The Slayton City Council spent more than two hours listening to questions, concerns and comments relating to the open public hearing for the Maple Avenue mill and overlay improvement project during its regular meeting on Monday, Oct. 2 at City Hall.
A handful of taxpaying individuals joined in the discussion, making sure their voices were heard but doing so in a respectful manner. Ultimately, the council chose to temporarily hold off voting on a resolution ordering the improvement so that they could review and potentially change the assessment percentage that respective property owners adjacent to the Maple Avenue project would be assessed. “I’m not sitting here saying I don’t want to pay more,” Megan Oslund said.
“I’m saying everyone should be paying for all of our city streets.”
Currently, street improvements to an arterial road, which Maple Avenue is classified as, is assessed to the property owner at 40 percent. Sixty percent of the project would be paid for by the city through bonding, with the annual bond payments spread out to all the taxpayers throughout the city. “I’m sold on having a discussion,” City Administrator Josh Malchow said.
“We haven’t updated or looked at (the assessment policy) since 2007. It’s time. I’m there. I’m not necessarily sold on the idea of eliminating special assessments all together and passing everything on to everybody.”
Malchow clarified that only Maple and Broadway Avenue are classified as arterial streets in town and that 26th, 28th, Maple Road and 30th are considered collector classifications that are assessed to the adjacent property owners at 45 percent. Everything else is residential, assessed at 50 percent, he said. “The classifications are not set by statute,” Malchow said. “They are complete at the discretion of the council.”
Council member Kate Harmsen said she wondered what other cities are doing as far as percentages. “I’m real curious about that,” she said. “Do you know, Scott (Lavoy)?” Lavoy, who did the Maple Avenue feasibility study that gave the council three main options to go with regarding the improvement project, said a lot of cities do a lot of different things.
“It’s all over the map,” he said.
Harmsen said the biggest deterrent for her when settling on the mill and overlay option was in large part due to the 40 percent special assessment rate to adjacent property owners.
With that percentage now being questioned, she wondered if the other two options should be looked at again. “Maybe the best option is to do the complete reconstruction,” she said.
“It’s about 35 years lifespan versus 15, and probably even more because I think we’ve done a good job of maintaining what we have. But also, from what I understand, if you do that complete reconstruction, you’re closing that street for three months, maybe longer.”
Several individuals thought the street closing would be too disruptive to homeowners but especially to businesses and entities like the fire department.
Oslund pointed out that, on the flip side, if you have to do the road again in 10 years, the costs are going to be much higher due to inflation. “It’s just more to think about,” she said.
It was mentioned that Slayton has one of the lowest tax rates throughout the state. Assessing everyone at 100 percent could significantly affect that.
When asked, Lavoy shared that the city was likely looking at a full reconstruction in the near future. “I would say this is probably the last chance you have at thought they might be looking at $1.7 million for the road but that they’d probably be looking at a lot more for utilities. The unknown costs was enough of a deterrent for several individuals.
While concrete has the longest lifespan, it is also the most expensive. It was also brought up that concrete is difficult to dig up if there was ever work that needed to be done under the street. “If it means anything, I sell concrete, but I agree with these guys that mill and overlay is the most equitable thing to do for right now,” councilman Chris Jacobson said. “Then we look at it again for the next lifecycle repair.”
Jacobson added that he was not in agreement that all taxpayers should be covering 100 percent of the project costs. “I think the property owners and business owners should shoulder some of it,” he said. “They’re gaining value.”
There was also a discussion about potential funding in the future. Malchow noted that it was unfortunate that cities with a population of under 5,000 have missed out on precious funding for projects like street repairs for many years but that at the last session, the legislature finally implemented the Small Cities Transportation Assistance Project. “Each city will get X amount of dollars per year,” he said. “Then you can choose to spend it every year and do those preventative maintenance type of things like patching and sealcoating or save up your money for 10 or 20 years and do a huge project.”
When asked, the council reiterated why they chose to go with the mill and overlay in the first place and that was because of the cost analysis provided by Lavoy. The mill and overlay was the cheapest option regardless of the lifecycle.
Eventually, the majority of the council members felt the mill and overlay option was still the best route to go. Malchow was going to find out if the special assessment rates were part of a policy or an ordinance, so that the council could move forward with the appropriate review process. An ordinance change would take longer and require more hearings, he said. Either way, if the percentages are changed, then new information would be required to go out to taxpayers and another hearing would need to take place. Some worried that the timeline was cutting it close but others felt there was still plenty of time to go out for bids and so on.
In other unfinished business, the council heard an update regarding the 24th Street alley. While making adjustments to get the pooled water to drain across the road, more problems were created. Most notably, a speed bump was inadvertently built up, so the city now plans to grade that out. Approximately $4,000 has already been spent in engineering fees, according to Heronimus, so besides lowering the intake a little bit, he feels the city’s job is complete.
In new business, the council approved up to $30,000 for the lagoon rip rap project. Based on the lowest quotes, the decision was made to go with B&H Excavating and R.A. Muecke Sand and Gravel for the project.
The council also approved police department training for officer McKenna Schreier. “Officer Schreier is going to get certified on the oxidizer,” Police Chief Jeremy Steinle said.
Council members also voted in favor of allowing Malchow and Mahon to attend the 2023 Minnesota Environmental Science and Economic Review Board (MESERB) Conference. “It’s a sister organization of the Coalition of Greater Minnesota Cities that’s focused on water and waste water regulatory stuff,” Malchow said. “They have equal parts implementation boots on the ground tips and tricks and regulatory fiscal paperwork part of it.”
The timing of the two-day fall conference couldn’t be any better as the city recently received a notice of violation from the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency at the end of August. Lavoy noted that MPCA asked that they provide the agency with a report of what the general plan to make adjustments might look like. Inflitration, inflow and collection systems are part of the focus, as is the recordkeeping process. “They gave us 30 days to act, to get a little more in-depth,” he said.
At the beginning of the meeting, the agenda, Sept. 18 minutes and claims were approved without any changes or discussion.
The next meeting is slated for 6 p.m. on Monday, Oct. 16 at City Hall.
