News

By Reed Anfinson
Publisher
Swift County Monitor-News

Though it has the authority to put its $10 wheelage tax on cruise control, not having to review its implementation annually, that is not the easy path Swift County Board of Commissioners has decided to follow.

At the March 5 county board meeting, Commissioner Eric Rudningen, District 5-Kerkhoven, said he likes to revisit the wheelage tax each year so that “the public and commissioners are aware that it is there rather than being approved once and forgotten about.”

There might be more controversy for commissioners when they bring it up every year, but Rudningen said he could accept that. “When we make choices, whether it is who we send to the Legislature or how we back certain things, that directly affects what we are able to do out here in the county,” he said.

School board sympathizes, but says lack of funds and $26.3 building project a priority

By Reed Anfinson
Publisher
Swift County Monitor-News

A large contingent of Benson-Kerkhoven-Murdock-Sunburg parents, coaches and gymnasts showed up at last Tuesday night’s District 777 Board of Education meeting seeking answers on when they will get a new facility.

“We were here months ago with our concerns after the option of using the civic center closed down,” Varsity Coach Kathy Ahrdnt said. “You promised that you would continue to work on it. We are here tonight to continue the discussion, to see where you are and to see if there is a timeline so we can move forward.”

The gymnastics program needs a safe place for its gymnasts to practice and compete, Ahrdnt said. The Benson Armory is too cramped to safely compete and practice, the school board has been told for several years.

June 30 is SWCD’s ‘unofficial’ deadline for compliance

By Reed Anfinson
Publisher
Swift County Monitor-News

Swift County landowners are now 93 percent compliant with the Minnesota buffer law, Soil and Water Conservation District (SWCD) Manager Andy Albertson told county commissioners at their meeting Feb. 19.

State law required buffers of at least 30 feet wide, and an average of 50 feet wide, to be installed along the state’s public streams, rivers, lakes, and wetlands by Nov. 1. Starting Nov. 1, 2018, 16.5-foot buffers must be installed on public ditches.

These buffers are intended to help filter out phosphorus, nitrogen and sediment that run off the land.

“There is a list that has been developed of landowners we haven’t heard from, or that we have heard from and we are waiting to follow up with to see if they were able to get their buffers seeded,” he said.

By Reed Anfinson
Publisher
Swift County Monitor-News
 

It appeared to be a relatively routine action, but proved to be anything but that.

Five Benson Public School teachers had applied for early retirement and requested a $15,000 payment to go toward their health insurance.

The five were: Peggy Bausman, high school business teacher; Shelly Mikkelson, school choir instructor; Ruth Ahrndt, high school science teacher; Jon Ahrndt, elementary teacher; and Don Brehmer, high school trades class teacher.

Early retirement requests are governed by state statute rather than the teacher’s union master agreement, Supt. Dennis Laumeyer explained. The board had three choices with the requests. It could deny them, approve them, or counter offer with a lower amount. The requests for early retirement had to be submitted, or withdrawn, by Feb. 1.

With Commissioner Ed Pederson, District 2-south Benson and Benson Township, resigning as chair at the county board’s Feb. 5 meeting, the first order of business at the Feb. 19 meeting was electing a new one.

As the Feb. 5 meeting came to an end, Pederson expressed his displeasure with the county board’s 3-2 vote to proceed with a $162,000 study of a new justice center. He was adamantly opposed to the study.

Based on the vote, Pederson said he was not the person to be the face of Swift County as its board chair as it potentially moved to building a $17.45 million justice center that would house a new jail, the Swift County Sheriff’s Office, the Swift County attorney, 6W Community Corrections, human services, and Restorative Practices.

“Therefore, I will resign as board chairman effective at the end of this meeting today,” he said.

Just when the City of Benson, Brightmark Energy and Xcel Energy thought they were past all the potential roadblocks a new development has intervened over the future use of the former Benson Power, LLC, site.

The Chippewa Valley Ethanol Company (CVEC) and BioPro Power (BPP) filed a formal complaint with the Minnesota Utilities Commission Jan. 25 contesting the sale of the assets of the site.

Those with an interest in the site’s use, including the City of Benson, have been given until 4:30 p.m., March 1, to comment on the complaint. The topics on which it can comment are:
- Does the PUC have jurisdiction over the subject matter of the complaint?
- Is it in the public interest for the PUC to investigate these allegations upon its own motion?
- If the PUC chooses to investigate the complaint, what procedures should be used to do so?

In September 2017, Department of Natural Resources Region 4 Groundwater Planner Tim Gieseke and Area DNR Hydrologist Ethan Jenzen outlined a Community-based Aquifer Management Partnership (CAMP) initiative the agency was implementing in select regions of rural Minnesota.

It told the Swift County Board of Commissioners the Benson area was on its agenda for a future plan that would help identify aquifer uses, assets, limitations and potential threats.

“Once you have abundance in your head you kind of feel that you can consume it endlessly,” Gieseke told commissioners at their Sept. 18, 2017, meeting. However, the reality is that even in Minnesota water resources have a limit.

Last week’s record cold left its mark not just on Minnesota, but the nation as it spread subzero temperatures to 22 states. Twenty-one deaths are attributed to the cold including two college students; hundreds of schools were closed as well as businesses; and mail delivery was suspended in 10 states.

For western Minnesota, the killer Arctic blast was part of a stretch of nine consecutive days with lows below zero with five record low temperature records broken and the all-time low temperature for Benson of a minus 35 degrees tied twice.

Benson made the CNN news when the wind chill at the National Weather Service recording station at the municipal airport recorded a minus 62-degrees. At the time, the air temperature was a minus 27 degrees with the wind blowing out of the northeast at 31 mph.

After an at times contentious two-hour debate the Swift County Board of Commissioners voted 3-2 to proceed with studying more detailed designs and costs for a justice center.

Commissioner Gary Hendrickx, District 1-Appleton, made the motion with a second by Eric Rudningen, District 5 – Kerkhoven. Commission Chair Ed Pederson, District 2-north Benson and Benson Township, claimed the motion was out of order since he had not called for it.

However, Hendrickx, Commissioner Pete Peterson, District 3 - south Benson and Benson Township, Commissioner Joe Fox, District 4-Hegbert Township, and Rudningen all said any board member could make a motion without the chair’s request.

When it came to the vote, Hendrickx, Peterson, and Rudningen voted in favor of it while Fox and Pederson voted no.

With windchills forecast to be a dangerous minus 55 to minus 65 degrees, Swift County Monitor-News Publisher Reed Anfinson notified carriers for delivery of the Monitor-News and Monitor Extra in Benson that delivery would be delayed.

This was the first time in the 25 years that the Monitor-News has delivered the two publications in Benson with its own carriers that it has halted distribution due to extreme and dangerous cold.

Some carriers may have chosen to deliver limited copies in Benson, however, we encouraged them to wait for warmer weather.

Counter sale deliveries will be made to stores and gas stations in Benson and the area, and subscribers can stop by the Monitor-News office to pick up their copy if they decide to venture out.

As soon as the weather improves enough not to endanger the health of the young carriers who distribute the Monitor-News and Monitor Extra in Benson, delivery will be completed.