Letter to the Editor (Verndale Sun)
To the Editor:
The final 2023 levy is on the board agenda for December 13. You can find it on the county web page agenda for that date. It is a reduction from the initial levy of $710,818 or from a 10.37% increase to 3.13%. I wish I could say that achieving competitive tax rates would happen faster, but it will take diligence and time. Our tax rates are declining.
Other things of interest...
At a State AMC meeting there was talk about potential changes in ditching regulations. It is possible that repairing ditches will get harder to do and all will require a waiting period that has to go through the state of Minnesota. With the price of land, it does not take long to pay for the work by reclaiming the use of land lost to water backup. This applies to existing private ditches or county ditches on your property. You will need to contact the Wadena County Soil and Water in most cases, but the time to repair ditches is as soon as possible.
A five-year plan for roads is important for a number of reasons and a big part of that is funding. The board, in the last few weeks, has approved the engineer to apply for various funding for resurfacing of County Road 23 which is the most traveled county road the county has. If this is approved it will have been 25 years since it was done.
Also County Road 18 north of Nimrod was included in funding applications. That section has never been done all at the same time.
Also approved was a cooperative agreement with the city of Sebeka on County Road 133 in the city limits.
And the city of Verndale brought forth a proposal on use for $123,000 of Federal ARPA dollars for a water/sewer project.
Murlyn Kreklau
District 4 Commissioner