After ‘12 loss, Tucker seeks to get back on county board

Published 10:17 am Wednesday, May 25, 2016

After losing his seat after 16 years on the Mower County board, Ray Tucker is looking to return as the District 2 commissioner.

Tucker

Tucker

Tucker, 64, filed this week to seek to reclaim his former seat because he thinks the county, especially the largely rural District 2, is falling behind when it comes to road and bridge infrastructure.

“It appears to me that we gotta be pushing that harder,” he said.

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In 2012, Tucker lost his seat to retired banker Polly Glynn, who filed for reelection last week, by 61 votes.

District 2 is the largest geographical Mower County District encompassing the eastern two-thirds of the county. That traditionally has made roads and bridges one of the chief concerns for residents in that area.

Tucker said the residents often don’t ask for a lot, but they do need good roads, and he said the area produces a lot of tax for the county through wind farms and ag land, which provides a good share of the county’s tax base.

“They do need some good roads and some infrastructure repairs,” Tucker said.

Tucker said he could jump right back in the mix of county government and thinks he could help with the board’s roadwork and economic development projects.

He also said he’d favor using tax credit money from wind farms for rural roads.

“I think that wind mill money should be allocated more so to the ag sector … for roads and bridges,” he said.

Tucker said more of the roughly $1.3 million a year the county receives from the wind energy production tax from its wind turbines should go toward roads. The money currently goes into the general fund to offset property taxes, and commissioners have voiced concerns shifting the money from the general fund to roads and bridges would result in a tax shift and levy increase.

However, Glynn, 69, on multiple occasions has voiced her constituents desires to see wind energy funds designated for roads. At a meeting this spring, Glynn asked the board to discuss dedicating the county’s projected $450,000 to $500,000 in additional wind production tax credit funding from the recently completed Pleasant Valley Wind Farm to roads starting in 2017 to roads and bridges.

That will be part of the county’s ongoing roads discussions. In recent months, the board has discussed a half-cent sales tax to address a roughly $100 million need for road and bridge projects over the next decade and an estimated funding shortfall of $6.5 million per year.

One option is the half-cent sales tax the board could enact for specific road projects, which would slim the county’s annual funding shortfall from $6.5 million a year to $5 million a year.

In 2014, just under $1.6 million went to Mower County based on 2013 energy production — $1.27 to Mower County and about $318,000 was distributed among townships with towers.

However, the half-cent sales tax discussion is scheduled to be decided before the November election.

Tucker also said the board needs to focus on the needs of the county first, and he questioned some spending decisions based around Vision 2020, noting the board can’t address every issue.

He also said the county is facing other tough decisions, like how to address potential landfill requests. The county is currently updating its outdated solid waste ordinance, which came up after SKB Environmental acquired neighboring Veit Solid Waste Facility and discussed adding mixed municipal solid waste — or household garbage.

“There’s some big decisions,” Tucker said.

Tucker lives in Dexter and owns Tucker Tiling. He has a daughter and four grandchildren. He enjoys fishing, traveling and helping his daughter on the farm.