Don’t hold your breath, Marvin Foster and Leroy Swanson.

Wednesday, March 15, 2000

Don’t hold your breath, Marvin Foster and Leroy Swanson.

If you’re waiting for a share of Mower County’s $33 million or more in reserves to help your communities, look what happened to LeRoy.

The Mower County Board of Commissioners denied a request from the LeRoy Task Force for $314,300 of the county’s reserves.

The decision of the county commissioners was unanimous and made three times over for each of the individual requests from the LeRoy Task Force.

"Needless to say, we are very, very disappointed in the County Board’s decision," said Nick Archuleta, chairperson of the LeRoy Task Force.

"The county coordinator, Mr. Oscarson, told us ‘If we did this for LeRoy, we’d have to do it for every town in the county’," Archuleta said. "Well, I say why not help every community in Mower County?"

Ray Tucker, Second District county commissioner and chairman of the county board, said the county cannot help the private sector in the way the LeRoy Task Force expected.

"The finance committee of the county board looked at all three requests," Tucker said. "There were problems from the beginning with assisting a private development. That’s not in the realm of the county’s authority."

A trio of LeRoy residents – Nick Archuleta, Chantel Dow and Colleen Jennings – went to the county board a month ago.

They argued by enhancing the community of LeRoy and the LeRoy-Ostrander school district, the county commissioners could help the county. The enhancements to be partly funded by county reserves would bring new residents to the community, new students to the school and both would result in more taxes paid to the county.

Specifically, the LeRoy Task Force sought $60,000 for a marketing communications package to promulgate the assets of the community and school district.

Another $227,300 was sought for the LeRoy-Ostrander school district to fund preschool programming and school-age child care before and after regular school hours.

The last request was for $27,000 to buy-down the cost of development of residential lots by offering a $3,000 incentive to entice families to build in LeRoy.

With that request came a request for a 10-year abatement of taxes or Tax Increment Financing benefits for new home builders anywhere in LeRoy.

Thus far, the county board’s only apparent interest in addressing what state Auditor Judi Dutcher calls an "excessive" unfunded reserve situation in Mower County has been to designate $1.8 million for a proposed multipurpose building, which would include two sheets of ice and replace the city of Austin’s own ice skating facility, Riverside Arena.

The LeRoy Task Force’s request was the first formal request from a municipality or township to share in the huge reserves, which accumulated from taxes paid and the investment of those taxes collected.

The only other proposal for the reserves was made by Malcolm McDonald last summer. He proposed a property tax buydown and rebate to county citizens.

Like the LeRoy request, McDonald’s also was denied.

A week ago, Foster, Brownsdale’s feisty mayor, came to the county board for $40,000 of the county’s reserves. With the Brownsdale City Council’s approval, Foster said he wanted the money for the community to affect a similar incentive program to lure home builders to Brownsdale.

Foster’s request is scheduled to be answered after the finance committee reviews it.

Also Tuesday, the county board members heard from Adams Mayor Leroy Swanson.

The county board approved the city of Adams’ request to acquire a tax-forfeited property at the east edge of the community along Highway 56.

A bowling alley burned to the ground on the property a few years ago and now the city and Adams Township want to build a multipurpose government facility there.

The building would house the Adams Fire Department as well as Adams Area Ambulance Service and Adams Police Department vehicles as well as serve as a meeting hall for Adams Township.

The city of Adams wanted to know whether Mower County was interested in joining the project in order to locate a Mower County Highway Department garage and shop building also on the property site where the new multipurpose government center would go.

"Certainly, the city is willing to work with the county board in whatever way we can," Swanson said.

Tucker, whose Second District includes 12 townships and eight municipalities, the city of LeRoy, the city of Adams and Adams Township among them, said the county indeed would be interested in exploring that option.

Tucker said County Engineer Mike Hanson would be the county board’s liaison with the city of Adams.

Then, Swanson told the county board, "We have two major projects going on in Adams."

One is a $760,000 expansion of assisted-living apartments at the city-owned Adams Health Care Center and the other is to acquire 4 acres of land to develop for industrial or other purposes in the northwest quadrant of the city.

"We would definitely be interested in any money you got to help us do these projects," Swanson said.

Then, Swanson told the commissioners, "From the standpoint of my people in Adams, there is a degree of animosity against this multipurpose ice arena you’re proposing."

"It will benefit the city of Austin more than any other place in the county," he said, "From a fairness standpoint, people are asking, why spend that kind of money in the city of Austin only?"

"That’s $1,000 or more per capita for every resident of Austin," Swanson went on. "Why not do something like that for the rest of the county, too? It may generate some goodwill for you."

The commissioners quickly responded in their own defense.

Len Miller, Fourth District, said the county is embarked on an "aggressive roads and bridges replacement program" every year.

David Hillier, Third District, said the county spends $7 million every year on roads and bridges and another $1 million per year on public safety in out-county areas.

"It’s just impossible to treat every citizen equally and fairly on a dollar basis," Hillier said.

"We certainly realize some of the individuals in the out-county area don’t see this direct benefit," he said. "But these same people are willing to drive to Rochester or Mason City, Iowa, or other places where they have facilities like the one we want to build here to see a show of some sort that could be held here."

The Leroy Task Force’s Archuleta said the organization is awaiting a written response to their request from the county board before planning their next course of action.

Today, he was angry and expressed cynicism about the county board’s decision.

"There are those of us who are just naive enough to believe the county board works for all of us," he said.

Tucker’s 2nd District includes the community of Leroy. He lamented "on Tuesday, we have to say ‘no’ to Leroy and can’t give them any money, but on Thursday, we’ll be there at LeRoy Products with the DCA (Development Corp. of Austin) to help give a LeRoy industry some financial help."