The Polk County Board of Commissioners met on Tuesday, April 1 at the Polk County Government Center in Crookston.
POLK COUNTY HIGHWAY DEPARTMENT
Polk County Engineer Richard Sanders came to the board asking the commissioners to approve a street sweeping quote for the roads in the cities within Polk County. “Wherever we have curb and gutter, so it includes Fisher Avenue in Crookston,” said Sanders. Mathsen Sweeping out of Grand Forks got the bid at $165.00 per hour.
The commissioners also approved a contract for surfacing CSAH 46 from Highway 102 to Highway 2. RJ Zavoral and Sons Inc., out of East Grand Forks, was the low bidder at $2,020,319. The board unanimously approved both items.
The commissioners approved Hot in Place Bituminous surfacing for multiple locations.
1. Polk County Highway 19 from Highway 75 to the east county line just north of Euclid
2. Polk County Highway 9 from the Thompson Bridge to Highway 75 in Crookston
3. Polk County Highway 45 from Highway 32 east into Mentor to our CSAH 12
The lowest responsible bidder for the project was Dustrol Inc. out of Kansas at $4,793,919.75.
The fourth item for Sander was to get a revision to Resolution (2025 – 18) from last month, where he asked that the County transfer excess Municipal Funds to Regular County Funds in the amount of $1.2 million so that they could be freed up for other projects since there were no large scale Municipal projects for 2025. Sanders found out that it is required that he keep two years’ worth of funds in the account at all times, so he asked for a revised transfer amount of $630,307.57. The board approved unanimously.
The board approved a blanket permit for the removal of blow (black) dirt from Polk County Highway Ditches as well as a motion to approve Sanders to approve County Ditch Drainage Petitions requested for the removal of blow (black) dirt from the county drainage system. “Throughout the county, a lot of soil has blown off fields into highway ditches, into county drainage systems, and so, for the Polk County Highway ditches, this doesn’t include township roads or state roads, just the county roads, the board approved a blanket permit for landowners to go back and reclaim their black soil,” says Sanders. “They will have to call into my office and let us know that they are going to be doing the cleaning, who is going to be doing the cleaning, so that we can control and approve verbally the permit to work within our right away, but they have the ability to just go out there and do it, there won’t be any fee from us to work within the right of way like our normal right of way process.”
Sanders says that if you are going to be doing a ditch cleaning that is more than just the blow soil, like removing sod and deepening a ditch, then the landowner will have to go through the normal permitting process. The only obstacle Sanders met with the first part of this item was originally calling it dirt. Commissioner Gary Wilhite asked if it would be ok to change the wording to black soil, and with that change, the board approved the blanket permit. “You have the county drainage systems that are out there, basically the same thing,” says Sanders. “ You will call into the office, request that you want to clean a certain stretch of county drainage ditch, and I’ll send you a petition. You fill out the area that you are going to clean and send it back to me. If you are going to be cleaning in front of a neighbor’s property or more than just your property, then everybody’s property that the blow soil is going to be piled on will need to sign, and then I have the ability to approve that petition right away instead of having to bring it up to the county board during a county board meeting” The board approved unanimously of Sanders being able to approve such drainage system cleanings without going to the board.
PLANNING AND ZONING
The Commissioners heard from Jake Snyder of the Planning & Zoning Department. Snyder brought a resolution to the board to rezone 12 acres of Agricultural land to Industrial Zoning District for RZS Holdings LLP. “We had a couple of action items. One of those was a rezone for RZS Holdings LLP, they are looking at establishing, what I would call, more of a contractor yard, and large truck storage building in the future,” says Snyder. “That’s not what we had action today. It was actually to rezone from our Agricultural District to our Industrial Zoning District.” The board approved the rezoning unanimously.
Snyder then brought to the board a resolution for a Conditional Use Permit for Dragseth Farms, Inc. for the Operation of a Custom Animal Butcher Business. “They are looking at establishing livestock butchering and doing some custom work for people that need animals butchered,” says Snyder. “They are not looking to operate a sell by the cut business, it would be very much taking animals, butchering them and preparing them so they can have packages of meat.” The board unanimously approved the conditional use for a butcher business.
Snyder’s final item was a resolution for termination of recorded resolution (2020-60) and the document that was recorded on July 9, 2020. “The last action item I had today was termination of a conditional use that was not acted on in 2020.”The board unanimously approved terminating the document.
PUBLIC HEALTH
Public Health Director Sarah Reese brought to the board a motion to approve the advertisement and hiring of a Wellness Coordinator and Public Health Nurse or Registered Nurse within Polk County Public Health. “I proposed a Wellness Coordinator, due to a recent retirement, as well as either a Public Health Nurse or Registered Nurse, and that is related to a promotion of one of our current staff,” said Reese. The board unanimously approved of filling these positions as well as any subsequent vacancies that may happen.
Reese updated the commissioners on the cutting of COVID-19 funding. “Last week, we received notice from the Minnesota Department of Health that they received Federal notice that the COVID funding that they had federally received was being terminated, effective immediately, which was, of course, a surprise to everyone,” says Reese. “So, subsequently, the Minnesota Department of Health provided a termination letter to us locally about our COVID funding, which is pass-through funding, meaning essentially it’s federal funding that went to the state and then came to our local health departments.” The letter, Reese says, told Polk County Health Department to stop utilizing the COVID-19 funds effective March 24, 2025. “So, we are in the process of submitting the invoices and doing the procedural requirements to be reimbursed for the expenses that we have had thus far,” said Reese. “In our 2025 budget, we had budgeted very conservatively because the eligible expenses were limited, and so we are going to be able to capitalize on the budgeted amount, and so our budget impact will be fairly insignificant.”
PROPERTY RECORDS
Sam Melbye from Polk County Property Records brought a resolution sponsoring the Crookston Driftbusters and the Sandhill Snowcruisers Snowmobile Clubs. The board unanimously approved the clubs’ continued sponsorship.
Melbye also spoke with the board about the Department of Public Safety’s desire to exercise its option to renew the lease for the License Center. If the board approves of the lease renewal, it will be for a two-year period with all the same terms, conditions, and rental rates and will be effective from July 1, 2025, to June 30, 2027. This was a discussion item for Tuesday’s meeting.
ADMINISTRATOR CHUCK WHITING
Last up for the Polk County Board of Commissioners was Polk County Administrator Chuck Whiting. Whiting was looking for authorization from the board to purchase Budgeting Software, which Abdo Financial recommended. The board approved purchasing the software with a few conditions that Whiting will put in place and report back at the April 15 meeting. Whiting also brought a request for approval of a payment to Tri-County Community Corrections for Legal Expenses pertaining to the Juvenile Center Roof litigation. The legal expenses were to be split between Polk County and Tri-County Community Corrections, and the board approved the payment to TCCC for half of the legal costs.
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