City, EDA to seek ideas for future projects

By Chad Koenen

Publisher

A project to bring a large portion of the city’s aging infrastructure up to date took a step forward last week, even though a funding plan and a timeline has yet to be finalized.

During its regularly scheduled meeting last week, the Henning City Council approved a funding application to the Clean Water Revolving Fund and Drinking Water Revolving Fund to seek funding should the city move forward with a nearly $10 million project to update its utilities and streets in town. The requests for funding were part of a predetermined plan to ensure the city is eligible for grant and low interest loans should it move forward with the project. 

The city council has yet to give the go-ahead for the project, but has stated in the past it wants the project to be shovel-ready should state aid and grants become available down the road. The hope is by having a shovel-ready project that Henning may be in a better position to receive funding should a limited amount of dollars become available down the road. The city has proactively completed similar plans to get them shovel ready for potential funding in the past as well.

“The earlier you get approval from these funding sources the higher on the priority list you are,” said a representative of Apex Engineering last week. “So even though construction wouldn’t happen until 2026, at the earliest,  you would be higher on the list for funding should it become available down the road.”

As part of the project, Apex Engineering recently completed the design phase of sanitary sewer, water main and a road surface improvement project throughout a large portion of the city. The project includes large portions of Marshall Ave., School Ave., Hipple Ave., Balmoral Ave., Front St., Milne Ave., as well as a number of other roads throughout the community. 

The estimated funding package for the project would be in the form of a grant for $7.5 million, a low-interest PFA loan for nearly $1.9 million and the estimated cost for non PFA eligible projects would be $384,236. 

Henning Mayor Jesse Hermanson asked if getting put on the funding list meant the City of Henning was committed to completing the project should the funding become available. 

The Apex Engineering representative said last week “it’s more of a placeholder” and getting on the list just means that the project would be eligible for funding should it become available in the future.

Hermanson said his concern revolved around whether the city can afford to do the project when the funding becomes available, but also contended it didn’t hurt to proceed to get the community put on the list for potential projects since the work will need to be completed down the road.

“I think we would like to do this, but it just comes down to where we are financially when it comes to it,” he said.

The city council approved moving forward to submit a funding application to the Clean Water Revolving Fund and Drinking Water Revolving Fund to see if the local project was eligible for funding.

Countryview Apartments

Henning EDA President Andy Eckhoff spoke to the city council about recent discussion by the EDA that could potentially see the city selling Countryview Apartments. The Henning EDA has not formally approved moving forward with the idea of selling the city-owned apartment building, but has discussed the potential of doing so at a number of recent meetings.

Eckhoff said the purpose of the Henning EDA is to spur economic development in the city and some members have questioned whether the city entity should own property like an apartment building. He went on to say if the city did sell the building the EDA wanted to have a solid plan in place on what the proceeds could fund to help improve the community. 

“I think selling Countryview would get us that big chunk of money, but we need to have a plan,” said councilwoman Mallory Loock, who is also on the Henning EDA. 

During the February Henning EDA meeting, local realtor Clay Houselog estimated the city could receive around $500,000 for the apartment building, based on recent comps.

Councilman Scott Hart said the city needs to have a few plans in place before it ultimately decides whether to sell the apartment building or not.

Proceeds from Countryview Apartments have funded city and EDA projects in the past, but Eckhoff said the EDA has been forced to make a number of upgrades over the past few years to replace the roof and heating system that has made the building not as profitable of late. He said selling the building could provide the entity with enough money to fund another large project, or several small projects, to grow the community.

After hearing from several Countryview residents about their concerns should the city sell the apartment building to a private investor, as well as some upgrades that will be needed in the future, the city council said it would like to get the community input to see if there was a project that the residents would like to see to spur economic or residential development in the city. 

City staff said even if the council ultimately decides to keep Countryview, and use the profits from the facility like it has in the past, it would be nice to know what local residents would like to see for future development in town. 

In other news

• Approved setting a work session for Tuesday, April 1 at 5:30 p.m.

• Heard from Hermanson about Henning Township’s desire to repair Airport Road, which is a shared road between the township and City of Henning. The township wanted to move forward with the repairs, but Hermanson said the City of Henning may not be in a position financially to move forward with a joint project at this time.

• Heard from Henning Police Chief Mike Helle who updated the city council on the potential of installing camping sites at the festival grounds. He received a bid of approximately $8,700 for four camping sites to install electricity and sewer pipes that could tap into the city’s holding tank at the festival grounds. He said the city could save money if it dug its own trench for the wires and piping, something he said they would continue to explore. 

• Approved the city’s new personnel policy for all full and part-time employees. The city council and staff said now that the new policy is in place it will need to adhere to the guidelines in the policy as the previous policy was not followed closely in certain situations.

• Approved having councilman Scott Hart and mayor Jesse Hermanson to meet with Henning Fire Chief Mike Helle and Henning Ambulance Director Chelsey Waskosky to work on having the two departments come together to work out any differences moving forward. 

• Heard the Henning Ambulance Service received a grant from the Ottertail Lions Club to purchase six new pagers for the department.

• Approved a supplemental services agreement with the City of Wadena that could help the City of Henning for things like electrical work, potential on-call hours and outage response for the Henning Public Utilities. The agreement was approved on a 4-1 vote with Travis Nelson voting in dissent. 

• Discussed the potential for completing a wage study for City of Henning employees. The last time the city completed a wage study was in 2022 and Hermanson brought up the idea of competing a similar study once again. The City of Battle Lake recently completed a wage study at a cost of $9,500 and Hermanson said he would contact the company the city used last time to get a cost on simply updating the last wage study the city completed.