It’s not that the city of Austin and Mower County don’t communicate or cooperative ever.

Thursday, December 14, 2000

It’s not that the city of Austin and Mower County don’t communicate or cooperative ever.

In reality, city and county staff do that daily on projects and problems of mutual concern.

However, city and council officials admit they need to practice more communications and cooperation. Thus, another city/county meeting was held Wednesday afternoon at the Austin Housing and Redevelopment Authority headquarters in Courtyard Apartments.

Mower County was represented by Ray Tucker and Richard P. Cummings, county commissioners, and Craig Oscarson, county coordinator.

The city out numbered them with a seven-member delegation headed by Mayor Bonnie Rietz and Council Member At Large Dick Chaffee.

Apex requests money

Apex Austin requested money for a welcome center.

The city has pledged to contribute $25,000, but Mower County is hedging.

"At this point, it’s the recommendation of the county board’s finance committee not to fund the Apex Austin request," said Cummings, First District county commissioner.

"We believe our own multi-cultural program coordinator is addressing these issues on the county level and we want to give her a chance to see some things through," Cummings said.

Mayor Rietz said the city’s $25,000 to Apex Austin is for only one week and Chaffee said after a year, the city’s funding role would be reevaluated.

Hormel Foods Corp. has pledged to give $25,000 if both the city and the county donate $25,000 each. Then, the Hormel Foundation would give another $50,000.

According to Rietz, the money is needed to supplement the $130,000 budget of the new welcome center designed to assist immigrants coming to Austin to work.

Over the mayor’s protestations of the county’s unwillingness to fund an additional multi-cultural effort, Tucker, Second District county commissioner and county board chair said, "The request is not in the levy at this time, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be funded from other sources when we make our allocations over and above the budget in January."

"Apex Austin is helping people in the county," Rietz said.

Chaffee said if the county doesn’t help the effort to leverage funds from Hormel Foods and the foundation, "The city can’t make up the difference in the welcome center budget alone."

Dick Lang, Third Ward council member, advised the county trio, "Look at the good it will do for all. You couldn’t spend money in any wiser a way."

Flood control sought

The city and county officials heard of a pending visit to Austin in January 2001 by a representative with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

The engineer will discuss possible flood control measures.

According to Pat McGarvey, city administrator, "Let’s not mislead the public. There’s no millions, no billions for dikes or levees."

McGarvey said the Corps of Engineers will only consider flood control projects which offer a verifiable cost-benefit to all participating parties.

On the subject of possible retention ponds to hold water in the three watersheds north of Austin, McGarvey said the Corps of Engineers has noted it could take as many as 1,440 retention ponds 300-feet long by 300-feet wide and 10- feet deep to hold back the flood water that inundated Austin in July. "And," McGarvey said, "they would all fill in a minute based on the Corps of Engineers’ calculations."

County seeks renegotiation

According to county coordinator Oscarson, the county wants to renegotiate a contract with the city to house prisoners.

Currently, the city pays $1,500 a year plus the cost of prisoners’ meals to board offenders arrested by the Austin Police Department.

Lang and Roger Boughton, Second Ward council member, both said, residents of Austin already pay taxes for county services and programs and Lang observed, "Austin is in Mower County, isn’t it?"

Lang and Boughton wondered aloud if the user fee the county charged the city wasn’t an act of "double-taking."

Oscarson, Tucker and Cummings said the influx of new residents has resulted in more demands on the criminal justice system. In addition, juvenile delinquency cases are "exploding," as Oscarson described it.

County budget, levy

It was the county’s turn to prepare the agenda for Wednesday’s meeting and one of the items was the county budget and tax levy proposals.

The county commissioners met with criticism at their Truth in Taxation information hearing a week ago.

At Wednesday’s meeting, the county representatives made it clear: there is no plan to spend down any of the county’s undesignated reserves. Also, the county has a spending plan in place to fund projects suggested by a long-range strategic planning committee.

And, when the bids for a proposed new multi-purpose building are opened Dec. 19, unless they come within the budget, the county will ask supporters to look for other financial players in the project.

City administrator McGarvey suggested the county board use the $2.5 million "windfall" it will realize from assisting Great River Energy in its Pleasant Valley Township substation in northeastern Mower County.

McGarvey went so far as to suggest naming the new multi-purpose building planned for the fairgrounds the "Great River Energy Center."

18th Avenue NW discussed

One one topic Wednesday both city and county officials agreed upon was the new four-way stop intersection along 18th Avenue NW at the entrance to Cash Wise Food and Drug is reaping traffic safety benefits for all.

Meetings will begin soon between city and county staffs to discuss the application for federal funding for the reconstruction project to be shared by both government entities beginning in 2002.