Month: June 2020

The Crookston Parks and Recreation Board fully supports the continued planning and development of a city-based Summer Skills Program for area youth in 2020.

Crookston Parks and Rec director Scott Riopelle made a presentation to the board Monday, laying out details and gathering input on a potential Summer Skills Program that would start July 6 and run through August 7. The program would allow area youth of all ages to hone their athletic skills and practice sports throughout the summer, but not play any actual games. The board unanimously voted to allow planning for this program to officially move forward.

There are a number of key ingredients needed to make the program work. Riopelle said checking people’s temperatures, and the continued practice of wearing masks and social distancing are all essential.

“All of that has to take place,” said Riopelle. “We have to check with our attorneys on whether we can legally do screening with temperatures. There’s some alternatives if we can’t, but it is heavily suggested to go that route.”

As for staffing, Riopelle said the city will rely heavily on high school and college-aged youth who have previously been employed by Parks and Rec to help run programs like this. Riopelle said the city is also hoping to find at least a few volunteers.

“It’s not a whole lot of work for them,” Riopelle said. “It’s only a few, 3-4 hours a day, but if we could get 12-15 hours (per week) for them, that would be good.”

Under current state guidance, there can be a maximum of 24 participants on an outdoor playing field. For Crookston, Riopelle said the idea is to have skill-based programs divided by age groups, with instructors leading groups of 10-12 kids at a time. The preferred time to have these programs would be in the morning, but evening times are also being explored. The main sports mentioned Monday were baseball and softball. There was also talk of tennis, golf and soccer programs, but the details on those are unclear. 

“Baseball and softball would be the big part,” Riopelle said. “We would also like to have kids learn those motor skills and do some soccer or tennis. As for golf, we’d have to check with Minakwa to see if that’s available. We wouldn’t be able to teach that ourselves. That would be a whole different thing there.”

Crookston Parks and Rec announced the cancellation of all youth and adult summer programs on May 5, but as COVID-19 restrictions began to ease in Minnesota, the desire to have some kind of organized outdoor activity for youth this summer grew stronger. About a half-dozen parents from Crookston and surrounding towns like Fertile spoke in support of starting this program at Monday’s meeting.

“There’s a group of people that want activities for their children and we would like to see it happen,” Riopelle said. “So, now that things have lightened up and changed, we have an alternative and some options we can do to make that work.”

Riopelle also presented the official preparedness plan to get the Central Park campground in Crookston back open. The bathhouse will remain closed for the summer, and there will be a city park ranger on duty starting June 16 to ensure that social distancing is being practiced. Hand wipes will also be available throughout the campground.

As for the Crookston Community Pool, work continues on the new shower installation. Much like the campground, the pool’s preparedness plan will focus on safe sanitation practices.

“It’s all of the high-touch areas,” Riopelle said. “We’ll have to make sure we disinfect all of those. The chemicals in the pool take care of that part. The concern is outside of the pool.”

The city hopes to have the pool open by July 20.

There is nothing more beautiful than a Minnesota summer! I hope everyone is able to enjoy this wonderful weather! There are a few things that I would like to update our community on as we continue to work to improve our schools and school facilities.

WHAT WILL THE BEGINNING OF THE SCHOOL YEAR LOOK LIKE?
I am very short on answers at this time. What I do know is that as a district we are going to support our kids and families as much as we are allowed to. We recognize what an incredibly difficult task that parents had as they supported students during distance learning. We also recognize that distance learning is not successful for everyone and while I am incredibly proud of the work that our staff put into distance learning, we all agree that distance learning is certainly not the best format for all students. What is uncertain at this time is what schools will be allowed to do this Fall. If things continue to open up, we will most likely be starting the year off face-to-face with several restrictions which will require us to do things we haven’t ever done before. Areas that we will have to rethink will be transportation (how do we safely transport students), lunchrooms/lunch service, passing times, etc. We are committed to keeping your kids safe and therefore in any scenario, we will have to do things differently to maintain safety. Our goal internally as a district is to start developing a plan in mid/late July so that we have a little better perspective on how the reopening of the country is going and are also hoping for additional guidance on what we can and should do from a public health standpoint. This is going to be an interesting fall, however, I am confident that we can develop a plan that both takes care of the educational needs of our kids and families while also keeping our kids safe. 

STRATEGIC PLAN:
This year our focus and planning was centered around Communication and Relationships. Some of this work led to decisions such as advertising for a Hispanic Liaison, expansion of our Indian Education Liaison position, putting in place supports for struggling students at the high school, setting of expectations for communication home by teachers, and examining our internal practices in an effort to make our school more customer service focused. Next year we are adding “A Culture of High Expectations”. What does this mean? This means a more focused look at what we expect from our students both academically and behaviorally as well as what we should expect from ourselves. We have certainly been slowed by the onset of COVID-19 and of course, early in this upcoming year, our focus will be on providing education while also ensuring the safety of our students and staff. 

FOUR-YEAR-OLD PRESCHOOL:
I wanted to remind anyone who is thinking about four-year-old Preschool that we have a five day a week full-day program and a half-day program available to all students. This is new this year as previously we had a four day a week option and heard feedback from parents wanting a five day a week option for Preschool. Pricing is based on a sliding scale model according to lunch status on the free/reduced lunch application. 

The goal of Preschool is to help our students become Kindergarten ready based on the following indicators as developed collaboratively between our Kindergarten and Preschool Teachers:

1. Recognize and write the letters in their name.
2. Name a minimum of 13 letters of the alphabet…uppercase and lowercase.
3. Recognize numbers and count objects 0-10.
4. Be able to listen to a story and turn the pages of a book one at a time.
5. Show independence with self-help skills such as toileting, washing hands, dressing self, and tying shoes.
6. Is able to get along with others and use words to express their feelings. 

We would ask that parents who want to be a part of our Preschool program to contact us to reserve spots for their children as we are in the process of developing staffing and will need to know what the demand will be so that we can staff accordingly. 

BUS GARAGE:
I know that many of you have been wondering about the status of this project as it has been on hold for a few weeks. The reason for this delay is that the building permit that is issued by the state of MN was slow in getting to us due to state employees working from home and a general delay in all state activities during the pandemic. This meant that our excavator was not able to start on time and therefore had to be rescheduled. This was incredibly frustrating as we have lost some precious time, however, the good news is that our permit did finally come through from the state and our excavator has been rescheduled for June 10th. 

We are still scheduled to close out the project in December 2020. This means that our transportation services will be moving in December with the shutdown on our current bus garage scheduled in December as well. We will continue to work collaboratively with the city to transition our current bus facilities to what I hope will be a responsible use. 

Thank you for your support of Crookston Public Schools! If you ever have any questions about our schools or about the direction that we are going, please contact me at 218-770-8717 (cell). 

The Dancing Sky Area Agency on Aging has received a $100,000 grant from the Minnesota Council on Foundations to assist organizations serving older adults during the COVID-19 pandemic.  The grant from the Minnesota Disaster Recovery Fund will play a continuing role in Minnesota’s legacy of giving, especially during challenging times.

According to Darla Waldner, Dancing Sky Director, the agency is thrilled with the opportunities this grant will create. These funds will be used to assist families, friends, and neighbors with nutrition-related services, and technology or other related services.

Susie Brown, President of the Minnesota Council on Foundations said that the initiative will help to mobilize and to meet the immense needs growing out of the pandemic. She stated the Foundation seeks to deliver a high impact, coordinated response to those affected.

The Dancing Sky Area Agency on Aging is currently developing the grant applications and will post information regarding the grant on their website, www.dancingskyaaa.org.  If you have any questions, please call 218-745-6733.

The Dancing Sky Area Agency on Aging is a program of the Northwest Regional Development Commission and serves the 21 counties of northwest and west-central Minnesota including Becker, Beltrami, Clay, Clearwater, Douglas, Grant, Hubbard, Kittson, Lake of the Woods, Mahnomen, Marshall, Norman, Otter Tail, Pennington, Polk, Pope, Red Lake, Roseau, Stevens, Traverse, and Wilkin.  

The Crookston Planning Commission will meet Tuesday night at 7:00 p.m. in the council chambers at city hall. There is just one action item on the agenda, a conditional use permit for a secondary residential dwelling at 811 Groveland Avenue.

Property owner Justin Jerde is requesting the conditional use permit to build a detached two-stall garage with a studio living space including a bathroom, kitchen, living room, and bedroom. The staff recommendation is to not approve the permit based on city ordinances.