By Ashley Stewart

Owatonna People’s Press

BLOOMING PRAIRIE — Although Rick Kittelson has always been acquainted with Blooming Prairie, that wasn’t the case for him and public utilities.

In fact, upon arriving to Blooming Prairie Public Utilities on March 21, 1973, Kittelson knew little about the subject.

But he learned.

“I started as a utility worker and did utility maintenance and was kind of a ground man for the line crew,” Kittelson said. “I just learned the rest on the fly from the guys,”

Kittelson, who grew up between Austin and Blooming Prairie, has worked much of his life, except one job, in Blooming Prairie.

That one job was at a packing plant in Dubuque, Iowa.

“I really didn’t like living down there very much, and in the spring, we had a maintenance shutdown for about three weeks, so we spent most of that time in Blooming.”

That’s when Kittelson found out that the local telephone company was hiring.

“I applied there, and I was told I would be hired, so I quit my job and waited around here and the job never materialized,” he said.

Later while he was at a bank in Blooming Prairie, a woman told him about a utilities job that opened up.

“I applied, and I got it,” he said. “I’ve been here ever since.”

And now, more than 40 years after being hired, Kittelson is set to retire as utilities manager — a position he’s held nearly 30 years — on Dec. 31.

“I was lucky that I had some great utility commissioners to teach me things,” he said.

Kittelson said he’ll miss the people, both the residents and his co-workers.

“When you see people every day as long as I have of course you’ll miss them,” he said. “I’ve enjoyed working with the guys and gals in the office and just being involved in the operations of the city.”

That despite some tough times, Kittelson said recalling the ice storm of 1991 when one-fourth of the city’s power lines were knocked down.

“We had to issue power on our own for a few days,” he said. “We called some nearby utilities for assistance, and within three days, we had things in working order.”

Kittelson said he doesn’t have “anything special” planned for retirement, “no big lifestyle changes,” but he’s looking forward to spending more time at the cabin in Wisconsin, golfing and reading.

But Kittelson won’t be retiring completely.

In 1997, he was elected to the Southern Minnesota Municipal Power Agency Board, where he’s currently serving as president.

“Once I got involved in the [Southern Minnesota Municipal Power Agency Board], it was almost like a whole different job,” Kittelson said.

And that will be a job, Kittelson plans to hold until the fall of 2016, when the new utilities manager will likely take his place on the board.

In September, the Blooming Prairie Public Utilities Commission hired Rauenhorst Recruiting of Minneapolis to assist the city in finding its next utilities manager.

And during on Dec. 14 during the monthly city council meeting, Mike Jones, Blooming Prairie city administrator, announced the commission had selected Jerry Mausbach as the public utilities manager.

Mausbach will start on Jan. 4, Jones said.

—Distributed by the Associated Press.