Access to Democracy
Since 1999, Access to Democracy has been a staple of Minnesota television. The program has featured more than 2,000 half-hour interviews with politicians, legislators, judges, academics, athletes, public figures, and everyday residents. Guests often share their expertise and debate with the host.
Access to Democracy
Joe Krueger - Candidate for Eagan Mayor
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Hosted by Steve Francisco. Joe Kueger is one of the three candidates seeking to win in the August 11 primary election to go forward on the November ballot. Joe tells host Steve Francisco about growing up in St. Paul, going to the Marine Corps, and becoming skilled in aviation and industrial maintenance. Joe once served on the Red Wing City Council and has now lived in Eagan for 19 years. He is very critical of high taxes and particularly opposes Local Government Aid (LGA), where he claims Eagan taxpayers are forced to spend too much money for other cities and towns across the state for non-essential services. He is concerned about fraud and mismanagement and claims that he would be a watchdog over local taxes and government spending, both of which he argues are too high.
Hello, and welcome to another episode of Access to Democracy. I'm your host, Steve Francisco. Thank you for joining us on this hot summer day. We'd like to thank our sponsors, Recalibra Health, the 45th Parallel Distillery, the Sheridan and Dulas Law Firm, and Truestone Financial. My guest today is Joe Kruger, who is a candidate in the August 11th primary election. You are running for mayor of Egan. Joe, welcome to Access to Democracy.
SPEAKER_03Well, thanks for having me here, Steve.
SPEAKER_02So give folks a little idea who you are. I suspect most people may not know who you are because you haven't run for office before in Egan. Am I correct about that? You're correct. Yeah. Tell us a little bit about your background, where you grew up, where you went to school, and what you did.
SPEAKER_03Uh grew up on the west side of St. Paul. Um went to St. Thomas Academy. Then um college for a while, got an associate from uh Denver Hills. Um went to uh a couple of four-year schools, didn't like it very much. Uh joined the Marine Corps, got into Marine Corps aviation. Uh from there I worked aviation for about 10 years total, and then moved into industrial maintenance. Um on the aviation side, I was uh I worked for the three biggest aviation companies, uh Raytheon, McDonnell Douglas, and Boeing. And that was because they kept buying out other companies. So um then uh got into the industrial side of maintenance. Uh I call myself a maintenance man, but I've also done uh I worked for uh Nestle Pirina down in Hager City. Um I was uh maintenance scheduler, whatever you want to call it, uh parts buyer, and I did environmental compliance and that was to make sure everything was disposed of, you know, according to regulations. Um and then uh moved up here to the Twin Cities, uh up here to Egan about 19 and a half years ago, I think. And uh basically kept working in factories or industrial jobs of some kind or another. Uh basically it's if you want to raise better switch jobs. It's kind of the way the world works, so that's what I did. And uh finished up over in Envergrove Heights, and uh that was about it.
SPEAKER_02And you're retired now? I'm retired.
SPEAKER_03Uh went out with the great, what do they call it, the great resignation or something during COVID? Right 2020. Yeah, and they it was uh you know everything was getting just unrealistic for to do, you know, wear a mask on a day like this. You could picture, you know, trying to work in a mask or all of that.
SPEAKER_02So I your campaign website mentions that um you previously served on a city council. Where was that and when was that?
SPEAKER_03That was Red Wing, Minnesota. Oh, yeah. Uh before we moved up here to Egan, obviously. But yeah, I was a city councilman for one term.
SPEAKER_02And what did you do on the council? Was there one particular achievement that you were proud of in your time on the Red Wing City Council? Uh what prompted you to run for city council there?
SPEAKER_03Uh property tax hikes were hitting like 30% some years.
SPEAKER_02Property taxes?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, and then we had uh uh there was a uh, for want of a better explanation, a viaduct, you know, where the the roads go up this way and then one comes down the center. Well, it was built in the 30s, it was crumbling, and it had been uh it had been an ongoing ruckus for I don't know, at least six years or something like that. Uh trying to get it fixed, and uh I got it. I tried the first year uh of there, and they said, well, the capital budget doesn't have it. And uh then the next year they came and they said we'll get it next year. The next year came up and I they laid out the capital improvements, and they said no. They said uh this gets fixed or replaced or something. And uh it was literally, you know, if you were strong enough, you could grab big hunks of it and throw it off. And uh, you know, I dug in, and then after a while, a couple of other council people said, no, this has been going on long enough. So yeah, I I got it, it was mostly replaced.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and so that's your only prior experience running for office, serving in municipal office, yeah. I mean it's Red Wing City Council. So you are challenging an incumbent mayor who's been mayor of Egan 20 years, I believe, Mike McGuire, and an incumbent city council member Mike Sabina, I believe Mike has served six years, if I'm correct, close to that. Um, do you have any particular policy differences with your opponents, which is another way of saying, why are you running? Why did you choose to run for mayor of Egan?
SPEAKER_03Um, my my biggest policy difference that I see no one really touches it. Uh the city of the people and businesses in the city of Egan pay a lot of taxes. Sales tax, income tax, uh, packages taxes, Minnesota. We got a lot of them. Um and there's this it's called local government aid. And uh some cities get a lot, a lot per capita. You've got St. Paul, Minneapolis, uh, they're each getting over 80 million a year. And I know they're they've got a bigger population and all that, but Egan gets exactly zero, and it's been zero now for uh 24 years. 2002, Egan got a million dollars, and then promptly they had to change the formula. I I think the formula for local government aid is basically to benefit uh everybody, a lot of the cities in Dakota County, but Egan, which went back to zero and it's been zero for 24 years. Um, so I I've talked to people about it and they'll say, well, that's more of a state issue.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I was gonna ask you that. Isn't that LGA isn't determined by the city council or the mayor, right? It's a state is determined in St. Paul.
SPEAKER_03It's a state issue, but yeah, state reps won't bring it up because well, my state rep is Bianca Vernig. Nothing against her, but if she went to bring it up, well, her party is in St. Paul and Minneapolis, she's gonna get nowhere. Um, and if George number, but no, it's not, it's Tom Lopak is her opponent. And if he gets in, there's a lot of outstate Minnesota, which also gets his local government aid. So you've got you've got like and it's supposed to be for basic services, right? But if you go outstate, go down to uh so I don't just pick on Minneapolis and St. Paul, there's a lot to work with there though. Um you go to like Red Wing, where I was, they actually are paying a uh greater uh greater Minnesota Cities, it's a lobbyist, and one of their you can go to their website, it's literally there. They're there to lobby for more local government aid. If you went down to Red Wing, you'd see they've got they have an airport, it's a nice airport, they have an aquatic center, not as the size of Egan's, but they're less probably about 20% our size. They have a bridge to nowhere, um literally. You can go down Old West Maine, you can see it. Even the locals joke about it. Uh, I know. And um, what else do they got? Three city parking garages, free parking. And I don't think these are basic services. And you can go down to other cities, I'll pick on another one. Walnut Grove. Yep. If we got per capita spending of Walnut Grove, uh, it would be over 50% of our city levy.
SPEAKER_02Um, if I can let's explore further this issue of local government aid, because as I understand it, the legislature did this to eliminate some of the disparities in property taxes. And by eliminating some of the disparities at the local level, county level, you would try to equalize funding opportunities for basic, as you said, basic services like police, fire department, and parks. Why is that a bad thing to do? Well, is it just that some cities like Egan don't get much or any LGA?
SPEAKER_03The city of Egan gets zero. Yeah. No LGA.
SPEAKER_02Because it's an affluent community.
SPEAKER_03Right. Comparison. Right. But then you look at the city of Minneapolis, their parks budget, just that their general fund of the parks budget is $109 million a year. The budget for the entire city of Egan is $60 million.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_03Then uh I believe I looked it up the city of Minneapolis's budget, it's 14 times the city of Egan's. But they have a much bigger population than Egan's. They're about six times our size, 14 times our size.
SPEAKER_02Joe, would you would you acknowledge that, you know, not all the people who use the parks in Minneapolis, for example, are city residents. I grew up in Minneapolis, use the parks in the lakes all the time. I still go up there. I live in Egan, but I ride my bike around the lakes in Minneapolis. Isn't it true that the metro area, people come to our parks here in Egan? They use Dakota County uh uh parks, such as um uh you know, any of our city parks or the county parks here in Egan, and they can do that freely, right? So uh is that really something that we should your position is we should eliminate LGA?
SPEAKER_03I would refer to I'd like to see it eliminated. You've got city of St. Paul, where I grew up, and yes, I did. When I was a kid, I came out. Uh you have lakes, and uh I've always not always, but I've had Chesapeake for a long time. I'd come out and use your lakes to throw the dummy for my dog.
SPEAKER_02Lebanon Hills, I couldn't think of the name earlier. We get a lot of it's a regional park, right? Dakota County taxpayers like you and I pay for that, but it's open to anybody, right?
SPEAKER_03Yeah. But I I don't go to the parks in Minneapolis, I haven't been to one in since I was a kid. We used to, I used to play baseball. And yeah, when we played in Minneapolis on a day like this, we would literally uniforms and all, we'd go hit a lake. But uh yeah, you've got well, you've got other the way they're spending money, you've got like St. Paul gets over $80 million a year. That's more than the entire budget of the city of Egan. And you're looking at uh you read the St. Paul paper, you've got city council members have legislative assistance. Uh the mayor of St. Paul, Mayor Herr, has four assistant mayors. So I'm thinking there's a little bit we could cut because I was just in St. Paul yesterday, and I think my kidneys will survive that.
SPEAKER_02But but does LGA money go to pay for those positions?
SPEAKER_03I thought you said it was for basic services, basic services is the excuse they'll give you, but it's allowed for any lawful expenditure. And so they can spend it basically as they want. And I think they could get by without four assistant mayors. Honestly, I do. And uh, you know, I've every time I go to St. Paul, I don't I don't like it. I see the way the city's gone, and I don't see that money benefiting the people of St. Paul at all. The roads are awful. I mean, you can drive around for a while, and I think you'll see that. Um so that's that's that's my main concern. And like I said in the outstate Minnesota, um, like it's supposed to be for basic services, but we go back to Walnut Grove. If we had as many police in Egan as they do in Walnut Grove per capita, we would have to triple uh the size of our police force.
SPEAKER_02I want to ask you about let's shift gears if we couldn't talk about economic development. And I've asked your opponents in the primary the same question. Egan is a fairly mature community economically. We have a wide mix of businesses. We have some 2,000 businesses, 50,000 people have jobs here in Egan. They don't all live in Egan. Many of them come here from the cities or surrounding communities, but those jobs exist in Egan. What is your platform on economic development? And are there any particular jobs that Egan doesn't currently have that you would like to see this city attract?
SPEAKER_03Uh the the uh the economic development I'd like to see or encourage would be uh startups and small businesses. And uh my uh kids played hockey growing up, and bigger companies, you know, they don't sponsor hockey teams or whatever. It's usually a you know, roofing company or an automotive shop or something like that. Um much more about civic engagement, smaller businesses. Somebody can actually talk to the owner of the company or you know, rather than we're going to do some bottom line of someone off uh in another state or another country.
SPEAKER_02Um what do you think the city uh can do to create opportunities for these smaller businesses that they're not doing now?
SPEAKER_03You can look into uh working with the county, helping with uh licensing and whatever red tape you gotta get through. Um, just give them opportunities to advertise and expand and try to be as burden try to uh put as few burdens as possible on them. Uh Minnesota's got a lot of regulations. Someone did a study, uh don't ask me who or when it was on the news. But if you're building a house in Minnesota, I think it was in Woodbury, Lake Elma, one of them, and built the same house in Hudson, Wisconsin, it was a $50,000 savings by going 10 miles down the road.
SPEAKER_02Um, these regulations you're talking about again, though, aren't most of those state regulations? Those aren't really things that the city of Egan necessarily regulates.
SPEAKER_03Well, that's why I see the voice.
SPEAKER_02So you would say you would be a voice as mayor if you were elected to try to get our state legislators to address some of those issues?
SPEAKER_03To move the ball wherever we can and however we have to. And too many times, uh, you know, and if you go to the state legislature, it's either A, I can't do nothing, or well, that's really the county's job. And if you go to the county, well, that's really federal. So um it it's someone's got to get a ball rolling once in a while instead of just saying uh pay your taxes and it's someone else's problem.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. We are gonna pause for just a quick moment, Joe. A word from our sponsors. Stay with us, and we'll be right back.
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SPEAKER_02And we are back with our guest today, Joe Krueger, who is a candidate for mayor of Egan, Minnesota. Joe, resuming our conversation, one of your concerns that you identify why you are running for mayor of Egan, you are concerned about honest governance. And specifically on your website, you talk about the fraud issue. What are your concerns about fraud?
SPEAKER_03Well, it's a lot of money that's been uh disappearing, getting floated out of Minnesota. A, I want to make sure there's none uh in Egan.
SPEAKER_02And B is there fraud in Egan city contracts that you're aware of or you believe exists?
SPEAKER_03Not that I'm aware of, but I I don't go through all the contracts. I don't take the votes. I would hope uh Mayor McGuire and Sabina and Bach and Fields and Hanson are would be doing their and Egan staff are doing their stuff. And uh, but a fresh pair of eyes on anything doesn't hurt.
SPEAKER_02Um Minnesota has uh what's called the open meeting law that when public elected officials meet to discuss the people's business, those meetings are supposed to be open to the public. Do you believe that that is occurring in all situations, or do you see instances where you think that is not happening and deals affecting taxpayers and residents are being done in violation of the open meeting laws?
SPEAKER_03Um I'm not aware of it in Egan, but I do know there's been uh mayors. Don't ask me how this works, they were signing non-disclosure agreements with data center, AI, whatever you want to call it. And I can't figure out how that would be because I would be an employee of Egan, working for the people of Egan, and uh how I, as an employee, could sign a non-disclosure while dealing with an entity outside of city government would be beyond me. But on the open meeting law, I also believe if you're dealing with personnel issues, those are closed.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, they have certain protections for personnel issues. I'm glad you brought up data centers because I wanted to ask you about that, and we have asked the other candidates as well. This is an issue of concern to a lot of people that where you see these large data centers being developed in many communities, not just in Minnesota but around the country, they are seeing significant water usage that is potentially driving up water rates that homeowners pay, and also significant electricity usage, uh, depending on the size of the facility, which has a potential to impact the rates that people pay for electricity. Uh, do you share those concerns? Do you support the EGA moratorium, a one-year moratorium, or would you go even further and ban them ban data centers or extend the moratorium?
SPEAKER_03As of right now, I have no problem banning. Um personally, I think there's a a bit of uh I don't know, bait and switch going on with it. If you go back two or three years with the data centers and AI, uh, you know, we'll be able to run factories with this and uh goods will be cheaper and we can export. And I was like, okay, fine. We've got 3,000 of these data centers now. We've got uh there's plans out in Utah uh to build one 62 square miles. That's that's twice the size of the entire city of Egan, full of processors and services. Servers and whatnot. And I don't I haven't gotten my six thousand dollar Ford Ranger yet. Have you? Well, it it's true. I'm like, I it got sold, but the I don't see the benefits of it.
SPEAKER_02I'm missing it. As I understand it, and we've had this discussion with Mike Sabina and Mayor McGuire, too. Um, not all the data centers are necessarily the same size. There are some proposals that I've heard of for smaller data centers, although some of the same concerns may still exist. What is the impact on local residents going to be with respect to electricity rates and water rates? You share those concerns, I take it from your answer.
SPEAKER_03Exactly. And the other part, um, I'm not sure how the water usage. I've like I said, I've they need the water to cool the aqua, I understand. That that's not an efficient way in Minnesota because uh water freezes. And I've worked in and factories that had uh you know water-cooled systems, and we shut the water off, you know, November 1st, give or take. And that's because you can't cool efficiently to the outside, it'll it'll freeze. Um so I think they're pretty to be in Minnesota, you would need the self-contained units. I've heard uh I'm I'm not quite sure I'd have to look at their system, but pretty much around this far north, you would have to have a self-contained system, even able to do it the other way.
SPEAKER_02Mayor McGuire has suggested that really this issue about regulation of AI data centers is really something that he would prefer the state to take a position on um so that you don't necessarily have one community saying one thing, another community saying something else. Do you think that's a reasonable approach uh or something you'd be willing to consider?
SPEAKER_03Or you just, as you said earlier, you would just ban that I've I've lost a lot of faith in the state of Minnesota government over the past few years. So I'm and I'm they do not uh spark optimism. So uh you know it's easy, like they're an example of oh, we'll let the state handle this. And is the state gonna handle it? They can't even watch where the money's going. So I I just assume you don't do it yourself and let the chips fall. But if we can get back to one other thing, uh we're City of Vegans getting sued by the data center that they that's right that pulled. Um and I read somewhere it was uh four uh cooling units. No, it was four semis. Each semi had two cooling units uh in a commercial area uh and then right into by people's backyards. The cooling capacity of those chillers probably exceed the cooling capacity of every air conditioner. So just picture every air conditioner and Egan piled up and sitting in your right on the fence line with your neighbor. So these aren't these aren't uh the old-time uh chillers, these are freezer chillers, and they can be done correctly, but uh I I I was at the council meeting when they came to ask for extension or whatever, keeping them going, and nothing against Mayor Maguire on it because it's not his field of expertise. Mayor McGuire and the uh company's lawyer were there, and it was two guys asking questions where they weren't they couldn't really communicate on it. I think it was just they weren't familiar with it, but those were those were very serious, those are very powerful chillers, and no one would want one in their backyard or right next to their backyard.
SPEAKER_02And we've seen this issue of uh AI data centers that's come up next door in Invergrove Heights. There's a big controversy, as you know, up in Hermantown, Minnesota, where I believe that was the community where this issue that you brought up about non-disclosure agreements came up. That's Farmington, Cadwell, too. Farmington as well, yeah. And so that would be a concern that I think a lot of residents probably would have too when you have city officials negotiating deals that are done out of the daylight, so to speak, and not necessarily even complying with open meeting laws. Right.
SPEAKER_03And you're like I said, as mayor, I'm your employee. I'm working for you, and I I couldn't quite understand how that would pass anybody's test on it. It would, you know, if someone's approaching me and I'll sit and talk to them, but I'll you know, tell anyone I know. I'm not signing a non-disclosure agreement. I'd never do that.
SPEAKER_02So, Joe, uh, we are down to our last minute and a half here, and I want to give you an opportunity to speak directly to our viewers and tell them why you think they should vote for you. Uh, just to set this up real quickly, there is a primary election August 11th. There are three candidates who have filed a run for mayor. Only two of them will advance to the November ballot. Yeah. Why should voters vote for you on August 11th?
SPEAKER_03Uh well, uh if you are concerned about uh the loss of tax revenue and your property taxes going up, and the only one in the race I can say is he has never voted for a tax hike. Um, and the the rate of the tax hike right 8.9, and I think next year it's going to be 6.7. And I think if we kept the taxes paid in Egan, any keep the taxes here, rather than they go out to uh through like the Met Council and other ways, and basically in the Twin Cities they get fed into St. Paul of Minneapolis and all over the state, um, it would be a huge benefit. And to give you an example of the city of Egan's being sued, we're losing some tax dollars uh to St. Paul of Minneapolis, but they're not coming in to bail us out on a lawsuit. We're on our own. So we accept all the risk, have all the staff time, and they take the nice cut of it.
SPEAKER_02Joe Kruger, candidate for mayor of the city of Egan. Thank you for coming on Access to Democracy to discuss your candidacy today. All right, thanks, Steve.
SPEAKER_00Access to Democracy is produced by Alan and Sharon Miller, directed by Mary Dulkin. Live audio mixed by Sharon Miller. Technical and post production services provided by Egan Television. This program was recorded at Egan High School. The views and opinions expressed on this program are solely those of the producers andor the persons appearing on the program, and do not reflect the views and opinions of ETV or those of District 196 schools.