Friday, April 07, 2000

Right before the Concerned Citizens’ meeting was scheduled to begin, four or five deer ran by the windows of the Ruby Rupner Auditorium and into the field beyond. That little demonstration, combined with Wednesday’s Lansing Township Board vote against the annexation, 3,000 signatures on their petition and more than $1,600 raised in a short time, and the Concerned Citizens for the Hormel Nature Center might not be blamed if they think that the big guy’s on their side.

Concerned Citizens’ spokesman Dr. Mark Reeve held up a copy of the Austin Daily Herald at the beginning of the group’s Thursday night meeting. The top story told the tale of the Lansing Township Board vote against the annexation of 55 acres of land west of the nature center. Currently farmland, Greater Minnesota Affordable Housing has an option on the land, which they would like to buy and erect 134 homes on once it is annexed into the city.

"Their vote against the annexation … was one of the things we’ve pushed worked for," Reeve said. "It’s pretty neat to see it happen."

The spokesman harkened back to a meeting a couple months before, recalling a statement he made then about the possibility of achieving the group’s dual mission of preventing development – commercial, residential or industrial – around the nature center and of acquiring lands to increase the nature center.

"Maybe we can succeed," he said. Then he moved on to the one thing the group will certainly need if they want to acquire any land: money.

The goal of the citizens’ group is to raise $300,000 and to apply for the same amount in matching grants.

Pledge cards were handed out and the 40 or so people at the meeting were encouraged to take more than one. The same for the buttons, which read "C.C.F.T.H.N.C. Expand the Nature Center" and are available for a donation. Several organizations and individuals also have been approached for donations.

"In the short time we’ve been fund raising, I haven’t had a ‘no’ yet," fund-raising co-chairman Dave Hagen said, "and I’ve asked a lot of people. It’s just a question of how much they’re going to donate."

News that the Isaac Walton League had agreed to help the group by holding any funds raised – the league is an incorporated non-profit organization, the Concerned Citizens are not – was explained. The Isaac Walton League agreed Monday night to allow the Concerned Citizens group to funnel their funds to them once lawyer Paul Sween, who is donating his services, draws up the legal papers.

The original proposal of putting any money raised into the hands of the Friends of the Nature Center organization didn’t happen, Reeve explained, because the Austin Park and Recreation Board could take charge of the money.

As far as land acquisition goes, fund-raising co-chairman Steve Persinger added good news.

"I have a commitment from a land owner that when we have the money, he’s willing to deal with us," Persinger said, explaining that he was talking about three different lots of land north or northwest of the nature center. "I have his word, which I trust, that he will talk to us first before anything happens or if anyone else makes an offer,"

He continued, "The land across the road (the 55 acres that was the subject of the annexation dispute) is not for sale now; it’s under option to the developers. We have to respect that. It’s not our No. 1 priority right now."

Austin City Council member Dick Lang also was at the meeting. He spoke, explaining that he was there as himself, not as a representative of the council.

Reeve asked Lang, who brought photocopies of the charter rules for referendum to an earlier meeting, whether the council could call for a referendum. Lang said yes, but added that if the council didn’t, the registered voters could "as long as the right procedure is followed."

"If the petition isn’t presented in the right fashion, it doesn’t matter," Lang said.

In the end, discussion moved back to the newspaper article, and a comment by developer David Wellstone that the issue with the annexation and development of the land west of the nature center was not about expansion of the nature center, but about people not wanting neighbors.

"I think it should go on record that a lot of us here, myself included, do not live close to the nature center," Dorothy Owens said.

The Concerned Citizens group will meet again at 7:30 p.m. April 30 in the Ruby Rupner Auditorium.