to be a month , but I'm thinking by spring-ish . Yeah , I'm thinking by spring-ish . Yeah , he should be up and running and he's going to have a . Is it a nurse practitioner he's looking for ?

Speaker 2 16:01

Yes , so it sounds like he's going to have a nurse practitioner there five days a week , wow . Yeah , that's great , that really is exciting , and he'll be there also , but one thing he's wanting to do is make house calls to Rymont . Yes , you're kidding . I , charles , no , rymont . Yes , you're kidding .

Speaker 1 16:20

I'm not kidding , that's what he's talked about . You know , I know Dr Buckenberg . Yeah , he has been my doctor from way back in my Sanford days in Jackson , when we owned the motel .

Speaker 2 16:26

Okay .

Speaker 1 16:26

And I've known him for probably 20 years , yeah , and he's been my doctor for most of that time . He would leave and I would showing up . Anyway , he loves people . Yes , he loves to sit and talk to you . He does . We would sit and he knows me and he knows my family and he would ask me all kinds of questions about what's going on . He's always very inquisitive and makes a good doctor . Yes , he's a great guy . His wife was his receptionist when he had the Smart Clinic in Fairmont at Sterling Drug . He had a Smart Clinic there for a while . Then he sold that and went to work for UHD .

Speaker 2 17:06

But his wife .

Speaker 1 17:07

she's a hoot . She's real bubbly , real nice . I liked her a lot . We'd be with my hand bandaged up one day and I'd cut my thumb with a stupid chisel . It wasn't bad . But she goes okay , let's take a look . And she goes oh , this isn't so bad , I go . No , I thought your thumb was going to be hanging there or something . I said no , it wasn't bad , she was a lot of fun . So I wonder if she'll work with him again or not . I don't know , but if she does , she's great too .

Speaker 2 17:35

We are so excited to have them come to town . For us it's going to be a great thing .

Speaker 1 17:39

It is going to be a great thing , you said also he wanted to be a training center .

Speaker 2 17:44

Yeah , he's going to try to offer some training to other nurse practitioners and stuff . So it could be just a huge thing . This whole facility he wants to use for lots of different things . It's going to be great . It is going to be great . Yeah , I know .

Speaker 1 18:00

I know I wrote down a few things here before we get to the big meat of the deal here . Okay , the outlook for the new year . What do we need in Trimod ? I mean , we've got a doctor . Now We've got great banks . Town center is amazing . I love town center . What are we lacking ?

Speaker 2 18:18

Restaurant yeah .

Speaker 1 18:19

Yeah , I was going to say the same thing .

Speaker 2 18:20

Yeah , somewhere to go at nighttime to eat , somewhere for people to gather socially , and you know , not necessarily , I don't know just even just a good burger . You know A place to get a pizza or something like that ? It'd be great . I know restaurants are very , very hard to run .

Speaker 1 18:42

They are Takes a special person .

Speaker 2 18:44

It does you kind of have to live in the ?

Speaker 1 18:47

restaurant . I have a sister who owns a restaurant and she for years lived there . Literally had a bed in the back because she'd worked 20 hours a week a day .

Speaker 2 18:55

Yeah , I maybe uh something , you don't know , but I've been uh working on trying to find some funding and stuff . Anyway , we have some small city development program money really within the city that if we could get somebody that wants to start a restaurant , the city's got some money that we could help with .

Speaker 1 19:16

But we don't have a building .

Speaker 2 19:18

Not necessarily . I mean , you could still use the bar if you wanted to .

Speaker 1 19:24

Convert it .

Speaker 2 19:25

Yeah , you'd have to have a little bit bigger of a kitchen , I think , to make a lot of food .

Speaker 1 19:32

And before we went on we were talking , I said Casey's , you know , Casey's , you know , and you're saying they have some rules ? Yep , they do have some rules .

Speaker 2 19:39

I know they're not trying to sell the building right at the very moment because the gas tanks were leaking , so there's some issues that they're taking care of , but it is in the works , so everything is going to be just fine .

Speaker 1 19:52

Yeah , we need a restaurant .

Speaker 2 19:53

I think we could make Casey's a restaurant . You know , I mean there's all kinds of different possibilities .

Speaker 1 19:59

I wonder if you could add on to the town center area that developed . But there's three buildings . You could add a fourth one , I don't know where exactly .

Speaker 2 20:05

Yeah .

Speaker 1 20:08

Maybe in the grassy across this .

Speaker 2 20:09

You know ? Yeah , I don't know , I don't know .

Speaker 1 20:11

That's not me , that's not who I am . I just throw down ideas .

Speaker 2 20:14

Yeah , I'd like to have a little drive-thru .

Speaker 1 20:18

Well , you know we'll sit down inside , but I know we're not going to get a chain Right . I mean , I'm sure they have rules Right . Trimont's not big enough for a chain .

Speaker 2 20:25

No , and you know we go over to Mountain Lake , to the A&W NW root beer over there it's great . We need something like that , even would be great in Tremont .

Speaker 1 20:35

I wonder if we could steal Bergens away from Bergens . Oh , I don't know . Wouldn't that be incredible ? Bergen would be great but I don't think so . I couldn't afford it .

Speaker 2 20:45

He won't even add on .

Speaker 1 20:46

Oh , I know it . I know it , he's like nope . No , I know it , he won , but he won't . No , so we need that .

Wastewater Plant Upgrade Funding Discussion

Speaker 1 20:52

We probably could use some new housing developments .

Speaker 2 20:54

Yes , maybe that's a possibility with our school too . Maybe we could get some commercial development in there when the school goes , or maybe we could make the school into some kind of a commercial and have housing up there in that area . We've got potential .

Speaker 1 21:12

Right , we do . Yeah , I heard you at and maybe I didn't . Maybe I didn't . Okay , so because you know I was delirious with my cold . No , I thought you said something about an election in April , do ?

Speaker 2 21:26

we have an election . There's small elections . I believe it's a township election .

Speaker 1 21:32

It has nothing to do with the city ? Okay , nothing in the city . I believe it's a township election . It has nothing to do with the city ? Okay , nothing in the city . I'm sitting here going . What election is she talking about ?

Speaker 2 21:38

Yeah , the off years have some different elections , but yes , there is elections every year , more of townships and things Okay , so take care of that .

Speaker 1 21:48

Water seems to be a big issue .

Speaker 2 21:50

Yes .

Speaker 1 21:51

And I don't fully understand it . You explain it to me one day and I'll play Ricky Riccardo with Lucy . Explain it to me , Lucy , because I don't get it . Your background is accounting correct . Yes , yeah , and you talk that kind of language and I'm like huh , so what you were saying . Though here's the problem cliff had brought up , and I think cliff's an amazing guy .

Speaker 2 22:16

Yes , breeze yes , yeah , yes , I said cliff , people are going . Who's ?

Speaker 1 22:19

cliff , yeah , he was on the city council for like three months . He was a is an intern , uh , interim and uh , I didn't know him before that never met the gentleman and I learned to love him . I I loved coming to meetings just to listen to him , because he was so much fun .

Speaker 2 22:35

He's been such a help to me Like he would come in and he'd have lots of different ideas for investments and accounting and all of that . So I have really enjoyed having him on our council in the meantime and he brought some different ideas to the council , which was great .

Speaker 1 22:58

He said something at one of the council meetings . He said I believe I'm on this council to teach you people parliamentary procedure . Yes , I laughed . I remember when he said he was going to flip a coin to see who to put on the council . I was going to reach in and pull a quarter out and throw it to him but I thought , well , this is kind of a serious subject , yeah , anyway but okay . But Cliff brought up an idea . Yes , and for funding all this water stuff .

Speaker 1 23:23

Yeah , and that's great , but here's my real question is what's going on with the water ?

Speaker 2 23:35

Before we went on , you were explaining to me about class A's and B's and all this . Yeah , so can you tell us ? Sure ? So where we are at right now is we have a proposal into the USDA trying to get funding for what we call our pond project .

Speaker 1 23:44

Okay .

Speaker 2 23:46

So in the meantime we have had our permit has to be renewed and we've been getting extensions on it for several years .

Speaker 1 23:54

And this is just a yearly thing or something .

Speaker 2 23:56

It lasts like 10 years 10 years okay . Yeah , and so we've been doing extensions and extensions on it . Anyway , the city did receive a letter that stated that we now have to go to being an A plant . Right now we are a B plant . Well , this is a right done deal . We have to go to being an A plant . Right now we are a B plant .

Speaker 1 24:14

Well , this is a very done deal . We have to go to an A .

Speaker 2 24:17

We have to go to an A plant with this new permit .

Speaker 2 24:20

So we did have the engineers come out and looked at our facility At our wastewater plant . It's not good , the buildings are deteriorating and all of that kind of stuff , and the engineers pretty much told us that it is not a rehab , it's a rebuild . Like we have to build a whole new plant because where we're at it would never , it's not going to last , even with a rehab , and a rehab is just the cost of it is going to be a lot for a minimal amount of time and we have to make it an A plant .

Speaker 2 25:02

And if it's an A plant there's more chemicals , there's more man hours , there's a test that we have to do a minimum of twice a year and that one test is $10,000 . It's just a lot of cost to become an A plant and then , going down the road , it's going to affect our towns around us . If we become an A plant , then Wellcome has to be an A plant because their population is the exact same as ours , which would then force Sherbourne also because Sherburn is bigger than us . So it's kind of a trickle-down effect . So we have submitted information to the state trying to get them to say that we can remain a B plant . But this is what we're facing right now with the waste plant .

Speaker 1 25:53

So , in layman's terms , what's the difference between an A plant and a B plant ?

Speaker 2 25:56

How they're run and capacities , and also the chemicals that you have to use to treat it . Okay , that's probably the biggest thing .

Speaker 1 26:08

Would an A plant , though , be better in the long run for the citizens ?

Speaker 2 26:13

I don't . I guess I'm not an expert in that area . I just know that it costs a lot . There is only 18 people in the state of Minnesota that are licensed to run an A plant , so by the time I'm just going to use Jason as an example because he works for us right now . Sure , you have to be employed with a city or somebody that has a waste plant for so many years to be able to go up in each class that you get a license , for Jason would be over his retirement age before he'd be eligible to get an A license .

Speaker 1 26:51

So they would have to find somebody coming right out of college .

Speaker 2 26:54

Really ideally , ideally , and then they have to start at the bottom .

Speaker 1 26:58

It's not something that even you walk out of college with oh , you don't you don't no . So all these towns with A plants have to share these 18 people .

Speaker 2 27:07

If you would have an A license .

Speaker 1 27:10

That's what I mean . Yes , if you have an , a license .

Speaker 2 27:11

Yep , wow . Yeah , it's a minimum of 12 hours a week physically in the plant . So we're looking at trying to pay somebody that 12 hours a week okay , they were talking just salaries alone could be around $50,000 just for 12 hours a week . Wow . So adding something like that to our already high costs , it would be detrimental to the city's finances with that .

Speaker 1 27:40

Yeah , right .

Speaker 2 27:43

So if we were to build a plant , it was going to cost us approximately $20 million . If we build the ponds , the ponds are going to cost us about $20 million to just build the ponds . So either way , we're about the same . If we were to build a plant , they say that that should last 15 to 20 years without having to do another major update . If we build ponds , we're looking at 40 to 50 years without having to redo anything other than maybe relining the ponds . So there's a huge cost savings by going to a pond .

Speaker 1 28:24

And I would imagine also the pond would probably be built a lot faster than a plant .

Speaker 2 28:30

I think it's about two years to build the pond .

Speaker 1 28:33

Really . I know there's a lot of dirt work with that stuff . Yeah , there would be .

Speaker 2 28:38

I'm just learning all this stuff too , yeah .

Speaker 1 28:42

Holy smokes . And you were telling me before that there are some funds . The 20 mil would not come out of just the city's budget .

Speaker 2 28:50

It's not . No , that's why we have it into USDA . We're trying to get financing and they say usually there's always exceptions . Usually about two-thirds of what you ask for is usually granted .

Speaker 1 29:06

So you ask for everything .

Speaker 2 29:07

Yeah , that's why we asked for the moon . I mean , what we have into the USDA right now for our PER report is a $62 million project , but that does include ponds . It includes a ton of infrastructure . Anything that is not already PVC pipe will be redone . Oh , wow , so there's a lot of infrastructure in there . There's also a new water tower and there's also a reverse osmosis for our water system . Wow , so there's a lot of infrastructure in there . There's also a new water tower and there's also a reverse osmosis for our water system too , so it would eliminate having to have all the water softeners in town .

Speaker 1 29:44

Oh , that's not good for those people .

Speaker 2 29:46

It's not good for Culligan .

Speaker 1 29:48

But it's better for you and I . It is that hard water is hard on your appliances .

Speaker 2 29:54

It is , but it's also hard on our waste plant , because when you put that water into our sewer system , that salt and everything is hard on the waste plant .

Speaker 1 30:08

You can't win .

Speaker 2 30:09

You can't win .

Speaker 1 30:10

No , it's like those ads on television . You know , for high blood pressure , take this , side effects are it could be death . And I'm always going . The side effects are worse than the condition . I've said that too , yeah . So , it's kind of the same thing . There's always a positive and a negative .

Speaker 2 30:28

There is Yep , Yep . Everything you do has a positive and a negative .

Speaker 1 30:31

Oh for every action there's an equal and opposite reaction , right ? Yeah , I don't know , I guess so .

Speaker 2 30:37

We've been shooting around some ideas that you know . Maybe there might be a potential to share a pond with . Welcome , it's a possibility . Arnie and Odin do it , yeah . And if we put the ponds out where the city has land right now ?

Speaker 1 30:55

Okay , a question for you . So I was talking with Mayor Dan Schmidke of Wellcome and he made a comment . This was about two meetings ago . They have Bolton and Minkin talking about they're doing some streets this spring , yes , and his comment was they're doing some streets this spring , yes , and his comment was let's do it right this time . You know , let's quit patching stuff . Let's do it right , and I think this is where you're coming from also yes , it is .

Speaker 2 31:26

I mean , we can see that over the past few years , when we had council members that wouldn't make the hard decisions about fixing some of the stuff and we just put a band-aid on it , right , what's happened now ? And our waste plant is falling apart , yeah , and we have some major funding that we're going to have to do and our citizens are going to be the ones that have to pay it and what if we had done this five years ago ?

Speaker 1 31:55

yeah , it probably would have been maybe a third less in cost I'm just guessing .

Speaker 2 32:00

Yeah , I have no idea , I know prices have gone up terribly terribly , especially after covid , exactly yeah , yeah yeah , and so , anyway , it's time it is yep I think we're gonna be forced to do it anyway , right , yeah ? Yep , and we could certainly . You know , trying to just keep our options open is what we're really trying to do right now . It's a big decision that the council has to make with all of this .

Speaker 1 32:23

Well , good luck to them .

Speaker 2 32:24

Yeah , yeah , I'm glad they have to make that decision .

Speaker 1 32:26

Oh , me too . Yeah , you know , I years ago thought about being on the city council in Jackson and I ran and I didn't win . And later I said I don't even like going to meetings . What was I going to do ? I was on the city council . Yeah , I don't like being in meetings , but it was always something in my head .

Speaker 2 32:46

Yeah .

Speaker 1 32:46

Not anymore . I'm done , I don't need it .

Town Infrastructure Funding Discussion

Speaker 2 32:49

Now you go to city council meetings all the time .

Speaker 1 32:51

I get to go all the time , anyway , so what else is going on ? Anything new in town .

Speaker 2 32:57

Not too much Everybody good , everybody well . I think so yeah . We're just trying , you know , getting the new council all done up with their emails .

Speaker 1 33:07

You've got some computers coming in .

Speaker 2 33:09

I heard you say yeah , Bush picked his up yesterday .

Speaker 1 33:11

Okay , good . So yeah , kevin didn't quite have time when he was in the office , so we'll get that . We'll get it , yeah .

Speaker 2 33:18

Yeah , it's a great way to have be able to communicate with your councilman , being able to email them All right .

Speaker 1 33:23

so last thing is is anybody out there funding ideas for you that ?

Speaker 2 33:31

would be terrific .

Speaker 1 33:32

Yes , and I will come and eat .

Speaker 2 33:34

Yes , we like to eat , I will bring money Right . Yeah , alright .

Speaker 1 33:40

No , it's always wonderful having you ?

Speaker 2 33:41

What do you got there ? Oh , I was looking at what it costs for us to deliver water to our residents .

Speaker 1 33:50

Okay , so what does it cost to deliver water to me ? Because I think it's expensive .

Speaker 2 33:53

It is very expensive . Um , these are just preliminary numbers , just so you know , nothing is final . I worked it with the 2024 numbers . Okay , and right now we're looking at a delivered product . It's costing us $6.97 a thousand gallons , so seven bucks Just under .

Speaker 1 34:20

And you're charging us eight .

Speaker 2 34:22

We're going to be charging you eight .

Speaker 1 34:24

Right , so you're making a buck off 1,000 gallons . That's not very much .

Speaker 2 34:29

No , it's really not , but this is another reason why our water fund is so far behind and that we just don't have the money .

Speaker 1 34:38

And Cliff had brought up and he explained it at one of the meetings that the general budget may have X amount of dollars and the water fund is negative X amount of dollars . Why don't we just put some money in there ? And then he explained it really well . You can't .

Speaker 2 34:54

We can't . Yeah , the hard part with government funding is that the general fund runs other things the city streets and the parks , and the fire department and the ambulance and my office and all of that stuff . But when you're talking about the water and the sewer , those are their own businesses , as I call them . So the water , sewer and our raw water fund have to be self-sufficient . They cannot use general funds . I can't get tax money to finance them .

Speaker 1 35:35

So they just go off of what the bill that I get in the mail from you is .

Speaker 2 35:39

Correct , yes . And that has to support our infrastructure . It has to support making the water and delivering the water .

Speaker 1 35:48

I don't even want to think what it's going to go to then when they do this big project .

Speaker 2 35:53

Yeah . I mean there'll be an expense obviously it will be an expense and you told me they can finance it for like a 40-year . Usually yep 30 to 40 years . That will help . But still it will help , I'm sure interest rates will be good .

Speaker 1 36:06

Yeah , they're very , very reasonable with federal stuff .

Speaker 2 36:10

So just being a municipality , you can get a lot of good interest rates .

Speaker 1 36:15

Okay .

Speaker 2 36:17

But it's still a lot of money .

Speaker 1 36:18

Yeah , and we don't have a choice .

Speaker 2 36:20

We don't .

Speaker 1 36:21

We have to do something , still a lot of money , yeah , and we don't have a choice .

Speaker 2 36:21

We don't , we have to do something . Well , you know , you had made the comment .

Speaker 1 36:25

I came in and asked you one day why are we so far behind ? You said it's water main breaks . It is . Each break is around $1,400 to fix it . Is that what you told me , $11,000 .

Speaker 2 36:34

$11,000 , that's right . I'm so sorry .

Speaker 1 36:39

Yeah , 11,000 , and you had 14 breaks , am I right ?

Speaker 2 36:43

No , we had 11 breaks last year in 2023 . In 2024 , we had two .

Speaker 1 36:50

That's good . Yes , it is good . It adds up .

Speaker 2 36:53

It is , but it's not just water main breaks that cost us money . So we had some the well . We had to clean the well . You know that's not cheap cleaning the wells .

Speaker 1 37:08

No , it's not .

Speaker 2 37:09

So we had that , and then in there you have a relay switch that went bad in the one . Well , and I mean there's always something . Just this last week we had an electrical panel that burned up .

Speaker 1 37:23

But you know , I made a comment in the paper because I actually appreciate the water .

Speaker 2 37:30

Yes .

Speaker 1 37:31

And I made a comment , but you know what $8 per 1,000 gallons beats the heck out of going to the pond and pulling it up in the well and carrying it into the house .

Speaker 2 37:38

I saw that comment , that was a good one .

Speaker 1 37:40

Yeah , I thought you know I'm not going to complain . No , it's not . I'll do this and I'll rather than have to bring it in .

Speaker 2 37:47

Right yeah 2023 . We don't have a lot of choices we had just in repairs and maintenance for the water fund was $174,000 .

Speaker 1 37:57

Whoa yeah . Well , that would have made a big down payment . Well , a small down payment on $20 million . Never mind , wouldn't do much .

Speaker 2 38:04

Unedited numbers .

Speaker 1 38:05

It was like $64,000 this year for 2024 .

Speaker 2 38:10

So it was a big difference , but you can see the water main breaks are definitely something that changes and those would go away . Well , I'm never going to say that they're going to go away .

Speaker 1 38:20

But , it should be better In a perfect world , perfect world when you have all new , everything infrastructure . They should , you know .

Speaker 2 38:28

Yeah , they should take care of some stuff yeah , um , you know , I don't , maybe something down the road is , uh , the highway . So , like our main street yeah that is scheduled to be redone in 2027 . Really it is .

Speaker 1 38:42

Okay , main Street .

Speaker 2 38:44

Yep Main Street . Okay , so if that happens , we would really like to at least redo the infrastructure . When they're ripping that all up , that's a good idea it is .

Speaker 1 38:53

What about this tree thing ? Yeah , okay , so what's going on there and where is it going on ? It just hit me when you were talking .

Speaker 2 39:00

So kind of what's happened was Cliff actually had the idea and said that you know , we've got a lot of trees here and the trees in the boulevard are just dangerous . We've had trees fall over in the middle of the night during windstorms and then it blocks the streets and it could damage our streets and all of that . So we need something to help with that problem . So Cliff said that he's going to approach people and ask them for donations . He's hoping to raise $50,000 .

Speaker 1 39:33

Wow .

Speaker 2 39:34

So the city has put in $50,000 in our budget .

Speaker 1 39:38

Okay .

Speaker 2 39:38

And so we're hoping that we can get about $100,000 to start taking down some of these trees in our town .

Speaker 1 39:48

And you're talking about the trees on Main Street , the boulevard .

Speaker 2 39:52

All streets .

Speaker 1 39:52

Oh , okay , so out here in front of my place , yep , okay , anything , that's a problem .

Speaker 2 39:58

Anything that's a problem yeah , oh okay , you know , if it's , I mean trees , get old .

Speaker 1 40:04

They do .

Speaker 2 40:05

It's not necessarily just going to be the ash borer's problem .

Speaker 1 40:08

Okay .

Speaker 2 40:09

You know , maple trees get old and hollow out too .

Speaker 1 40:13

They do .

Speaker 2 40:13

So we're trying to look at all the trees .

Speaker 1 40:16

Good idea .

Speaker 2 40:17

And you know somewhere between 12 and 15 foot from a street .

Speaker 1 40:21

Yep , I told you cliffs .

Speaker 2 40:24

He thinks outside the box .

Speaker 1 40:25

I love it , I do I I love people who think outside the box and people who say , well , that's the way it's always been , you know he's like well , but let's take a look at that because that's my whole thing is . I don't care how it's always been , yeah , right . Just because you've done it for 40 years wrong doesn't make it right . Yeah , you know , you know . Think about this for a second .

Speaker 2 40:44

He was just in my office yesterday and he brought me this article and he's like you have to look into this , kelly , and it was about add-ons to CDs and where , like the CD that you currently have , is going to be this rate , we'll just say 4% right now Okay . But now CDs down the road are , you know , 3.5 , 3 and all of that , but they're making these called add-ons where if I keep that CD I can add to it and I get to keep that percent he's like .

Speaker 1 41:14

you've got to check it out and see if any of the places that we have CDs will do something like that , I'll get you All right .

Speaker 2 41:19

So , anyway , we will have do something like that .

Speaker 1 41:21

We'll get you , we'll look at it , all right . So anyway , we will have to look into that ourselves , right ? Yes , yeah , all right . Well , anyway , it has been wonderful having you here . Oh , thanks for having me again Do you realize we've talked for over 41 minutes . Nice .

Speaker 2 41:34

I know right .

Speaker 1 41:36

We could talk forever . Maybe I should cut this in half .

Speaker 2 41:38

There you go .

Speaker 1 41:39

Anytime , of course . You know that already .

Speaker 2 41:40

Yes , all right . Thanks , kelly . I love it that you let me come and geek out with you about numbers and all this stuff because nobody else wants to listen .

Speaker 1 41:48

You know , here's the thing though we learn and I can write an article and you know a couple of paragraphs , and people don't get it .

Speaker 2 41:58

I don't even get it half the time .

Speaker 1 41:59

And so I'm going , I'm writing about stuff , I'm not sure what I'm saying , and then I run it by you . Sometimes I go did I say this right ? Because I'm going , I don't know what I'm doing and you're like , but you come in the end and sitting down and not just you , others also and explaining . I think it's just . I think it's helpful .

Speaker 2 42:17

It is to me anyway . I I think it's important for our citizens to understand how it works , because they might be more shall we say more willing to pay property taxes when they understand what it does .

Speaker 1 42:28

Yeah , yeah , you're exactly right and pay their water bill and go okay , $8 for 1,000 gallons . You know I'm not excited about it , but at least I get it now .

Speaker 2 42:36

Yeah .

Speaker 1 42:37

You know it's not going in your pocket or the mayor's pocket . You know this is we got we have . It's not going in your pocket or the mayor's pocket . You know this is we got we have .

Speaker 2 42:43

So we went up $1.50 . $1.50 . And it will start on this next month's billing . Yeah , oh , next month's billing , yeah because it's a start with January's usage . Oh , sure , so that's billed out in February . Anyway , I guess what I was just trying to say is that that really is only going to add about $18,000 into the city .

Speaker 1 43:06

Candy is so funny , she'll take a shower and she's in and out like in five minutes or less . Right , she goes . I don't want to pay a lot of money for water . I go calm down and the average person uses about 1,000 gallons of water a month . Yeah , about , about that .

Speaker 2 43:25

Yeah , everybody is different and that's what's hard about it . You know , some people water more things . Some people have dogs and you give your dog a bath .

Speaker 1 43:34

I mean it's true , or people like me . I like about a 10 , 12-minute shower . Yeah , I have to get my bones moving , you know , and sometimes it's like I can't hardly stand up , and then it's like okay , after a niceminute shower I have to get my bones moving . Sometimes it's like I can't hardly stand up and then it's like okay , after a nice warm shower I'm going . All right , I can move now .

Speaker 2 43:48

Right , yeah . Anyway , there's a lot of things that come into factors with it . So when somebody says they're moving into this house and like how much was their utility bill ?

Speaker 1 43:57

Yeah .

Speaker 2 43:57

Well , how many people do you have in the house ?

Speaker 1 43:59

Yeah , I mean it totally changes . It does change things . Every person does different . It does Indeed .

Speaker 2 44:05

And whether you wash by hand or whether you wash in a dishwasher . Yeah , how many times do you wear your jeans ? Twice or once , you know ? Yeah .

Speaker 1 44:15

But we have in the apartment building , we have a common laundry and so and we don't have a meter on it , we just everybody uses it and you know so , but we pay the water bill , and so you know it's like that's part of it . It is , it's part of what you're charging rent , yeah , and so anyway .

Speaker 2 44:30

Yeah , all right Thanks for having me , we could do this half the day .

Speaker 1 44:37

I know we could . We sure could . It's great . Thanks , kelly , appreciate it . All right , we've had Kelly with us today . We're so thankful . All right , see you guys next week . Bye .