Rice County Observer Report: Rice county Commissioner Meeting, 10.10.23

Rice Co Commissioners Meeting 10.10.23

• Public Forum: No comments given
• Property Tax & Elections: Denise Anderson
  • Set price for forfeited land in Rice County due to unpaid taxes:
    • Parcel 03.31.1.75.001 – land only: $145,300
    • Parcel 22901 Fertile Ave, Morristown: $26,200
• Community Services and Community Corrections: Angela Brewer
  • Accepted the FY 23 Second Chance Act Smart Supervision Program grant award for $400,000 from the Bureau of Justice Assistance
  • Approved amended Community Corrections Advisory Board bylaws to align with updated statutory requirements
  • Community Corrections Advisory Board new members were appointed
    • Honorable Jeffrey Johnson, Judiciary representative
    • Rochelle Marquardt, Community Corrections representative
    • Thao Trinh, Prosecution representative
    • Francis Davies, Social Services representative
    • Jay Haws, Business Member
    • Carolyn Treadway, General Public Member
• Sheriff’s Office: Jesse Thomas
  • Approved $11,500 for Mid-America Business Systems (Mid-America) to scan and convert services/inmate roster cards and daily jail logs to digital records. They must be kept as digital records, legally. Decided to give very old books to historical society, others will be kept in physical storage. In order to get 140,000 images from log books digitized.
    • Question: Are these being done digitally now? Yes.
    • Question: Will these be available as public records? Yes. 
• Attorney’s Office: Brian Mortenson
  • Approved MN OJP Grant award for crime victim services for $70,000 to help fund crime victims services program in the Attorney’s office. Covers about 50% of the costs of running the program. 
• Parks and Facilities Department: Matthew Verdick
  • Fairgrounds – budget is about $1,000 from the county each year for the fairgrounds
    • Purfeerst: County board takes care of exteriors, is it our responsibility to repair?
      • Answer: No, that’s the fairgrounds responsibility. 
    • Underdahl: Who owns the land?
      • Answer: The county owns the land, but there is some confusion about who owns the buildings. County insures the buildings and the county has liability for the buildings, but there is no clarity about whether the buildings were transferred to the county’s ownership.
    • Hoisington: We need to clear up confusion about who owns the buildings. If county owns the buildings, $1,000 budget is not enough. 
    • Folsted: UMN Extension has agreements with other county fairgrounds, so Rice Co will be getting a similar agreement in place for those structures on our fairgrounds. But the other buildings 
    • Underdahl: The buildings are in various states of disrepair. There is a lot that we need to look at. The first step is to figure out ownership of these buildings. There isn’t extra money in the budget to start working on this. So we need to figure out who is responsible for what first. 
    • Purfeerst: Agrees. Also notes that roofs of buildings are leaking and need to be repaired so the whole building does not suffer damage.
    • Docken: Agrees. We need to make sure we get these leaks fixed. We want to support the fairgrounds and the fair. I would hate to see this county lose its fair. 
    • Underdahl: Fairibault is thinking about adding a community center near the fairgrounds, another community group thinking about adding an ice sheet — so this all needs to be figured out. 
  • Award Bid for Fairgrounds Conservation Building Roof
    • $19,755 bid from Jacob Schultz Construction LLC for asphalt shingles
    • $36,000 bid for metal roof
    • Docken: How many sq feet
      • 4,723 square feet 
    • Malecha: So this is going to come out of levy dollars?
      • Folsted: We have a capital fund that we could pull from with about $500,000 balance
    • Malecha: Go with the metal roof 
    • Hoisington: The two bids look really different. Were they given the same specs?
      • Yes
    • Hoisington: What is the difference in warranties for the two roofs?
      • Don’t know off hand. 
    • Purfeerst: Agrees with Malecha. Let’s put the metal roof on it, and it will outlive most of us up here. 
    • Hoisington: Motion to accept metal roof bid.
    • Underdahl: You’ll likely get a materials warranty, not a weather tightness warranty. Advantage with steel, it’s a lighter roof, which is good given questions about stability of the building. However, it depends on how it’s attached, so that it won’t blow away. These are not professional judgments, but he knows they are aged buildings open to the public and we have liability and risk. 
    • Hoisington: It’s critical how this roof is attached, and there is no requirement for building permit, so there will not be oversight. It’s critical that there be oversight.
      • Verdick: Can be arranged
    • Hoisington: Is it being resheeted?
      • No – it’s not sheeted. 
    • Purfeerst: Does it need to be insulated for condensation? 
    • Docken: Recommends leaving the existing shingles on 
    • Purfeerst: Agree – otherwise you’ll have condensation
    • Verdick: Wants to get weight off the building
    • Hoisington: It’s standard construction process to put a metal roof over the asphalt. So that’s how we should do it. 
    • Voted to approve metal roof. 
• Highway: Dennis Luebbe
  • Approved support for Bridgewater Township Application for Minnesota Highway Freight Program Funding. This is federal money. Rice County would be the fiscal agent. Funding would be used to upgrade 140th Street East as part of the Core X Partners Cold Storage Project. As proposed, the Core X development will necessitate a paved, 10-ton, roadway from CSAH 76 (Baseline Road), 1.25 miles east on 140th Street. 140th Street is a Bridgewater Township road.
  • Approved support for Rice County highway department application for Minnesota Highway Freight Program Funding, same funding source. This would cover CSAH 46 (Hazelwood Avenue) from TH 19, north approximately 5-miles, to the Scott County line. The project is programmed for 2027. Seeking a $1.44 million grant. The estimated cost of the proposed improvements are $7.5 million, and county has secured $4.56 Million in Federal funding from the Surface Transportation Block Grant Program through Federal Highways.
• Approved consent agenda
• Adjourned